Tribe of Issachar

According to the Hebrew Bible, the Tribe of Issachar (Hebrew: יִשָּׂשכָר, Modern Yissakhar, Tiberian Yiśśâḵār) was one of the Tribes of Israel.

Following the completion of the conquest of Canaan by the Israelite tribes after about 1200 BCE,Joshua allocated the land among the twelve tribes. The territory which it was allocated was immediately north of (the western half of) Manasseh, and south of Zebulun and Naphtali, stretching from the Jordan River in the east, to the coast in the west; this region included the fertile Esdraelon plain. (Joshua 19:17–23)

Origin

According to the Torah, the tribe consisted of descendants of Issachar, the ninth son of Jacob, and a son of Leah, from whom it took its name; however some biblical scholars view this also as postdiction, an eponymous metaphor providing an aetiology of the connectedness of the tribe to others in the Israelite confederation. According to this biblical passage, the name Issachar refers to Leah hiring Jacob's sexual favours at the cost of some mandrakes; this suggests the etymology is ish-sachar, literally meaning man of hire, though the Bible says it means reward or recompense, in reference to Issachar being the result of Jacob being hired (Gen 30:17).