Deborah - Definitions from Dictionary.com

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Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) - Cite This Source - Share This

Deb·o·rah

Audio Help [deb-er-uh, deb-ruh] Pronunciation Key

–noun

1.	a prophetess and judge of Israel. Judges 4, 5.

2.	Also, Deb·o·ra. a female given name: from a Hebrew word meaning “bee.”

Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1)
Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006.

Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Deborah

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American Heritage Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Deb·o·rah Audio Help (děb'ər-ə, děb'rə) Pronunciation Key
In the Bible, a judge and prophet who aided the Israelites in their victory over the Canaanites.

[Hebrew dəbôrâ, bee; see dbr¹ in Semitic roots.]

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The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2006 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

Online Etymology Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This
Deborah

prophetess and judge in the O.T., in Heb., lit. "bee" (thus the name is the same as Melissa).

Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Deborah

a bee. (1.) Rebekah's nurse. She accompanied her mistress when she left her father's house in Padan-aram to become the wife of Isaac (Gen. 24:59). Many years afterwards she died at Bethel, and was buried under the "oak of weeping", Allon-bachuth (35:8). (2.) A prophetess, "wife" (woman?) of Lapidoth. Jabin, the king of Hazor, had for twenty years held Israel in degrading subjection. The spirit of patriotism seemed crushed out of the nation. In this emergency Deborah roused the people from their lethargy. Her fame spread far and wide. She became a "mother in Israel" (Judg. 4:6, 14; 5:7), and "the children of Israel came up to her for judgment" as she sat in her tent under the palm tree "between Ramah and Bethel." Preparations were everywhere made by her direction for the great effort to throw off the yoke of bondage. She summoned Barak from Kadesh to take the command of 10,000 men of Zebulun and Naphtali, and lead them to Mount Tabor on the plain of Esdraelon at its north-east end. With his aid she organized this army. She gave the signal for attack, and the Hebrew host rushed down impetuously upon the army of Jabin, which was commanded by Sisera, and gained a great and decisive victory. The Canaanitish army almost wholly perished. That was a great and ever-memorable day in Israel. In Judg. 5 is given the grand triumphal ode, the "song of Deborah," which she wrote in grateful commemoration of that great deliverance. (See LAPIDOTH ØT0002240, JABIN ØT0001938 [2].)

Easton's 1897 Bible Dictionary

Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This

Deborah

Deborah, word; thing; a bee

Hitchcock's Bible Names Dictionary

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