A recent About Hebrew column in this magazine discussed ganav, a thief who takes or steals using stealth. In this issue, the column would like to catch a גַּזְלָן (gazlan), a thief who takes by force, but did not realize how elusive that rascal could be. It turns out that, like thieves, language also doesn’t obey laws, often causing translators to equivocate, as we can see in the root ג-ז-ל (gimel-zayin-lamed), to snatch.

The authoritative Jewish Publication Society translation of the Hebrew Bible discusses the root in Ecclesiastes 5:7 by pointedly translating גֵזֶל מִשְׁפָּט (gezel mishpat) as “the suppression of right and justice.” In Genesis 31:31, when Jacob defends himself for having used stealth to “steal” Laban’s daughters—i.e., the women Laban gave Jacob in marriage—he argues that he did so because he feared פֶּן תִּגְזֹל (pen tigzol), “lest you take your daughters [back] by force.”

Although Talmud tractate Sukkah 31b declares that landed property אֵינָהּ נִגְזֶלֶת (einah nigzelet), cannot be physically stolen, Abraham, in Genesis 21:25, reproaches Abimelekh that his servants גָּזְלוּ (gazlu), “seized” a well he had dug. Proverbs 4:16 tells a curious anecdote about robbers and their professional pride: At night, after a day when a malicious thief has not succeeded in causing even one victim to feel pain, נִגְזְלָה שְׁנָתוֹ (nigzelah shenato), he feels so troubled he is robbed of sleep. Interestingly, our Sages treat גֶזֶל שֵׁנָה (gezel shainah), “to take away someone’s sleep,” not as a crime but as the negation of the Jewish ethical principle, “You shall love your neighbors as yourself”— and let them sleep. Compassionate rabbinical jurisprudence, in an update to strict biblical law, treats someone who is addicted to gambling as a גַזְלָן דְּרַבָּנַן (gazlan de-rabbanan), a robber according to rabbinic law, who, instead of punishment, should be coaxed out of his compulsion.

Long ago on the battlefield, there was a civilian military camp follower known as a sutler, who sold merchandise and provisions to soldiers at outrageously high prices; he could be called a גַּזְלֶן (gazlen), exploiter, of his monopoly. In Israel today, this term has been bequeathed without rancor to street cart vendors.

Many parents of Israeli youths about to be called up for military service identify with iconic Israeli singer-songwriter Arik Einstein’s song עוֹף גוֹזָל (uf gozal), “Fly Away Young Chick,” a song about their fledglings being “wrested away” from their home nest. The expression גְּזֵלַת נְעוּרַי (gezelat ne’urai), “the theft of my youth,” from the poem Where Are You? by cultural icon Hayyim Nahman Bialik, was recently “snatched” by contemporary actor and comedian Yaniv Biton, one of the stars of the Israeli comedy skit show Eretz Nehederet. Biton lampooned Bialik’s nostalgic poem in a song that went viral on TikTok, cementing his role as a cultural icon himself.

Today, no one considers this a theft.

Joseph Lowin’s columns for Hadassah Magazine are collected in HebrewSpeak, Hebrew Talk and Hebrew Matters.