ואהבת: It is generally agreed that abstract verbs are later developments that arise from concrete verbs. This is a phenomenon that occurs not just in Hebrew, but in all languages. (An example in Hebrew is קשר for “conspire.” This meaning grew out of the concrete meaning “tie, connect.”)
“Love” is an abstract verb. Our question is: What was the original concrete verb here? One suggestion notes that in Arabic there is a word “ihab” that means both “skin” and “leather.” Based on this, the suggestion is that אהב may have originally had to do with some positive feeling that you felt in your skin and that it was then applied to the emotional stimulation that produced it.
There is an interesting use of the word “ahava” at Shir HaShirim 3:9-10. We are told that Shlomo made himself an “aperion” with gold and silver and that it was “ratzuf ahava—inlaid with ‘ahava.’” Some have suggested that “ahava” has that “leather” meaning here. See, e.g., Anchor Bible, citing G.R. Driver and others. But it is hard to see a concrete meaning underlying the word “שנא—hate.” So, perhaps, we are wrong to seek one for אהב.
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מאדך: At Mishna Brachot 9:5 (and elsewhere), one of the meanings suggested for this phrase is “with all your wealth” (ממונך). But the context, “levavecha” and “nafshecha,” clearly implies a “might, strength” meaning. On what basis was the ממונך interpretation suggested? (See also Onkelos: נכסך—your property. Targum Yonatan has ממונכון.) In all of Tanach, there is only one other time that מאד is used as a noun. That is at Kings 2, 23:25. The context there too is “levav” and “nefesh,” also implying a “might, strength” meaning. (Normally, the word מאד is an adverb with the meaning: “very, exceedingly.”)
Fortunately, we can answer our question somewhat based on a text that is one of the Dead Sea scrolls. In the “Damascus Document,” at 9:11, we have: “And everything that is lost without it being known who stole it ‘mimeod hamachane’… ” Here מאד is a noun which means something like “property” (“from the property of the camp”). See Chaim Rabin, “The Zadokite Document,” page 46. See also 12:10.
P.S. The “Damascus Document” (also referred to by other names) is a very interesting text. Versions were found in the Cairo Geniza at the end of the 19th century. (The geniza was an attic in a shul and contained documents mostly from around 1000-1300.) It was suspected that the “Damascus Document” was a copy of a text written by a sect from late Second Temple times. When the Dead Sea scrolls were discovered in the mid-20th century, this suggestion was proven correct—as versions of the “Damascus Document” were discovered among the Dead Sea scrolls. (But the material that concerns us here is only found in the versions recovered from the Genizah.) I should also mention the word מאודך in an earlier source: Ben Sira (200 BCE), at verse 7:30. Its meaning is uncertain in this verse. But a “property” meaning at 7:30 is, perhaps, implied by the next verse.
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טוטפת: This word appears three times in Tanach: at Exodus 13:16, Deuteronomy 6:8 and 11:18.
I am not going to discuss the interpretation found in Menachot 34b relating it to “two” in the Coptic and African languages. It seems too homiletical as it only produces the number “four” and it does not describe the object itself. I am going to discuss two views that try to fit the word within Hebrew or other Semitic languages.
Scholars today look at that pattern of letters טטפ, and believe they reflect an original root of טפטפ—where the first פ dropped. As a parallel, let us look at that biblical word ככב—“star.” We now know from Amorite and Ugaritic that it derives from an original כבכב. But what does our hypothetical original טפטפ mean?
There are two widespread approaches, although each is not without problems. One approach believes that טפטפ derives from an original נטפ. See, e.g., Ernest Klein, “A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language,” page 241. נטפ is a well-known root in Tanach which means “drip.” (It is also probably the root of the word טיפה—“drop.”) Two times in Tanach, we have the word נטיפות as a kind of decoration that men or women wear. See Judges 8:26 and Isaiah 3:19. Since the root is נטפ, scholars believe that it must be a kind of pendant that drips downward—worn on the head, neck or ear. See further Daat Mikra to Exodus 13:16, and the Soncino on Judges 8:26. “Totafot” may just be a synonym of נטיפות, and from the same root.
Another widespread approach sees the fundamental root as טופ. In Arabic, this root has a meaning like “encircle.” See, e.g., Samuel David Luzzatto on Exodus 13:16, Brown-Driver-Briggs and Jeffrey H. Tigay, “Journal of Biblical Literature” 101:3 (1982). In this view, “totafot” means something like “headband.”
There are two weaknesses with the first approach: First, we would prefer to find a root for “totafot” that did not have a “nun” as its initial root letter (even though initial “nuns” do often drop). More importantly, tefillin do not drip downwards from the head. In response to this, we can suggest that—although the word may have originated as a description for pendants that drip downwards—the word, subsequently, expanded its meaning to include items worn that do not drip downwards.
As to the second approach, ordinarily, we would prefer not to base suggestions on parallels in Arabic. Although Arabic is a Semitic language, our sources for Arabic are usually from the time of Mohammed and later, long after the period of the Tanach. Moreover, a word that has an “encircle” meaning and implies “headband” does not, at first glance, fit with tefillin—an item focused on the front of the head. A response would be that items on the front of the head typically do not stay in place, unless they are attached by an encirclement on the head. Therefore, a term that means “encircle” can be viewed as appropriate. (I have written a longer essay on טוטפת in my book, “Links to Our Legacy.”)
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אחד: I cannot leave this column without writing about that simple word אחד in the phrase: “Hashem Elokeinu Hashem echad. As one scholar has written, ‘For all of its familiarity, the precise meaning of the Shema is uncertain.’”
One possible meaning of אחד here is “alone,” i.e., Hashem alone is our God. This is the view of Rashbam and many others. One problem with this approach is that Hebrew normally expresses “alone” with a word like לבד. But “alone” as the meaning of אחד in Shema (Deuteronomy 6: 4) is consistent with Deuteronomy 32:12: “Hashem alone (בדד) led him; there was no strange god with Him.” God being alone and unrivaled is also consistent with ideas expressed by the prophet Zechariah at 13:2 and 14:9.
Another possible meaning of אחד in the Shema is “one.” This might mean that God is unique, or that he is indivisible and does not consist of multiple deities. (For “echad” meaning “unique” see Samuel 2, 7:23: “Who is like your people Israel ‘goy echad baaretz’ that God went out to redeem … ” See also the parallel to this verse at Chronicles 1, 17:21.)
Finally, Rashi takes a different approach. Building on Zecharia 14:9 and Zephaniah 3:9, he suggests the meaning: God—who is our God now—will in the future be the one God for all nations. (But on a plain sense level, the phrase does not switch to the future. The source for Rashi’s interpretation is “Sifrei Deuteronomy,” end of section 31.)
Mitchell First can be reached at [email protected]. There is, undoubtedly, a deep and mystical connection between אחד and the name “First!”
