Abarim Publications' online Biblical Hebrew Dictionary
פסס
There are two roots with the form פסס (p-s-s) in Biblical Hebrew, which may actually simply be the same one but used in two semi-distinct ways. Then there are two comparable roots פשה (p-s-h) and אפס ('-p-s), which closely relate in meaning:
פשה
The root פשה (pasa) means to spread. There's only a verb, which occurs only in Leviticus 13 and 14, and only in connection with leprosy and similar eruptions. The letters שׂ (sin) and ס (samekh) often interchange, and this verb appears to be related to root פסס (pss).
פסס I
The assumed root פסס (pss I) isn't used in the Bible but two derivations remain:
- The masculine noun פס (pas), often thought to denote the flat of the hand or foot, but note that these body parts also denote the extremities of the limbs they're attached to. In the Bible this noun is only used in conjuncture with a garment — Joseph's tunic (Genesis 37:3), Tamar's robe (2 Samuel 13:18) — which is then assumed to have reached to the hand palms and the foot soles. Modern translations appear to interpret the spreading conveyed by this verb not so much in the spatial sense but rather in the way it looked; NAS figures that Joseph's tunic was "varicolored," and NIV has "richly ornamented". This may make perfect sense in view of this root's other derivative.
- The feminine noun פסה (pissa), which meaning is as obscure as its root. It's used only once, in Psalm 72:16, and probably means abundance, or abundantly spread out.
פסס II
The verb פסס (pasas II) means to disappear or vanish. It's used only once, in Psalm 12:1, where the psalmist laments that the faithful disappear from among men. Since faithfulness requires social cohesion (to establish and retain standards to be faithful to), the disappearance of these faithful was likely due to their density in society, which results from them being spread out.
אפס
Verb אפס ('apes) means to end, to come to nothing or terminate (either in presence or function). This verb is clearly an adaptation of the previous in that it speaks of something spreading so thin that it vanishes all together. Our verb occurs four times in the Bible, namely in Genesis 47:15-16, which speaks of the "coming to nothing" of money, and Isaiah 16:4 and 29:20, which speaks of the "coming to nothing" of military threats.
From this verb derive:
- The masculine noun אפס ('epes/'apes), meaning end, termination or nought. This noun is used only in two ways: (1) in the phrase אפסי ארץ or the "ends of the earth" (Deuteronomy 33:17, Micah 5:3, Psalm 2:8, and about a dozen other places), which is not a physical end but rather those places where no humans are or so very far apart that human civilization is effectively not existing, and (2) in the sense of nought or non-existence: Deuteronomy 32:36, Isaiah 34:12, Amos 6:10 and about a dozen more places (most of which in Isaiah, perhaps most notably in verses like Isaiah 47:6).
- The masculine noun אפס ('opas), which only occurs in the dual form and describes a man's (lower) physical extremities: the soles of his feet (Ezekiel 47:3 only, and see references to knees and loins in the following verse).
Here at Abarim Publications, we privately suspect that this Hebrew root is also the source of the familiar Greek word αψινθος (apsinthos), Wormwood (Vermouth) or Absinthe.