Genesis 4:22

And Zillah, she also bare Tubal-cain . Worker in brass or iron;related to Persian, tupal , iron dross (Gesenius, Rodiger, Delitzsch). Keil and Furst think this Persian root cannot be regarded as the proper explanation of the name. Furst suggests that the tribe may have been originally named Tubal, and known as inventors of smith-work and agricultural implements, and that Cain may have been afterwards added to them to identify them as Cainites ( vide 'Lex. sub hem.'). The name Tubal, like the previous names Jabal and Jubal, is connected with the root yabal , to flow, and probably was indicative of the general prosperity of the race. Their ancestor was specially distinguished as an instructor (literally, a whetter ) of every artificer (instrument, LXX . ,Vulgate, Kalisch) in brass (more correctly copper) and iron בַּרְזֶל , according to Gesenius a quadrilateral from the Genesis בְּרַן , to transfix, with ל appended; according to Furst out of בָּזֶל , from בָּזַל , to be hard, by resolving the dagesh into r . And the sister of Tubal-cain was Naamah —the lovely. Considering. the general significance of names, we shall scarcely go astray if with Kalisch we find in the name of the sister of Tubal-cain, "the beautiful," as compared with that of Adam's wife, "the living," a growing symptom of the degeneracy of the times. Beauty, rather than helpfulness, was now become the chief attraction in woman. Men selected wives for their lovely forms and faces rather than for their loving and pious hearts. The reason for the introduction of Naamah's name into the narrative commentators generally are at a loss to discover. Ingiis with much ingenuity connects it with the tragedy which some see in the lines that follow.