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Tirshatha
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
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tẽr - shā´tha , tûr´sha - tha ( תּרשׁתא , tirshāthā' ; Ἁθερσαθά , Hathersathá ): A title which occurs 5 times in Ezra and Nehemiah ( Ezra 2:63; Nehemiah 7:65 , the American Standard Revised Version and the English Revised Version margin "governor"). In Nehemiah 8:9; Nehemiah 10:1 , Nehemiah is called the tirshāthā' . In Ezra 2:63; Nehemiah 7:65 , Nehemiah 7:70 , it is the title of Sheshbazzar, or Zerubbabel. As in Nehemiah 12:26 , Nehemiah is called a peḥāh , or governor, a title which in Ezra 5:14 is given to Sheshbazzar also, it has been supposed that peḥāh and tirshāthā' were equivalent terms, the former being of Assyrio-Babylonian and the latter of Persian origin. According to Lagarde, it comes from the Bactrian antarekshatra , that is, "he who takes the place of the king." According to Meyer and Scheftelowitz it is a modified form of a hypothetical Old Persian word tarsata . According to Gesenius and Ewald, it is to be compared with the Persian torsh , "severe," "austere," i.e. "stern lord." It seems more probable that it is derived from the Babylonian root rashu , "to take possession of," from which we get the noun rashu , "creditor." In this case it may well have had the sense of a tax-collector. One of the principal duties of the Persian satrap, or governor, was to assess and collect the taxes (see Rawlinson's Persia , chapter viii). This would readily account for the fact that in Nehemiah 7:70 the tirshāthā' gave to the treasure to be used in the building of the temple a thousand drachms of gold, etc., and that in Ezra 1:8 Cyrus numbered the vessels of the house of the Lord unto Sheshbazzar. This derivation would connect it with the Aramaic rashya , "creditor," and the New Hebrew rāshūth , "highest power," "magistrate."
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Bibliography Information
Orr, James, M.A., D.D. General Editor. Entry for 'Tirshatha'. International Standard Bible Encyclopedia. https://www.studylight.org/encyclopedias/eng/isb/t/tirshatha.html. 1915.
