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מַקֵּל maqqēl – branch, rod, staff

Semantic Fields: Utensils   
Author(s): W.A.M. Beuken
First published: 2011-03-24
Last update: May 2025 (Marten van Dam)
Citation: W.A.M. Beuken, מַקֵּל maqqēl – branch, rod, staff,
               Semantics of Ancient Hebrew Database (sahd-online.com), 2011 (update: May 2025 (Marten van Dam)) (WORK IN PROGRESS)

Introduction

Grammatical type: noun masc.
Occurrences: 18x HB (9/9/0); 0x Sir; 0x Qum; 0x Inscr. (Total: 18)

  • Torah: Gen 30:37 (2x), 38, 39, 41 (2x); 32:11; Exod 12:11; Num 22:27.
  • Nebiim: 1 Sam 17:40, 43; Jer 1:11; 48:17; Ezek 39:9; Hos 4:12; Zech 11:7, 10, 14.

1. Root and Comparative Material

A.1 Root. According to Klein the root is ‘of uncertain etymology. cp. Egypt. ma-qi-ra.’1 The latter was proposed by Albright.2 Also Helck and Hoch regard it as a Semitic loanword in Egyptian,3 so this does not help us with regard to the Hebrew word’s etymology. Some scholars confidently declare √קלל to be the root4 or raise other possibilities, like a √נקל, or even √בקל or √מקל, all three otherwise unattested in Hebrew.5 Since the Hiph. of √קלל is attested in biblical Hebrew, it would seem safest to assume an original meaning ‘instrument to make lighter, faster’,6 i.e. an instrument to increase a person’s mobility. As a consequence, one has to assume that the meaning ‘branch’ would be a secondary development. The √qll ‘to be light, swift’ is attested in many Semitic languages.7 An Indo-Mediterranean origin8 is less likely.

A.2 Rabbinical literature. In the Hebrew text of Jesus Sirach and the Dead Sea Scrolls מַקֵּל is not attested. The term occurs several times in Mishnaic and Talmudic tractates, mostly in the sense of a walking stick,9 which also serves for defence10 or to discipline.11 Its worked character comes to the fore in the fact that it could have a secret receptacle for a mezūzah or jewels.12 These texts confirm the Old Testament range of functions of the staff.

2. Formal Characteristics

A.1 [Discussion will be added later.]

3. Syntagmatics

A.1 [Discussion will be added later.]

4. Ancient Versions

a. Septuagint (LXX) and other Greek versions (αʹ, σʹ, θʹ):

  • LXX ῥάβδος ‘rod, staff, sceptre’: all instances except for the ones listed below.13
  • βακτηρία, ‘staff, rod’: Exod 12:11; 1 Sam 17:40 (not in v. 43) and Jer 1:11.14
  • α´ σκῆπτρον, ‘sceptre’: Jer 48:17. It is his common rendering of → מַטֶּה.
  • σκυτάλη, ‘staff, pole’: Zech 11:7.15 It is also attested as an alternative hexaplaric rendering in Gen 31:37 and Zech 11:7.

b. Samaritan Targum (TgSmr):

  • חטר and חוטר, ‘stick, staff’: serve as renderings for both → מַטֶּה and מַקֵּל.16

c. Peshitta (Pesh):

  • Normally ḥūṭrā, ‘stick, staff’.
  • zeqtāʾ, ‘rod, goad’17: Gen 30, all instances.

d. Targum (Tg):

  • In the rabbinic Targumim חוטרא is the normal rendering of all Hebrew words for ‘stick, staff, branch’. Only in TgPsJ on Num 22:27 we find שוטא ‘whip’.

e. Vulgate (Vg):

  • virga in texts when the meaning is ‘branch’: Gen 30:37-41; Jer 1:11; Zech 11:7, 10, 14.
  • baculus when the meaning is ‘staff’ or ‘stick’: Gen 32:11; Exod 12:11; 1 Sam 17:40, 43; Jer 48:17; Ezek 39:9; Hos 4:12.
  • fustis, ‘stick, cudgel, staff’: Num 22:27.

5. Lexical/Semantic Fields

A.1 [Discussion will be added later.]

6. Exegesis

6.1 Literal Use

A.1 מַקֵּל appears to be a fresh branch of a tree in Jeremiah’s vocation story. Here the term indicates a branch in its natural condition because no other site is mentioned in connection to it: ‘I see a branch of an almond’ (Jer 1:11; cf. v.13: ‘a boiling pot facing away from the north’18). Whether or not the wordplay between the vision (‘almond’, שָׁקֵד, v. 11) and the explanation (‘I am watching’, שֹׁקֵד, v. 12) involves a blossoming branch because the almond is the first in spring to blossom, is disputed.19 In all other texts, a מַקֵּל is a rod taken from a tree. As a consequence, it is unlikely that Jeremiah in his vision was not watching a real almond tree but the rod of Aaron, a cultic object preserved in the temple of Jerusalem, which presence there is is explained in Num 17:16-26 (1-11), the more so since in this story Aaron’s staff is always called → מַטֶּה.20 A מַקֵּל is light enough to be carried and strong enough to be leant on during journeys through rough territory (Gen 32:11; Exod 12:11), to discipline domesticated animals and to beat off aggressive ones with it (Num 22:27; 1 Sam 17:40, 43) or to be used as a weapon (Ezek 39:9). Only once it occurs, parallel to → מַטֶּה, as a prestigious symbol of authority (Jer 48:17).

A.2 In the story of how Jacob manipulated the breeding of Laban’s flocks (Gen 30:31-43), the meaning of מַקֵּל as a freshly peeled branch is clear (vv. 37-41). Obscure, however, is the function of these rods placed near the watering troughs (v.3921). Explanations diverge from fertility magic (things observed by living beings during the conception, in this case varicoloured rods, would leave their characteristics on the offspring) to breeding techniques, well-known in olden times, of medical or aphrodisiac impact. Nevertheless, parallels from the Ancient Near East with regard to these insights and practices are lacking. The complexity of the story is partly put right if the phrase הַמַּקְלֹותאֶל־ (v. 39) is translated not as usually ‘at the sight of the rods’ or ‘near the rods’, but ‘upon the rods’, conceived as a phallus fallax or teaser animal. Jacob misleads the animals which he does not want to be impregnated, as part of a more sophisticated procedure to enrich himself with a strong flock while providing Laban with a flock of weaker animals. The story has to be interpreted as a revenge for Laban’s treatment of Jacob in Gen 28. Laban had tricked Jacob into receiving the ‘wild cow’ Leah instead of the ‘ewe lamb’ Rachel. Here, Jacob tricks Laban into giving him the lambs he desires.22 ‘Rod’ as euphemism for phallus may also play a role in Hosea’s accusation of rhabdomantic: ‘My people inquire of a thing of wood, and their staff (מַקֵּל) gives them oracles. For a spirit of harlotry has led them astray’ (4:1223). On the other hand, in Gen 30 the context, esp. vv. 37-38 and 40-42, suggests that real striped rods were involved in a more or less magical way. The parallel word עֵצּ in Hos 4:12 is never used as a euphemism for the membrum virile. So it remains uncertain whether מַקֵּל could have this figurative meaning. Rather it hints at the practice of obtaining oracles by shaking sticks in a container.24

6.2 Figurative Use

A.1 In the prophetic symbolic action of Zech 11:4-14, the term מַקֵּל designates two ‘rods’ of a shepherd, called ‘Delight’ and ‘Bonds’ (esp. vv. 7, 10, 1425). A shepherd often carried two staves with him (→ מַטֶּה). Yhwh’s command ‘to shepherd a flock doomed to slaughter’ (v. 4) leads the prophet to taking these two rods which embody the ideological programme of his ministry (v. 7), just as he will later symbolise its failure by breaking them (vv. 10, 14). The story draws on older prophetic themes. A first tradition is that of the evil shepherds, the leaders of Israel, who have not fulfilled their responsibilities and enriched themselves instead of taking care of the needs of the flock (Ezek 34). As opposed to this allegory, the Zechariah narrative does not promise a better future: neither God nor the prophetic shepherd is to guide the herd for its own welfare. Instead, the prophet is to punish the buyers and sellers by leaving the flock to complete abandonment and destruction (v. 8-9). The focus is so much on the chastisement of the elite that the rescue of the flock is not at stake. A second tradition at the basis of this symbolic act is the one to which Ezekiel was called, i.e. the joining of two pieces of ‘wood’ (עֵצּ) with the names of ‘Judah’ and ’Joseph’, which means that ‘they shall be no longer two nations’ (Ezek 37:15-23, esp. v. 22). What Zechariah does with the second rod, ‘Bonds’, forms the counterpart of that story. By severing this rod he clarifies that ‘the kinship between Judah and Israel is broken’ (v. 14). His severing of the first rod, ‘Delight’, which stands for ‘the annulling of the covenant that I had made with all the peoples (i.e. the component tribes of Israel)’ (v. 10), has no counterpart in a specific rod in the Ezekiel story. It could be, however, an antithetic elaboration of the second purport of Ezechiel’s act, i.e. the renewal of the covenant: ‘and they shall be my people, and I will be their God’ (Ezek 37:23). In this way, because the taking of the rods is subservient to their breaking, the story as a whole points retrospectively to the failure of Israelite prophecy (cf. ‘the hardening of the people’ by Isaiah [6:8-10] and the confessiones of Jeremiah [esp. 20:7-18]).

A.2 The circumstance that the rods are given names, points to the fact that they could function as symbols of authority (→ מַטֶּה). The names of the two rods here have no traditio-historical background. The first one, ‘Delight’ (נֹעַם), has a variety of meanings, reaching from ‘pleasantness’ parallel with ‘peace’ (Prov 3:17), ‘purity’ (Prov 15:26) and ‘health’ (Prov 16:24), to the ‘favour’ which people enjoy in the presence of Yhwh (Ps 16:11; 27:4; 90:17). Since its semantic basis involves some form of good relationship, it is a fitting term for the covenant of Yhwh with his people. The second term, ‘Bonds’ (חֹבְלִים [active participle]), is a concrete noun. It might hint at the reciprocity of commitment between Judah and Israel, the more so since √חבל is associated with the idea of pledging. At the same time, an association with the noun חֶבֶל for ‘territory, allotted portion’ seems to be intended since the two kingdoms are allied to each other by the apportioning of the Land (cf. Deut 32:9; Josh 17:14; Zeph 2:7; Ps 105:11). Both names, however, witness to the originality in wording of this prophetic symbolic action.

6.3 Pictorial Material

A.1 → מַטֶּה, section 7.

6.4 Archeology

A.1 [Discussion will be added later.]

7. Conclusion

A.1 Whether ‘branch’ (Gen 30:31-43; Jer 1:11) or ‘instrument to make (walking) lighter, swifter’, hence ‘staff’ (almost all other occurrences), is the more original meaning is uncertain. Like other Hebrew words for staves the מַקֵּל could serve as a symbol of authority. The ancient versions seem to indicate that at least in later times little difference was made between the various types of rods and staves.

A.2 In Zech 11:4-14 the staves are a symbol of the prophet’s ideological ministry and its failure. People could give names to their staves (Zech 11:7, 10, 14), as they did with other objects of a personal nature, e.g. weapons. More or less magical use of the מַקֵּל might attested in Gen 30:31-43 and Hos 4:12, or it might be a metaphor for the membrum virile there. The word occurs as a Semitic loanword in Egyptian. One of its attestations there seems to indicate that a מַקֵּל could have a knob of painted wood.26 Perhaps this knob sometimes contained a secret hollow to hide a precious object in (1. Root and Comparitive Material, Rabbinical Literature).

Notes

  1. Klein, CEDHL, 379. ↩

  2. Albright 1934, 45. ↩

  3. Helck, BÄV, 515; Hoch, SWET, 166-7. ↩

  4. E.g. König, HAWAT, 242. ↩

  5. Discussion: TPC, 816; HWAT, 780; GB, 456; BDB, 596; Kopf 1976, 158; HALAT, 593; HAHAT, 730. ↩

  6. Cf. HGHS, § 61qζ-xζ. ↩

  7. Cf. Leslau, CDG, 428. ↩

  8. Salvesen 1998, 124. ↩

  9. b. Shab., 66a. ↩

  10. m. Pes. V.9; Rosh Hash. I.9. ↩

  11. b. Shab., 139a; m. Abod. Zar. III.1; b. Abod. Zar., 41a; y. Ned., 41b. ↩

  12. m. Kel. XVII.16; B. Meṣ. VII.9. ↩

  13. GELS-L, 415; GELS-M, 210. ↩

  14. GELS-L, 76. ↩

  15. LSJ, 1617. ↩

  16. DSA, 266. ↩

  17. CSD, 120; DSF, 91. ↩

  18. Otherwise Sauer 1966: ‘ein vom Baum geschnittener Stab’ (57); Carroll 1986, 102-103: ‘cannot be determined ... unimportant’. ↩

  19. Holladay 1986, 37, vs W. McKane 1986, 15. ↩

  20. Pace Van der Toorn 1989, following a suggestion of H. Gressmann. ↩

  21. For a survey of the problems of the passage, cf. Fokkelman 1975, 144-51. ↩

  22. Cf. Noegel 1997. ↩

  23. Cf. Ginsberg 1967, 74-5. ↩

  24. Dietrich & Loretz 2011, 153-156. ↩

  25. For the exegesis of this passage, cf. Meyers & Meyers 1993, 237-304. ↩

  26. Hoch, SWET, 166. ↩

Semantics of Ancient Hebrew Database