v. scrutinize, examine, inquire
Gen 31:34 Laban searched the whole tent, and did not find them.
Num 10:33 went .. looking for them a resting place
Deu 4:29 if from there you seek the LORD your God
Deu 12:5 the place that .. that you will seek, and there you will go
1Sa 16:17 Saul answered .. look for me now
1Sa 20:21 then I will send the .. Go, look for the arrows
1Sa 26:20 the king has gone out to look for a flea
2Ki 2:17 they searched three days, but did not find him
1Ch 15:13 we did not seek him according to his ordinance
1Ch 16:11; Psa 105:4 seek the Lord .. b his face
1Ch 28:9 if you seek him, you will find him; more if
2Ch 7:14 if… pray, and seek my face, and be
2Ch 14:7 we have sought the Lord .. we have b, and
2Ch 15:4 God .. they sought him, he was found by them
2Ch 15:12 promised..that they would seek Jehovah
2Ch 26:5 days when he sought the Lord .. he prospered
2Ch 34:3 began to seek the God of David his
Ezr 6:1 gave the order to search the .. the archives
Ezr 8:22 for good on all who seek him
Job 5:8 I would seek God, and commend to him
Job 7:21 if you look for me tomorrow, I will no longer exist
Job 8:5 in the morning seek God, and pray
Job 10:6 my iniquity, and seek my sin
Job 32:11 I have listened…while ye sought
Psa 10:4 evil .. does not seek God; there is no god in
Psa 14:2 someone who understands, who seeks God
Psa 24:6 those who seek him .. that b your face, oh
Psa 27:4 one thing have I demanded ..this will I seek
Psa 27:8 seek my face. Your face I will seek, oh
Psa 34:4 I sought the LORD, and he heard me, and
Psa 34:10 those who seek the Lord will not lack
Psa 34:14 do good; Seek peace and pursue it
Psa 40:16; 70:4
A. Baqash verbs (vq’B; , 1245), “seek, procure, consult”. This verb appears in Ugaritic, Phoenician, and Hebrew (both biblical and post-biblical). It is found in the Bible about 220 times and in all periods. Basically baqash means “to search” in order to find something that is lost or missing, or at least whose location is unknown. In Gen 37:15 a man asks Joseph, “What are you looking for?” A particular nuance of this meaning is “search within a group; choose, select ”something or someone not yet identified, as in the case of 1Sa 13:14 “The Lord has sought for himself a man after his own heart”. To look for someone’s face or face is to “seek” to enter his presence or have a favorable audience with him; everyone “sought to see” the face of Solomon (1Ki 10:24 nrv). In a similar sense one can “consult” the face of God by praying in God’s presence in the temple (2Sa 21:1). The meaning of “seek to make sure” emphasizes the pursuit of a desire or the achievement of a plan. Moses asked the Levites who had rebelled against the privileged position of Aaron and his sons: “Do you also seek the priesthood?” (Num 16:10). This can have an emotive (rather than informational) overtone, such as, “aspire to or pursue” and “be concerned about”. God asks the sons of men (human beings): “How long will you turn my honor into infamy, will you love vanity, and seek falsehood?” (Psa 4:2). In a cultic context one can “seek” or “assure” God’s favor or help: “And the Judah came together to ask the Lord for help” (2Ch 20:4). In these cases, the intellectual element is not usually of primary interest; it is not information that is sought. There is an exception in Jdg 6:29 “And seeking and inquiring, they said to them, Gideon son of Joash has done it.” On rare occasions the verb is used in the sense of seeking information from God (Exo 33:7). With a similar meaning one can “seek” the face of God (2Sa 21:1). In this case baqash clearly connotes seeking information (a cognitive search). See also the search for wisdom (Pro 2:4). The connotation of “seeking security” can refer to the search for life (nepesh). God told Moses, “Go and return to Egypt, for all who sought your death are dead” (Exo 4:19). Baqash can be used with this same nuance, but without the nepesh (as when Pharaoh “sought to kill Moses”). There are only two cases in which this nuance of the word refers to seeking what is good, as, for example, in Psa 122:9 “For the sake of the house of the Lord our God I will seek your good” (darash is generally used when referring to to seek one’s own good). About 20 times baqash has the meaning of making someone responsible for something to which the subject has a legal right (real or imagined). In Gen 31:39 (the first case of the verb in the Bible) Jacob defends himself with Laban: “You charged me for it”, referring to animals torn apart by beasts. Very few times baqash refers to searching or moving somewhere. José “searched for a place to cry; and he went into his chamber, and wept there” (Gen 43:30). The verb can be used theologically, not only in the sense of seeking a space before the Lord (that is, being before Him in the temple seeking His blessing), but it can also refer to an attitude: “But when from there you seek Jehovah you will find your God if you seek him with all your heart and with all your soul” (Deu 4:29 rva). In cases like this where the verb is used in a synonymous parallelism with darash, both verbs have the same meaning. darash (vr’D; , 1875), “search, inquire, consult, ask, require, frequent”. This verb is a common Semitic term found in Ugaritic and Syriac, and also in the Hebrew of various periods. In modern Hebrew it is commonly used in the verbs, “to interpret” and “to expound,” and also in the derivatives of the nouns “sermon” and “preacher.” Darash appears over 160 times in the Old Testament, beginning with Gen 9:5 “For I will surely require your life’s blood.” It often has the connotation of revenge for offending God or for bloodshed (see Eze 33:6). A fairly frequent use of the term is in the expression “to consult God”, which sometimes indicates a private prayerful search for divine direction (Gen 25:22); a prophet is often involved as an instrument of divine revelation (1Sa 9:9; 1Ki 22:8). At other times the expression is used in connection with the Urim and Thummim when the high priest sought to discover the will of God by throwing the sacred stones (Num 27:21). Exactly what this involved is not clear, but we assume that the answers would be “yes” or “no” as the stones fell. Pagan peoples and even apostate Israelites “inquired” about pagan gods. So King Ahaziah instructed his messengers: “Go and ask Baal-zebub, the god of Ekron, if I am to be cured of this disease” (2Ki 1: 2). In flagrant violation of the Mosaic Law (Deu 18:10-11), Saul went to the fortune teller of Endor to “consult” (rva) with her, which in this case involved summoning the late prophet Samuel (1Sa 28:3). . Saul sought out the witch of Endor as a last resort, saying: “Find me a woman who has a spirit of divination, that I may go to her and ask through her” (1Sa 28:7; “see” rva). The term is often used to describe the Lord’s “seeking” in the sense of establishing a covenant relationship with Him. Prophets often used darash as they called the people to turn their lives around, saying, “Seek the Lord while he may be found” (Isa 55:6). B. Midrash name can mean “study; comment; history”. The word appears a few times in late Biblical Hebrew (2Ch 13:22); it is commonly used in postbiblical Judaism to refer to the various traditional commentaries by Jewish sages. An example of how the term is found is in 2Ch 24:27 “As for the sons of Joash, and the multiplication that he made of the rents † ¦ behold, it is written in the history of the book of kings.”
Source: Vine Old Testament Dictionary
1. zeteo (zhtevw, 2212) means: (a) seek, go after (eg, Mat 7:7-8; 13.45; Luk 24:5; Joh 6:24); conspiring against a person’s life (Mat 2:20 “sought”; Act 21:31; Rom 11:3); metaphorically, trying, thinking, to seek how to do something, or what to obtain (eg, Mc 11.18; Luk 12:29, VM: “do not go looking”); try to elucidate a meaning (Joh 6:19 “Do you ask each other?”); seek God (Acts 17:27; Rom 10:20); (b) try to do something, wish (eg, Mat 12:46; VM: “seeking means of speaking”; Luk 9:9 “seeking to see him”; Joh 7:19 “seeking”); to seek the Kingdom of God and the righteousness of it, in the sense of eagerly coveting, of going resolutely after it (Mat 6:33); “things above” (Col 3:1); “peace” (1Pe 3:11); require or demand, request (eg, Mc 8.12; Luk 11:29, some mss. have No. 4 here; 1Co 4:2 “it is required”; 2Co 13:3 “you seek”). See DEMAND, REQUEST, ASK, WORRY, PROCURE, WANT. 2. anazeteo (ajnazhtevw, 327), search carefully (ana, above, used intensively, and No. l). It is used to search for human beings, implying difficulty in this activity (Luk 2:44, 45, some mss. have No. 1 in the last passage; Act 11:25); Moulton and Milligan give numerous illustrations of this particular meaning in the papyri.¶ In the LXX, Job 3:4; 10.6.¶ 3. ekzeteo (ejkzhtevw, 1567) means: (a) search outside (ek) or after, search; eg, to God (Rom 3:11); to the Lord (Act 15:17; Heb 11:6 “who † ¦ seek”; 12.17: “sought”; 1Pe 1:10 “inquired”, followed by exeraunao, seek diligently); (b) require or demand (Luk 11:50, 51). See DEMAND, INQUIRE, PROCURE.¶ 4. epizeteo (ejpizhtevw, 1934), seek in pos (directive, epi, towards). It is translated with some form of the verb “search” (Mat 6:32; Luk 4:42; 12.30; Act 12:19; Rom 11:7; Phi 4:17, appears twice; Heb 11:14; 13.14); with some form of the verb “demand” (Mat 12:39; 16.4; Luk 11:29; Act 19:39); with a form of the verb “ask” (Mk 8.12); as “desired” (Acts 13:7). See DEMAND, WISH, ASK.¶ 5. episkeptomai (ejpiskevptomai, 1980), later form of No. 13, visit. It has the meaning of seeking, and is translated “seek” in Act 6:3: See VISIT. 6. katadioko (katadiwvkw, 2614), to follow closely, with the determination to find (kata, down, intensive, giving the idea of a hard and persistent search, and dioko, to follow) (Mk 1.36: “Simón sought him”) . The disciples going with Simon are said to have gone to meet the Lord, who had gone to a deserted place to pray.¶ This verb is found, eg, in 1Sa 30:22; Psa 23:6, and with hostile intent in Gen 31:36:7. peitho (peivqw, 3982), trust, assure. It is translated “seek” in Gl 1.10. See ENSURE, COLLECT, TRUST, TRUST, FAVOR, PERSUADE, BRIBERY, TRUST. Note: Pselafao, translated “to feel” in all the passages in which it appears in the RVR, is translated “to grope” in the Bóver-Cantera version. See FEEL.
Source: Vine New Testament Dictionary
“Man wears himself searching without ever discovering anything” (Eccl 8,17), but Jesus proclaims: “He who seeks finds” (Mt 7,8). At the bottom of all his restlessness, the man seeks…