Exile ; concretely and collectively exiles
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The Hebrew noun golah can name exile as forced removal or the community living under that displacement. Kings records Jerusalem's leaders, artisans, officials, and royal household carried to Babylon, while Ezekiel receives visions and speaks among the exiles by the River Kebar.
Reader summary
Full entry for גּוֹלָה (H1473) · Open the biblical lexicon
The Hebrew noun golah can name exile as forced removal or the community living under that displacement. Kings records Jerusalem's leaders, artisans, officials, and royal household carried to Babylon, while Ezekiel receives visions and speaks among the exiles by the River Kebar.
The BSB source-word alignment has 43 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include into exile (11), the exiles (8), . . . (6), of the exiles (5), for exile (4).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at 2 Kings 24:14. Its strongest book concentrations include Ezra (12), Ezekiel (11), Jeremiah (10), 2 Kings (3).
The Hebrew noun golah can name exile as forced removal or the community living under that displacement. Kings records Jerusalem's leaders, artisans, officials, and royal household carried to Babylon, while Ezekiel receives visions and speaks among the exiles by the River Kebar. Jeremiah addresses the displaced community with instructions for faithful life during a long stay, and Ezra continues to call returned people the exiles as they rebuild and worship.
The word therefore holds place, loss, and corporate identity together. It does not mean that displaced people cease to belong to God or that every individual exile bears the same responsibility for national failure. Ezekiel's seven days of overwhelmed presence among displaced people models attention before speech, not a technique that guarantees understanding.
Jeremiah's counsel to build, plant, and seek the city's welfare does not excuse the empire that deported them or forbid lament and hope for return. Returned exiles still carry an identity shaped by displacement, showing that homecoming does not instantly erase grief, memory, or practical needs. Responsible teaching names the coercive history, listens to displaced people, and supports worship, housing, livelihood, family connection, and safety without romanticizing exile or demanding premature closure.
Golah can denote exile or deportation and can collectively identify the exiled community, including people who later return. Syntax and narrative setting distinguish the event or condition of displacement from the community formed under and after it.
He carried into exile all Jerusalem—all the commanders and mighty men of valor, all the craftsmen and metalsmiths—ten thousand captives in all. Only the poorest people of the land remained.
Nebuchadnezzar carries Jerusalem's commanders, skilled workers, and many others into exile while the poorest remain in the land.
In the thirtieth year, on the fifth day of the fourth month, while I was among the exiles by the River Kebar, the heavens opened and I saw visions of God.
Ezekiel is among the exiles by the River Kebar when the heavens open and he sees visions of God.
I came to the exiles at Tel-abib who dwelt by the River Kebar. And for seven days I sat where they sat and remained there among them, overwhelmed.
The prophet sits among the exiles at Tel-abib for seven days, overwhelmed before beginning his public warning work.
This is what the Lord of Hosts, the God of Israel, says to all the exiles who were carried away from Jerusalem to Babylon:
Jeremiah's letter addresses the exiles carried from Jerusalem to Babylon before giving instructions for life there.
Now these are the people of the province who came up from the captivity of the exiles carried away to Babylon by Nebuchadnezzar its king. They returned to Jerusalem and Judah, each to his own town,
The record names people from the province who return from Babylonian captivity to Jerusalem and Judah, each to a town.
On the fourteenth day of the first month, the exiles kept the Passover.
The returned exiles keep the Passover together after the temple is completed.
BSB source-word alignment connects this entry to exact verse rows, English rendering, source form, transliteration, and parsing.
How English Renders ItA compact distribution from source-word alignment before the full evidence tables.
Hebrew word. Displacement from homeland with corporate identity; collective exilic community bearing covenantal consequences
Displacement from homeland with corporate identity; collective exilic community bearing covenantal consequences
exile; concretely and collectively exiles BDB: exiles Usage: (carried away), captive(-ity), removing.
How the stem changes the meaning of this verb across the biblical text.
This verb appears through different tense, voice, mood, or stem patterns. Those forms help readers see how the action is presented in context.
Selected passage-level study witnesses for this word. This section is not the full occurrence list.
Showing 1 selected witness from 43 lexical occurrence verses.
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Golah keeps displaced people visible as a community. Second Kings 24 names a deportation that removes rulers, military leaders, artisans, and metalworkers while leaving poor residents in the land. The account shows that displacement rearranges households, skills, power, and local economies rather than merely changing an address. Ezekiel's opening locates a vision of God among the exiles, refusing the assumption that forced distance from Jerusalem means distance from God's attention.
In Ezekiel 3, the prophet sits overwhelmed among the people for seven days before speaking. His presence does not erase his later hard message, but it resists detached ministry that talks about suffering without sitting with sufferers. Jeremiah 29 speaks to a community facing a longer exile than false prophets promised. Building, planting, family life, prayer, and seeking the host city's welfare are practices of durable faith, not praise for the deporting empire.
Ezra 2 records return by households and towns, joining belonging to accountable communal order. Ezra 6 still calls the worshipers exiles after return, indicating that displacement remains part of their remembered identity. Faithful application supports refugees and returning families with patient listening, lawful documentation, language access, housing, livelihood, worship, and trauma-informed care while allowing lament and hope to coexist.
Ezek.3.15
Golah transliterates Hebrew גּוֹלָה. The feminine noun can refer to exile or collectively to exiles, and governed witnesses preserve that communal label after return; lexical form alone does not identify the cause, culpability, or duration of a specific displacement.
The New Testament remembers the Babylonian deportation and addresses believers as sojourners or dispersed communities through other terms. Those canonical connections can illuminate belonging and hope, but they must not turn every inconvenience into exile or erase the historical coercion named by golah.