to send: depart
sha.lach denotes sending people, messengers, goods, or forces, and can also describe dismissing someone or extending a hand.
The prevailing use concerns dispatching someone or something toward a person, place, task, or military purpose: messengers, materials, servants, and armies are sent in the supplied verses. A further use concerns releasing or dismissing people, while several clauses use the verb for putting out or extending a hand.
Senses in use
-
Dispatching persons, messages, or resources · dominant
In 1 Chronicles 14:1, the sequential imperfect introduces Hiram's sending of messengers, cedar wood, and craftsmen to David; in 1 Chronicles 19:8 it introduces David's sending of Joab and the army. The same outward dispatch is shown when David sends comforters in 1 Chronicles 19:2 and when Asa sends silver and gold through his servants in 1 Kings 15:18.
-
Releasing or dismissing someone · common
In 1 Kings 11:21, Hadad's imperative request concerns being allowed to go to his own land, and 1 Kings 11:22 repeats that request. In 1 Kings 8:66, the APB renders the clause as Solomon sending the people away, while 1 Samuel 20:13 describes Jonathan's sending David away in safety.
-
Extending a hand · occasional
In 1 Chronicles 13:9, the sequential imperfect occurs in the clause where Uzzah reaches out his hand toward the ark. In 1 Kings 13:4, the same form occurs twice in the account of Jeroboam stretching out his hand and then being unable to draw it back; 1 Samuel 22:17 likewise has an infinitive construct in the guards' refusal to stretch out their hand against the priests.
In the Anselm Project Bible: The APB commonly presents the verb with “sent” when agents, goods, or forces are dispatched, as in 1 Chronicles 14:1 and 1 Chronicles 19:8. It also uses “sent away,” “dismiss,” and “stretched out” in contexts of release or hand-extension; these renderings reflect whole clauses.