Word studies · Hebrew · Strong's H4941
מִשְׁפָּט · mishpâṭ · appears 422 times in the Old Testament
In one line: The right verdict, and the right ordering of life.
He has shown you, O man, what is good. And what does the LORD require of you but to act justly, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?
Micah 6:8
Mishpat is justice — the right verdict and the right ordering of life, what a good judge decides and a good society does.
Mishpat covers the judgment a court hands down, a person's legal right or due, and the ordinances that govern Israel's life. The prophets use it as a measure of the nation's health: God requires His people “to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly.”
Mishpat comes from shaphat, “to judge,” and can name the act of judging, the sentence, the case, or the custom established by such decisions. Its breadth means Hebrew barely distinguishes between the rule, the ruling and the resulting way of life.
Modern justice tends to mean punishment or fairness in the abstract; mishpat is concrete and often about the vulnerable — the widow, the orphan, the sojourner, whose “due” is the standing test of whether justice exists at all. It is a word measured at the margins.
Mishpat (H4941) appears 399 times in the Hebrew Bible, frequently paired with tsedeq — justice and righteousness as a single social ideal.
Because God is a just judge, justice is not a human invention but a reflection of His character, and its absence is treated as an offense against Him rather than a policy failure. The pairing of justice with steadfast love keeps it from hardening — God's judgments and His mercy come from the same person.
Ask who around you is owed something they are not getting — attention, wages, a hearing. Do one concrete thing this week for someone with no leverage over you.
properly, a verdict (favorable or unfavorable) pronounced judicially, especially a sentence or formal decree (human or (participant's) divine law, individual or collective), including the act, the place, the suit, the crime, and the penalty; abstractly, justice, including a participant's right or privilege (statutory or customary), or even a style
For I have chosen him, so that he will command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the LORD by doing what is right and just, in order that the LORD may bring upon Abraham what He has promised.”
Genesis 18:19And Moses cried out to the LORD, and the LORD showed him a log. And when he cast it into the waters, they were sweetened. There the LORD made for them a statute and an ordinance, and there He tested them,
Exodus 15:25And the priest must prepare the second bird as a burnt offering according to the ordinance. In this way the priest will make atonement for him for the sin he has committed, and he will be forgiven.
Leviticus 5:10You are to observe it at the appointed time, at twilight on the fourteenth day of this month, in accordance with its statutes and ordinances.”
Numbers 9:3Show no partiality in judging; hear both small and great alike. Do not be intimidated by anyone, for judgment belongs to God. And bring to me any case too difficult for you, and I will hear it.”
Deuteronomy 1:17Then on the seventh day, they got up at dawn and marched around the city seven times in the same manner. That was the only day they circled the city seven times.
Joshua 6:15Press and hold justice in any chapter and this study opens on the verse you are reading, with the lexicons, every occurrence and the commentaries beside it. The Bible is free to read.
Scripture quoted from the Berean Standard Bible, public domain. Strong's definitions are public domain. Counts come from The Pillar's own tagged text.