ESTUDIO DE LA PALABRA HEBREA
Rasha — Meaning & Usage in the Bible
Rasha (רָשָׁע, H7563) is a Hebrew adjective/noun meaning 'wicked,' 'guilty,' or 'wrong,' describing persons actively hostile to God or guilty of wrongdoing.
Significado de la palabra
Rasha (רָשָׁע) is a Hebrew term rendered in English Bibles as 'wicked,' 'ungodly,' 'guilty,' or 'wrong.' The lexicon defines it as 'morally wrong,' and as a concrete noun 'an (actively) bad person.' It describes someone whose actions oppose God's standard of righteousness.
The extended definition distinguishes three uses: (1) a criminal or actively guilty person, (2) a person hostile to God, and (3) a person guilty of sin against either God or neighbor. The term functions both as a substantive ('the wicked one') and as a moral adjective describing conduct ('wicked deed').
In KJV usage the word is translated by several phrases: 'condemned,' 'guilty,' 'ungodly,' 'wicked (man),' and 'that did wrong.' This range shows that rasha is not merely an abstract label but a forensic-moral term tied to judgment: the rasha is one declared guilty and condemned.
Uso en las Escrituras
Rasha appears about 230 times across roughly 220 verses of the Hebrew Bible. One of its most striking early uses is in Genesis 18, where Abraham intercedes for Sodom and asks whether the Judge of all the earth would 'slay the righteous with the wicked' (vv. 23, 25). Here rasha is the moral opposite of 'righteous' (tsaddiq), setting up the basic scriptural contrast between the two categories.
In the legal material of Exodus, rasha denotes a guilty party in a dispute (Exod 2:13), collective wrongdoing (Exod 9:27, where Pharaoh confesses 'I and my people are wicked'), and the kind of person excluded from being a false witness (Exod 23:1) or from being 'justified' by God (Exod 23:7). The word therefore carries concrete social and judicial weight, not only a religious tone.
In the wisdom literature and the prophets, rasha describes the persistent ungodly: those silenced in darkness (1 Sam 2:9), condemned by divine judgment (1 Kings 8:32), and at rest only in death according to Job (Job 3:17). Job's dialogues show rasha as those whom God 'destroyeth' alongside the blameless in Job's frustrated complaint (Job 9:22), making the term central to Israel's reflection on justice and suffering.
La palabra en detalle
- H7563 Rasha (רָשָׁע) is both adjective and substantive: 'wicked' as a quality and 'the wicked (one)' as a person. The root's basic sense is 'to be loose, to be wrong,' and the term functions in three closely related spheres — criminal guilt (a wrongdoer), moral hostility to God (the ungodly), and the person condemned in God's courtroom. It is the regular antithesis of tsaddiq ('righteous').
Versículos de ejemplo
- Genesis 18:23 Abraham contrasts 'the righteous' with 'the wicked' (rasha), establishing the canonical pair rasha/tsaddiq used throughout Israel's prayers and legal texts.
- Exodus 2:13 In a civil dispute Moses asks 'why smitest thou thy fellow?' and calls the aggressor rasha — the word applied to a concrete wrongdoer in an everyday conflict.
- Exodus 23:7 God declares 'I will not justify the wicked' (rasha); the term here is judicial — God will not declare the guilty party innocent.
- Job 9:22 Job's complaint that God 'destroyeth the perfect and the wicked' shows rasha used of those whom Job believes perish alongside the innocent, making the term central to wisdom literature's debate on retributive justice.
Preguntas frecuentes
Is rasha only about being 'evil' in a vague sense?
No. Rasha carries a more concrete, often judicial meaning: 'guilty,' 'criminal,' 'wrongdoer.' The lexicon distinguishes the actively guilty (criminal), the ungodly (hostile to God), and the condemned (guilty of sin against God or neighbor).
What is the opposite of rasha in the Bible?
The regular opposite is tsaddiq (צַדִּיק), 'righteous.' Passages such as Genesis 18:23–25, Exodus 23:7, and 1 Kings 8:32 pair the two terms as complementary categories in God's judgment.
How many times does rasha occur in the Hebrew Bible?
In the form cited by Strong's H7563, the word occurs about 230 times across roughly 220 verses, making it one of the most frequent Hebrew terms for moral evil and guilt.