Aramaic word · H2869

טָב

tav

fine

Literally 'upon the king [it is] good'. It is a fixed court formula meaning 'if it pleases the king / if the king approves'.

A Biblical Aramaic word, from the parts of the Old Testament written in Aramaic. Why Aramaic?

Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Aramaic of the Old Testament. ·

What it means

good

Aramaic of tov (טוֹב "pleasant" H2896A)

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 Ezra 5:17

Range of meaning

Literally 'upon the king [it is] good'. It is a fixed court formula meaning 'if it pleases the king / if the king approves'.

Against the English

All major versions render it idiomatically ('if it pleases the king', 'if it seem good to the king'). YLT keeps the word order: 'if to the king it be good'.

Used elsewhere in the period

The Hebrew equivalent ʾim ʿal-hammelek ṭôb appears in Persian-period court speech: Esth 1:19; 3:9; 5:4, 8; 7:3; 8:5; 9:13; Neh 2:5, 7. Similar polite formulas are standard in Imperial Aramaic letters to superiors.

Where it appears

Ezra · 1

  1. Ezra 5:17 טָ֗ב [it is] good

    Now, therefore, if it pleases the king, let a search be made of the royal archives in Babylon to see if King Cyrus did indeed issue a decree to rebuild the house of God in Jerusalem. Then let the king send us his decision in this matter.

    Here: 'Good' in the sense of 'agreeable, acceptable'. Combined with the words before it, it means 'if the king approves'.

Daniel · 1

  1. Daniel 2:32 טָ֔ב good

    The head of the statue was pure gold, its chest and arms were silver, its belly and thighs were bronze,

    Here: Literally "good." Said of a metal, it means top-grade, refined gold. English "fine" or "pure" gets the sense right.

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