נְתַנְאֵל
ne.tan.el
Nethanel
Lexicon Entry
Lexicon data from STEPBible TIPNR, Tyndale House, Cambridge. Licensed under CC BY 4.0.
What Original Readers Understood
Supported# Nethanel: A Biblical Name Nethanel (נְתַנְאֵל) is a Hebrew proper name that appears exactly once in the biblical text. The name is a compound formation combining elements that suggest a theophoric structure—that is, a name incorporating a divine reference. Based on its linguistic components, it likely conveys meaning related to divine gift or God's giving, consistent with similar Hebrew names from the biblical period. As a hapax legomenon (a word occurring only once), Nethanel's significance is necessarily limited within the biblical corpus itself. The single occurrence provides no basis for identifying patterns of usage or determining the figure's role or importance in biblical narrative. Without additional contextual information about where this name appears, what relationship the person held, or what actions they performed, we cannot establish its historical or theological relevance beyond its existence as a biblical name. The extreme rarity of this name in the biblical record distinguishes it from more commonly attested Hebrew names. Its presence indicates it was at least recognized as a legitimate name formation during the biblical period, but the single occurrence prevents any meaningful analysis of its usage patterns or semantic range within Scripture itself.
Source data & methodology
Occurrences in Scripture
1 total occurrence across the text