nature
tigris
חדקל · דגלת · הדקל · תיגרס · דקל
Bottom line
Chidekel and Diglat are one river under two names, and both render Tigris: Chidekel is the Biblical Hebrew, Diglat the Aramaic that Targum and Shas use. Rashi says so explicitly, so never translate them as two rivers. Where a passage expounds the name, keep the Hebrew visible: Berachos 59b hears chad (sharp) and kal (swift) in Chidekel, and that derashah dies in English. Tigras in Chullin 59b is a separate word for an animal, not the river.
At a glance
| Hebrew | translit | English | what sets it apart |
|---|---|---|---|
| חדקל | Chidekel | Tigris | the Biblical name, twice only; read as chad + kal, sharp and swift (Berachos 59b) |
| דגלת | Diglat | Tigris | the Aramaic/Rabbinic name; Targum Onkelos to Bereishis 2:14 and the standard word in Shas (Rashi: it is the Chidekel) |
| הדקל | ha'dekel | Tigris | the Samaritan text's form, chet replaced by hey; not Masoretic |
| תיגרס | tigras | tiger; a mythical lion | Chullin 59b; tiger for Rabbi Binyamin Mussafia, manticore for HeAruch HaShaleim |
Where the authorities disagree
Why the Torah says Chidekel and Chazal say Diglat. Rabbi Naftali HaKohen Katz (Kedushah U'Brachah to Berachos 59b) asks from the Torah's side: Kush and Ashur are given their ordinary names, so why does the Tigris get an obscure one? Because Chidekel alludes to the river's character. Rabbi Matzliach Mazuz (Vaya'an Shmuel vol. 12 p. 76) answers from the other side: by Chazal's time nobody called it Chidekel, so they used the current name. Shadal (to Bereishis 2:14) makes the two cognate, the Aramaic dropping the initial chet and trading kuf for gimmel. All three are compatible: one river, one name in Hebrew and one in Aramaic.
What "sharp and swift" describes. Torah Temimah (to Bereishis 2:14): the water itself, sharp in taste and light on the body. Rabbi Refael Mamo (Shevo V'Achlamah to Berachos 59b): the current, which runs fast where the Euphrates runs slow, since in Chazal's idiom whatever works fast is called sharp, as a sharp knife cuts quickly. Mamo's reading is the more useful, fitting Rava's remark that the men of Mechoza were sharp from drinking those waters.
How the name is built. Rabbi Aharon Marcus (Keses HaSofer, Barzilai) takes Chidekel as a genuine four-letter root, ח-ד-ק with a suffixed lamed, on the model of barzel, karsul, arafel, carmel and chargol. Torah Temimah says the reverse: because four-letter roots are rare, Chazal broke the name into two two-letter words. Rabbi Mamo takes a third path, that the base is dekel and Chazal asked only what the prefixed chet adds, the answer being chad.
Tigras in Chullin 59b. Rabbi Binyamin Mussafia (Mussaf HeAruch): the tiger, so called because it runs as swiftly as an arrow, matching Abarbanel on the river's name. HeAruch HaShaleim rejects this, a tiger being no lion and the sugya plainly describing a legendary creature, and identifies tigras with the manticore of Persian legend.
Distinctions
Chidekel (חדקל)
Twice in Tanach: Bereishis 2:14, the third of the four rivers of Eden, east of Ashur; and Daniel 10:4, "the Great River that is Chidekel," vocalized Chidakel there only because a segol turns to kamatz at the end of a pasuk. Berachos 59b expounds it as chad and kal, and Bereishis Rabbah 16:4 applies the same reading to the four kingdoms: Chidekel alludes to Greece, whose decrees were sharp and swift.
Diglat (דגלת)
Targum Onkelos renders Chidekel as Diglat, and Targum uses it again at Nachum 1:12 where the Hebrew has no river-name. In Shas it is the only name used: Bava Kamma 30a, Taanis 24b, Eruvin 22b and 57b, Moed Katan 25b, Yevamos 121a, and Kiddushin 71b, where it marks the boundary of Bavel for yuchasin. Berachos 59b rules that certain stretches call for the berachah oseh maaseh bereishis, only part of the course being the original riverbed. Rashi (to Taanis 24b, Moed Katan 25b, Bava Kamma 30a) states plainly that the Diglat of Shas is the Chidekel of Tanach. The Samaritan text at Bereishis 2:14 writes ha'dekel, a hey for the chet, which carries no authority against the Masorah.
dekel (דקל), the flag, and tigras (תיגרס)
Rabbi Refael Mamo ties both river-names to dekel, the palm, palms growing thick along the Tigris to this day, Diglat reaching the same root through the kuf/gimmel interchange. Rav Hirsch (to Bamidbar 1:52), writing of neither, notes that ד-ג-ל and ד-ק-ל run together: a degel is a standard visible from afar, a palm a tall tree seen from a distance. On the Greek name, Abarbanel (to Bereishis 2:14) says the river is called Tigris after the tiger, both moving at speed; Rabbi Aharon Marcus instead makes Tigris a worn-down Diglat, l turning to r and d to t.
Rendering guidance
- Both names render Tigris in running prose. A translation that keeps Chidekel in a pasuk and Diglat in a Gemara reads as two rivers to anyone who does not already know better; add "the Tigris" on first mention of each.
- The trap is the reverse one: "Tigris" absorbs both Hebrew words, so wherever the passage is about the name (Berachos 59b, Bereishis Rabbah 16:4), print the Hebrew and gloss it.
- Where Chazal call the river or its people sharp, keep "sharp"; Rava's line about the men of Mechoza depends on one word doing duty for the water and for the men.
- Tigras in Chullin 59b is not the river. Render it as the animal the commentary you follow identifies, and say which one you followed.
Sources
Rabbi Reuven Chaim Klein, "Devarim: The Sharp River," What's in a Word?, Ohr Somayach, 8 Av 5785 (2025-08-02): raw text in sources/whats-in-a-word/raw/11903-devarim-the-sharp-river.md. Primary loci cited: Bereishis 2:11, 2:14; Shemos 23:31; Bamidbar 1:52, 34:12; Devarim 1:7; Nachum 1:12; Daniel 10:4; Berachos 59b; Bava Kamma 30a; Taanis 24b; Eruvin 22b, 57b; Moed Katan 25b; Yevamos 121a; Kiddushin 71b; Chullin 59b; Bereishis Rabbah 16:4; Targum Onkelos and Targum Neofiti to Bereishis 2:14; Rabbi Saadia Gaon, Tafsir; Abarbanel and Torah Temimah to Bereishis 2:14; Kedushah U'Brachah and Shevo V'Achlamah to Berachos 59b; Rabbi Aharon Marcus, Keses HaSofer; Mussaf HeAruch and HeAruch HaShaleim s.v. tigras. The article's Sumerian, Akkadian, Old Persian and Avestan derivations, its citations of Josephus and Isidore of Seville, and Gesenius on Tiglat-Pileser are omitted under house rule 9.