Hebrew word · H6052

עָנָן

'anan

Anan

Spelled exactly like the common noun 'anan (H6051), "cloud". That noun is the word for the pillar of cloud in the wilderness and the cloud of God's presence at Sinai and over the tabernacle. As a name it may simply mean "cloud". The exact sense of the longer name is debated.

Appears once in the Hebrew Old Testament. ·

What it means

A man living at the time of Exile and Return, only mentioned at Neh.10.26

§ Anan = "cloud"

one of the heads of the people who signed the covenant with Nehemiah

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 Nehemiah 10:26

Range of meaning

Spelled exactly like the common noun 'anan (H6051), "cloud". That noun is the word for the pillar of cloud in the wilderness and the cloud of God's presence at Sinai and over the tabernacle. As a name it may simply mean "cloud". It could also be a shortened form of a longer name such as Ananiah (Nehemiah 3:23; 11:32), with God's name dropped. The exact sense of the longer name is debated.

Against the English

English versions all read "Anan". In English, Hanan and Anan look nearly the same, but in Hebrew they start with two different throat sounds (ḥet and ʿayin) and come from different roots.

Used elsewhere in the period

This is the only person called Anan in the Hebrew Bible. The name turns up again much later in Jewish history (for example Anan ben David, 8th century AD), but that tells us nothing directly about this man.

Where it appears

Nehemiah · 1

  1. Nehemiah 10:26 עָנָֽן׃ Anan

    Ahijah, Hanan, Anan,

    Here: A personal name spelled the same as the ordinary word for "cloud". It may be the plain word used as a name, or a shortened form of a longer name built on God's name. This is the only time a person named Anan appears in the Hebrew Bible.

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