Hebrew word · H8608
תָּפַף
metofefot
to beat
'To strike a hand-drum (tōp)'; by extension, to beat rhythmically. The form here (Poel participle, feminine plural) means 'women drumming.'
Appears 2 times in 2 verses of the Hebrew Old Testament. ·
What it means
1) to play or sound the timbrel, beat, play upon, drum (on a timbrel or other object)
1a) (Qal) playing (participle)
1b) (Poel) beating (participle)
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
- Range of meaning
'To strike a hand-drum (tōp)'; by extension, to beat rhythmically. The form here (Poel participle, feminine plural) means 'women drumming.'
- Against the English
KJV 'tabering' (from the archaic 'tabor,' a small drum), which keeps the drum image; modern versions 'beat(ing).' 'Beat' is accurate but loses the picture of a drum.
- How it drifted
KJV 'tabering' was clear in 1611. Today most readers do not know the word, so the drum picture has dropped out of the English tradition.
- Used elsewhere in the period
Ps 68:25 uses the same form for the young women 'playing tambourines' in God's victory procession. Women with drums lead celebrations in Exod 15:20, Judg 11:34 and 1 Sam 18:6. Beating the breast as a mourning gesture appears in Isa 32:12 (with a different verb) and in the New Testament (Luke 18:13; 23:48).
- Range of meaning
The verb means to strike or beat. With the noun tof (H8596) it means to play the frame drum. The tof was a shallow wooden hoop with an animal skin stretched over one side. It was held in one hand and struck with the other. Elsewhere the verb describes beating the breast in mourning (Nahum 2:7).
- Against the English
KJV has 'timbrels,' an archaic word most readers can't picture. BSB, WEB, NASB, ESV and NLT have 'tambourines,' which today means a drum with metal jingles that shakes and rattles. 'Hand-drums' or 'frame drums' is closer to the evidence.
- How it drifted
English Bibles of the 16th and 17th centuries used 'timbrel' (from Old French timbre, a drum). Later versions swapped in the modern word 'tambourine,' and the modern instrument came along with the word. As far as the evidence goes, the Iron Age tof had no metal discs. Its sound was a deep beat for keeping rhythm, not a jingle.
- Used elsewhere in the period
In the Hebrew Bible the tof is mostly played by women at moments of victory and celebration: Miriam and the women at the sea (Exod 15:20), Jephthah's daughter going out to meet him (Judg 11:34), the women greeting Saul and David with 'tambourines' and song (1 Sam 18:6). Many terracotta figurines from Iron Age Israel and nearby lands (roughly the 10th–7th centuries BC) show a woman holding a round drum flat against her chest. Carol Meyers has argued from these figurines that drum, dance and song made up a recognized form of women's performance.
Where it appears
Psalms · 1
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Psalm 68:25 תּוֹפֵפֽוֹת׃ playing tambourines
The singers lead the way, the musicians follow after, among the maidens playing tambourines.
Here: A feminine plural participle, 'women beating hand-drums.' The verb comes from the same root as tof, the round frame drum, and its ending marks the drummers as women. It pictures striking a skin stretched on a hoop. The same verb is used for women beating their breasts in grief in Nahum 2:7.
Nahum · 1
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Nahum 2:7 מְתֹפְפֹ֖ת [they are] beating
It is decreed that the city be exiled and carried away; her maidservants moan like doves, and beat upon their breasts.
Here: From the same root as tōp, the hand-drum or tambourine. The women beat their chests like drums. The same form describes festive drum-girls in Psalm 68:25. Here the drumming is for a funeral.
Word data: STEPBible.org (CC BY 4.0), main text only.