Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

What Is “Enaim” at Genesis 38: 14, 21?
 
At Genesis 38: 14, Judah’s daughter-in-law Tamar is at Enaim, when Tamar 
dresses as a prostitute and thereby tricks Judah into impregnating his own 
daughter-in-law with twin sons/grandsons.
 
What is Enaim?  Where is Enaim?  What does “Enaim” mean?  Is “Enaim” the 
historical name of an historical Late Bronze Age city in Canaan?  
 
We may be able to learn a lot about the Patriarchal narratives by examining 
the town name “Enaim”.
 
1.  Meaning of “Enaim”
 
“Enaim” is ayin-yod-nun-yod-mem/(YNYM.  If the ayin is represented by an E, 
then this town’s name is Eynym.  (No one in the Middle Ages knew how to 
pronounce the truly ancient name of this town, so we should not worry too 
much about 
the medieval pointing, which is where the “ai” comes from in the traditional 
transliteration.  On the other hand, there may be an ancient tradition that 
this yod represented a dual vowel-type sound.)
 
Most translators view Eynym at Genesis 38: 14, 21 as being the proper name of 
a town.  (KJV is in the minority in viewing it as being an adjective meaning “
open”.  But the majority view, to which I subscribe, is as follows:  “The 
occurrence in v 21 [of chapter 38 of Genesis] of ‘enayim by itself…supports 
the…
interpretation as a place-name….”  Anchor Bible Dictionary, Vol. II, p. 505.)
 
Eynym/“Enaim” is the dual of eyn/“ayin”.  In the singular, eyn means “eye” 
or “well” or “fountain”.  But the dual, Eynym, means only “eyes”, or, as 
is very often the case, has the figurative meaning of “judgment” or “opinion”
.  In the Bible in general and in the Patriarchal narratives in particular, 
one of the most common expressions is to say that something is good or bad in 
the “eyes” of a person, that is, in the “judgment” or “opinion” of such 
person (similar to English).  
 
In the Patriarchal narratives, the exact spelling Eynym only applies to the 
name of this town where Judah meets a disguised Tamar.  The most common 
spelling of this word elsewhere in the Patriarchal narratives is eyny (with 
no final 
mem/M), though often one of several consonants is added at the end, such as 
kaf/K to make it mean “your eyes”/“your judgment”/“your opinion”, etc.  
(Since the final mem/M in the town name “Eynym” is somewhat unusual, but is 
present both at Genesis 38: 14 and 38: 21, we would expect to see that final 
mem/M 
in this town’s historical name, if it turns out that Eynym is the historical 
name of an historical town.)
 
[Note that a lamed/L can be attached at the beginning of this word, creating 
the phrase “before [someone’s] eyes”.  Note in particular Genesis 42: 24, 
where “before their eyes” comes out as lamed-ayin-yod-nun-yod-he-mem/LEYNYHM. 
 
(This identical phrase appears at Exodus 8: 26.)  A similar phrase, meaning “
before your eyes”, and hence having a different final consonant (kaf/K), 
appears 
at Genesis 47: 19.  One possibility is that originally, this town’s name was “
before (the) eyes”, or L + Eynym/Leynym/LeyNyM, featuring L-N-M as the key 
consonants, which later got shortened to “eyes” (as in “judgment”)/Eynym.  On 
that theory of the case, a conquering Egyptian pharaoh in the mid-15th 
century 
BCE might record the equivalent of L-N-M as being the three key consonants in 
this town’s name, whereas a century later, the Amarna Letters may set forth 
the Akkadian cuneiform equivalent of the shortened form Eynym that we see in 
Genesis, that is:  vowel sound + N + vowel sound + M + case ending (with such 
case ending routinely being dropped in Biblical Hebrew).  We cannot expect 
the 
spellings in Egyptian or in Addadian cuneiform to be identical to the Hebrew 
spelling of this town’s name in the received text of Genesis, especially as 
to 
vowel-type sounds.]
 
On the basis of the foregoing analysis, Eynym/“Enaim” is probably the proper 
name of a town, that literally means “eyes”, but that actually means, in a 
figurative sense, “judgment”.
 
2.  Does the Meaning of “Enaim” Fit the Plot Line of Chapter 38 of Genesis?
 
The meaning of Eynym/“Enaim” (“eyes” or “judgment”) fits the plot line of 
chapter 38 of Genesis perfectly.  Tamar covers all of herself except her 
“eyes”
 at Eynym (with “Eynym” literally meaning “eyes”), as Tamar puts on a veil 
in order to impersonate a prostitute.  Genesis 38: 14-15  The two questions 
raised then concern “judgment” (which is the figurative meaning of “Eynym”).  
Will Judah have the “judgment” to see that this supposed prostitute, of whom 
all he can actually see are her “eyes”, is actually his own daughter-in-law 
Tamar?  And more importantly, once Judah finds out the actual facts, and 
Tamar 
turns out to be pregnant with Judah’s twin sons/grandsons, will Judah then 
have the good “judgment” to see that Tamar’s controversial actions should be 
revered, rather than reviled?  Showing his good “judgment”, despite having 
been 
fooled by Tamar’s “eyes”, Judah famously states at Genesis 38: 26:
 
“'She is more righteous than I….’”
 
3.  But Is There an Enaim in Secular History?
 
So far, so good.  But the really exciting question is the following.  Is 
there an historical town in Late Bronze Age Canaan whose historical name was 
Eynym/
“Enaim”?  Is it located somewhere fairly near Dothan (the last place [north 
of Shechem], whose location we’re certain of, where Judah is before he goes “
up” to Eynym).  Does “up” indicate that Eynym is located in the high altitude 
area of eastern hill country, perhaps in eastern Lower Galilee?  Or, perish 
the thought, are scholars right that Eynym is a fictional name created by 
JEPD 
in the 1st millennium BCE for a fictional town that is fictionally located in 
southern Canaan (far south of Shechem)?  
 
As noted at the beginning of this post, we can find out a lot about the 
Patriarchal narratives by examining the town name Eynym/“Enaim”.  For 
example, if 
Eynym is located in Late Bronze Age northern Canaan, we can be quite sure 
that 
JEPD knew nothing about Eynym, and hence that JEPD neither composed nor 
edited chapter 38 of Genesis.  So Eynym/“Enaim” is  v-e-r-y  exciting.  (As 
is “
Timnah”, which would then logically be the next town name to investigate, 
since 
Judah goes to nearby Timnah to have his sheep sheared immediately after being 
with a disguised Tamar at Eynym/“Enaim”.)  
 
Is Eynym/“Enaim” JEPD fiction, or is it Late Bronze Age northern Canaan 
historical fact?  We may find that Eynym/“Enaim” is one key to understanding 
the 
Patriarchal narratives.
 
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois




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