ירח:ירח never functions as a verb in Tanach. But with a slight alteration, we can see the verb ארח. This verb means: “travel, wander.” The widespread scholarly view of the Hebrew word ירח is that it is related to this root ארח. Most likely, in the ancient world, the moon was viewed as the “wandering/traveling object in the sky.” See, e.g., “Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament,” volume 6, page 356. This view is also mentioned in Jastrow and in the concordance of Mandelkern.

Now, let us look at the following Biblical words with the root ארח:

אורח (oreach): The original meaning of this word is not “guest.” It is “wanderer, traveler.”

אורח (orach): This word means “path” because it is something that one wanders/travels along.

ארחה (orchah): This word means “caravan,” derived from the “wander/travel meaning.” It only appears two times in Tanach. One is at Genesis 37:25 (story of Joseph): orchat Yishmaeilim.

ארוחה: Here the etymology is in dispute: The word appears six times in Tanach with a “food” meaning. One time (Jeremiah 40:5), it seems that the word means “food for the journey.” But one cannot read this “food for the journey” meaning into four of the other times it is used. It is possible that the meaning expanded to mean “food, portion,” in general. Or perhaps, the word has a completely different etymology based on an Akkadian word that means “consume, destroy.”

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Returning to our word ירח:

The “month” meaning of the word ירח in Tanach is a later development.

The place name יריחו may derive from ירח and its “moon” meaning. There was much moon worship in ancient times in the Near East. Perhaps that was what was going on at that site originally. Yericho existed for thousands of years prior to the time of Yehoshua.

Most likely, the verb to “wander, travel,” in the original Semitic language was ורח. But in Hebrew, roots generally do not begin with vav, so the original vav turned to yud—a common occurrence. But in this particular root, the initial vav also turned into an aleph to generate the different root ארח.

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ענן: The Koehler-Baumgartner lexicon writes that the etymology of ענן—cloud is uncertain. But it then suggests a possible relation to an Arabic word “anna.” This Arabic word has meanings like: “to appear suddenly,” and “to intervene as an obstruction.” For the idea of a “cloud” as an “obstruction,” see, e.g., Eichah 3:44 (referring to God): “You have covered yourself with a cloud, so that no prayer can pass through.”

Many times, the Tanach refers to an עונן or מעונן and forbids this practice. (See, e.g., Deuteronomy 18:10 and Leviticus 19:26.). From the contexts, these seem to be people who predict the future. One view is that these individuals do this by studying cloud forms and movements. But most reject the connection to clouds here. The etymology of these words remains uncertain. For example, maybe these individuals make the dead “appear” (see the Arabic word above). For some early rabbinic views, see Sanhedrin 65b.

Based on the understanding of ענו—cloud as coming from an “obstruction” meaning, I have seen the suggestion that the עונן and מעונן, in trying to predict the future, were occupied with “obstructed, hidden” matters. So, by trying to understand the etymology of ענן—cloud, we are perhaps finally shedding light on those difficult words עונן and מעונן! (This is all obviously speculation, but it is reasonable speculation.)

ענן is used as a verb at Genesis 9:14. But the verb here is surely one created after the “cloud” meaning, not before it.

Rav S.R. Hirsch connects our root with the verb חנן (bestowing). See his comments on Numbers 6:25 and Genesis 6:8. (Scholars too, sometimes, substitute ע and ח. For example, both ערם and חרם have the meaning “pile.”) Rav Hirsch writes that the rain from the clouds bestows blessings on the earth’s produce.

(The comments on 6:8 were omitted by I. Levy, in his English translation of Rav Hirsch. But they are found in the Hebrew translation on alhatorah.org.)

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שמש: We all know the verb שׁמשׁ—to serve. Interestingly, this verb appears nowhere in the Hebrew portion of Tanach. It is found one time in the Aramaic portion of Tanach, at Daniel 7:10.

Here is Ernest Klein on our noun and this verb: “Several scholars see in (the verb) a shortened form of a base (found in Arabic) שמשם (to be quick, be swift, run), whence also Arabic ‘samsama’ (he ran, was active was busy, was industrious) … The noun שמש—“sun” probably also derives from base שמש in the above sense and literally denotes, ‘the running or wandering celestial body,’ or is, perhaps, so called in allusion to its quivering beams. Other scholars … see in שמש a verb denominated from שמש (sun); according to them (the verb) would have meant originally “to serve (or worship) the sun,” whence, through sense enlargement, would have developed the meaning ‘to serve (in general).’” Citation is from Klein, “A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language for Readers of English.”

The Koehler-Baumgartner lexicon also mentions a possible relation to that same Arabic word “samsam” and defines it as “nimble” and suggests it can refer to the flickering rays of the sun. It also mentions the possibility of relating our noun to the verb “to serve,” without giving any details.

An issue is how early the verb “to serve” arose. Our earliest evidence for it in Hebrew or Aramaic is only the book of Daniel (in the Aramaic section). I am not sure whether other Semitic languages are of any help here. Surprisingly, the essay on our noun in the “Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament,” discusses everything but the word’s etymology. It probably wanted to refrain from speculative suggestions.

Rav S.R. Hirsch looks at the word שמש and concludes: “Thus the sun is the servant, the first, most outstanding servant in God’s household of physical creation.” Commentary on Psalms 19:5. See his similar comments on Deuteronomy 4:19.

It is interesting that שמש has the same first two letters as another word for something above: שמים. Can this be mere coincidence, or is there something deeper going on? Most likely, words originated with two-letter roots. See Edward Horowitz, “How the Hebrew Language Grew,” page 299.

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כוכב: This word appears in all ancient Semitic languages with the meaning “star, heavenly planet.” Scholars believe that an earlier form of the word was כבכב. This would have been a doubling of a two-letter root כב, or an expansion of an original root כבב. In Hebrew, כבכב evolved into כוכב, as the “vav” probably substituted for the “bet.”

Scholars intuited that the original name of this object was כבכב based on an early Arabic language Mahri (also known as Mehri). See Brown-Driver-Briggs, page 456, and see also Jastrow, page 619. Later, the ancient Semitic language of Ugaritic was discovered (in the early 20th century) and one can see this form for the word.

As to the word’s meaning, there is a root כבב—“to burn” in Aramaic (Jastrow, page 606), Arabic, and Akkadian. An alternative etymology proposed by scholars is that it is related to an Arabic root which has a circle-related meaning. (The latter is the view of Jastrow, page 619.)

On all of this, see “Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament,” volume 7, page 76, and the Koehler-Baumgartner lexicon, page 463. Finally, there is a noun in Mishnaic Hebrew כבכב, which is an arched round vessel. See Jastrow, page 608.

I can be reached at MFirstAtty@aol.com. I would like to thank my daughter Rachel for inspiring this column when she asked about the meaning of ענן. I had already written extensively about ירח, but not about the others.