Tohu wa-Bohu or Tohu va-Vohu (, tṓhû wāḇṓhû) is a Biblical Hebrew phrase found in the Genesis creation narrative (Genesis 1:2), which describes the condition of the Earth immediately before the creation of light in Genesis 1:3.
Numerous interpretations of this phrase are made by various theological sources. The King James Version translation of the phrase is "without form, and void", corresponding to the Septuagint's (aoratos kai akataskeuastos) and, in the Vulgate, , "unseen and unformed".
Text
The words tohu and bohu also occur in parallel in , which the King James Version translates with the words "confusion" and "emptiness".
The two Hebrew words are segolates, spelled tohu (תֹּהוּ) and bohu (בֹּהוּ).Wilhelm Gesenius, A Hebrew and English Lexicon (1906). Hebrew tohu translates to "wasteness, that which is laid waste, desert; emptiness, vanity; nothing".Strong's Concordance H8414 Tohu is frequently used in the Book of Isaiah in the sense of "vanity", but bohu occurs nowhere else in the Hebrew Bible (outside of Genesis 1:2, the passage in Isaiah 34:11 mentioned above,Strong's Concordance H922 and in Jeremiah 4:23, which is a reference to Genesis 1:2), its use alongside tohu being mere paronomasia, and is given the equivalent translation of "emptiness, voidness".
Inside the text, the first letter of the two words are spirantized to be pronounced [θ~t] and [β~v] (written without dagesh qal), because they appear before vowels, but in isolation or before consonants, the two words begin in the plosives [t] and [b] (written with dagesh qal).
Rabbinical interpretation
In the early rabbinical period, the verse was a point of contention regarding the question of creatio ex nihilo. In Genesis Rabbah 1:14, Rabbi Aqiba "refutes both the existence of primordial matter and the view that God was not the sole creator". In Genesis Rabba 2:2, the amora Abbahu and Shimon ben Pazi give analogies in which tohu wa-bohu means "bewildered and astonished" (mentally formless and void), referring to the Earth's confusion after, having been created simultaneously with the Heavens in Genesis 1:1, it now immediately plays an inferior role.Midrash Rabbah: Genesis, Volume One, translated by Rabbi Dr. H. Freedman; London: Soncino Press, 1983; ; p. 15.
In the 12th century, Abraham bar Hiyya was the first to interpret the tohu and bohu of Gen. 1:2 as meaning "matter" and "form", and the same idea appears in the anonymous Bahir 2.9–10, which was probably edited by the Hachmei Provence.
Possibly related to the concept of "formless and void" is the Yesod hap-Pashut () in the Qabbala, in which "everything is united as one, without differentiation".Chaim Kramer, Anatomy of the soul, Breslov Research Institute, Jerusalem/New York City 1998 ArtScroll's Stone Edition Humash translates the phrase as "astonishingly empty". ArtScroll translates in accordance to Rashi, the most famous medieval Jewish biblical commentator on the Torah.
Use in modern culture The phrase is featured on the front of Godspeed You! Black Emperor's EP Slow Riot for New Zero Kanada, referring to the use of the phrase in Jeremiah 4:23. Jeremiah 4:23-27 is shown on the inner-sleeve of the album cover.
See also Abzu Chaos (cosmogony) Cosmic ocean Hundun Tehom Tohu and Tikun The Void (philosophy)
References
External links Go to , p. 419 for info on related word in Isaiah Chapter 22 called mekuddash (מקדש) which is Hebrew for "it is sanctified"