Abarim Publications' online Biblical Hebrew Dictionary
אבד
The verb אבד ('abad) is the Bible's common verb for to die or to expire. In essence, this verb appears to describe a disintegration, whether the disintegration of one person (what happens to that person's body in the grave), or that of a group or organization, or even of some person or event from the larger library of personal or collective memories.
Our verb is used to describe the death of people (Numbers 17:12, Job 31:19), or their wisdom (Deuteronomy 32:28), and even their erasure from other peoples' memory (Job 18:17, Psalm 41:5). Vigor may fail (Job 30:2), wisdom may fail (Isaiah 29:14), hearts (=courage) may fail (Jeremiah 4:9).
Our verb is even, quite telling, used to capture a state of lostness, from which redemption is certainly possible: of donkeys (1 Samuel 9:3), or sheep (Jeremiah 50:6, Psalm 119:176).
The derivatives of the verb are:
- The masculine noun אבד ('obed), meaning destruction (Numbers 24:20 and 24:24 only).
- The feminine noun אבדה ('abeda), denoting a lost item, that is an item that is no longer integrated in its normal place of application (Exodus 22:8, Leviticus 6:3).
- The masculine noun אבדן ('abdan), meaning destruction (Esther 8:6 and 9:5).
- The feminine noun אבדון ('abaddon), denoting a mythological place of destruction, or a place where destroyed lives reside (Job 31:12, Proverbs 15:11). In Revelation 9:11 this word is used as a name: Abaddon.