The Bible never mentions Kuse by name. Jerusalem appears over 800 times across the Old and New Testaments. The comparison between Jerusalem and Kuse is not a biblical one. It is a modern question that arises from a single verse in the Septuagint, the Greek translation of the Hebrew scriptures completed around 132 BCE. Jerusalem is the earthly and spiritual capital of biblical Israel. Kuse is a place name that appears in one textual variant of the Book of Isaiah, where it may refer to a location in Mesopotamia or a scribal error for Cush (Ethiopia). The two cities are not compared in any biblical narrative, but the question reveals how translation choices reshape what we think the Bible says.
Where Does the Name “Kuse” Appear?
The name Kuse (Κουσή in Greek) appears in the Septuagint version of Isaiah 11:11. The Hebrew Masoretic Text, which forms the basis of most modern English Bibles, reads “Cush” (כּוּשׁ) in this verse. Cush is the Hebrew name for the region south of Egypt, roughly modern Sudan and Ethiopia. The Septuagint translators rendered it as Kuse, a direct transliteration of the Greek form.
This single occurrence is the entire textual basis for the comparison. No ancient manuscript, no church father, no rabbinic commentary treats Kuse as a distinct city. It is a translation artifact. The Hebrew word for Cush and the Greek Kuse are the same place, filtered through a different alphabet.
The confusion likely began when readers encountered the Septuagint text and assumed Kuse was a separate location. English Bibles that translate from the Greek rather than the Hebrew sometimes retain “Kuse” or “Ethiopia” depending on the translator’s choice. The King James Version uses “Ethiopia” here. The Douay-Rheims, which follows the Latin Vulgate (itself a translation of the Septuagint), uses “Ethiopia” as well. No major English version prints “Kuse.”
What Isaiah 11:11 Actually Says
Isaiah 11:11 describes a future restoration of Israel’s remnant. The verse lists seven locations from which God will gather his people: Assyria, Egypt, Pathros, Cush, Elam, Shinar, Hamath, and the islands of the sea. The context is the messianic age, when the root of Jesse will stand as a signal for the nations.
The Hebrew text reads:
“In that day the Lord will extend his hand yet a second time to recover the remnant that remains of his people, from Assyria, from Egypt, from Pathros, from Cush, from Elam, from Shinar, from Hamath, and from the coastlands of the sea.”
The Septuagint renders Cush as Kuse. The Vulgate follows with Aethiopia. The Syriac Peshitta uses the same term for Ethiopia. No ancient version treats Kuse as a different location.
The consequence for the reader is straightforward: if you are reading a Bible that translates from the Hebrew, you see Cush. If you are reading a Bible that translates from the Greek, you may see Kuse or Ethiopia. The place is the same. The difference is the language of the source text.
Jerusalem in the Same Verse
Jerusalem does not appear in Isaiah 11:11. The verse speaks of gathering the remnant to the land of Israel, but the city itself is not named until verse 9, where “the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord.” The mountain of the Lord’s house appears earlier in Isaiah 2:2-4, where Jerusalem is the center of the nations’ pilgrimage.
The comparison between Jerusalem and Kuse in this context is therefore anachronistic. Jerusalem is the destination. Kuse (Cush) is one of the points of origin. The verse describes a movement from the periphery to the center. Kuse represents the farthest reach of the known world from Israel’s perspective. Jerusalem represents the center of God’s redemptive plan.
This geographic symbolism matters. The prophet lists Cush alongside Assyria and Egypt, the great empires that had oppressed Israel. The inclusion of Cush signals that the restoration is universal. No distance, no enemy territory, no foreign power can prevent the gathering. Jerusalem is the fixed point. Kuse is the farthest horizon.
How the Septuagint Changed the Question
The Septuagint was translated by Jewish scholars in Alexandria between the 3rd and 1st centuries BCE. It was the Bible of the Greek-speaking Jewish diaspora and later the early Christian church. When the apostles quoted the Old Testament in the New Testament, they usually quoted the Septuagint.
The translators faced a problem with place names. Hebrew names for foreign lands often had no direct Greek equivalent. They could transliterate the Hebrew (Cush becomes Chous), translate by meaning (Cush becomes Aithiopia, “burnt-face”), or adapt the name to Greek phonetics (Cush becomes Kuse). The Septuagint does all three in different verses. Isaiah 11:11 uses Kuse. Other verses use Aithiopia. The inconsistency is not a mistake. It reflects the fluid state of Greek geographical vocabulary in the Hellenistic period.
By the 4th century CE, Jerome’s Latin Vulgate standardized the rendering as Aethiopia for most Western readers. The Greek Orthodox tradition retained Kuse in liturgical texts. The question of whether Kuse is a separate city from Cush never arose in patristic or medieval exegesis. It is a product of the modern encounter with textual criticism, where readers compare translations and notice discrepancies that earlier readers simply did not see.
What Cush Meant in the Biblical World
Cush appears 54 times in the Hebrew Bible. It refers to the region along the Nile south of Egypt, corresponding to the Kingdom of Kush, which ruled Egypt as the 25th Dynasty from 744 to 656 BCE. The Cushite pharaohs, including Piye, Shabaka, and Taharqa, are mentioned in Assyrian records and appear indirectly in 2 Kings 19:9 and Isaiah 37:9, where Taharqa is called “king of Cush.”
The biblical writers knew Cush as a real political power. The prophet Zephaniah (1:1) traces his genealogy to Cushi, meaning “the Cushite.” Moses married a Cushite woman in Numbers 12:1, and Miriam and Aaron criticized him for it. The psalmist declares in Psalm 68:31 that “Cush shall hasten to stretch out her hands to God.”
Cush was not a mythical land. It was a known kingdom with diplomatic and military relationships with Israel and Judah. The Septuagint translators rendered it as Kuse or Aithiopia depending on context, but they never confused it with Jerusalem or any other Israelite city.
Why the Question Persists
The comparison between Jerusalem and Kuse persists for three reasons.
First, the textual variant creates ambiguity. A reader who encounters Kuse in one translation and Cush in another may reasonably wonder if they are different places. The answer is that they are the same place, but the question is not unreasonable.
Second, the name Kuse resembles other place names in the ancient Near East. The city of Kusae (modern el-Qusiya) existed in Upper Egypt. The city of Kish appears in Mesopotamia. The name Kuse could be confused with these locations by a reader unfamiliar with the textual history.
Third, the question taps into a deeper curiosity about whether the Bible contains hidden geography, lost cities, or suppressed references. The esoteric tradition has long speculated about places that appear only once or in variant readings. Kuse fits this pattern. It looks like a secret. It is not.
What the Comparison Actually Reveals
The comparison between Jerusalem and Kuse reveals more about translation than about the Bible itself. Jerusalem is a city with archaeology, history, and continuous habitation for 4,000 years. Kuse is a Greek transliteration of a Hebrew name for a region that no longer exists as a political entity. The two are not comparable in biblical terms.
But the question does have value. It forces the reader to engage with the textual tradition. It demonstrates that the Bible we read is mediated by centuries of translation choices. The Septuagint, the Vulgate, the King James Version, and the modern critical editions all make decisions about how to render names. Each decision carries consequences for interpretation.
The reader who asks about Kuse is asking about the reliability of the text. The answer is that the text is reliable, but it requires context. Kuse is not a lost city. It is a Greek word for a land that the Hebrew writers called Cush. The land was real. The people were real. The name changed.
FAQ
Is Kuse mentioned anywhere else in the Bible? No. Kuse appears only in the Septuagint version of Isaiah 11:11. The Hebrew text reads Cush, and no other biblical book uses the Greek form Kuse.
Is Kuse the same as Cush? Yes. Kuse is the Greek transliteration of the Hebrew Cush. Both refer to the region south of Egypt, roughly modern Sudan and Ethiopia.
Why do some Bibles say Kuse and others say Ethiopia? It depends on the source text. Bibles translated from the Hebrew use Cush. Bibles translated from the Greek Septuagint may use Kuse or Ethiopia. The King James Version uses Ethiopia.
Could Kuse be a different city that was lost to history? No. There is no archaeological or textual evidence for a lost city called Kuse in the biblical world. The name is a translation variant for the known region of Cush.
Further Reading
The relationship between Jerusalem and the nations of the ancient Near East is a recurring theme in biblical prophecy. For a deeper study of how sacred geography shapes biblical theology, see our guide to sacred sites in the Bible. The role of Cush in prophetic literature connects to broader questions about symbolic geography in the ancient world. For the textual history of the Septuagint and its impact on biblical interpretation, our article on Septuagint variants traces how translation choices have shaped what readers find in the text.