A camel
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The Hebrew noun gamal names a camel, an animal used for transport, trade, household wealth, gifts, and movement through arid regions. Genesis places camels in a long journey and at a well where both travelers and animals need water.
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Full entry for גָּמָל (H1581) · Open the biblical lexicon
The Hebrew noun gamal names a camel, an animal used for transport, trade, household wealth, gifts, and movement through arid regions. Genesis places camels in a long journey and at a well where both travelers and animals need water.
The BSB source-word alignment has 54 aligned rows for this entry. Common renderings include camels (15), the camels (7), and camels (4), . . . (2), and their camels (2).
The source-word alignment first shows this entry at Genesis 12:16. Its strongest book concentrations include Genesis (25), Judges (4), 1 Chronicles (3), 1 Samuel (3).
The Hebrew noun gamal names a camel, an animal used for transport, trade, household wealth, gifts, and movement through arid regions. Genesis places camels in a long journey and at a well where both travelers and animals need water. Kings describes the queen of Sheba arriving with a large caravan bearing costly goods and difficult questions, while Chronicles shows neighbors using camels and other animals to bring food for a national gathering.
Isaiah can portray camels carrying treasure toward a failed alliance or filling Zion's land in a vision of nations bringing gifts and praise. The animal itself does not carry one fixed symbolic meaning. A camel in a list may mark logistics or wealth, in a caravan it may support diplomacy or commerce, and in prophetic poetry it may contribute to judgment or restoration imagery.
The presence of costly animals does not prove divine approval, guarantee prosperity, or make the labor behind transport invisible. Responsible teaching follows the people, goods, route, and literary setting rather than constructing a hidden camel code. It also remembers animal care, worker dignity, and the economic systems that make a journey possible.
Gamal is the ordinary Hebrew noun for a camel. Lists, journeys, caravans, wealth accounts, military scenes, food transport, and prophetic images supply the animal's changing narrative significance.
Then the servant took ten of his master’s camels and departed with all manner of good things from his master in hand. And he set out for Nahor’s hometown in Aram-naharaim.
Abraham's servant departs for Aram-naharaim with ten camels and gifts from his master's household.
After she had given him a drink, she said, “I will also draw water for your camels, until they have had enough to drink.”
After giving the servant a drink, Rebekah offers to draw water until the camels have enough.
She arrived in Jerusalem with a very large caravan—with camels bearing spices, gold in great abundance, and precious stones. And she came to Solomon and spoke to him all that was on her mind.
The queen of Sheba reaches Jerusalem with a large camel caravan bearing spices, gold, and precious stones before speaking with Solomon.
And their neighbors from as far away as Issachar, Zebulun, and Naphtali came bringing food on donkeys, camels, mules, and oxen—abundant supplies of flour, fig cakes and raisin cakes, wine and oil, oxen and sheep. Indeed, there was joy in Israel.
Neighbors use camels and other animals to bring abundant food and drink for the gathering around David.
This is the burden against the beasts of the Negev: Through a land of hardship and distress, of lioness and lion, of viper and flying serpent, they carry their wealth on the backs of donkeys and their treasures on the humps of camels, to a people of no profit to them.
Isaiah pictures Judah's envoys carrying treasure on camels through a dangerous land to a people who cannot profit them.
Caravans of camels will cover your land, young camels of Midian and Ephah, and all from Sheba will come, bearing gold and frankincense and proclaiming the praises of the Lord.
Isaiah envisions camel caravans from Midian, Ephah, and Sheba bringing gold and frankincense while proclaiming the Lord's praise.
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. a camel
a camel BDB: camel Usage: camel.
How this word appears across different grammatical cases and numbers.
Greek words that correspond to or develop the meaning of this Hebrew word in the New Testament.
Gamal is a concrete animal term whose meaning comes from its setting. Genesis 24 presents camels as transport for a long household mission and as creatures needing substantial water after travel. Rebekah's action is generous and demanding work, so the scene should not be reduced to a romantic test or used to assign unlimited hospitality labor to young women.
First Kings 10 uses a large caravan to show the scale of the queen of Sheba's journey, resources, and diplomatic encounter. The valuable cargo frames the visit but does not replace her difficult questions or authorize leaders to measure wisdom by gifts received. First Chronicles 12 lists camels alongside other animals carrying food to a joyful gathering. Provision depends on neighbors, transport, handlers, producers, and shared distribution rather than appearing without labor.
Isaiah 30 uses camel-borne treasure in a warning about seeking help from Egypt. Expensive transport can carry an unwise policy, so material scale does not prove faithful direction. Isaiah 60 reverses the movement in a vision where nations bring gifts and proclaim the Lord's praise. Faithful application values creation, safe travel, humane workloads, fair compensation, generous provision, and careful discernment about where resources are going without turning an ancient animal into a secret code or financial promise.
Isa.30.6
Gamal transliterates Hebrew גָּמָל. The governed morphology records singular and plural nominal forms; the noun identifies the animal, while possession, cargo, route, and genre establish whether a passage emphasizes transport, wealth, threat, provision, or worship.
The New Testament uses the related Greek camel noun in literal and proverbial settings. Those passages can broaden canonical imagery, but the animal's appearance in either Testament should not be turned into a universal symbol independent of its sentence and genre.