H8639 — תַּרְדֵּמָה (tardēmāh)¶

Core Data¶

Strong's: H8639
Original: תַּרְדֵּמָה
Transliteration: tardēmāh
Pronunciation: tar-day-maw'
Part of Speech: Feminine noun (n-f)
Root: From H7290 רָדַם (rādam) — "to stun, stupefy (with sleep or death)"; morphologically a taqtil formation nominalizing the root state, i.e., "(state of) being stupefied."
Occurrences: 7 unique verses in OT (7 tokens)
Books: 5 (Genesis, 1 Samuel, Job, Proverbs, Isaiah)
First Occurrence: Gen 2:21 — "And the LORD God caused a deep sleep (tardēmāh) to fall upon Adam"
Hapax Legomenon: No (but rare — 7x; near-hapax in distribution)

Lexicon Definition¶

(BDB/Strong's): "A lethargy or (by implication) trance: — deep sleep." Built on the root H7290 רָדַם (primitive root: "to stun, i.e. stupefy with sleep or death"). The noun denotes a divinely induced unconscious state distinct from ordinary sleep (שֵׁנָה / יָשֵׁן) — a stupor in which the subject is unaware of his surroundings yet can be the passive recipient of revelation or divine action.

Translation Distribution (KJV)¶

Translation	Count	%
a deep sleep / deep sleep	6	85.7%
deep (in "deep sleep from the LORD")	1	14.3%

KJV renders tardēmāh uniformly with the phrase "deep sleep" (or a minor variant). There is no lexical competition in English translation — every occurrence is glossed the same way.

Distribution by Book¶

Book	Count	Per 100 Verses
Genesis	2	0.13
Job	2	0.19
1 Samuel	1	0.12
Proverbs	1	0.11
Isaiah	1	0.08

The word is narratively rare but canonically significant: it appears once or twice in clusters of the Bible's most theologically charged texts — creation (Gen 2), covenant-cutting (Gen 15), the David/Saul succession crisis (1 Sam 26), the night-vision speeches of Job's friends (Job 4; 33), wisdom sayings (Prov 19), and judicial hardening oracle (Isa 29). Notably absent from Torah legal corpora, Psalms, and the Latter Prophets outside Isaiah.

Semantic Categories¶

Derived from ALL VERSE TEXTS. Seven occurrences fall into three clearly distinct usage patterns.

1. Divinely Imposed Sleep for Creative/Covenantal Purpose¶

God himself is the agent; the tardēmāh is the means by which He acts decisively on a passive human subject. - Gen 2:21 — "the LORD God caused a deep sleep (tardēmāh) to fall upon Adam" (context: creation of woman from rib) - Gen 15:12 — "a deep sleep (tardēmāh) fell upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him" (context: cutting of the Abrahamic covenant) - 1 Sam 26:12 — "they were all asleep; because a deep sleep (tardēmāh) from the LORD was fallen upon them" (context: YHWH-sent stupor on Saul's entire camp)

2. Night-Vision / Revelatory Backdrop¶

The tardēmāh is the receptive human state during which God communicates via vision or dream. The noun names the condition; the revelation is the content. - Job 4:13 — "In thoughts from the visions of the night, when deep sleep (tardēmāh) falleth on men" (Eliphaz's spirit-encounter) - Job 33:15 — "In a dream, in a vision of the night, when deep sleep (tardēmāh) falleth upon men, in slumberings upon the bed" (Elihu on how God speaks)

3. Judicial / Negative Stupor¶

A stupefying torpor characterized as loss, loss of agency, or divine withdrawal-of-sight. - Prov 19:15 — "Slothfulness casteth into a deep sleep (tardēmāh)" (moral torpor producing ruin) - Isa 29:10 — "the LORD hath poured out upon you the spirit of deep sleep (רוּחַ תַּרְדֵּמָה / ruaḥ tardēmāh), and hath closed your eyes" (judicial blinding of prophets and seers)

The same noun can thus name a receptive state (categories 1–2) or a punitive state (category 3) — what distinguishes them is whether YHWH sends tardēmāh for revelation/action to the subject or against perception in the subject.

Common Collocations¶

Word	Strong's	Co-occurrences	Typical Pattern
יְהֹוָה (Yᵉhōvāh)	H3068	3x (43%)	YHWH is the explicit agent causing/pouring/sending tardēmāh (Gen 2:21; 1 Sam 26:12; Isa 29:10)
חִזָּיוֹן (chizzāyōn) — vision	H2384	2x (29%)	tardēmāh paired with night-vision revelation (Job 4:13; 33:15)
לַיִל (layil) — night	H3915	2x (29%)	"visions of the night" as the temporal setting (Job 4:13; 33:15)
יָשֵׁן (yāšēn) — to sleep (ordinary verb)	H3462	2x (29%)	tardēmāh described alongside normal sleep, marking it as something beyond (Gen 2:21; 1 Sam 26:12)
לָקַח (lāqaḥ) — to take	H3947	2x (29%)	decisive divine action taken while subject is in tardēmāh — rib taken (Gen 2:21), spear taken (1 Sam 26:12)
חֲלוֹם (chălōm) — dream	H2472	1x	dream as vehicle when tardēmāh falls (Job 33:15)
אֵימָה (ʾêmāh) — terror	H367	1x	numinous dread accompanying tardēmāh (Gen 15:12)

Signature verbal collocate: נפל (nāphal, "to fall") + תַּרְדֵּמָה — "tardēmāh falls on X" is the stereotyped syntax in Gen 15:12, Job 4:13, and Job 33:15. In Gen 2:21 YHWH causes it to fall (Hiphil of nāphal); in Isa 29:10 the verb is נסך (nāsak, "pour out").

Word Family / Cognates¶

H7290 רָדַם (rādam) — primitive root verb: "to stun, stupefy (with sleep or death)." Also 7 OT occurrences: Judg 4:21 (Sisera "fast asleep"); Ps 76:6; Prov 10:5; Jonah 1:5, 6; Dan 8:18; 10:9 — the verbal form נִרְדָּם (nirdām, Niphal) describes Daniel's own state when receiving angelic revelation. The Daniel passages use the verb, not this noun, but they are same-root cognate descriptions of the identical experiential state named by tardēmāh.

Synonyms¶

No synonyms returned by search_relationships.py for H8639.

Antonyms¶

No antonyms returned by search_relationships.py for H8639.

Semantic Neighbors (sleep / unconscious states)¶

Word	Strong's	Relation
שֵׁנָה (šēnāh)	H8142	ordinary sleep (not divinely weighted)
יָשֵׁן (yāšēn)	H3462	to fall asleep naturally
נוּם (nûm) / תְּנוּמָה (tᵉnûmāh)	H5123/H8572	to slumber, drowsiness (lighter than tardēmāh)
רָדַם (rādam)	H7290	verbal cognate of tardēmāh (see above)

Easily Confused Words¶

Because KJV renders only tardēmāh and rādam-forms as "deep sleep," there is no English overlap with other Strong's numbers in this exact phrase. The conceptual foils are:

Word	Strong's	Shared Semantic Field	Key Difference
שֵׁנָה (šēnāh)	H8142	sleep in general	Ordinary sleep; no inherent divine agency or revelatory function
תְּנוּמָה (tᵉnûmāh)	H8572	slumber	Lighter drowsiness; Prov 6:10 pairs it with שֵׁנָה for laziness — compare Prov 19:15 where tardēmāh carries the same moral weight but stronger
מַרְדֵּמָה	—	(nominal cognate of rādam, not in MT)	n/a

Semantic Domains¶

UBS / Relationship Domains¶

[002001001004] Asleep — search_relationships.py places tardēmāh in the sleep/asleep field alongside ordinary sleep vocabulary, confirming the basic sleep-state frame while the biblical contexts mark it as a divinely imposed stupor or trance.

LXX Mapping¶

Greek Equivalent	Strong's	Co-occ	PMI	Notes
ἐπιπίπτω (epipíptō) — "fall upon"	G1968	4	8.57	The verb of the collocate נפל, not of tardēmāh itself — LXX translates the idiom "tardēmāh fell on X" with epipíptō carrying the semantic weight
φόβος (phóbos) — "fear"	G5401	3	6.36	Associated with the numinous-dread component of the state (esp. Gen 15:12; Job 4:13–14)
ἔκστασις (ékstasis) — "ecstasy, trance"	G1611	—	—	The actual LXX noun rendering tardēmāh in Gen 2:21 and Gen 15:12; bridges into NT at Acts 10:10; 11:5; 22:17 (Peter's and Paul's visionary trances)

The LXX rendering ἔκστασις is theologically significant: the translators understood tardēmāh not as unconsciousness but as a trance — a revelatory, vision-receptive displacement of ordinary awareness. That is the Greek word picked up in Acts to describe Peter on the Joppa rooftop and Paul in the temple.