Goshen in the Bible Encyclopedia - ISBE

go'-shen (goshen; Gesem): 1. Meaning of Name: The region where the Hebrews dwelt in Egypt. If the Septuagint reading Gesem be correct, the word, which in its Hebrew form has no known meaning, may mean "cultivated"-- comparing the Arabic root jashima, "to labor." Egyptologists have suggested a connection with the Egyptian word qas, meaning "inundated land" because Goshen was apparently the same region, called by the Greeks the "Arabian nome," which had its capital at Phakousa representing the Egyptian Pa-qas (Brugsch, Geog., I, 298), the name of a town, with the determinative for "pouring forth." Van der Hardt, indeed, more than a century ago (see Sayce, Higher Criticism, 235), supposed the two words to be connected. Dr. Naville in 1887 found the word as denoting the vicinity of Pi-sopt (now Saft el Henneh), 6 miles East of Zagazig--in the form Q-s-m. He concludes that this was the site of Phakousa, but the latter is usually placed at Tell el Faqus, about 15 miles South of ZOAN (which see), and this appears to be the situation of the "City of Arabia" which Silvia, about 385 AD, identifies with Gesse or Goshen; for she reached it in her journey from Heroopolis, through Goshen to Tathnis or Taphnis (Daphnai), and to Pelusium. 2. Situation: It is generally agreed that Goshen was the region East of the Bubastic branch of the Nile; and in Ps 78:12,43, it seems to be clearly identified with the "field (or pastoral plain) of Zoan," which was probably also the "land of Rameses" mentioned (Gen 47:11) as possessed by Jacob's family (see RAAMSES; ZOAN). Where first mentioned (Gen 45:10), Goshen is promised by Joseph to Jacob as a land fit for flocks, and the Septuagint here reads, "Gesem of Arabia," probably referring to the Arabian nome which took its name from the "desert" which defended the East border of Egypt. In the second notice (Gen 46:28 f), the boundary of the land of Goshen, where Joseph met his father, is called in the Septuagint Heroo(n)-polis, and also (Gen 46:28) "the land of Ramesse(s)"; so that in the 3rd century BC Goshen seems to have been identified with the whole region of the Arabian nome, as far South as Heroopolis which (see PITHOM) lay in Wady Tumeilat. Goshen included pastoral lands (Gen 46:34; 47:1,4,6,27; 50:8) and was still inhabited by the Hebrews at the time of the Exodus...