ABSTRACT. We are studying rewriting systems over free modules, that is linear combinations of free generators with noninvertible coefficients. We provide a sufficient condition in terms of local confluence restricted to generators for the global rewrite relation to be confluent: this condition is formulated in terms of syzygies. When the coefficients belong to a domain, we equip the set of syzygies with a module structure, which provides a finer criterion: the local confluence has to be checked over a subset of syzygies, namely a generating set for the module structure.