Tohu appears 20 times in the Hebrew Bible, most famously in Genesis 1:2: 'The earth was tohu and bohu' — formless and empty. The word describes a state of primordial chaos, trackless wasteland, or spiritual emptiness. Its range includes: the pre-creation void (Genesis 1:2), literal desert wasteland (Deuteronomy 32:10), worthlessness or unreality (Isaiah 40:17, 23), and the chaotic aftermath of divine judgment (Isaiah 34:11; Jeremiah 4:23).
Tohu theology frames the entire biblical narrative. Creation begins with tohu wa-bohu (formless and void) and God's Spirit hovering over it — creation is the bringing of order out of chaos, meaning out of meaninglessness, life out of emptiness. Sin returns things to tohu: Jeremiah 4:23 uses 'tohu wa-bohu' to describe Judah's judgment as a reversal of creation. Isaiah uses tohu for idols (41:29) and for nations as 'less than nothing' before God (40:17). The New Testament's new creation (2 Corinthians 5:17; Revelation 21) is the ultimate reversal of tohu — all things made new, chaos transformed into eternal shalom.