SUPH

soof (cuph; plesion tes eruthras (thalasses); the King James Version Red Sea): As the verse stands, the place where Moses addressed the children of Israel is indicated as "beyond the Jordan in the wilderness, in the Arabah over against Suph" (Deuteronomy 1:1). the King James Version, following Septuagint, takes the name as a contraction of yam cuph (see RED SEA ). The abbreviation is not found elsewhere. The name of the sea was not derived from that of a city; so we need not look in that direction. Knobel suggested Naqb es-Safa, a pass about 25 miles West-Southwest of the Dead Sea. But it is "unsuitably situated; nor does the name agree phonetically (for @@ ... agrees with ..., not with ...)" (Driver, "Deuteronomy," ICC, 4). No identification is possible.

W. Ewing

From the International Standard Bible Encyclopedia
Edited by James Orr, published in 1939 by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.