כָּתַב kâthab — to grave, by implication, to write (describe, inscribe, prescribe, subscribe)
Translated in the KJV as describe, record, prescribe, subscribe, write(-ing, -ten).
a primitive root; to grave, by implication, to write (describe, inscribe, prescribe, subscribe).
kâthab in each stem
Qal (Pa'al)
Participle (passive) 113Wayyiqtol 28Imperative 18Perfect (qatal) 17Imperfect (yiqtol) 12Sequential perfect (weqatal) 10Infinitive construct 4Participle (active) 3Infinitive absolute 1
And the Lord said unto Moses, Write this for a memorial in a book, and rehearse it in the ears of Joshua: for I will utterly put out the remembrance of Amalek from under heaven.
And Moses wrote all the words of the Lord, and rose up early in the morning, and builded an altar under the hill, and twelve pillars, according to the twelve tribes of Israel.
And the Lord said unto Moses, Come up to me into the mount, and be there: and I will give thee tables of stone, and a law, and commandments which I have written; that thou mayest teach them.
Niph'al
Imperfect (yiqtol) 7Wayyiqtol 5Participle (passive) 3Jussive 2
By number and by weight of every one: and all the weight was written at that time.
If it please the king, let there go a royal commandment from him, and let it be written among the laws of the Persians and the Medes, that it be not altered, That Vashti come no more before king Ahasuerus; and let the king give her royal estate unto another that is better than she.
And when inquisition was made of the matter, it was found out; therefore they were both hanged on a tree: and it was written in the book of the chronicles before the king.
Pi'el
Participle (active) 1Perfect (qatal) 1
Woe unto them that decree unrighteous decrees, and that write grievousness which they have prescribed;
What the stems mean
A Hebrew verb is its root letters set into a pattern. The pattern — the binyan — is the grammar's way of saying three things at once: whether the action is simple, intensive or causative, and whether its subject is active, passive or reflexive. That is why one Hebrew word can need six English ones. All seven binyanim, explained ›