Naphtali () () was, according to the Book of Genesis, the second son of Jacob and Bilhah, and the founder of the IsraeliteTribe of Naphtali; however some Biblical scholars view this as postdiction, an eponymousmetaphor providing an aetiology of the connectedness of the tribe to others in the Israelite confederation[1]. The text of the Torah argues that the name of Naphtali refers to the struggle between Rachel and Leah for the favours of Jacob; Bilhah was the handmaid of Rachel, who had thought herself to be infertile, and had persuaded Jacob to have a child with Bilhah as a proxy for having one with herself.
In the Biblical account, Bilhah's status as a handmaid, rather than an actual wife of Jacob, is regarded by biblical scholars as indicating that the authors saw the tribe of Naphtali as being not of entirely Israelite origin;[2] this may have been the result of a typographic error, as the names of Naphtali and Issachar appear to have changed places elsewhere in the text[3], and the birth narrative of Naphtali and Issachar is regarded by textual scholars as having been spliced together from its sources in a manner which has highly corrupted the narrative.[4][1]
According" to the Targum Pseudo-Jonathan, Naphtali was a swift runner, though this appears to have been inferred from the Blessing of Jacob, which equates Naphtali to a hind.[2] However, Biblical scholars believe this to actually be a description of the tribe of Naphtali, particularly since textual scholars regard the Blessing of Jacob as having been written long after the tribe settled permanently in Canaan.[2][1] The Torah states that Naphtali had four sons, who migrated with him to Egypt,[5] with their descendants remaining there until the Exodus.[6]
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