מָלַח mâlach — properly, to rub to pieces or pulverize
Translated in the KJV as × at all, salt, season, temper together, vanish away.
a primitive root; also as denominative from H4417; properly, to rub to pieces or pulverize; intransitively, to disappear as dust; also to salt whether internally (to season with salt) or externally (to rub with salt).
mâlach in each stem
Hoph'al
Infinitive absolute 1Perfect (qatal) 1
And as for thy nativity, in the day thou wast born thy navel was not cut, neither wast thou washed in water to supple thee; thou wast not salted at all, nor swaddled at all.
Pu'al
Participle (passive) 1
And thou shalt make it a perfume, a confection after the art of the apothecary, tempered together, pure and holy:
Qal (Pa'al)
Imperfect (yiqtol) 1
And every oblation of thy meat offering shalt thou season with salt; neither shalt thou suffer the salt of the covenant of thy God to be lacking from thy meat offering: with all thine offerings thou shalt offer salt.
Niph'al
Perfect (qatal) 1
Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look upon the earth beneath: for the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall wax old like a garment, and they that dwell therein shall die in like manner: but my salvation shall be for ever, and my righteousness shall not be abolished.
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 ›