ספיר

Pronunciation

• Tiberian: sappîr^[1][2]
• Samaritan reading tradition: sēfər^[3][4]

Forms

סַפִּיר (sappîr) noun, masculine^[1] Plural סַפִּירִים (Isaiah 54:11, Song of Songs 5:14).^[2]

Etymology

Its origin is disputed.^[3][5] Noonan derives it from the old West Semitic root ⟨špr⟩ “to shine, be fair”, of שׁפר (špr, “to be fair”) and Arabic سَفَرَ (safara, “to shine”), with an initial ⟨s⟩ and the noun pattern of adjectives, so that the stone was first “the shining one”.^[5][6] Ellenbogen thought it hardly derivable from the Hebrew root ⟨spr⟩ and so of foreign origin.^[7]

BDB, after Lagarde, and HALOT derive it from Sanskrit शनिप्रिय (śanipriya, “precious to Saturn”).^[2][3] Noonan rejects this: the Sanskrit word appears only in late lexical texts and is explained there as a foreign word, so that, if the two are connected, Sanskrit borrowed it from Hebrew.^[5] Wiktionary follows Ayil (2024) in deriving it from Assyrian Akkadian šipirtu (“lapis lazuli”).^[8] The usual Akkadian and Ugaritic words for lapis lazuli are uqnû and Ugaritic iqnu.^[3]

Ancient Greek σάπφειρος (sáppheiros, “lapis lazuli”) is somehow related to the Semitic word, and Beekes notes that this may itself be borrowed.^[9][3] Classical Syriac ܣܰܦܺܝܠܴܐ (sappīlā) and Jewish Aramaic סַמְפִּירִינוֹן (sampîrînôn), from σαπφείρινον (sappheírinon), belong with it.^[2][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

The first use in the canon is in the theophany on Sinai: wəṯaḥaṯ raḡlāyw kəmaʿăśēh liḇnaṯ hassappîr “and under his feet as it were a pavement of lapis lazuli” (Exodus 24:10).^[1][11] It is one of the stones of the high priest's breastplate (Exodus 28:18, 39:11).^[2]

Semantic evolution

The stone of the Bible is most probably lapis lazuli, not the modern sapphire.^[11][3] Noonan points to Job 28:6, where it goes with gold dust, matching the gold-flecked blue of lapis lazuli and Theophrastus's description of the Greek stone, and to the hardness of true sapphire, which was hardly cut as a gem in the ancient Near East before the late first millennium BC.^[5][12] BDB gives “sapphire, perhaps also lapis lazuli”, and SDBH a deep blue stone, possibly sapphire.^[2][13] Ezekiel sees the throne of God as ʾeḇen-sappîr (Ezekiel 1:26, 10:1), Isaiah 54:11 promises foundations of sapphires, and the stone is costly (Job 28:16) and highly polished (Lamentations 4:7).^[2]

The Septuagint renders it Ancient Greek σάπφειρος (sáppheiros), and the Vulgate Latin sapphirus.^[1][5] The Dead Sea Scrolls have it 15 times.^[14] In Rabbinic Hebrew it is the sapphire of the breastplate, on which the name of Issachar was engraved, and a kind of bean.^[15] Through Greek it reached English sapphire.^[3]

Timeline

• Classical Biblical Hebrew – liḇnaṯ hassappîr (Exodus 24:10) and the breastplate stones (Exodus 28:18, 39:11).^[1][2]
• Prophetic and poetic books – Isaiah 54:11, Ezekiel 1:26, 10:1, 28:13, Job 28:6, 16, Song of Songs 5:14, Lamentations 4:7.^[3]
• 3rd–2nd century BC – the Septuagint renders it Ancient Greek σάπφειρος (sáppheiros).^[16][1]
• 2nd century BC – 2nd century AD – 15 uses in the Dead Sea Scrolls.^[17][14]

Meanings

Noun

1. lapis lazuli, a deep blue precious stone, traditionally rendered “sapphire”.^[3][11][5]
2. (post-biblical) a variety of bean.^[15]

Descendants

• Modern Hebrew ספיר (sapír)^[8]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f Clear Bible (2023–), MACULA Hebrew Linguistic Datasets (Westminster Leningrad Codex, with Greek alignment), github.com/Clear-Bible/macula-hebrew, CC BY 4.0
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Brown, Francis; Driver, S. R.; Briggs, Charles A. (1906), A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, with an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. סַפִּיר
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i Koehler, Ludwig; Baumgartner, Walter; Stamm, Johann Jakob (1994–2000), The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, transl. and ed. M. E. J. Richardson, 5 vols, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. סַפִּיר
4. ^ Højgaard, Christian Canu; Naaijer, Martijn; Schorch, Stefan (2023), Text-Fabric Dataset of the Samaritan Pentateuch, Zenodo, doi:10.5281/zenodo.7734632
5. ^ a b c d e f Noonan, Benjamin J. (2019), Non-Semitic Loanwords in the Hebrew Bible: A Lexicon of Language Contact, University Park: Eisenbrauns (Linguistic Studies in Ancient West Semitic 14), p. 346
6. ^ Lane, Edward William (1863–1893), An Arabic-English Lexicon, 8 parts, London: Williams and Norgate, p. 1370
7. ^ Ellenbogen, Maximilian (1962), Foreign Words in the Old Testament: Their Origin and Etymology, London: Luzac, p. 125
8. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
9. ^ Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. σάπφειρος
10. ^ Gesenius, Wilhelm; Buhl, Frants (1915), Hebräisches und aramäisches Handwörterbuch über das Alte Testament, 17th ed., Leipzig: F. C. W. Vogel, p. s.v. סַפִּיר
11. ^ a b c Holladay, William L. (1971), A Concise Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. סַפִּיר
12. ^ Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. σάπφειρος
13. ^ de Blois, Reinier, ed. (2000–), Semantic Dictionary of Biblical Hebrew, United Bible Societies, sdbh.org, p. s.v. סַפִּיר
14. ^ a b Abegg, Martin G.; Jacobs, Jarod; Roorda, Dirk (2022), The Dead Sea Scrolls, Text-Fabric dataset, version 2.0.2, github.com/ETCBC/dss
15. ^ a b Jastrow, Marcus (1886–1903), A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature, London: Luzac; New York: Putnam, p. s.v. סַפִּיר
16. ^ Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 93
17. ^ Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 143