H8354 — שָׁתָה (shâthâh)¶

Core Data¶

Strong's: H8354
Original: שָׁתָה
Transliteration: shâthâh
Pronunciation: shaw-thaw'
Part of Speech: Verb (primitive root)
Occurrences: 193 unique verses (233 tokens) across 34 books
First Occurrence: Gen 9:21 — "And he drank of the wine, and was drunken; and he was uncovered within his tent."
Hapax Legomenon: No
Aramaic counterpart: H8355 (שְׁתָה, sheth-aw') — identical sense, used in Daniel/Ezra

Lexicon Definition¶

A primitive root; to imbibe (literally or figuratively) — assuredly, banquet, certainly, drink(-er, -ing), drunk(-ard), surely.

The sense is the simple act of imbibing any liquid — water, wine, strong drink, blood, milk, vinegar, or figuratively "the waters of Sihor" (Jer 2:18) or "the wine of violence" (Pro 4:17). Context alone supplies the beverage. The causative/hiphil sense ("give to drink, cause to drink") is handled by H8248 (שָׁקָה shaqah), not by H8354.

Verb Stem & Form Distribution¶

Tallied from BHSA morphological output (216 verb tokens of lemma שׁתה):

Stem.Form	Count	Notes
Qal.Imperfect	72	By far dominant — narrative, modal, and prophetic future
Qal.InfinitiveConstruct	42	"to drink" (purpose/complement infinitives)
Qal.Perfect	32	Completed drinking events
Qal.Wayyiqtol	25	Narrative past ("and he drank")
Qal.Participle	20	"those drinking / drinkers"
Qal.Imperative	16	Direct command to drink (see list below)
Qal.InfinitiveAbsolute	9	Emphasis / adverbial
Peal (Aramaic)	4	Aramaic stem — extra-canonical to the Hebrew lemma
Niphal.Imperfect	1	Lev 11:34 — passive "shall be drunk"

The verb is overwhelmingly Qal. One Niphal form (Lev 11:34) and a few Aramaic Peal forms appear. No Piel, Hiphil, or Hithpael forms exist — causation ("give to drink") is carried by the distinct lemma H8248 shaqah.

All 16 Qal Imperative Occurrences¶

Direct commands to drink, across the entire Hebrew Bible:

Reference	Form	Addressee	Beverage	Speaker / Setting
Gen 24:14	שְׁתֵה (2ms)	Rebekah (hypothetical)	water	Servant's prayer test
Gen 24:18	שְׁתֵה (2ms)	Servant	water	Rebekah to Abraham's servant at well
Gen 24:44	שְׁתֵה (2ms)	Servant	water	Recap of prayer test
Gen 24:46	שְׁתֵה (2ms)	Servant	water	Rebekah's offer retold
1 Ki 18:41	שְׁתֵה (2ms)	Ahab	(food/drink)	Elijah after Carmel — feast before rain
2 Ki 18:31	שְׁתוּ (2mp)	Jerusalem	own cistern water	Rabshakeh's propaganda ("make peace")
Isa 36:16	שְׁתוּ (2mp)	Jerusalem	own cistern water	Parallel to 2 Ki 18:31
Jer 25:27	שְׁתוּ (2mp)	Nations	cup of wrath	YHWH's cup-of-wrath oracle
Jer 35:5	שְׁתוּ (2mp)	Rechabites	wine	Jeremiah's test (Rechabites refuse)
Hab 2:16	שְׁתֵה (2ms)	Babylon	cup of YHWH's right hand	Ironic judgment taunt
Pro 5:15	שְׁתֵה (2ms)	Young man	"waters out of thine own cistern"	Fidelity metaphor
Pro 9:5	שְׁתוּ (2mp)	The simple	Wisdom's wine	Wisdom personified at her feast
Pro 23:7	שְׁתֵה (2ms)	Guest	(host's food)	Sarcastic — stingy host says "eat and drink"
Son 5:1	שְׁתוּ (2mp)	"Friends" / lovers	wine, milk	Wedding banquet poem
Ecc 9:7	שֲׁתֵה (2ms)	Generic hearer	"thy wine with a merry heart"	Qoheleth's carpe diem exhortation
Neh 8:10	שְׁתוּ (2mp)	Post-exilic assembly	"the sweet" (mamtaqqim)	Feast of Trumpets — "eat the fat and drink the sweet"

Torah imperatives (Gen-Deut): 4 total, ALL in Genesis 24, ALL addressing water, ALL in narrative dialogue (Rebekah/servant at the well). No Qal imperative of shathah occurs in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, or Deuteronomy. No Torah imperative of shathah governs yayin (H3196) or shekar (H7941).

Translation Distribution (KJV)¶

Collapsed across the 90+ distinct KJV phrasings (all render the verbal idea "drink"):

Translation Family	Verses	%
drink / Drink / drank / drunk (finite + imperative)	~120	62%
to drink / drinking (infinitive + participial forms)	~40	21%
shall drink / thou shalt drink / ye shall drink (modal/imperfect)	~25	13%
banquet, assuredly, certainly, surely (idiomatic, from inf. abs.)	~5	3%
Uncategorized / helper-only renderings	~3	1%

Virtually every occurrence is rendered by some form of English "drink." Three Esther tokens pass through the cognate noun mishteh ("banquet, feast").

Distribution by Book (sorted by density)¶

Book	Count	Per 100 Verses
Obadiah	1	4.8
Amos	6	4.1
Joel	2	2.7
Haggai	1	2.6
1 Kings	20	2.5
Ecclesiastes	5	2.3
Jonah	1	2.1
Zephaniah	1	1.9
Esther	3	1.8
Habakkuk	1	1.8
Judges	10	1.6
Ezekiel	15	1.2
Isaiah	14	1.1
2 Kings	8	1.1
Jeremiah	13	1.0
Micah	1	1.0
2 Samuel	7	1.0
Genesis	14	0.9
Deuteronomy	9	0.9
Proverbs	8	0.9
Exodus	11	0.9
Zechariah	2	0.9
Numbers	9	0.7
Job	7	0.7
Lamentations	1	0.6
Nehemiah	2	0.5
1 Samuel	4	0.5
Ezra	1	0.4
1 Chronicles	4	0.4
Daniel	1	0.3
Leviticus	2	0.2
Psalms	5	0.2

Pattern: The verb is broadly distributed — every book from Genesis to Zechariah except Song/Ruth in this data. Highest density in prophetic judgment contexts (Obadiah, Amos, Joel, Habakkuk) where the "cup of wrath" motif dominates, and in narrative court settings (1 Kings, Esther, Judges). Lowest density in Leviticus and Psalms. The Torah uses it 45 times, but always in narrative or regulatory prose, never in a second-person command to drink wine or strong drink.

Semantic Categories¶

1. Ordinary Drinking of Water¶

Gen 24:18 — "Drink, my lord" (Rebekah offers water)
Exo 7:21 — "the Egyptians could not drink of the water of the river"
Jdg 7:6 — Gideon's 300 "that lapped... drinking"
Deu 2:28 — "give me water for money, that I may drink"

2. Drinking Wine (yayin) — Typically Descriptive, Often Negative¶

Gen 9:21 — Noah "drank of the wine, and was drunken" (first occurrence — negative)
1 Sam 1:15 — Hannah: "I have drunk neither wine nor strong drink"
Pro 4:17 — "they... drink the wine of violence"
Amos 2:8 — "they drink the wine of the condemned"
Dan 1:12 — Daniel refuses wine, requests water

3. Feast / Banquet Settings (Eating-and-Drinking Pair)¶

Gen 26:30 — Isaac and Abimelech "did eat and drink"
Est 3:15 — "the king and Haman sat down to drink"
Ecc 2:24, 3:13, 5:18, 8:15 — "eat and drink" as Qoheleth refrain
Job 1:4, 13, 18 — sons "eating and drinking wine"

4. Judgment — The Cup of YHWH's Wrath (Dominant Prophetic Metaphor)¶

Jer 25:27 — "Drink ye, and be drunken, and spue, and fall" (cup of wrath to nations)
Hab 2:16 — "drink thou also, and let thy foreskin be uncovered: the cup of the LORD's right hand"
Oba 1:16 — "as ye have drunk upon my holy mountain, so shall all the heathen drink continually"
Eze 23:32–34 — "Thou shalt drink of thy sister's cup... thou shalt drink it and suck it out"
Psa 75:8 — "the wicked of the earth shall wring them out, and drink them"

5. Ritual / Priestly Restrictions (All Prohibitive or Permissive, Never Commanded)¶

Lev 10:9 — "Do not drink wine nor strong drink... when ye go into the tabernacle" (prohibition — Qal impf 2ms + אל)
Num 6:3 — Nazirite "shall drink no vinegar of wine" (prohibition)
Num 6:20 — "after that the Nazarite may drink wine" (permission — impf, not imperative)
Lev 11:34 — only Niphal: "all drink that may be drunk" (passive, of purity regs)

6. Covenant Loyalty / Provision¶

Exo 17:1, 6; Num 20:5, 11, 17 — water from the rock ("that the people may drink")
Deu 29:6 — "ye have not drunk wine or strong drink, that ye might know I am the LORD"
1 Ki 17:4 — Elijah "shalt drink of the brook" (divine provision)

7. Figurative — Drinking Iniquity, Scorn, Blood, Reproach¶

Job 15:16 — "which drinketh iniquity like water"
Job 34:7 — "drinketh up scorning like water"
2 Sam 23:17 / 1 Chr 11:19 — "shall I drink the blood of these men?"
Pro 5:15 — "Drink waters out of thine own cistern" (marital fidelity metaphor)

8. Wisdom / Celebration Imperatives¶

Pro 9:5 — Wisdom: "Come, eat of my bread, and drink of the wine I have mingled"
Son 5:1 — "eat, O friends; drink, yea, drink abundantly, O beloved"
Ecc 9:7 — "drink thy wine with a merry heart"
Neh 8:10 — "eat the fat, and drink the sweet" (post-exilic feast — note: "sweet" mamtaqqim, not yayin)

Common Collocations¶

Word	Strong's	Co-occurrences	Typical Pattern
אָכַל (akal — eat)	H398	92x (48%)	"eat and drink" formulaic pair, feast or famine
מַיִם (mayim — water)	H4325	61x (32%)	The default beverage; wells, rivers, drought
לֹא (lo — not)	H3808	57x (30%)	Negation: "did not drink / shall not drink" is very common
אָמַר (amar — say)	H559	49x (25%)	Drinking within reported speech / dialogue
יַיִן (yayin — wine)	H3196	39x (20%)	Explicit wine-drinking — mostly descriptive
יְהוָה (YHWH)	H3068	32x (17%)	Drinking "before the LORD" or YHWH's cup of wrath
לֶחֶם (lechem — bread)	H3899	24x (12%)	"Bread and drink" — daily provision pair
שֵׁכָר (shekar — strong drink)	H7941	~17x	Paired with yayin in prohibitions and prophetic complaint

Word Family / Cognates¶

H4945 מַשְׁקֶה (mashqeh) — "drink, butler, cupbearer" — from the causative root H8248, not from shathah; functional family
H4960 מִשְׁתֶּה (mishteh) — "banquet, feast" — directly derived from shathah; 45x, dominant in Esther
H8355 שְׁתָה (Aramaic shetha) — cognate Aramaic verb; used for Belshazzar's drinking (Dan 5)
H8356 שָׁתָה (shathah II) — homograph lemma "foundation" (unrelated sense; rare)

Synonyms¶

No synonyms were returned by search_relationships.py for H8354.

Antonyms¶

No antonyms were returned by search_relationships.py for H8354.

Easily Confused Words¶

Word	Strong's	Shared KJV	Key Difference
שָׁקָה (shaqah)	H8248	"drink" (62x)	Causative — "give to drink, water (cattle), irrigate." Transitive counterpart to shathah. Never simple "imbibe."
מַשְׁקֶה (mashqeh)	H4945	"drink, drinking"	Noun — the liquid itself, or the office of cupbearer
מִשְׁתֶּה (mishteh)	H4960	"banquet, drinking, feast"	Cognate noun — the social event, not the act
שְׁתָה (Aramaic)	H8355	"drink, drank"	Aramaic counterpart; only in Dan/Ezra
לָגַם / לָקַק (laqaq)	H3952	"lap (up)"	Specific manner of drinking (Judg 7:5–7; 1 Ki 21:19)

The KJV translator's single English word "drink" therefore sits atop a Hebrew system that carefully distinguishes imbibing (H8354) from causing-to-drink (H8248) from the beverage-noun (H4945) from the banquet-noun (H4960).

LXX Mapping¶

Greek Equivalent	Strong's	Co-occ	PMI	Notes
πίνω (pinō)	G4095	179	6.66	Primary equivalent — used in ~93% of LXX renderings
ἐσθίω (esthiō — eat)	G2068	87	4.34	Chain-pair: "eat and drink" carries over as esthio+pino
οἶνος (oinos — wine)	G3631	41	4.83	Object-collocate in wine-drinking verses
ὕδωρ (hudōr — water)	G5204	60	3.82	Object-collocate in water-drinking verses
σίκερα (sikera — strong drink)	G4608	8	6.19	Hebrew loanword; high PMI indicates tight binding
ποτήριον (potērion — cup)	G4221	10	5.41	"Cup of wrath" motif carries across
μεθύω (methyō — be drunk)	G3184	9	4.70	When drinking-to-drunkenness is in view
μέθη (methē — drunkenness)	G3178	3	5.48	Same cluster

The Hebrew H8354 → Greek G4095 (pinō) bridge is one of the cleanest one-to-one correspondences in the LXX. See TR-shathah-pino.md for the full cross-testament trace.

Semantic Domains¶

[002001001025] Ingest — ingestion vocabulary. Other words returned by search_relationships.py: אכל (A399/H398), בלע (H1104), בֶּלַע (H1105/H1106), ברה (H1262).
[002003003011] Engage — participation/engagement vocabulary. Other words returned: אָב (H1), אחד (H258), אחז (H270), אנס (A598/H597), אפק (H662).
[002002002011] Festivals — feast/festival vocabulary. Other words returned: הִלּוּלִים (H1974), חַג (H2282), חגג (H2287), חֹדֶשׁ (H2320/H2321), כרה (A3735).