Hebrew word · H1608

גַּ֫עַשׁ

ga'ash

Gaash

A place name: Mount Gaash, in the hill country of Ephraim. The name may come from a verb gāʿaš, "to shake, quake," but no one knows if that is the origin.

Appears 4 times in 4 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

§ Gaash = "quaking"

a mountain of Ephraim where Joshua was buried

Abridged from Brown, Driver and Briggs, A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (1906), via STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0).

In depth

From the study of 2 Samuel 23:30

Range of meaning

A place name: Mount Gaash, in the hill country of Ephraim. The name may come from a verb gāʿaš, "to shake, quake," but no one knows if that is the origin.

Against the English

Transliterated as "Gaash" in all major versions.

Used elsewhere in the period

Joshua 24:30 and Judges 2:9 place Joshua's burial site, Timnath-serah/heres, "north of Mount Gaash." 1 Chronicles 11:32 repeats "the wadis of Gaash."

From the study of Joshua 24:30

Range of meaning

A place name for a height in Ephraim, of unknown location. It sounds the same as the verb ga'ash, 'to shake, heave, quake' (Ps 18:7; 2 Sam 22:8).

Against the English

All versions simply transliterate it.

Used elsewhere in the period

Outside the two burial notices (here and Judg 2:9), it appears only in 'the wadis of Gaash' (2 Sam 23:30; 1 Chr 11:32), home of Hiddai/Hurai, one of David's warriors. Later rabbinic interpretation (Babylonian Talmud, Shabbat 105b) played on the sound: the mountain 'quaked' against Israel because they did not mourn Joshua properly.

Where it appears

Joshua · 1

  1. Joshua 24:30 גָּֽעַשׁ׃ Gaash

    And they buried him in the land of his inheritance, at Timnath-serah in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash.

    Here: A local height in Ephraim. Its exact location is unknown. The 'wadis of Gaash' are the home of one of David's warriors (2 Sam 23:30). The name sounds like the verb 'to shake, quake'.

Judges · 1

  1. Judges 2:9 גָּֽעַשׁ׃ Gaash

    They buried him in the land of his inheritance, at Timnath-heres in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash.

2 Samuel · 1

  1. 2 Samuel 23:30 גָֽעַשׁ׃ ס Gaash

    Benaiah the Pirathonite, Hiddai from the brooks of Gaash,

    Here: A place name, known elsewhere as Mount Gaash in Ephraim. Joshua was buried just north of it (Joshua 24:30; Judges 2:9), so a hearer would place Hiddai in the heartland of Ephraim. The following ס is a scribal paragraph mark, not a word.

1 Chronicles · 1

  1. 1 Chronicles 11:32 גָ֔עַשׁ ס Gaash

    Hurai from the brooks of Gaash, Abiel the Arbathite,

Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.