Hebrew Word Study – The Snare  מפח Mem Pei Cheth   

Psalms 91:3 Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, [and] from the noisome pestilence.

The word for snare is mipach which could come from two different root words.  It could be pachach or pachad.  Pachach means to entrap, either by a net or a snare. It is also used to express the idea of causing to ruin or destroy something or someone. It is also used for crooked lightning which expressed impending danger.  When you see the lightning you brace yourself for the coming thunder as light travels faster than sound and all that.  Pachad means to tremble or fear or to be afraid of an impending danger. It also means reverence.  It is also used for dangling testicles.  When two men made an oath to each other they would touch each other’s privates.  It was a sign of reverence for that person.  It was also a sign of trust. For someone to come that close to a man’s sexual organ creates a sense of impending danger and fear and thus allowing it would show great trust.

The intended root is most likely pachach which means an entrapment by snare or net although the idea of pachad may be a play on the word pachach to say that this snare represents impending danger from making yourself vulnerable. 

I recall watching a television program years ago where an American sportsman was visiting an English nobleman on his estate.  The nobleman offered to take the American bird hunting.  The American was surprised when the nobleman gave him a net instead of a rifle. They went hunting and the nobleman showed how he was able to capture a bird with the net.  As he picked up the terrified bird, he stoked it and calmed and showed it to the American and said: “You see, you Americans are so barbaric with your guns blowing the poor creature apart.  Look here not a feather on his head is harmed.”  The American, somewhat charmed by the bird began to stroke his head to help calm him and asked; “So what do you do with him now?”  The nobleman looked at the American like he had no power of understanding and said: “Why wring its blooming neck, of course.” 

I think being caught in a snare or net is the perfect illustration.  You get yourself trapped in a net of sin and you panic and are fearful and terrified of impending doom. But then you find it is not so bad and you start to become comfortable in your entrapment of sin.  That’s when it wrings your blooming neck. 

Ancient Egyptian hunters used a snare.  They would take a vine and form a loop so that when the bird steps in the loop the hunter pulls the vine and closes the loop tightening it around the poor creature’s legs.  The bird is usually terrified and the ancient hunters often calmed the creatures before they did – that thing to them.  They would only hunt for food and the hunters believed that if you killed the bird while it was terrified you would absorb that terror when you ate the bird.  Actually, I read that there might be some scientific fact behind that which is why there is a move to be more humane to animals bred for slaughter.   In fact, in Judaism only a shochet who was trained in how to slaughter an animal in one swift blow so the animal suffers no fear or terror could be used for kosher meat. There may be a spiritual reason behind it. 

This may be why the Psalmist is speaking of being delivered from the snare of the hunter and not the hand of the hunter for in the hand of the hunter he will become complacent and calm before the final blow.  It is best to call on God when you are first ensnared in sin, if you wait you may become too complacent to call on God and that is when sin will wring your blooming neck. 

Pachad (fear) is different from the fear of yara’ which is related to the fear of the Lord.  The fear yara’ of the Lord is not a fear for one’s own safety but for the welfare of another.  To yara’ or fear the Lord is to fear wounding his heart or bringing sorrow to Him.  Pachad is the fear of your own gizzard.  That is not bad.  It is fear that will make you cautious.  It is pachad fear that will cause you to call upon God.  But once that fear has left and you are in the hand of the hunter, you would not be as inclined to call upon God.  While all the time sin is preparing to ring your blooming neck.  

This verse ends by saying God will deliver us from the noisome pestilence. Whatever that is, it sounds bad. In the Hebrew, it is madavah havvah.  It is interesting that the word madavah is used.  It comes from the root word debar for speech, to speak from one’s heart, an intimate speaking.  It takes on the idea of a plague, according to my study partner, because a plague is contagious, no one is immune to it.  When you speak your heart to someone they respond almost likewise and often will share intimately with you.  The word havvah means to desire in a bad sense.  It is a desire that leads to destruction.  Thus a madevah havvah could mean a destructive plague and it also could mean, according to my study partner, that if you have evil in your heart and you davar or speak it out it could cause destructive desire in someone, a desire for revenge or destruction.  Such a desire can spread like a plague.  

The Psalmist is probably making an allusion to Numbers 11 where the people of Israel were bellyaching about the manna and wanted meat. So God sent quail, more quail than they could handle such that they started to eat the dead quail (against kosher law). We know today that bird meat goes bad real quick.  Many became sick and died.  Had they followed God’s kosher laws they would have lived.  They did not know anything about microbes in those days.  

Someone pointed out to me just now in an email that the word in the prior verse for fortress could also come from the root word tsud which means hunting or catching a prey.  The Psalmist is following a hunter’s motif here and thus this last phrase of being delivered from the destruction of plague is most likely a reference to spoiled meat and following the dietary laws of God. If you follow God’s laws you would not suffer from eating spoiled bird meat. 

So whether you are the hunted, God will free you from the trap before the hunter or sin wrings your blooming neck and if you are the hunter, God will protect you from eating spoiled meat which could prove fatal and did for those who ignored God’s laws. 

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