H8398 H8398
world, inhabited earth — poetic synonym for the terrestrial realm as God's creative domain
Tevel is a feminine noun meaning 'world' or 'inhabited earth,' functioning as a poetic synonym for eretz ('land, earth'). It appears 36 times, almost exclusively in elevated verse — psalms, prophetic oracles, and wisdom poetry — and never takes the definite article, lending it a grand, cosmic register. The word may derive from the root y-b-l ('to produce, yield'), pointing to the earth as a productive, fruit-bearing entity. Its most striking theological use comes in creation contexts: 'He set the world upon its pillars' (1 Sam 2:8), and 'the world is established, it shall not be moved' (Ps 93:1; 96:10). The prophets deploy it for universal judgment: 'the LORD comes to judge the tevel' (Ps 96:13; 98:9). Nahum 1:5 confirms the word's cosmic scope: 'the tevel and all its inhabitants melt away.'
Senses
1. world / inhabited earth — The inhabited world conceived as God's established creation, used in parallelism with eretz ('earth') across psalmic, prophetic, and wisdom poetry. Carries a tone of cosmic grandeur absent from the prosaic eretz. Key collocations include tevel u-melo'ah ('the world and its fullness,' Ps 89:12; 96:13), tevel ve-yoshvei vah ('the world and its inhabitants,' Isa 18:3; Nah 1:5), and the foundational assertion that God 'established the tevel by his wisdom' (Jer 10:12 = 51:15). Never determined by the article, always absolute or construct. French 'monde,' Spanish 'mundo,' German 'Welt' all render it as a universal term without distinction from eretz, though in Hebrew the poetic register is unmistakable. 36×
AR["العَالَمَ", "الـ-مَسْكُونَةَ", "المَسكونَةَ", "المَسْكونَة", "المَسْكُونَةَ", "الْعَالَمِ", "الْمَسْكُونَةَ", "الْمَسْكُونَةُ", "الْمَسْكُونَةِ"]·ben["জগত", "জগতে", "জগৎ", "পৃথিবী", "পৃথিবীকে", "পৃথিবীর"]·DE["[תבל]", "belongs-der-Welt", "der-Welt", "world"]·EN["belongs-the-world", "the-world", "world"]·FR["Tubal", "monde", "תבל"]·heb["תבל"]·HI["जगत", "जगत-का", "जगत-की", "जगत-के", "तेवेल", "संसार", "संसार-का", "संसार-की", "संसार-को"]·ID["dunia"]·IT["Tubal", "mondo", "world"]·jav["Kula", "jagad", "jagat"]·KO["세계", "세계-가", "세계-를", "세계-와", "세계-의", "세계의", "세상", "세상-과", "세상-에", "세상-을", "세상-의", "세상-이요", "세상을"]·PT["do-mundo", "mundo", "o-mundo"]·RU["-вселенную", "во-вселенной", "вселенная", "вселенной", "вселенной.", "вселенную"]·ES["al-mundo", "el-mundo", "mundo"]·SW["dunia", "ni-wangu", "ulimwengu", "wa-ulimwengu"]·TR["dünya", "dünyanın", "dünyayı"]·urd["جہان", "جہان کے", "جہان-کی", "جہان-کے", "دنیا", "دنیا-کو", "دنیا-کی"]
Related Senses
H8033 1. There (locative adverb) (835×)H7760a 1. put, place, set physically (444×)H8064 1. heavens / sky (329×)H5439 1. around, all around (spatial) (319×)H4057b 1. wilderness, desert region (270×)H3220 1. sea, body of water (269×)H0520a 1. cubit (unit of length) (246×)H0127 1. ground, land (territory) (210×)H3383 1. Jordan River (proper noun) (183×)G1093 1. earth, the world (176×)H5800a 1. forsake, abandon (Qal active) (166×)H8121 1. sun (celestial body) (133×)H7126 1. offer, present sacrificially (122×)H6828 1. north, cardinal direction (120×)H2351 1. outside, exterior space (119×)H5104 1. river, stream (119×)H7341 1. width, breadth (101×)G1563 1. there (95×)H7126 2. draw near, approach (95×)G2281 1. sea, large body of water (91×)
BDB / Lexicon Reference
† תֵּבֵל n.f. Na 1:5 (appar. m. Is 14:17) world, poet. synon. of אֶרֶץ (perhaps orig. as productive, cf. יְבוּל, בּוּל, but this sense not clearly maintained; cf. also Assyrian tabalu in êlî tabali, by land, ‖ êlî nâru, by water (river) MeissnerZA 1889, iv. 3, 261, 263, 265 f. SASm Assyrian Letters iv. pl. viii. ix, 1. 33)—usually abs. ת׳ (no art.), cstr. Jb 37:12 Pr 8:31; world, usually ‖ אֶרֶץ:…