What is the…
Sepharad
Hebrew: סְפָרָד —transliteration: Sephared —meaning: (unknown, of foreign origin)
This name appears in the book of Obadiah.
And the exiles of this military force of the sons of Israel,
Who are among the Canaanites as far as Zarephath,
And the exiles of Jerusalem who are in Sepharad,
Will possess the cities of the Negev. —Obadiah 1:20
This is some currently uncertain locality where some Israelite exiles lived.
The modern Jews think that Spain is meant, and hence they designate the Spanish Jews “Sephardim,” as they do the German Jews by the name “Ashkenazim,” because the rabbis call Germany Ashkenaz.
Others identify it with Sardis, the capital of Lydia.
The Latin father Jerome regarded it as an Assyrian word, meaning “boundary,” and interpreted the sentence, “which is in Sepharad,” by “who are scattered abroad in all the boundaries and regions of the Earth.”
John James Stewart Perowne said:
“Whatever uncertainty attaches to the word Sepharad, the drift of the prophecy is clear—that not only the exiles from Babylon, but Jewish captives from other and distant regions, shall be brought back to live prosperously within the enlarged borders of their own land.”
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