What’s in a Word?

society

staff and tribe

מטה · שבט · משענת · מקל · שרביט · חוטר

Bottom line

Mateh is a staff of office, the stick of a man with authority, and by extension a tribe (chiefly in Bamidbar and Yehoshua). Shevet is a rod swung with force, the instrument of discipline, and equally a tribe. Mishenes is a cane, leaned on. Makel is a rod for striking, the shepherd's stick. Sharvit is the royal scepter. Choter is a Hebraized form of Aramaic chutra, staff. The one thing not to get wrong: mateh and shevet are both stick and tribe, and English has no word that carries both, so the pun in a derashah has to be built rather than translated.

Distinctions

mateh (מטה)

Malbim (Yirmiyahu 1:11): the stick a dignitary holds, displaying the honor owed to his station. Rabbi Shlomo Aharon Wertheimer: a stick held by one in authority, which is why of all the sticks in Tanach only Moshe Rabbeinu's is called a mateh, his standing as prophet and king together being unmatched. He relates the word to mateh, inclined, after the bend at the top by which it is gripped, and holds that a mateh is always of wood. Rabbi Yehuda ibn Kuraish narrows it further to dry wood, though the rabbinic tradition has Moshe's mateh hewn from blue stone, sapphire or lapis lazuli. On the naming of the tribe, Rabbi Yaakov Tzvi Mecklenburg (HaKesav VeHaKabbalah), citing Shadal, connects mateh to lematah, below, the tribesmen who live under their chief.

shevet (שבט)

Rashi (Sanhedrin 5a): shevet denotes authority and the responsibility that comes with it; in a judicial context the shevet or shotim is the instrument of flogging. Wertheimer: such terms first named a stick for driving animals, and their use of people is borrowed. The Vilna Gaon distinguishes the two sticks by how they are wielded: a mateh needs only a slight lift of the hand for the blow to be felt, while a shevet must be wound up with force. Wertheimer adds that a shevet may be wood or metal, as in the iron shevet of Tehillim 2:9, where mateh and makel are wood only. Malbim (Bereishis 49:28): shevet does not strictly mean stick but branch, the commonest thing used as a stick, and each tribe is a branch of the family tree of Yaakov Avinu. Mecklenburg in Shadal's name: shevet first named the tribe's leader, the mast around which the tribe rallies, and came to cover the tribesmen because the leader embodies the tribe; as sticks, shevet is the top of the staff and mateh the bottom.

mishenes (משענת)

A walking stick, from mishan, to lean or rely: the cane an old man leans on. Wertheimer: wooden, and necessarily a thick branch, since a twig will not bear a walker's weight.

makel (מקל)

A rod for striking, appearing in Tanach chiefly with a shepherd driving the animals in his charge; likely related to malkos / makkos, lashes.

sharvit (שרביט)

The royal scepter that Achashverosh holds out in Megillas Esther. Some hold shevet and sharvit to be the same object, Tanach sometimes adding a reish sound, as it calls Damascus both Damesek and Darmesek.

choter (חוטר)

Probably a Hebraized form of the Aramaic chutra, which is what the Targumim use for both mateh and shevet.

The connotations

Wertheimer in the name of Rabbi Yaakov Lorberbaum of Lissa: the three words carry different colorings. Makel is negative, tied to punishment; mishenes is positive, supporting the elderly; mateh is neutral. On that basis Wertheimer explains why the staff with which Moshe worked the wonders in Mitzrayim and at the sea is a mateh: its effects were good for Klal Yisrael and bad for the Egyptians, so the neutral word fits.

Rabbi Zev HaKohen Hoberman draws the two tribe-words together: Klal Yisrael are shevatim because Hashem gave them a measure of authority and responsibility among the nations, and matos (which he takes with mishenes and chutra) because they are Yaakov Avinu's cane after his death, the support he leans on to carry his legacy forward, following his tradition rather than standing on their own.

Rendering guidance

  • Trap: English "staff" or "rod" will absorb mateh, shevet, and makel. Keep "staff" for mateh, "rod" for shevet, and "stick" or "rod for striking" for makel, and do not let one carry two.
  • Mateh as "tribe" and mateh as "staff" cannot be held together in one English word. Where a derashah turns on the double sense, translate the operative one and gloss the other in a bracket or a note; do not force "branch" to do both jobs.
  • Mateh Moshe: "the staff of Moshe," never "Moshe's rod," which pulls it into the shevet / punishment register that Rabbi Yaakov of Lissa's reading expressly rules out.
  • Shevet in Tehillim 2:9 (iron) is a rod of rule and of shattering, not a tribe; check the material and the verb before choosing.
  • Mishenes is "cane" or "support," and in a metaphor ("a mishenes of a broken reed") the leaning is the whole point, so keep a verb of leaning in the English.
  • Sharvit is "scepter" and only that; do not level it to "rod" even where a source equates it with shevet.

Sources

Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein, "Tribesmen Stick Together," What's in a Word?, Ohr Somayach, 28 Tammuz 5777 (2017-07-22): https://articles.ohr.edu/articles/tribesmen-stick-together; raw text in sources/whats-in-a-word/raw/7357-tribesmen-stick-together.md. Primary loci cited: Bereishis 49:28; Yirmiyahu 1:11; Tehillim 2:9; Megillas Esther (the sharvit of Achashverosh); Sanhedrin 5a; Malbim; Rashi; Rabbi Shlomo Aharon Wertheimer; the Vilna Gaon; Rabbi Yehuda ibn Kuraish; Rabbi Yaakov Lorberbaum of Lissa; Rabbi Yaakov Tzvi Mecklenburg, HaKesav VeHaKabbalah, in the name of Shadal; Rabbi Zev HaKohen Hoberman.