🔼The name Jogbehah: Summary
- Meaning
- Lofty, Exalted
- Etymology
- From the verb גבה (gaba), to collect or to be high, the verb יגב (yagab), to till.
🔼The name Jogbehah in the Bible
The name Jogbehah occurs twice in the Bible. It belongs to a city that appears to have been built or fortified by the men of the tribe of Gad (Numbers 32:35), who had chosen their territory on the east of the Jordan.
When Gideon had defeated the armies of the Midianites with 300 men, he gave chase to the two kings Zebah and Zalmunna. He met up with them at Karkor, as he had led his troops "by the way of those who lived in tents on the east of Nobah and Jogbehah" (Judges 8:11).
🔼Etymology of the name Jogbehah
The name Jogbehah is either an active form of the verb גבה (gaba), meaning either to collect or to be high, or it has to do with the verb יגב (yagab), which means to till, to be a farmer:
גבב
The verb גבב (gabab) doesn't occur in the Bible but it appears to have meant to be concave or convex; to be bulbous or hollow. Noun גב (gab) denotes anything that is bulbous (hills, buttocks).
The verb גוב (gub) means to dig. Noun גב (geb) means pit or ditch. This verb appears to be associated with the verb יגב (yagab), meaning to till (what a farmer does). Noun יגב (yaqeb) probably refers to the field where the farmer tills.
Noun גבא (gebe') appears to describe a hollow in which water collects and is commonly translated with cistern, pool or marsh.
Verb גבה (gaba) means to collect. Nouns גב (geb), גוב (gob), גבי (gobay) and גובי (gobay) refer to locusts. Possibly a whole other verb גבה (gabah) means to be high, exalted or lofty, although this verb could actually describe a person who collected a heap, or who plunders a society like a swarm of locusts. In the Talmud the word for tax collector was derived from this verb. Adjective גבה (gaboah) means high or haughty. Noun גבה (gobah) means height or haughtiness. And noun גבהות (gabhut) means haughtiness.
Verb גבע (gabay) appears to mean the same as גבב (gabab), to be concave or convex. The very common noun גבעה (gib'a) means hill.
The unused verb גבן (gaban) probably meant to be curved, contracted or coagulated. Adjective גבן (giben) means humpbacked. Noun גבינה (gebina) means curd or cheese. Noun גבנן (gabnon) means peak or rounded summit.
A certain grammatical construction that creates a sort of continuous tense of the verb גבב (gabab) is formed from prefixing a נ (nun) and making the double ב (beth) a single one. The result, a verb נגב (nagab) would mean to undulate, to wave, to have shifting dunes. That verb doesn't exist, but a mysterious noun נגב (negeb) does. This noun would thus denote a region with rolling hills, and came to be synonymous with "south".
The final ה (he) of our name may either indicate a motion towards, or it's paragogic and does not really add to the meaning.
🔼Jogbehah meaning
For a meaning of the name Jogbehah NOBSE Study Bible Name List reads Lofty. BDB Theological Dictionary and Jones' Dictionary of Old Testament Proper Names propose Exalted, although BDB adds a question mark. Jones remarks that the Septuagint figured that Jogbehah wasn't a name at all but rather an appellative. Hence the Septuagint didn't transliterate יגבהה as the name Jogbehah but translated it with "exalted".