“The Valley of Baca”
As they pass through the Valley of Baca, they make it a place of springs; even the autumn rain covers it with pools. (Psalm 84:6 BSB)
What it sounds like today
A place name on a map, meaningless to the reader.
The cultural key
'Baca' is not merely a location; it is a wordplay. The name echoes the Hebrew for weeping (bakah) and also denotes the balsam shrubs that grow in arid, waterless ground, so 'the Valley of Baca' evokes a dry valley of tears, a hard, thirsty stretch on the pilgrim road up to Jerusalem. The psalm's point turns on the pun: as the God-trusting pilgrims pass through this Valley of Weeping, 'they make it a place of springs', their very passage, watered by the autumn rains, transforms a valley of tears into a valley of pools. It is a picture of faith converting hardship into refreshment on the way to God's house. The English reader sees an unknown place name and misses that the name itself means weeping.
Recovered meaning
'Baca' puns on 'weeping' and on the balsams of dry ground, so the pilgrims pass through a Valley of Tears and leave it a place of springs. The name carries the message: faith turns the hard road into refreshment.