Bible Locations

This Tiphsah was a town attacked by Menahem, king of Israel. Second Kings 15:16 says, "At that time Menahem, starting out from Tirzah, attacked Tiphsah and everyone in the city and its vicinity, because they refused to open their gates. He sacked Tiphsah and ripped open all the pregnant women." This brutal act happened when Menahem seized the throne after killing Shallum. Since Menahem started from Tirzah, near Shechem, Tiphsah was probably nearby, not the distant city on the Euphrates. The Greek Septuagint reads "Tappuah," a town on the border of Ephraim and Manasseh, south of Shechem, and many scholars follow this reading. If so, it's at Sheikh Abu Zarad. The story shows the violence of the last years of the northern kingdom, when kings seized power by murder.