TheBibleNet

Tsepho

צפו

Genesis 36:11 names him as a son of Eli-Phaz.

1 Chronicles 1:36 gives his name as Tsephi (צפי).

The name is taken to mean "watchtower", and connected with Mitspeh, the shrine that functioned as both a terrestrial watchtower and an observation tower for the heavens; but this is too vague.

The root Tsaphah (צפה) means "to shine" or "to be bright", which does not at first appear to have anything to do with "watchtowers", though 1 Samuel 14:16, 2 Samuel 13:34 and 18:24 all use it in this sense (Tsophim - צֹּפִים - "watchmen", definitely in the sense of soldiery). Jeremiah 6:17 uses it metaphorically to mean a prophet in the sense of a man to whom the future is revealed by vision; but the metaphor only works because the word Tsophim is understood to mean "watchmen". Likewise Ezekiel 3:17, Isaiah 21:6 (Ha Metsapeh on this occasion - הַֽמְצַפֶּ֔ה - but still with the same meaning), Micah 7:4 (Metsapeycha - מְצַפֶּיךָ) and Habakkuk 2:1; and in Proverbs 15:3 and 31:27 it has the specific sense of "making accurate observations".

The prophetic link may also occur because the first Prophet of Yisra-El, Shemu-El (Samuel), came from Ramatayim Tsophim (1 Samuel 1).

A Tsopheh (צופה) can thus be read equally as a "security guard" and a person who makes detailed observations in the daily world, and also the ancient name for an astronomer; with the watchtower serving equally as military look-out, and as the point of observation of the constellations from where exact accounts of the movements of the stars were recorded. What else "shines" or "is bright", but the stars at night or the sun by day?

And then there is the "hill of wisdom" in Yeru-Shala'im, which isn't actually called the Hill of Wisdom in modern Ivrit or Biblical Yehudit, but Har ha Tsophim, "Mount Lookout". "Hill of Wisdom" might translate into Greek as Mount Scopus, because skops in Greek is the owl, and the wise owl was the bird of the goddess of wisdom, Athena; but actually it is called Mount Scopus in English because scopus in Greek means "watcher" (as in telescope, microscope etc); and as it happens now to house the Hebrew University, it probably should be called "The Hill of Wisdom" in Ivrit too, only that would be Har Chochmah, and as such a lovely contrast to the neighbouring "Hill of Evil Counsel"

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Tsemarim

צמרים

Genesis 10:18 names Ha Tsemari (הצמרי) as a nation of the Beney Kena'an, probably from the town of Simyra - or Sumra in its modern form - at the western base of Mount Lebanon. The birthplace of the Roman Emperor Alexander Severus, it is associated with the Arki (Arkites); the Romans knew the town as Arca Caesarea.

Joshua 18:22, however, names it as a town in the tribe of Bin-Yamin, also known as Har Tsemarim (הר צמרים), in the hill country of Mount Ephrayim; c.f. 2 Chronicles 13:4

The root means "wool", and Tsemeret (צמרת) is used for the shaggy (i.e. wool-like) bark of certain trees, as well as for its foliage (Ezekiel 17:3, 31:3).

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Tsaphnat Pa'ne'ach, Tsephan-Yah (Zephaniah)

צפנת פענח

Genesis 41:45: Yoseph's Mitsri (Egyptian) name, or title, more likely. Yoseph itself is probably a Yehuditisation of Yah Suph, the god of the reeds or the Reed Sea, the Nile Delta around Goshen where Ya'akov was settled; which is to say Osher (Osiris). In Egyptian it means "Saviour of the Age", and is thus a title of the sacred king, or in this case the vizier who stands in for the sacred king.

The Yehudit word Tsaphan (צפן) means "to hide" or "conceal", whence he is usually translated as "Keeper of a Secret"; but it is erroneous to explain a Mitsri name through the Yehudit, when it clearly entered the language from the Mitsri.

However it did become a Yehudit root, and Tsaphan is echoed in the name of the prophet Zephaniah (properly Tsephan-Yah - צפניה), the ninth of the twelve minor prophets. His father was named Kushi (כּוּשִׁי), his great-grandfather was named Chizki-Yah (חִזְקִיָּה - Hezekiah), which scholars tend to assume must have been the king of that name, though there is no evidence to support that speculation, and in fact the King may actually have been named Chizki-Yahu (חִזְקִיָּ֔הוּ), though spellings, even within the Book of Kings, vary. Tsephan-Yah lived and prophesied during the reign of Yoshi-Yahu (יֹאשִׁיָּהוּ - Josiah), which is to say in the first half of the 7th century BCE, which made him a contemporary of Yirme-Yahu (יִרְמְיָהוּ - Jeremiah).

A priest of the same name, the son of Ma'asey-Yah (מַעֲשֵׂיָה), is mentioned in Jeremiah (21:1 and many others). While this is not the prophet, it is almost certainly the same Tsephan-Yah who was taken prisoner in Yeru-Shala'im, when Nevuzaradan conquered the city in the time of king Tsidki-Yahu (צִדְקִיָּהוּ - Zedekiah). 2 Kings 25:19 ff tells how

"The commander of the guard took as prisoners Sera-Yah (שְׂרָיָה) the chief priest, Tsephan-Yah the priest next in rank, and the three doorkeepers. Of those still in the city, he took the officer in charge of the fighting men, and five royal advisers. He also took the secretary who was chief officer in charge of conscripting the people of the land and sixty of the conscripts who were found in the city. Nevuzaradan the commander took them all and brought them to the king of Babylon at Rivlah. There at Rivlah, in the land of Chamat, the king had them executed."

Zechariah 6:10 names a Tsephan-Yah who was the father of Yoshi'ah (Josiah - יֹאשִׁיָּה), a priest in Yeru-Shala'im at the time when Darius issued the decree that the Temple should be rebuilt.

1 Chronicles 6:36 names a Tsephan-Yah of the Beney Kohat who was an ancestor of the prophet Shemu-El (Samuel).

Exodus 14:2 has a place named Ba'al Tsephon (the attached link cannot identify its location because, alas, it is looking for it in the wrong place!), and see my notes in the Exodus text for further explanation of this word.

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Tol'a

תלע

Genesis 46:13 names him as the eldest son of Yisaschar. His brothers are Tol'a (תולע), Puvah (פֻוָּה), Yov (יוב) and Shimron (שִׁמְרוֹן). The name means "a worm".

1 Chronicles 7:1 gives the same information, but then adds that "The sons of Tol'a were Uzi (עֻזִּי), Repha-Yah (רְפָיָה), Yeri-El (ירִיאֵל), Yachmai (יַחְמַי), Yivsam (יִבְשָׂם) and Shemu-El (שְׁמוּאֵל), "heads of their fathers' households. The sons of Tol'a were mighty men of valour in their generations; their number in the days of David was 22,600".

But what a strange name to give your first-born son! Tal'a = "a worm", especially one bred on putrefaction; i.e. linked to the death-cult and the Underworld. See also Exodus 16:20; Isaiah 14:11 and 66:24; Jonah 4:7; Deuteronomy 28:39 and Psalm 22:7, all of which use the word with this meaning.

Judges 10:1 informs us that "after Avi-Melech died, there arose to save Yisra-El Tol'a the son of Pu'ah, the son of Dodo, a man of Yisaschar; and he dwelt in Shamir¹ in the hill-country of Ephrayim"; in other words a Judge of Yisra-El - for twenty-three years, according to the verse that follows. Given that the Judges were not judges as we think of them today, but oracular prophets, and that the snake was the principal oracular beast, perhaps the name Tol'a isn't quite so surprising; we are in the realms of Nechushtan and of the Nachash of Eden etc. The Avi-Melech mentioned here is not the one from the Av-Raham and Yitschak stories in Genesis, but the man made king of Shechem in Judges 9. [¹ see my notes to Judges 10:2 for Shamir]

cf Numbers 26:23 for Tol'a'i, the Tol'a'ites who were Tol'a's tribal descendants.

Tol'a is also used to mean "scarlet" (some translations prefer "crimson"), in Lamentations 4:5 and Isaiah 1:18, which links to the scarlet thread on Parets' ankle (Genesis 38), and to the three shades of colour used in the priestly vestments and the adornments of the ark and the Torah. The scarlet is Tola'at Shani (תוֹלַעַת הַשָּׁנִי), the purple Argaman (אַרְגָּמָן), and the blue Techelet (תְּכֵלֶת) - cf Exodus 39:1. This leaves open the question: was he named Tol'a because he wore the priestly robes, or was he named Tol'a because he was an oracular prophet? Entirely possible of course that he was named Tol'a because his parents liked the name!

The oddity of two such different meanings for the same word leads me to wonder if there might have been a reason for it, that requires context to fathom. I am going to make a speculation, and leave it here for others to wonder: we have no idea what was the name by which the ancients knew the snail that we call the murex, the one that was used to produce those dyes which made the three colours of the priestly garments possible. But the way the worm is described in all of the references linked above, not just a worm but a very slimy sort of worm, a kind of living putrescence, could very easily describe the snail, rather better indeed than it does the regular garden worm. Was Tol'a "scarlet" because Tol'a wasn't "a worm", but "the murex"?

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Togarmah

תגרמה

The name appears in Genesis 10:3 and 1 Chronicles 1:6, both of which tell us that he was a son of Gomer (גומר) and a grandson of Yaphet (יפת); and that his brothers were Riphat (רִיפַת) and Ashkenaz - some Yehudit versions give the first of those as Diphat (דִיפַת), a similar error to Dodanim and Rodanim elsewhere.

Ezekiel 27:14 speaks of Beit Togarmah (בֵּית תּוֹגַרְמָה) as one of Yisra-El's trading partners; "they traded for your wares with horses and horsemen and mules".

Ezekiel 38:6, prophesying the downfall of Gog Magog, includes among the armies that of Gomer and Beit Togarmah, "in the uttermost parts of the north".

They were probably the Cymmerians, who later became the Cymry and Cumbrians of Britain, and abounded in horses and mules. The Armenians regard Torgom, son of Gomer as their ancestor, which does rather add some weight to the speculation. Mag, incidentally, becomes softened to Mac when the language reaches Brython. Thus Gog Magog is really "Gog son of Og", just as Hamish MacDougall is Hamish son of Douglas. Probably, though, this came from the Scythians, who spoke the same Hittite-source language.

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Tiras

תירס

Genesis 10:2: a northern nation out of Yaphet (יפת).

Tiras = corn.

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Timna, Timnah

תמנע, תמנה

See also Teyman (תימן) for even more comparison and confusion!

Genesis 36:11 has Teyman (תימן) as a son of Eli-Phaz ben Esav, a sibling to Omar (אוֹמָר), Tsepho (צְפוֹ), Ga'tam (גַעְתָּם) and Kenaz (קְנַז), all of whom verses 15 and 16 name as Edomite clan-chieftains.

The very next verse, Genesis 36:12, has Timna (תמנע), with a final-letter Ayin, as a concubine of Eli-Phaz, and [dis]credits her with mothering Amalek, who is also named as an Edomite clan, though not one of those who gathered around Esav in Genesis 36:42.

1 Chronicles 1:39 likewise notes Timna (again with a final-letter Ayin) as a concubine of Eli-Phaz, and likewise [dis]credits her with mothering Amalek (if you know the story of Amalek you will understand my repeated square bracket); it also notes that she was the sister of Lotan, one of the sons of Se'ir of the Beney Chor.

The question then is: are Teyman and Timna merely the coincidence of similar names, or do we have textual confusion? The answer is probably the former. A family in ancient Greece where the son is named Theodore (Teddy for short), and the wife Dorothea (Dorothy today) would not have been uncommon.

But then there is the third variant, Timnah (תמנה) with a Hey (ה), which refers to a different town, for which see the notes to Teyman, or probably several different towns, as we shall see. That Timnah is referred to in Genesis 38:12 as an ancient Kena'ani (Canaanite) town; Joshua 15:10 and 57 say it was given to Yehudah, but Joshua 19:43 gives it to Dan, presumably in its Coast of Sharon location, before it moved to La'ish; so definitely a second by the same name.

Judges 14:1 and 2 Chronicles 28:18 confirm the Danite by claiming that it was ruled by the Pelishtim (Philistines) at the time of Shimshon (Samson), which may be another way of saying Dan, since the tribe of Dan were almost certainly the Dana'an Phoenicians. Judges 15:6 refers to the Timni (תמני), presumably linked to Teyman (תימן) rather than Timna, a deduction made from the absent Ayin (ע).

Judges 2:9 mentions a Timnat-Cheres (תמנת חרס) which Gesenius translates as "portion of the sun". He also points out that it is a misreading of Timnat-Serah (תמנת סרח) in Joshua 19:50 and 24:30; both are described as a town in the hill country of Ephrayim, north of Mount Ga'ash, given as a portion to Yehoshu'a, and the place where he was buried. Which one is correct? See my notes at Joshua 19:50, and then follow them back to the Shimshon tale and my notes at Judges 14:1.

The root of Serach links to fountains and other forms of water pouring over falls or out of springs, which would certainly make a likely name for a town that grew up in the mountains. Cheres is a poetic term for the sun, found in Job 9:7 for example: "Ha omer la cheres ve lo yizrach - הָאֹמֵר לַחֶרֶס, וְלֹא יִזְרָח - he commands the sun, and it does not rise"; and in Judges 14:17 (14:18 in some versions), in the variant form of Charsa (חַרְסָה), when the men of Timnah come to Shimshon just before sunset and he offers his famous riddle about the honey and the lion; interesting coincidence that this use of Charsa should come up in relation - davka as they say in Ivrit - to Timnah.

The root of Teyman and Timnah is not clear; it has to be Tav-Mem-Nun (ת-מ-נ), but there is nothing in any of the ancient languages to explain this. As explained in the notes to Teyman, it is taken to mean the "right" or "south", but even this is probably an error for Yamin (ימין) (modern Yemen acquires its name from the same root and for the same reason: south and right).

References to Teyman appear throughout the Tanach: Jeremiah 49:7 and 20; Ezekiel 25:13; Habakkuk 3:3; Obadiah 9; Baruch 3:22; Job 2:11 and 22:1. Almost all of these are late, even apocryphal writings; perhaps the answer lies in Aramaic rather than Yehudit.

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