In his famous Biblical Thesaurus, Rev. Dr. Hellmuth -- the well-known Professor of Hebrew and Rabbinical Literature -- discusses the meaning of the Hebrew word taabal in the Old Testament. There, he renders it: "dabble, i.e. wetting by little dips or by sprinkling."
Also Dr. Robert Young offers a similar definition of this Biblical word taabal. In his famous Analytical Concordance to the Holy Bible, he renders it: "to moisten" or "besprinkle."
Now this Hebrew word taabal is often translated either as baptein, or as its cognate baptizein. Indeed, taabal is so rendered even in the LXX. That latter work, reputedly compiled by some 'seventy' erudite scholars, is the (270 B.C.) old Greek Septuagint translation of the ancient Hebrew Scriptures.
Those many eminent Hebrews who then produced the Septuagint, all professed the one true religion of Ancient Israel! It is thus very significant that precisely they often used the word baptein -- as their own Greek translation of the Hebrew word taabal.
They did so in many places of Holy Scripture. In some of those places, the word taabal cannot possibly imply even partial im-mersion. Still less can it there imply complete sub-mersion! Nowhere is this clearer than in the Septuagint's translation of Josh 3:15f.
For there, we are told that when the priests came to the Jordan river -- they 'bapt-ed.' The Hebrew here has: ni-tebel-oo. The Greek Septuagint renders this: e-baph-eesan -- 'they bapt-ed.' However, we are also told that the Israelites at that very time "passed through" the Jordan -- "on dry ground." Consequently, they 'bapt-ed' without being submersed!
In almost all Bible texts where it occurs, taabal is consistently associated with dyeing or painting or pouring or sprinkling. Take, for example, Ezk 23:15. There, Ezekiel uses the phrase "dyed attire" -- alias the 'painted turbans' which people then often wore "upon their heads." Now "dyed" translates the Hebrew word tebuul-iym -- derived from taabal. Rightly, the Septuagint itself renders this derivative -- bapt-os!
The word baptein itself -- which frequently translates taabal -- often means "to dye." Indeed, the latter is frequently associated with painting -- by way of sprinkling. Compare too the frequentative baptizein (in Isa 21:4) -- with the word "sprinkle" in Isa 52:15 and 63:3. With the two latter verses, also compare Mt 28:19's "baptize" and Rev 19:13-16's "vesture dyed with blood" (or himation bebammenon haimati). There, "baptize" and "dyed" translate derivatives from baptizein and baptein!
