TR: shachat → sphazō (Sacrificial Slaughter)

The Chain

Hebrew OT               LXX (Greek OT)          Greek NT
────────────────        ───────────────         ────────────────
שָׁחַט (shachat)   →   σφάζω (sphazō)      →   σφάζω (sphazō)
H7819, 70x in OT        58x as LXX rendering    9x in NT
"slaughter"             of shachat              "slaughter / slay"
                     PMI: 8.09 | Score: 32.98

OT Usage (Hebrew)

Strong's	Word	Occurrences	Primary Meaning
H7819	שָׁחַט (shachat)	70	slaughter in sacrifice or massacre
H7820	שָׁחַט (shachat)	—	cognate verb form

Key OT passages: - Gen 22:10 — "Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son" — the Akedah; the paradigmatic near-sacrifice using shachat vocabulary - Exo 12:6 — "the whole assembly of the congregation of Israel shall kill it in the evening" — Passover lamb slaughter; shachat as the prescribed act - Lev 1:5 — "he shall kill the bullock before the LORD: and the priests, Aaron's sons, shall bring the blood" — standard burnt offering procedure - 1 Ki 18:40 — "Take the prophets of Baal; let not one of them escape...And Elijah slew them there" — massacre use; same word for sacrifice and killing

H7819-shachat.md

LXX Bridge

H7819 shachat → what Greek words translate it in the LXX:

Greek Translation	LXX Co-occ	PMI Score	Notes
σφάζω (G4969)	58	8.09	Primary equivalent — dominant LXX rendering
αἷμα (G129)	25	—	Blood — context collocation, not a translation
μόσχος (G3448)	14	—	Calf/bullock — the slaughter object
θυσιαστήριον (G2379)	14	—	Altar — the slaughter location
θύω (G2380)	9	—	Sacrifice — secondary rendering

G4969 sphazō ← what Hebrew words does it translate in the LXX:

Hebrew Source	Strong's	Co-occ	Notes
שָׁחַט (shachat)	H7819	58	Primary: sacrificial and violent slaughter
טָבַח (tabach)	H2873	6	Secondary: slaughter for food (less cultic)
זָרַק (zaraq)	H2236	11	Sprinkle — ritual context, not a translation

Semantic continuity: σφάζω carries both registers of shachat — ritual cultic slaughter (Passover, burnt offerings) and violent massacre — directly into NT usage.

NT Usage (Greek)

Strong's	Word	Occurrences	Primary Meaning
G4969	σφάζω (sphazō)	9	slaughter, butcher (sacrificial or violent)
G4967	σφαγή (sphagē)	3	slaughter (noun — the act)
G4968	σφάγιον (sphagion)	1	sacrificial victim (slaughter animal)

Key NT passages: - 1 John 3:12 — "Cain...slew (ἔσφαξεν) his brother" — first NT use; draws the line from Gen 4 to the moral category ἀνθρωποκτόνος (murderer, 1 John 3:15) - Rev 5:6 — "a Lamb as it had been slain (ἐσφαγμένον)" — Christ as sacrificial victim; Perfect Passive Participle freezes the slaughter as Christ's permanent identity - Rev 5:9 — "thou wast slain (ἐσφάγης), and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation" — combines slaughter language directly with blood-redemption (Passover/atonement theology)

[G4969 word study: G4969-sphazo.md]

Direct OT→NT Quotations

No direct verbal quotations identified. The connection is typological:

NT Passage	OT Type	Shared Concept
Rev 5:6, 9, 12 (ἐσφαγμένον)	Exo 12:6 Passover lamb	Lamb slaughtered; blood = redemption
Rev 5:6 (ἐσφαγμένον)	Gen 22:10 Akedah	Near-sacrifice of the son; the knife/slaughter averted in Isaac, fulfilled in Christ
Rev 6:9 (ἐσφαγμένων)	Lev 1:5 altar procedure	Souls of martyrs under the altar, mirroring the blood poured at the altar base

Continuity and Shifts

What stays the same: - The sacrificial-slaughter register: σφάζω carries shachat's cultic meaning directly — the Passover lamb and burnt offering vocabulary becomes the NT's primary language for Christ's death - The violence register: both shachat and sphazō cover massacre/murder alongside sacrifice; 1 Ki 18:40 parallels 1 John 3:12 structurally - The blood connection: both words co-occur with blood (H1818 / G129) in their respective corpora — slaughter and blood are inseparable in both testaments

What shifts: - In the OT, shachat describes physical acts on animals (ritual) and enemies (war/massacre); in the NT, σφάζω shifts almost entirely to Christ (the Lamb) and martyrs — the sacrificial register is absorbed into Christology - The Perfect Passive Participle (ἐσφαγμένον) dominates in Revelation (6 of 8 Revelation uses) — "the Lamb in the state of having been slaughtered"; the OT expressed the act, the NT expresses the permanent condition - The beast's mortal wound (Rev 13:3 — ἐσφαγμένην εἰς θάνατον, "wounded unto death") inverts the Lamb imagery: a counterfeit slaughter that mimics but cannot redeem

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Generated from: gather_trace_data.py, search_strongs.py (--lxx-map, --hebrew-source) Last updated: 2026-04-01