HEBREW / ARAMAIC · H8227
שָׁפָן
sha.phan — rock badger
rock badger, coney, the hyrax
27 tagged verse occurrences · see every occurrence →BIBLE DICTIONARY + WORD STUDY
Badger
Original Hebrew / Aramaic / Greek connected to this term
How to read this: there is rarely one magic “true meaning” hidden behind an English word. A lexicon records a word’s semantic range. The intended meaning is narrowed by grammar, sentence, author, historical usage and context.
HEBREW / ARAMAIC · H8476
תַּ֫חַשׁ
ta.chash — leather
1) a kind of leather, skin, or animal hide 1a) perhaps the animal yielding the skin 1a1) perhaps the badger or dugong, dolphin, or sheep, or a now extinct animal
13 tagged verse occurrences · see every occurrence →Historical dictionary entry
This word is found in Ex. 25:5; 26:14; 35:7, 23; 36:19; 39:34; Num. 4:6, etc. The tabernacle was covered with badgers’ skins; the shoes of women were also made of them (Ezek. 16:10). Our translators seem to have been misled by the similarity in sound of the Hebrew tachash_ and the Latin _taxus, “a badger.” The revisers have correctly substituted “seal skins.” The Arabs of the Sinaitic peninsula apply the name tucash to the seals and dugongs which are common in the Red Sea, and the skins of which are largely used as leather and for sandals. Though the badger is common in Palestine, and might occur in the wilderness, its small hide would have been useless as a tent covering. The dugong, very plentiful in the shallow waters on the shores of the Red Sea, is a marine animal from 12 to 30 feet long, something between a whale and a seal, never leaving the water, but very easily caught. It grazes on seaweed, and is known by naturalists as Halicore tabernaculi.
Scripture references
Source: Easton’s Bible Dictionary (1897). Historical dictionary wording reflects the scholarship and language of its era.