Gopher wood
Gopher wood or gopherwood is a term used once in the Bible, to describe the material used to construct Noah's Ark. states that Noah was instructed to build the Ark of , commonly transliterated as wood, a word not otherwise used in the Bible or the Hebrew language in general. Although some English Bibles attempt a translation, older English translations such as the King James Version leave it untranslated. The word is unrelated to the name of the North American animal known as the gopher.
Identity
The Greek Septuagint translates the phrase as ἐκ ξύλων τετραγώνων,, translating as. Similarly, the Latin Vulgate rendered it as de lignis levigatis,.The Jewish Encyclopedia states that it was most likely a translation of the Akkadian term,, or the Assyrian,. Ancient and modern kuphar boats on the Tigris and Euphrates are also built of reeds, waterproofed with pitch. The Aramaic Targum Onkelos renders this word as,. The Syriac Peshitta translates this word as, .
Many modern English translations favor an identification with cypress. This was espoused by Adam Clarke, a Methodist theologian famous for his commentary on the Bible: Clarke cited a resemblance between the Greek word for cypress, κυπάρισσος, and the Hebrew word. Likewise, the Nova Vulgata has it as de lignis cupressinis.
Others, noting the visual similarity between the Hebrew letters and , suggest that the word may actually be, the Hebrew word meaning : thus wood would be. Later suggestions for a dynamic equivalent of the word have included , or a now-lost type of tree, but there is no consensus.