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TIII: 


HEBREW  LANGUAGE. 


THE 


HEBREW  LANGUAGE 


VIEWED  IN  THE  LKiHT  OF 


ASSYRIAN  RESEARCH. 


BY 


D*{FREDERIc)j)ELITZSCH, 

PROFESSOR  OK   A-*YIUt'MtOY   IS   THE  I'XIVERSITY  OF  LEIPZIG. 


WILLIAMS  AND  NORGATE, 

11.   HENRIETTA  STKKKT.  CiiVKXT  (SAIJDKN.   I.(»M>«'\ 
AND  20,  SOUTH  FREDERICK   >TI{KKT.   KlUXISfKiiH. 

1883. 


All  rights  reserved. 


Printed  by  MITZQER  AND  WITTIG  at  Leipzig. 


PREFACE. 


The  Milistanee  of  the  present  treatise  is  a  reprint,  in  a 
ivvi>i-il  ami  augmented  form,  of  a  series  of  article  which 
appeared  in  Xos.  2897,  2898,  2900,  2902,  2908,  29u'J,  2913 
"!'  the  Athenaeum.1  In  reissuing  these  articles  in  the  shape 
of  a  separate  publication  I  have  in  view  the  double  object 

•  it'  making  them  accessible  to  a  larger  circle  of  readers  and 

•  •I'  elicitini:  the  opinions  of  scholars  competent  to  judge  of 
the  soundness  or  otherwise  of  the  principles  here  advocated. 
My  esteemed  teacher,  Professor  Dillmann.  in  his  discussion 
on  the  site  of  Paradise,  ironically  refers  to  my  owii  solution 
of  that  difficult  question  as  having  been  effected  by  "the 
\\vll  known  wand  of  cuneiform  research."2    I  am  prepared 
to  h.-ar  the  same  remark  applied  to  the  present  work,  which 
endeavour  to  apply  the  iv>ults  of  Assyriology  to  the  lexico- 
graphical treatment  of  the  Hebrew  language.    I  reject  from 
the  very  outset  the  reproach  that  I  am  trying  to  explain 

v.-ry  thing"   by   Assyrian.     It  is   true   I   have   explained 
A  — \  rian   itself  by  its  own  help  and  it  is  no  small  satis- 


1  The  importance  of  Assyriology  to  Hebrew  lexicography;  see 
,  May  5.  12.  26;  Jane  9;  July  21.  28;   August  25.  1883. 
if,  4'h  edition,  p.  61. 


—       VI 

faction  to  me  that  I  have  arrived  at  results  which  have 
already  met  with  the  approval  of  scholars  not  biased  in 
favour  of  Assyriology. 

When  I  commenced  the  study  of  Assyrian,  Assyriology 
was  in  a  state  of  slavish  dependency  on  Arabic  lexico- 
graphy. People  were  happy  to  compare  the  Assyrian  takdhi, 
"to  trust,"  now  recognised  to  mean  originally  "to  be  strong," 

with  the  eighth  form  of  the  Arabic  J^l   (JJot),  and  felt 

only  secure  under  the  sheltering  roof  of  Arabic  lexicography. 
I  soon  became  convinced  that  Arabic  was  less  important  to 
the  study  of  Assyrian  than  the  North  Semitic  languages, 
the  Hebrew  and  the  Aramaic  dialects,  a  conviction  which 
I  regard  as  the  fundamental  principle  of  Assyrian  research. 
When  I  undertook  the  compilation  of  my  Assyrian  dictio- 
nary and,  in  obedience  to  the  first  principle  of  lexicography, 
began  to  explain  Assyrian  by  the  rich  and  various  stoivs 
of  its  own  literature,  I  was  first  taught  by  the  instructive 
instances  of  the  verbs  byi  and  bns  that  Assyrian  assigns  to 
these  and  other  stems  a  meaning  far  different  from  that 
based  on  the  comparison  of  Arabic,  a  meaning  which  not 
only  admirably  suits  the  context,  but  is  also  directly  .con- 
firmed by  the  parattelismus  membrorum.  Thus  the  Assyrian 
dictionary,  which  embodies  a  world  of  ancient  Semitic 
thought  and  speech,  disclosed  an  entirely  new  foundation 
for  the  understanding  of  the  sacred  language  of  the  Old 
Testament  and  created  a  new  line  ofinterpretation  directly 
opposed  to  the  old  system  of  Assyrian  as  well  as  of  Hebrew 
lexicography. 

Lest  it  should  be  supposed  that  I  am  guided  in  thi> 
little  work  by  a  principle  of  unjust  warfare  against  the 
ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary,  I  would  remark  that 


VII       - 


my  CCIIMUV  is  limited  t«»  tli-->.-  .-.i^-s  where  the  editor- 
have  erroneously  debated  from  the  correct  views  nf  <, 
nius  himself.  i.r  have  failed  i<>  vc»<:m&e  what  Fur>t  and 
Levy  had  alivady  anticipated.  It  is  also  to  be  deplored 
that  in  a  book  intruded  to  introduce  young  b«-Lriir 
tu  tin-  study  of  the  Semitic  languages  the  boundary  <»f 
Inputhcsjs  and  certainty  is  not  marked  with  suflicient 
clearness.  On  the  other  hand,  1  cheerfully  acknowledge  that 
th"  ninth  edition  contains  a  good  many  improvements  in 
matters  of  detail.  In  opposing  my  own  views  to  those  ex- 
I'l-.-ssed  in  the  ninth  edition  nothing  is  more  remote  from 
my  intention  than  personal  controversy.  The  warm  interest 
which  my  revered  teacher,  Professor  Fleischer,  has  taken 
in  the  preparation  of  the  two  last  editions  of  the  dictionary 
excludes  controversy,  in  the  common  sense  of  the  word,  on 
the  part  of  an  attached  pupil.  Xor  am  I  so  unreasonabl> 
to  charge  the  editors  with  having  taken  no  notice  of  results 
which  they  could  not  have  known.  I  opp9se  my  own  view 
in  that  of  the  ninth  edition,  because  Gesenius's  dictionary 
occupies  the  first  and  foremost  place  in  Hebrew  lexicography. 
and  claims  to  represent  the  mental  labour  which  men  of 
different  shades  of  theological  opinion  have  devoted  to  the 
exegesis  of  the  Old  Testament.  I  have  myself  experience^ 
the  greatest  difficulty  in  breaking  through  the  spell  of  idea- 
iml»il>ed  at  an  early  age.  The  disputes  here  raised  are  only 
concerned  with  tacts,  and  for  them  I  am  not  responsible. 
unless  I  be  reproached  for  having  recognised  and  proclaimed 
them  before  the  world.  If,  in  spite  of  these  assertion- 
the  contrary,  this  treatise  should-  still  be  considered  too 
controversial.  1  shall  derive  comfort  from  the  thought,  that 
this  very  character  may  induce  the  advocates  of  the  old 
s\>tem  to  oppose  their  own  views  to  my  statements,  and 


VIII 

thus  to  bring  about  the  establishment  of  truth  which  is  the 
desired  end  of  all  our  efforts. 

The  facts  here  brought  forward  are  of  such  fundamental 
importance,  that  I  shall  be  grateful  for  any  well-founded 
objections  which  may  be  urged  against  them.  They  mate- 
rially change  our  views  of  the  different  degrees  of  affinity 
between  the  Semitic  languages,  and  assign  chiefly  to  Ara- 
bic a  position  quite  different  from  that  which  it  has  hitherto 
occupied.  If  we  take  a  single  Arabic  verb  like  viLU>  as 
compared  with  the  North  Semitic  fbn,  and  consider  the  loss 
sustained  by  Arabic  of  so  many  ancient  Semitic  words  (see 
Dillmann,  Ethiopic  Grammar,  p.  5,  note),  and  the  nu- 
merous inflections  of  late  origin,  we  are  compelled  to  ad- 
mit that  Arabic  cannot  be  the  prototype  of  the  other  Se- 
mitic languages,  least  of  all  of  Hebrew.  This  opinion 
receives  the  fullest  confirmation  from  Assyrian  research.  It 
is,  therefore,  time  to  abandon  the  ordinary  practice  of  forcing 
the  peculiar,  often  late,  meanings  of  the  Arabic  words 
upon  the  much  older  Hebrew  sister.  The  editors  of  the 
last  editions  of  G-esenius's  dictionary  wrill  perhaps  now  agree 
with  me  that  in  future  it  will  no  longer  be  sufficient  to 
patch  some  new  Assyrian  pieces  upon  an  old  cloth,  but 
that  a  thorough  revision  of  every  Hebrew  stem  and  of 
every  Hebrew  word  must  be  effected.  This  salutary  refor- 
mation of  the  Hebrew  dictionary  by  means  of  Assyrian,  so 
far  from  increasing  the  bulk  of  the  lexicon1,  will  save 
much  useful  space  by  the  removaf'of  a  mass  of  erroneous 
statements  and  worthless  speculations. 

The  transfer  of  the  leading  part  in  Hebrew  lexico- 
graphy from  Arabic  to  Assyrian  is,  however,  only  one  point 


1  See  Preface  of  the  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary,  ]>.  I. 


IX 

of  live,  which  justify,  in  my  opinion,  the  compilation  of 
a  new  Hel.rew  dictionary.  The  Hebrew  proper  nanp-- 
occurring  in  the  Old  Testament  require  a  thorough  and 
iv\i-ion  -earcely  im.iirined  by  the  continuator-  of 
>  work.  I  forbear  mentioning  here  a  con>ider- 
able  number  of  Hebrew  post-exilic  names  receiving  the 
mo-t  sati-factnry  explanation  by  the  corresponding  Babylo- 
nian names;  a  number  of  Hebrew  stem-;  and  words  piv— rved 
only  in  proper  names  like  zVw,  rnbnP,  ippb,  C"»p,  rrr. 
nST.  which  obtain  the  most  surprising  light  by  the  A--y- 
rian  lamniaire:  and  the  illustration  of  many  proper  name- 
like  -TP,  rvoijp  by  parallel  names  in  A—  yrian.  But  I  wi-h 
to  draw  particular  attention  to  the  mode  of  naming  the 
children  which  is  airain  a  point  of  essential  agreement  bet- 
ween Habylonian  and  Hebrew.  An  attentive  study  of  the 
-•\eral  thousand  Babylonian  and  Assyrian  proper  nanie- 
cannot  fail  to  sharpen  our  eye  for  a  better  understanding 
of  the  Hebrew  names  of  persons.  I  do  not  mean  here  ex- 
planation- like  bsr-sn,  ''heat  of  god,"  c^crc.  "killer  of 
moth-."  •jirpr,  "perhaps  like  •ptt''Ch  desert,"  "|Trn».  ''brother 
of  the  water.  /.  e.,  dwelling  near  the  water,  or,  perhap-. 
man  of  a  watery  heart.  /.  e.,  a  coward,"  or  bsTE.  "<livine 
>implicity,  if  not  for  bsrrro" — thou-rli  it  seems  to  me  im- 
|io-sible  that  a  child  ever  and  anywhere  could  have  i. 
c.illed  "desert"  or  "divine  simplicity,"  or  that  the  hereditary 
prince  of  the  Hamathites  was  named  '7R  (I  Chron.  xviii.  9). 
nieaiiim:  "madne-."  N,,r  ba\e  I  in  view  the  names  of 
prophetic  import,  which  predict  the  future  station  ami  avo- 
cation of  a  man.  as  snc^p,  which,  according  to  Dietrich, 
means  "line  of  battle  or  general."  an  explanation  by  which 
that  Canaanitic  commander  is  inve-ted  a-  a  li-lple—  infant 
with  the  >tart'  of  militarv  command.  I  rather  refer  to  the 


explanations  of  the  purest  and  most  easy  Hebrew  proper 
names  given  in  Gesenius's  dictionary,  names  like  n^::n. 
rpjflec,  EEEibs.  It  is  no  small  difference  whether  these 

T    :    -     :  '  T    T       •  ••:  t 

names  are  interpreted  with  Gesenius's  dictionary  "Jahve 
is  merciful,"  "Jahve  hears,"  "my  God  judges,"  or,  in  ac- 
cordance with  grammar  and  true  Semitic  thought,  "Jahve 
has  been  gracious,"  "Jahve  has  heard,"  "my  God  has  judged." 
The  interpretations  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  express  divine 
qualities  in  general,  but  the  names  simply  relate  to,  and 
commemorate,  facts  connected  with  the  birth  of  the  child. 
It  is  difficult  to  understand,  how  that  beautiful  and  easy 
department  of  Hebrew  nomenclature  could  have  been  so 
carelessly  treated.  Thus,  nni^b'a  is  rightly  translated  by 
••my  king  is  sublime,"  while  DTS^S  is  wrongly  rendered  "lord 
of  the  height."  The  name  rPT>,  evidently  a  name  like 
r,^"1,  -Sp"!"1  and  others,  could  never  have  meant  "praising 
Jahve."  How  can  the  Qal  rrp  mean  "to  praise"?  Nor 
does  ''3TS  mean  "ear  of  Jahve."  It  has  the  same  meaning 
as  ^EC,  "the  hearing  of  my  prayer,"  -  the  birth  of  the 
child  is  the  divine  fulfilment  of  the  father's  prayers.  I 
assert  with  the  fullest  confidence  that  there  are  scarcely  a 
hundred  Hebrew  proper  names  the  explanation  of  which  in 
Gesenius's  dictionary  do^es  not  challenge  criticism.  It  is 
here  out  of  place  to  seek  an  excuse  by  the  convenient  saying 
Dies  diem  docet,  the  truth  could  here  have  been  seen  main- 
years  ago. 

A  second  and  still  more  serioirS-  point  of  disagreement 
with  Gesenius's  dictionary  is  the  treatment  of  the  roots. 
The  exasperating  consistency  with  which  all  Hebrew  stems 
are  derived  from  a  root  of  two  consonants  and  the  most 
various  meanings  deduced  from  one  common  primary  mean- 
ing, is  open  to  many  serious  objections.  Even  granted 


—      XI      — 

some  ot  the-e  curious  speculations  on  tin-  mean- 
ing attached  to  tin-  Semitic  sounds  arc  rijrht.  they  tin  imt 
•r\e  a  place  in  the  Hebrew  dictionary  itself,  but  ou«:ht 
to  be  separately  dealt  with  in  an  appendix.  Hebrew 
lexicography  in  its  present  state  has  to  supply  desiderata 
of  a  far  more  solid  and  important  character.  A  sharper 
understanding  of  the  Hebrew  stems  themselves  a-  to  their 
-nmidx  and  accurate  meaning  or  shades  of  meanin.i:  i>  e-pe- 
cially  required.  I  cannot  see  any  real  profit  resulting  from 

such  a  Viiurne  tl ry    as  that  of  the   supposed   roots.    The 

eighth  edition  of  Geseniu^>  dictionary  derived  the  word  03T3.. 
"tribute",  from  003,  "to  number,"  the  root  of  which  we 
are  taught  is  03,  "to  cut,  to  separate" ;  counting  is  said  to 
be  separating,  dividing.  The  ninth  edition  has  given  up 
this  explanation;  following  Fleischer,  it  rightly  states  that 
03tt  is  the  stem.  But  Arabic  ^^Joo  means  "to  oppress.  t» 
harm  some  one" ;  how,  then,  could  0313  mean  tribute?  The 
editors  of  the  ninth  edition  enlighten  us  on  the  subject. 
Going  back  to  the  root  of  the  stem,  "pa,  which  is  said  to 
mean  "to  press,  comprimere"  they  state  that  "to  count''  i- 
"to  compress,  nmniro  (ttmpreheiidere" .  0313  is,  therefore. 
"tribute"  as  that  which  is  comprised  in  a  certain  number. 
I  am  at  a  loss  to  see  the  force  of  this  mode  of  etjTnological 
reasoning.  Is  there  any  scientific  value  in  the  conjecture 
that  rtP,  "to  kindle  fire",  may  go  back  to  the  root  nx, 
allied  with  HE,  and  mean  originally  "to  lay  the  fire" ?  Ac- 
cording to  the  preface  of  the  ninth  edition,  the  etymologies 
have  been  carefully  revised  and  that  which  is  certain  has 
lieen  separated,  as  far  a-  pu->ilile.  fn.m  that  which  is  only 
probable.  Nevertheless,  npr  is  still  identified  with  nnc  (for 
the  interchanire  of  p  and  n  r.px.  "thou".  and  the  suffix  1 
are  compared!),  which  iNelf  is  derived  from  the  root  MD, 


XII 

"to  sit  down,"  and  runic,  "to  drink,"  is  stated  to  m< •..,: 
originally  "to  make  the  thirst  sit  down,  sedare  sitim."  Yet. 
in  another  place,  nj?tj  is  again  derived  from  the  root  pTD 
and  is  said  to  be  akin  to  the  other  verbs  *J03,  ppT,  pr^! 
I  could  give  many  more  instances  of  this  kind.  I  think, 
all  these  speculations  upon  the  roots  and  their  vague  mean- 
ings could  be  omitted  without  any  harm  to  the  Hebrew 
dictionary  and  the  enormous  space  saved  by  this  omission 
could  be  turned  to  a  better  and  more  useful  account. 

I  have  not  yet  decided  whether  I  shall  discuss  these 
and  other  points  in  a  special  introduction  or  Prolegomena 
to  a  new  Hebrew  dictionary  or  publish  at  once  my  own 
Hebrew  dictionary  which  I  have  compiled  along  with  my 
A^yrian  dictionary.  In  the  meantime  I  submit  this  treatise 
to  the  judgment  of  Semitic  scholars.  Its  publication  was 
necessary,  because  the  philological  notes  added  in  my  As- 
syrian dictionary  to  every  stem  or  word  will  be  only  under- 
stood in  connexion  with  the  principles  expounded  in  this 
treatise.  I  am  not  bold  enough  to  believe  that,  in  this  first 
attempt,  I  have  shed  light  everywhere  by  the  "wand"  of 
Assyriology.  I  shall  be  satisfied  if  I  have  succeeded  in 
unearthing  from  the  mines  of  Babylonian  and  Assyrian  anti- 
quity some  material  useful  for  a  better  understanding  and 
appreciation  of  the  sacred  records  of  the  Old  Testament. 

London,  October  1883. 

Ffederic  Delitzsch. 


THE 

HEBREW  LANGUAGE 

viewed  in  the  light  of  Assyrian  Research. 

I. 

FEW  departments  of  linguistic  research  have  been  so 
thoroughly  investigated  as  that  of  the  language  of  the  Old 
Testament.  As  a  natural  consequence  of  such  unremitting 
labour,  the  Biblical  books  written  in  that  tongue  are  now 
better  understood  than  perhaps  any  other  sacred  record 
handed  down  to  posterity.  Yet  it  is  a  fact  well  known  to 
every  serious  student  of  the  Old  Testament  that  there  still 
remains  a  large  number  of  passages,  some  of  them  of  the 
highest  importance,  which  have  received  very  divergent  and 
far  from  satisfactory  explanations  at  the  hands  of  commen- 
tators. There  is  likewise  a  long  list  of  single  words  of 
which  the  true  sense  is  quite  uncertain.  We  have  here  in 
view  not  only  the  names  of  some  of  the  animals  specified 
by  the  Levitical  law1;  the  names  of  plants2  and  precious 
stones3;  the  nouns  and  verbs  of  rare  occurrence  and  the 


1  For  in.stain-1-  nt:x. 

1  K  g.  r^itan . 

8  K.  g.  -irr.  : ~. 

Delituch,   Hebrew  and  AMjrikn. 


so-called  a^a$  ASYojisva1,  but  also  verbs  of  frequent  use, 
including  such  as  have  a  number  of  derivatives.2  There 
are,  besides,  certain  grammatical  problems,  whose  true 
solution  has  not  yet  been  found. 

These  difficulties  of  interpretation  are  mainly  due  to  the 
want  of  a  tradition  based  on  a  minute  and  exact  knowledge 
of  Old  Testament  language  and  literature.  Nor  is  it  difficult 
to  see  why  such  a  tradition  is  wanting. 

The  transportation  of  the  ten  tribes  from  Palestine  to 
Mesopotamia  and  Media,  and  the  close  intercourse  of  those 
left  behind  with  people  of  different  nations,  as  the  Elamites, 
Babylonians,  and  Arabs,  who  supplied  the  places  of  the 
exiled  Israelites,  struck  a  deadly  blow  at  the  ancient  lan- 
guage of  the  kingdom  of  Israel.  Nor  was  it  destined  to 
nourish  much  longer  in  the  kingdom  of  Judah.  In  the  year 
701  B.  c.  Sennacherib  carried  away  captive  from  the  moun- 
tain districts  of  Judah  no  less  than  200,150  inhabitants3, 
and  Nebuchadnezzar  afterwards  completed  the  work  com- 
menced by  his  Assyrian  predecessor.  Still,  the  language 
continued  to  live  for  a  time  in  Babylonia,  as  is  amply 
shown  by  the  pure,  classical  Hebrew  of  that  great  national 
prophet  whom  modern  criticism  has  styled  the  "Deutero- 
Isaiah." 

The  termination,  however,  of  the  Babylonian  exile 
marks  the  beginning  of  that  process  by  which  Hebrew  gra- 


1  E.  g.  nbs;  rwalsn,  IOB?  a-i 

*  For  instance  1533,  from  which  1733,  ..heathen  priest",  and 
,,net"  are  derived. 

8  See  Sennacher.  iii.  11  ff.  It  is  difficult  to  understand,  how 
Sennacherib  was  capable  of  transporting  such  a  multitude  after  the 
destruction,  which  his  army  is  reported  to  have  suffered  at  the  hand 
of  the  angel  of  the  Lord. 


<lually  disappeared  from  among  living  languages.  It  is  true 
that  that  small  portion  of  the  nation  who  availed  themselves 
of  the  permission  to  return  to  the  Holy  Land  still  wrote 
and  spoke  Hebrew,  but  the  Aramaic  dialect,  which  had 
been  favoured  by  the  Persian  kings  and  was  almost  regarded 
as  the  official  language  of  the  Western  portion  of  the  Persian 
empire,  had  already  begun  to  bring  its  deteriorating  influence 
to  bear  upon  it,  and,  rapidly  advancing,  was  conquering 
one  portion  of  Palestine  after  the  other.  This  process  con- 
tinued under  the  dominion  of  the  Greeks  and  was  greatly 
hastened  by  the  various  wars  and  revolutions  which  the 
Jewish  nation  experienced  during  that  period.  Hebrew  be- 
came more  and  more  confined  to  the  narrow  circle  of  the 
learned,  in  whose  hands  it  gradually  assumed  the  character 
of  an  artificial  language  and  was  corrupted  by  an  inter- 
mixture of  Aramaic  elements.1  It  was  still  used  for  literary 
purposes  at  the  time  of  Antiochus  Epiphanes  and  the  Macca- 
bees, but  it  had  already  ceased  to  be  a  spoken  language. 
This  is  strikingly  illustrated  by  the  book  of  Daniel  (com- 
posed about  167  B.  c.)  and  the  book  of  Chronicles  (about 
200  B.  c.).  Even  so  erudite  a  Jew  as  the  compiler  of  the 
last-named  work  fails  to  grasp  the  import  of  the  more  diffi- 
cult passages  and  expressions  in  the  older  portions  of  the 
sacred  code  on  which  his  own  work  is  based.  The  learned 
among  the  Jews,  during  the  last  two  centuries  before  Chri.-t. 
even  preferred  to  write  in  Aramaic,  and  at  the  time  of 
Christ  that  dialect  reigned  supreme  as  the  adopted  language 
of  the  country. 

It  is  true  that  the  study  of  their  sacred  language  re- 
mained a  favourite  occupation  among  the  Jews,  who  trans- 


1  See  NOldeko,  Art.  Aram,  in  Schenkel's  BiM-Lfxicon. 

1* 


mitted  their  knowledge  to  succeeding  generations,  but  a 
deeper  understanding  of  the  sacred  text  was  lost.  The 
Greek  translation  of  the  Septuagint,  some  portions  of  which 
date  as  far  back  as  the  third  century  B.  c.,  and  the  so- 
called  Targumim,  or  Aramaic  interpretations,  though  in  some 
respects  valuable  for  the  understanding  of  the  text,  show 
unmistakable  signs  of  an  imperfect  knowledge  of  the  old 
Hebrew  language.  As  Noeldeke  justly  remarks,  "Those 
old  translations  are,  at  the  present  state  of  Biblical  philo- 
logy, not  very  important  for  the  recognition  of  the  true 
sense.  They  rarely  assist,  where  the  usual  philological 
resources  fail,  in  the  explanation  of  difficult  words  and 
passages,  their  translation  being  usually  due  to  a  mere 
guess." l 

Fortunately  another  resource  is  available  which  supplies 
in  some  measure  the  want  of  a  trustworthy  tradition.  We  refer 
to  the  wonderful  aid  afforded  by  the  language  of  the  Old 
Testament  itself  by  means  of  the  context,  parallel  passages, 
and  the  so-called  parallelismus  mcmbrorinn.  The  comparison 


1  ,,Fiir  den  jetzigen  Standpunkt  der  biblischen  Philologie  sind 
jene  Uebersetzungen  zur  Erkenntniss  des  waliren  Sinncs  nicht  beson- 
ders  wichtig.  Man  ist  zu  der  Einsicht  gekommen,  dass  in  den  Fallen, 
wo  tins  die  sonstigen  philologischen  Hulfsmittel  zur  Erklaruug  schwie- 
riger  Worte  und  Stellen  im  Stich  lassen,  die  alten  Uebersetzungen 
selten  fordern,  denn  gewohnlidi  haben  auch  sie  dann  den  Sinn  nur 
errathen."  See  Noldeke,  Alttestamentiiche  'Literatztr,  p.  246.  Even 
among  the  Jews  themselves  the  necessity  was  sometimes  felt  of  going 
beyond  the  traditional  interpretation.  The  illustrious  Abu'l-Walid  often 
applies  the  Arabic  language  to  the  elucidation  of  Hebrew.  The  Karaite 
Jews,  who  naturally  opposed  the  traditional  mode  of  interpretation, 
wrote  chiefly  in  Arabic  and  had  frequently  recourse  to  that  language 
in  explaining  the  sacred  text. 


—     5     — 

of  the  kindred  Semitic  tongues  is  in  this  respect  only  of  a 
secondary  value  and  often  misleading.  And  here  it  must  be 
stated  that  the  indiscreet  use  made  of  the  cognate  dialects, 
and  more  particularly  of  Arabic,  has  blinded  the  eyes  of 
many  distinguished  labourers  in  this  field  against  the  native 
power  of  the  Hebrew  language. 

The  value  of  Arabic  for  Hebrew  lexicography  has  been 
greatly  exaggerated.  It  seems  to  me  that  the  continua- 
tors  of  Gesenius's  great  and  admirable  work  have  fallen 
in  this  respect  into  errors,  against  which  the  original 
compiler  had  wisely  guarded  himself.  The  well-known  fact 
that  the  Arabic  language  has  preserved  in  numerous 
instances  original  forms  of  the  Semitic  idiom  which  are  lost 
in  the  kindred  dialects,  combined  with  the  enormous 
copiousness  of  its  vocabulary,  has  led  to  the  erroneous 
supposition  that  the  same  degree  of  unchanged  originality 
is  to  be  assumed  for  the  meanings  of  the  Arabic  words. 
The  common  practice  of  arbitrarily  forcing  Arabic  meanings 
upon  Hebrew  words  constitutes  a  fundamental  error  of  mo- 
dern Hebrew  lexicography.  A  few  instances  will  suffice  to 
show  the  fatal  consequences  of  this  practice.  Because  Arabic 
J.gv  means  "to  drink"  ("primo  haustu  bibit  camelus"),  the 
same  meaning  is  ascribed  to  Heb.  bn:,  and  the  Piel  bn:  i- 
explained  to  mean  "to  give  to  drink,  to  lead  to  water" — 
in  general,  "to  lead,  guide,  protect"!  We  question  whether 
this  generally  accepted  sense  of  bn:  can  be  entertained  any 
longer.  It  is  plainly  indicated  by  the  jMrdMiMMM  »in»- 
brorum  in  Ps.  xxiii.  2,  and  by  the  parallel  passages 
2  Chron.  xxxii.  22  and  1  Chron.  xxii.  18,  that  bn:  is  a 
synonym  of  ^3^,  "to  lie  down,"  and  ni:,  "to  rest,"  which 
is  further  confirmed  by  the  fact  that  nadlu,  na/jn.  and 
are  the  equivalents  of  the  same  ideogram  in  the 


—     6 

old  Babylonian  bilingual  texts.1  We  therefore  translate  the 
passages  Ps.  xxiii.  2,  "He  maketh  me  to  lie  down  in  green 
pastures,  he  causes  me  to  rest  beside  the  still  waters"; 
2  Chron.  xxxii.  22,  "And  the  Lord  gave  them  rest  on  every 
side"  (as  in  1  Chron.  xxii.  18,  not  "And  guided  them  on 
every  side");  Ex.  xv.  13,  "Thou  in  thy  strength  Irnst  placed 
them  in  safety  in  thy  holy  habitation";  2  Chron.  xxviii.  15, 
"And  put  all  the  feeble  of  them  upon  asses,  and  brought 
them  to  Jericho";  finally,  Gen.  xlvii.  17,  "And  he  (Joseph) 
satisfied  them  with  bread,"  not  "And  he  fed  them  with 
bread"  &c. 

Another  striking  instance  is  afforded  by  the  zoological 
name  D»n  or  D"1^.  We  read  in  Job  xxxix.  9 — 10:  "Will 
the  rem  be  willing  to  serve  thee  or  abide  by  thy  crib? 
Canst  thou  bind  the  rem  with  his  band  in  the  furrow,  or 
will  he  harrow  the  valleys  after  thee?"  What  animal  is 
the  DSp?  It  is  evident  from  the  poet's  words  that  it  must 
be  a  wild  animal,  certainly  one  quite  unfitted  for  the  peace- 
ful labour  of  ploughing  the  field.  The  Authorized  Version 
translates  OSH  by  "unicorn."  But  even  granting  the  existence 
of  such  an  animal,  it  was  surely  never  at  home  in  Palestine. 
Besides,  who  does  not  see  the  obvious  contradiction  involved 
in  the  translation  of  Ps.  xxii.  21,  "For  thou  hast  heard  me 
from  the  horns  [dual  in  Hebrew]  of  the  unicorns,"  where 
more  than  one  horn  is  ascribed  to  the  wm'corn?  The  last 
two  editions  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  explain  OSTl  by  the 
Arabic  <Jy,  Antilope  leucoryx,  although  that  animal  could  never 
have  lived  in  Palestine,  since  its  home  being  in  the  sandy 
wastes  of  Arabia  and  of  the  north-eastern  regions  of 


1  Compare  for  na'dlu  =  rabfifu,  for  instance,   W.  A.  I.  iv.  27,  19 
and  20a  with  17,  51  and  52a.    16  and  17 b. 


Africa.  Besides,  in  spite  of  its  two  spear-shaped  horns,  the 
Antilope  leucoryx  is  known  to  be  an  animal  of  meek  dis- 
position, directly  opposed  to  the  wild,  hostile  nature  ascribed 
to  tin-  DSp.  Gesenius,  guided  by  the parallelismus  membrorwn 
in  passages  like  Deut.  xxxiii.  17,  translates  buffalo;  but  the 
•  \i-tence  of  the  buffalo  in  further  Asia  is  traceable  only  a 
short  time  before  the  Christian  era.  We  know  now,  by  the 
cuneiform  inscriptions  and  the  pictorial  representations  on 
the  Assyrian  sculptures,  that  the  OKI  is  the  Assyrian  rimu, 
that  strong-horned,  fierce-looking  wild  bull,  skilled  in  climb- 
in. ir  the  mountains1,  whose  colossal  and  formidable  likeness 
\\:t>  placed  by  the  Assyrian  kings  before  the  entrance  of 
their  palaces  to  ward  off  and  terrify  the  approaching  enemy.2 
1 1  may  be  expedient  to  mention  here  another  deplorable 
error  of  modern  Hebrew  lexicography,  which  is  centred  in 
the  common  practice  of  representing  the  sense  of  Arabic 
words  as  the  original  meaning  of  their  Hebrew  equivalents, 
even  in  cases  where  each  of  the  two  languages  exhibits  a 
totally  different  usage  of  the  word  in  question.  Thus  Hebrew 
5T  is  explained  by  the  Arabic  c&*,  "to  deposit,"  «.  e.,  to 
deposit  in  the  mind,  to  know3;  TIB,  "to  be  fat," 


1  This  character  of  the  animal  seems  to  be  alluded  to  in  the 
almve.  mentioned  passage:  "will  he  harrow  the  ralleys  after  thee?" 

*  It  may  be  interesting  to  enumerate  here  the  synonyms  of  rfm«: 
1 1  n-hu,  i.  e.  the  quick  one  (Pl*i8t  "to  be  quick'').  2)  p&r*,  originally 
"•strong"  (piyfar,  a  synonym  of  Jcarradu  "strong",  and  probably  pint* 
the  Assyrian  name  of  the  "elefant,"  are  derived  from  the  same  root). 
:<!  tu,  with  its  feminine  form  lit*,  from  the  stem  nxb,  which  is  a 
onmnon  Assyrian  word  fi.r  "tu  be  strong." 

'  (fesenins  in  T/ietaunut,  second  edition,  riphtly  remarks  ».  r.  51": 
"\..n  audiendi  Mint  4111  sciendi  potestatem  apud  Hebraeos  repetant  a 
sc.  in  aniino 


Q 

"to  break,"  i.  e.,  to  be  broken,  to  be  languid,  soft,  fat; 
nbC,  "to  send,"  by  ^JL**»,  "to  skin,"  i.  e.,  to  draw  out,  to 

extend,  to  stretch  out,  to  send;  "ijPflJ,  "to  lie,"  by  CjLi,  ,,to 

be  red,"  /.  e.,  to  redden,  to  paint  red,  to  varnish  the  truth, 
i.  e.,  to  lie;  yea,  we  are  told  that  "IEJ3  means  "to  join,"  and 
is  to  compared  to  the  Arabic  ^S ,  "to  break,"  because 
joining  as  well  as  breaking  may  be  effected  by  striking  one 
object  against  the  other. 

It  must  be  owned  that  these  combinations  do  credit  to 
the  ingenuity  of  their  authors.  Their  plausibility  becomes, 
however,  seriously  impaired  when  we  consider  the  totally 
different  history  of  the  two  languages.  Hebrew  became  a 
literary  language  many  centuries  before  the  Christian  era. 
Arabic  was  not  used  for  literary  purposes  until  the  seventh 
century  of  our  era.  How,  then,  is  it  possible  to  make 
Arabic  the  prototype  of  a  sister  tongue  so  much  older  as 
Hebrew?  Further,  it  must  be  taken  into  account,  that  the 
Aramaic  dialect  and,  in  some  instances,  even  Ethiopic  ex- 
hibit the  same  late  meanings  ascribed  to  Hebrew.  If  we 
admit  that  Arabic  is  the  prototype  of  the  other  Semitic 
languages,  we  cannot  but  conclude,  that  they  have  passed 
side  by  side  through  the  same  phases  of  development  to 
arrive  at  the  same  stage  of  decay  as  to  the  meanings  of 
their  words.  How,  then,  can  we  account  for  the  differences 
of  sound  by  which  one  is  separated  from  the  other?  These 
considerations  alone  suffice  to  shake  our  belief  in  a  system 
of  etymological  research  so  exclusively  based  on  Arabic. 
The  whole  fabric  is,  however,  finally  overturned  by  the  mo- 
numental literature  of  Babylonia  and  Assyria. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  comparison  of  the  kindred  ton- 
gues is  of  inestimable  value  in  the  explanation  of  the  He- 


brew  sounds.  In  this  respect  especially  the  Aramaic  and 
Arabic  dialects  have  done  good  service  in  advancing  Hebrew 
lexicography.  By  their  help  a  rigid  philological  method  was 
for  the  first  time  applied  to  the  treatment  of  the  Hebrew 
roots.  The  comparison  of  the  cognate  dialects  demonstrated 
clearly  that  certain  roots — as  31?  VT*  "to  m^x>"  and  a"^ 
Vr^  "to  enter,  to  set"  (of  the  sun) — which  in  spelling  had 
come  to  be  one  in  Hebrew,  were  originally  distinct  and  of 
entirely  different  etymology.  In  this  respect  Arabic  is  very 
instructive  for  the  roots  containing  one  of  the  gutturals  n 
(h,  h=  .)  and  f  ( ,  g  •==•  e,  e),  and.  combined  with 

Syriac,  for  those  containing  one  of  the  sibilants  TT,  T  and  X. 
It  is  to  be  lamented  that  even  in  the  latest  editions  of 
Gesenius's  dictionary  the  necessity  of  consistently  applying 
this  fundamental  law  of  Hebrew  lexicography  is  not  suffi- 
ciently recognized.  To  quote  a  few  instances,  n:tj,  "year," 
is  still  explained  as  meaning  the  "repetition  of  the  same 
natural  phenomena"  (the  seasons),  and  is  compared  with  the 
Semitic  numeral  for  "two,"  though  the  latter  has  an  original 
i)  vi»-  In  like  manner  TWX,  "woman,"  is  represented,  in 
accordance  with  the  etymology  set  forth  in  Gen.  ii.  23,  as 
the  feminine  form  of  flhfct,  "man,"  though  it  is  clearly  de- 

e. 

rived  from  the  root  vi*it,  "to  be  feeble,"  denoting  the  woman 
as  the  feeble  one,  while  ETK  must  be  referred  to  a  root 
"to  be  strong,"  marking  the  man  as  the  strong  one.1 


1  Another  derivative  of  the  root  3TK  is  "pSTX,  generally  wrongly 
translated  by  "apple  of  the  eye,"  because  occurring  in  passages  liki- 
Dout.  xxxii.  10  ("he  kept  him  as  the  apple  of  his  eye")  in  connexion 
with  115,  "eye."  That  this  translation  is  wrong  is  evident  from  the 
passage  in  Ps.  xvii.  8,  where  we  read  "pSTa  V^SO  ^lati,  whk-h 
liavi-  t<>  !•«•  translated  "Keep  me  as  the  apple  of  the  apple  of 


10 

The  Hebrew '23285,  "finger",  is  still  combined  with    *jue  "to 

dye"  or  "to  dip,"   though   this   combination  is   contradicted 

>-  <>*• 
by   the  Arabic    *JL*C\,   which   has   a   c,   not   a    c.     If  such 

plain  etymologies  fail  to  be  recognised,  what  can  be  ex- 
pected in  cases  of  a  more  intricate  nature,  such  as  the 
stems  ITS  or  TOX? 

The  close  relationship  existing  between  the  several 
Semitic  languages  naturally  causes  each  of  them  to  throw 
light  upon  the  other.  It  was,  therefore,  clear  from  the  very 
first  that  the  Semitic  idiom  of  the  Assyrian  and  Babylonian 
literature,  so  recently  brought  to  light  by  the  excavations 
in  Mesopotamia,  would  prove  a  valuable  help  towards  a 
better  understanding  of  the  Hebrew  language.  It  will  now 
be  our  object  to  show  that  the  language  of  the  cuneiform 
inscriptions  is  a  far  greater  aid  to  the  advancement  of 
Hebrew  philology  than  the  other  cognate  dialets.  Indeed  it 
will  be  seen  that  Assyriology  is  actually  inaugurating  a  new 
era  of  Hebrew  lexicography. 


the  eye,"  for  'pS'Pa  certainly  means  the  apple  of  the  eye  (see  La- 
ment, ii.  18).  And  what  sense  does  this  translation  of  ")'il2''N  yield  in 
passages  like  Prov.  vii.  9,  "In  the  apple  of  the  eye  of  the  black  and 
dark  night"?  The  authors  of  the  Authorized  Version,  rightly  feeling 
the  difficulty,  have  omitted  to  render  'p'ttjix  in  their  translation  of  this 
passage  and  of  Ps.  xvii.  8.  The  true  sense  of  "p^X  has  already  been 
recognized  by  Levy  in  his  dictionary  of  the  Targumim.  It  is  a  syno- 
nym of  D5C5,  meaning  ".strength,"  used  lilip  nxy  in  Ex.  xxiv.  10,  as 
is  further  confirmed  by  the  Assyrian  isunu.  The  above-quoted  pas- 
sages are  therefore  to  be  rendered:  "He  kept  him  as  Ms  own  eye" 
(Deut.  xxxii.  10);  "Keep  me  even  as  the  apple  of  the  eye"  (Ps.  xvii.  8) 
"Seen  in  the  black  and  dark  night"  (Prov.  vii.  9). 


II. 

IN  one  respect  it  was  to  be  expected  that  a  special 
advantage  would  accrue  to  Hebrew  lexicography  from  Assy- 
rian research,  inasmuch  as  the  Babylonian  and  Assyrian 
proper  names  of  persons  and  deities,  and  the  geographical 
and  official  names,  which  are  of  such  frequent  occurrence  in 
the  Old  Testament,  could  only  receive  a  final  and  satis- 
factory explanation  by  the  language  of  the  cuneiform  in- 
scriptions. It  must  be  owned  that  Assyriology  has  fully 
realized  these  expectations.1  We  know  now  the  meaning  of 


1  Of  course,  there  are  still  some  dark  points  requiring  to  be 
cleared  up.  Thus,  the  true  meaning  of  the  names  of  the  god  ^"IXIO 
or  of  the  river  i^^n  has  not  yet  been  settled  with  certainty.  A 
the  name  of  the  goddess  rntTIJS,  we  must  insist  upon  its  non-Semitic 
origin  (see  the  German  edition  of  George  Smith's  Chaldean  Genesis,  p. 273. 
276  f.J.  It-tar  is  a  compound  like  Nam-tar  and  ai-tar;  see  W.  A.  I.  v.  20, 
17  a.  b,  where  the  sign  lal  is  to  be  changed  into  tar.  It  is  clearly  a 
gloiw  showing  that  the  Assyrian  aitartum  (the  name  of  the  fastening 
"t  a  door)  is  borrowed  from  the  non-Semitic  ai  "power"  or  "strength" 
and  tar  "to  fix".  The  only  obscure  point  in  the  name  of  Ittar  is 
the  first  syllable.  The  meaning  "light"  (Unt),  which  George  Smith 
_-ned  to  it,  rests  on  an  erroneous  reading.  The  word  Jitar  had 
l>r<>t>ably  a  rather  general  meaning  such  as  "fate-deciding."  This  is, 
at  least,  suggested  by  the  ideograms  of  two  inferior  deities,  one  ele- 
ment of  which  is  ii-tar  (see  Delitzscli,  Assyritche  Lftegtucke,  2nd  edi- 
tion, p.  46,  1.  51;  p.  47,  1.  53).  The  non-St/niitk-  name  Ittar  passed 


12 

the  names  -of  kings  like  ynn~lDSjj  (Assyr.  Asur-dlj-idilin, 
"Asur  has  given  a  brother")  and  TpTTa  ^8  (Babyl.  Avcl- 
Marduk,  "Man  or  servant  of  Merodach").  We  have  learnt 
that  the  god  Nergal  (blVlD,  Nergal),  whom  the  men  of  Cuth 
made  (see  2  Kings  xvii.  30),  is  the  deity  represented  by  the 
colossal  lions  at  the  entrance  of  the  royal  palaces,  and  that 
his  non-Semitic  name,  Ne-uru-gal,  characterizes  him  as  the 
governor  of  the  "great  city,"  or  the  empire  of  death.1  We 
have  further  been  taught  that  the  true  meaning  of  blD, 
Balnlu  is  not  "confusion,"  as  explained  in  Gen.  xi.  9,  but 
"gate  of  God";  and  we  can  now  prove  that  Jlb3  (Gen.  x.  11), 
the  sister  city  of  Nineveh  and  the  Assyrian  Kalhu,  is  "the 
strong,  firm  city,"  derived  from  the  same  root  as  Heb.  H52 
(see  Job  v.  26  and  xxx.  2).2  Finally,  the  proper  meaning 
of  official  names,  as  1FHI?,  is  now  plainly  seen.  The  com- 
mander-in-chief  of  the  Assyrian  army,  whom  the  books  of 
Kings  call  tartan,  is  the  Assyrian  turtdnu — a  genuine  Se- 
mitic word,  derived  from  turtu,  a  by-form  of  tertu,  which  is 
the  common  Assyrian  word  for  law  or  commandment  (comp. 
Heb.  rn'lH?).  Turtdnu  thus  answers  exactly  to  the  Hebrew 
term  pJJHTQ.  Heb.  «"inB,  the  official  name  of  the  Chaldean 


into  the  Assyrian  language  as  Istdiiu,  which,  at  the  same  time,  became 
a  general  name  of  any  female  deity,  and  was  finally  applied  to  any 
female  being,  especially  to  the  kadi&tu,  fTIJ'lp.  The  Hebrew  n"mJS 
in  ",&«£  ninths  (Dent.  vii.  13;  xxviii.  4.  18.  51)  was  even  used  of  the 
females  of  the  flock  of  sheep  and  goats;  compare  Deut.  vii.  13,  where 
'y  is  clearly  a  synonym  of  "U1ZJ,  which,  ^gain,  is  a  synonym  of  nrn, 
"womb'',  Ex.  xiii.  12. 

1  See  the  German  edition  of  George  Smith's  Chaldean  Genesis, 
p.  275  f. 

8  For  similar  names  like  Purutu,  I"HD,  "Euphrates,"  Kutu,  n*l3, 
SiMS,  "Cuth,"  Ninua,  M^S,  "Nineveh"  see  our  book  entitled  Wo  lag 
das  Paradies?  p.  169  f.  217  f.  260. 


—     13     — 

prefects,  wliu  were  at  the  same  time  military  governors,  is 
the  Babylonian  pahritu  or  piftutu,  originally  a  portione<l-off 
district  or  province  (derived  from  Assyrian  paljii,  "to  «hut, 
to  enclose"),  afterwards  the  governor  (bel  pafaiti)  himself. 
The  ngttin  (Is.  xxxvi.  2;  2  Kings  xviii.  17),  who  com- 
manded the  Assyrian  army  dispatched  by  Sennacherib 
against  Hezekiah  of  Judah,  is  not  the  chief  butler,  an  offi- 
cial little  fitted  to  command  a  military  expedition;  he  is  the 
Assyrian  rab-hlkf.  or  rab&uk,  the  "chief  of  the  officers,"  the 
colonel.  The  Hebrew  0^5353  has  long  been  compared  with 
the  Assyrian  Saknuti,  lit.  "the  appointed"  and  especially 
"the  vicegerents."  The  Assyrian  jfaknti  is  a  synonym  of 
ScUaf  (lablD),  "governor."  The  softening  of  the  1  to  a  is  pro- 
bably due  to  the  influence  of  the  lingual.  Further,  the 
Hebrew  "IOBE  is  the  "scribe,"  Assyr.  tupSarru  (for  t,  not  d, 
see  our  Assyrisclte  Lesestucke,  p.  60,  1.  38).  This  meaning 
suits  admirably  in  the  passage  Nah.  iii.  17  and  gives  at 
least  a  satisfactory  sense  in  Jer.  Li.  27.  The  "IDEE,  who 
shall  be  appointed  against  Babylon,  is  the  scribe  who 
registers  the  different  objects  of  the  booty  after  the  capture 
of  the  city. 

I  conclude  this  list1  by  a  few  remarks  on  the  etymo- 
logy of  yo.  Several  attempts  have  been  made  to  explain 
this  name  of  the  312  or  "Magi,"  its  true  etymology  being 
expected  to  throw  light  on  the  origin  of  the  magic  arts  and 
tin  nationality  of  the  old  Medians,  one  of  whose  tribes  is 
railed  MO'YOI  by  Herodotus.  Some  scholars  have  tried  to 
explain  the  name  by  an  Aryan  etymology,  while  others 


1  The  meaning  and  etymology  of  the  difficult  word  ixifl  (I)an.  i. 
II.  Iti i  have  been  for  the  first  time  satisfactorily  explained  in  Libri 
Daniel  it,  Ezrat  ft  Nehtwiae  ed.  S.  Baer  |L;|.-i  >  .  xi. 


14 

maintain  its  Semitic  origin.1  It  is  difficult  to  conceive  how 
the  true  origin  of  that  name  could  have  remained  so  long 
undiscovered.  The  passage  (Jer.  xxxix.  3)  which  describes 
the  31Q~11  entering  Jerusalem  together  with  the  other  dig- 
nitaries of  Nebuchadnezzar,  and  the  well-known  fact  that 
Babylonia  is  the  home  of  magic  arts,  point  alike  to  the 
Babylonian  origin  of  the  name.  Nor  are  the  cuneiform  in- 
scriptions deficient  in  evidence  of  such  origin.  The  Assyrian 
nidhu  is  a  synonym  of  a$ipu,  "sorcerer,"2  and  a  text  of 
Asurbanipal's  published  by  George  Smith3  mentions  the 
interpretation  of  dream-visions  as  the  particular  business  of 
the  make.  The  Sumerian  form  of  the  word  is  magha,  which 
has  passed  into  Babylonian  in  the  form  mdhu,  "the  right 
reverend,"  a  name  respectfully  applied  to  the  Magi  by  the 
credulity  of  the  people.  This  etymology,  if  accepted,  furnishes 
a  remarkable  proof  that  the  Hebrew  3  in  3E  had  the  ad- 
spirated  prononciation. 

Passing  over  a  host  ot  successful  interpretations  of 
similar  names,  we  may  here  be  permitted  to  make  a  few 
remarks  on  the  Hebrew  names  of  the  months,  which  the 
Jews  borrowed  from  the  Babylonians  during  the  time  of 
their  exile.  It  is  indeed  fortunate  that  the  Semitic  origin 
of  the  names  •}0^3,  1*8,  &c.,  which  the  Jews  have  kept  to 

1  Compare  Schrader,   Die  Keilinschriften   und  das  Alte  Testament, 
2nd  edition  (1883),    p.  417—421.     Schrader's  explanation  of  the  word 
3T3  by  the  Babylonian  emlfv.,  Smgu  "wisei1^  (pT35)  has  linguistic  grounds 
against  it. 

2  Comp.  W.  A.  /.  ii.  32,  19  with  51,  49,  and  v.  23,  46.    According 
to  these  passages  mah-hu-u  is  a  synonym  of  e$-$e'-pu-u  (esepd)  and  dsipu 
(C]1Efct).     Observe  further  the  passage    W.   A.   I.  ii.  31    No.  5    col.  ii, 
where  the  name  of  maM  is  placed  next  to  the  ideograms  of  the  sor- 
cerers and  the  priests. 

3  History  of  Asurbanipal,  p.  128,  95. 


—     15     — 

the  present  time,  is  now  established,  and  that  the  far-fetched 
etymologies  from  the  Sanskrit  and  the  Persian  may  at  last 
be  dispensed  with.  It  is,  however,  equally  wrong  to  explain 
these  Semitic  names  by  the  Hebrew  or  even  by  the  Arabic 
language,  and  to  do  so  partly  in  a  manner  which  defies  all 
principles  of  sound  etymology.  Thus,  fir:  is  explained  as 
the  "budding  month,"  and  compared  with  Heb.  72,  "bud, 
flower."  It  appears  that  Hebrew  lexicography  in  its  present 
state  has  not  yet  recognized  the  absolute  necessity  of  ex- 
plaining Babylonian  words  according  to  the  spirit,  and  by 
the  laws  of  formation  and  the  vocabulary,  of  the  Babylonian 
language.  Thus  "jC^  (in  Babylonian  Nisdnu),  the  name  of 
the  first  month,  means  undoubtedly  "start,  beginning"  (from 
;</.-•//  =  Heb.  702),  which  is  also  the  meaning  of  "HflJPl  (in 
Babylonian  TiSrltu),  the  first  month  of  the  second  half  of  the 
year.  T^S  (Bab.  Aim-,  Am)  signifies  the  bright  month,  while 
IIS  (Bab.  Addant= February — March)  is  the  dull,  gloomy 
month1,  the  time  from  February  till  March  being  particu- 
larly rainy  in  Babylonia.  The  rainy  season  commences  in 
P3I3  (December — January),  the  month  of  rain-showers  ac- 
cording to  Sennacherib's  graphic  description8,  for  Babylonian 


1  The  small  fragment  of  a  vocabulary  which  is  one  of  the  few 
Assyrian  relics  preserved  at  Zurich  is  of  great  importance  to  the  mean- 
ing of  the  word  adnrv.  According  to  this  tablet  the  word  is  used  of 
the  darkening  of  the  moon  by  clouds  as  well  as  of  a  solar  eclipse. 
The  corresponding  non-Semitic  word  is  kern  (see  Assyritche  Lcsettiickt, 
2nd  edition,  p.  58,  1.  21.  22),  meaning  also  "cloud"  (urpitu);  the 
Sumerian  people  called  the  month  of  Kislev  Hi  kankana  as  the 
"cloudy"  month. 

*  See  Sennach.  iv.  75  ff.  Sennaeh.  Const.  42  f.  Sennacherib  is 
deterred  from  the  pursuit  ot'  the  Elamite  king  Kudur-Xachundu  by  the 
"fury"  (raggv)  of  the  torrents  coming  down  from  the  Elamitc  moun- 
tains, in  the  month  of  Tebet 


16 

Ti'l'ftu  means  .the  "sinking  in  water"  (from  ftM=Heb.  37212). 
The  devastation  of  nature  occasioned  by  the  incessant  rains 
(zunne  $a  zunne)  and  inundations  of  the  month  of  Tebet 
culminates  in  the  month,  of  I31TJ3,  Sabutu ,  where  the  fury  of 
the  weather  reaches  its  highest  pitch.  This  circumstance 
justifies  the  name  Sabutu,  by  which  the  month  is  characte- 
rized as  the  "destroying"  one.1  In  like  manner  are  almost 
all  the  other  names  most  satisfactorily  explained  by  the 
language  of  the  people  who  first  framed  them.2 

The  three  Babylonian  local  names  compounded  with 
bp,  "hill"— namely,  a^as  bp.  (Ezek.  iii.  15),  NTCnn  bp,  and 
nbtS  bp  (Ezra  ii.  59;  Neh.  vii.  61)  —  are  remarkable  in- 
stances of  the  danger  attending  the  rash  explanation  of  such 
Babylonian  names  by  Hebrew.  It  would  be  easy  to  prove 
that  those  words  cannot  mean  in  Babylonian  corn-hill,  for- 
est-hill, and  salt-hill.  The  Babyl.  TD^M  never  means  "forest"; 


1  For  the  Assyrian  stem  sdbdtu  see  p.  46.     According  to  his  an- 
nals   (W.  A.  I.  iii.  15,   col.  i.  14),   Esarhaddon    received    the    intelli- 
gence of  the  murder  of  his  father  Sennacherib  in  the  month  of  Shebat, 
while   he  was    stationed  in  the    vicinity  of   Melitene.     It  is    expressly 
mentioned  that  his  hasty  return  to  Nineveh  was  not  stopped  by  the 
"fury  of  the  storm." 

2  The  months  of  •p£JPH33  (Bab.  arah  sdmna,  "the  eighth  month") 
and  of  Man  (Bab.  Dtt'uzu,  "the  month  of  the  god  Tammuz")  need  no 
further   commentary.      The   third  month,    Sivdnu    Cp^O),    is    explained 
W.  A.  I.  ii.  32    as    the  appointed  time  ^rom  admu,   DID).     According 
to    the    cylinder-inscription    of    king    Sargon    (see  Lyon,    KeilscJn-iff- 
texte  Sargons,   Leipzig  1883,  p.  9,   1.  58)  it  is  the    season    appointed 
by  divine  authority  for  the  making  of  bricks   and    the  laying   of   the 
foundation  of  houses  and  cities,  its  heat  being  particularly  favourable 
to   this  kind   of  work.     The   meaning  of  2X   is  less  evident.     It  may, 
however,  be  conjectured,  that  it  is  the  Assyr.  dbu,  "hostile,"  an  appel- 
lation fully  justified  by  the  excessive  heat  of  this  month. 


17 

in  the  numberless  passages  where  it  occurs  it  has  invariably 
the  meaning  of  "mountain-ridge."  The  translation  "forest- 
hill,"  current  in  most  Assyriological  publications,  is  founded 
on  a  wrong  etymology.1 

These  illustrations,  which  could  be  easily  multiplied, 
must  suffice  for  the  present.  Important  as  they  are,  they 
are  nevertheless  of  a  more  subordinate  character.  For  in  all 
these  respects  Assyriology  does  only  the  same  service  to 
the  Old  Testament  as  Egyptology  has  done  for  Egyptian 
proper  names,  though  the  latter  are  far  inferior  in  number. 
The  importance  of  Assyriology  to  Hebrew  lexicography  is 
<>1  a  far  more  solid  and  comprehensive  character. 


1  It  cannot  be  denied  that  the  Heb.  Ci'n  mean*  "forest".  Both 
meanings,  "forest"  and  "mountain-ridge,"  may,  however,  easily  be  de- 
rived from  the  stem  C">n  as  explained  in  W.  A.  1.  v.  18.  Even 
in  some  passages  of  the  Old  Testament  the  meaning  "mountain- 
ridge"  is  far  preferable  to  that  of  "forest."  Comp.  1  Sam.  xxiii.  14 
with  verse  15,  where  "IH2  and  ntinna  exchange  places,  and  especially 
v.  19,  where  r'lTMJ  are  mentioned  as  being  PiB^ha.  The  most  in- 
-trurtiv  passage,  however,  is  2  Chron.  xxvii.  4.  The  Authorized  Ver- 
-i..n  translates:  "Moreover  he  built  cities  in  the  mountains  of  Ju-lali, 
and  in  the  forents  ho  built  castles  and  towers,"  but  the  proper  site  of 
castles  and  towers,  which  are  built  for  the  defence  of  the  country,  is 
not  the  forest,  but  the  top  of  the  mountain,  whence  the  approach  of 
the  enemy  can  be  espied. 


Uelituch,  Hebrew  »ud  AwyrUn 


III. 

THERE  may  be  a  diversity  of  opinion  about  the  exact 
position  which  the  old  language  of  Babylonia  and  Assyria 
occupies  among  the  Semitic  sister  tongues,  but  this  much  is 
certain,  that  it  is  more  closely  allied  to  the  so-called  North 
Semitic  or  the  Canaanitic  and  Aramaic  dialects  than  to  the 
South  Semitic  or  the  Arabic  and  Ethiopian  languages.  It 
is  true  that  Assyrian  exhibits  in  some  respects — as  in  the 
sibilants,  the  careless  treatment  of  the  gutturals  X,  H,  n, 
and  y,  and  some  other  striking  points  of  agreement  in 
grammar  as  well  as  vocabulary1 — a  great  family  likeness 
to  its  Ethiopian  sister,  but  these  points  of  similarity  are 
either  remnants  of  that  time  when  the  great  Semitic  idiom 
had  not  yet  split  into  dialects  or  linguistic  phenomena  due 
to  similar  causes.  It  would  certainly  be  rash  to  build  upon 
them  the  hypothesis  of  a  closer  affinity  between  the  two 
languages,  which  is  amply  disproved  by  the  want  in  Assy- 
rian of  the  inner  plural  formation  and  the  peculiar  vocabu- 
lary of  Ethiopic.  It  is  an  undisputed  fact,  on  the  other 
hand,  that  the  Assyrian  language  bears  a  strong  resemblance 
to  Hebrew.  The  sibilants  are  the  same  in  both  languages. 


1  Comp.   for  instance    ^ftftJM,    Assyr.  Jcisddu,  "neck"; 
Assyr.  haldkv,  "to  perish";    'Pj&I,   Assyr.  md'tt,  "praepollere." 


—     19     — 

Compare  Assyrian  iuru,  "ox,"  and  fafnt,  "gazelle,"  with 
Hebrew  Sor  and  fetAn,  and  contrast  these  words  with  Arabic 
Ijmr,  ;(M,  and  Aramaic  taurd,  fabyd.  Turning  to  grammar, 
we  find  in  Assyrian,  as  in  Hebrew,  andku,  "I"  CpiK),  the 
conjunctions  DK  and  ^fet,  and  the  adverbial  formations  in 
C,  as  annama,  "in  vain,"  Heb.  Din;  pitlnia,  "suddenly." 
Heb.  Dfcr.B;  miiidma,  "by  night,"  compare  Heb.  DITP,  "by 
•  lay."1  The  use  of  the  tenses  is  likewise  analogous.  Heb. 
bi3p^,  with  preceding  O,  TS,  and  0")O,  is  used  in  the  same 
aoristic  sense  as  in  Assyrian,  and  the  Nifal  is  the  passive 
voice  in  Hebrew  as  its  corresponding  form  is  in  Assyrian. 
The  resemblance  is,  however,  actually  overwhelming  when 
we  come  to  compare  the  vocabulary  of  the  two  languages. 
Leaving  aside  such  words  as  "'RtiJ?,  "one,"  Assyrian  i&ten, 
in  the  known  numeral  for  "eleven,"2  which  were  partly 
borrowed  by  the  Jews  during  the  Babylonian  exile,  I  pro- 
pose to  include  in  the  following  list  only  words  which  form 
part,  as  it  were,  of  the  original  stock-in-trade  of  the  lan- 
guage: such  are  ilu,  "God";  dibu  or  dbu,  "enemy";  aljnt, 
"ox";  amSatu,  "eve,  yesterday";  asdpu,  "to  gather";  eril»i. 
"locust";  ardru,  "to  curse";  ere&u,  "to  betroth"  (ereiu, 
"bridegroom";  erelttu,  "bride");  tipatu,  "quiver";  n&£uru, 
"to  cause  to  prosper";  itimdfi,  tinutli,  "yesterday";  bdmdtf, 
"high  places";  dddu,  "the  beloved";  dudu,  "basket";  daltu, 


1  These  Assyrian  adverbs  ending  in  ma  decide  for  ever  the* 
question  as  to  the  origin  of  the  Heb.  Q-f-  in  O'ST',  O^"n,  &c.  For  the 
former  explanations  comp.  Stade,  Lehrlwh  der  htbraitckt*  Qi-ammatik^ 
p.  175. 

1  "lis^n^y  oi-cure  eighteen  times  in  the  Old  Testament,  vii., 
eleven  times  in  the  exilic  or  post-exilic  books,  and  six  times  in  Exodus 
and  Numbers  in  passages  forming  part  of  the  so-called  "C  >dex  of  the 
Priests";  the  sole  remaining  instance  being  in  Deut.  L  3. 

2* 


20 

"door";  eru,  "to  be  pregnant";  harddu,  "to  tremble";  Ini- 
raxu,  "gold";  tatapu,  "to  encircle"  (comp.  rnsttit:);  yduni, 
yam,  "river";  yasdru,  "to  form";  kalutu,  syn.  unutu,  "ves- 
sel"; bit  ki-li,1  "prison"  (Heb.  xbs  ma);  kiru,  "cistern"; 
kiretu,  "banquet";  kalapu,  Piel,  "to  bewitch";  litu  (i.  e.  nnb), 
"to  keep",  e.g.  clothes  (comp.  Heb.  nnp.b'S,  "wardrobe"); 
mt'kaltu  (If.  A.  I.  ii.  38, 19),  "brook"  (comp.  bs^ti,  2  Sam.  xvii. 
20);  marUj  "to  be  fat";  nidbu,  nindabu,  "freewill  offering"; 

,  "progeny";  nasiku,  "prince";  ndkidu,  "shepherd"; 
,  "property";  sapadu,  "to  mourn";  sardru,  "to  be 
refractory";  ddu,  "time"  (Heb.  "hy);  eru,  "city";  erpitu, 
"cloud"  (comp.  D'1£i'|1l5'i) ;  pdnu,  "face";  siibbu,  "waggon"; 
kakkadu,  "crown  of  the  head";  kirbu,  "middle";  rapu,  "to 
heal";  su'dlu,  "Hades"  (Heb.  blSTC);  Sarru,  "prince";  Sardpu, 
"to  burn";  Sahalu,  "to  roar";  stru,  "flesh";  saldlu,  "to  lead 
captive";  Saldpu,  "to  draw,"  e.  g. ,  the  sword;  Sapdtu,  "to 
judge";  SurSu,  "root,  offshoot";  tdru,  "to  turn."  Were  I  to 
aim  at  anything  like  completeness,  this  list  would  be  found 
to  comprise  almost  every  single  root  in  Hebrew,  and  to  in- 
clude even  peculiar  Hebrew  phrases,  such  as  ^HD  5Bt3,  in 
Assyrian  tapdlu  taskirti,  "to  invent  a  lie";  "P  X572,  in  Assy- 
rian mullu  kdtd,  "to  fill  the  hand  of  one,"  /.  e.}  to  invest  one 
with  an  office.  As  has  been  recently  shown  by  Franz  De- 
litzsch,  the  words  of  the  sacerdotal  benediction  (Num.  vi.  26) 
"The  Lord  lift  up  his  countenance  upon  thee  and  give  thee 
peace,"  receive  a  new  significance  from  the  common  Assyrian 
phrase  "to  lift  up  one's  face,  one's  e^es  to  any  one,"  L  e., 
to  bestow  one's  love  upon  any  one.2 

Of  course,   though  intimately  connected,   Assyrian  and 


1  W.  A.  I.  i.  27  No.  2,  36. 

2  See  Zfifwfirift  f'iir  Jcii-chl.  Wiss.   u.  Leben,   Lfiji/icr   18S2.  p.  125. 


II 

Hebrew  are  l>y  n<>  mean-  identical.  Assyrian  ha.«.  like 
Ilrhrew,  peculiarities  of  its  own,  due  chiefly  to  the  fact 
that  it  became  a  literary  language  at  an  earlier  period 
than  any  of  its  Semitic  sister  tongues  (about  3000  B.  c.). 
W'-  refer  here  especially  to  the  want  of  the  article  and 
to  the  rare  use  of  the  prepositions  3  and  b,  ba  and  la. 
which  in  Ass)Tian  is  restricted  to  the  combinations  Imsii 
and  lapani.  On  the  other  hand,  Hebrew  must  have 
undergone  some  changes  before  it  was  fixed  in  literature. 
All  these  peculiarities,  however,  do  not  loosen  the  ties  of 
intimate  relationship  by  which  it  is  bound  to  its  Hebrew 
sister. 

Nor  is  it  difficult  to  see  the  reason  of  such  intimate 
relationship.  The  striking  similarity,  both  in  grammar  and 
vocabulary,  which  the  Assyrian  and  Babylonian  langua.'- 
bears  to  Hebrew  is  a  natural  consequence  of  the  fact  that 
the  Babylonian  and  Hebrew  peoples  at  one  time  dwelt 
together  in  long  continued  and  close  intercourse.  The  sub- 
sequent emigration  of  the  latter  to  Palestine  was  not  calcu- 
lated to  exert  an  alienating  influence  on  their  language,  as 
the  original  inhabitants  of  that  country  spoke  a  tongue  not 
entirely  foreign,  and  the  external  conditions  of  life  were 
very  nearly  the  same  in  Palestine  as  in  their  original  home. 
All  these  circumstances  prove  that  Assyriology  is  destined 
to  play  a  most  important  part  in  the  history  of  Hebrew 
lexicography. 


IV. 

BEFORE  considering  the  various  advantages  resulting  to 
the  understanding  of  the  Old  Testament  from  this  intimate 
relationship  between  Assyrian  and  Hebrew  it  may  be  appro- 
priate to  mention  here  an  accidental  merit  of  Assyriology 
which,  though  secondary,  is  of  very  high  value.  The  pos- 
session of  literary  documents  dating  from  periods  of  the 
Babylonian  and  Assyrian  empire  the  most  varying  in  time 
is  certainly  no  small  privilege  of  Assyriology.  By  the  help  of 
these  authentic  documents  the  origin  of  many  hitherto  doubtful 
Hebrew  words  has  been  explained,  and  a  wholesome  check 
has  been  put  on  the  pernicious  practice  of  forcing  foreign 
etymologies  upon  genuine  Semitic  words.  I  am  referring 
here  to  those  Hebrew  words  concerning  which  great  uncer- 
tainty exists  whether  they  are  Semitic  or  borrowed  from  the 
Persian  or  Greek.  Thus  n^PSt,  "fortress  or  castle,"  applied 
to  the  castle  of  Susa  in  the  book  of  Esther,  is  explained 
in  the  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  by  the  Persian 
bdru,  "wall  or  fortress,"  and  the  Greek  {3<xpt<;.  Now  birlu, 
"castle,"  is  often  to  be  met  with  in  the  inscriptions  of 
Shalmaneser  II  (860 — 824  B.  c.),  as  in  the  black  obelisk, 
1.  34,  and  occurs  about  twenty  times  in  the  annals  of  Ti- 
glath-pileser  II,  Sargon,  and  Sennacherib.  It  is,  moreover, 


—     23     — 

mentioned  in  the  dictionaries  of  the  royal  library  of  Nine- 
veh as  a  synonym  of  fjdlxii.  "fortification,"  or  "fortified  place, 
fortress."  Compare  rait  birti  and  rob  hul.su.  both  meaning 
"governor  of  a  fortress."  The  Semitic  origin  of  the  word 
is,  therefore,  no  longer  doubtful.1  Again,  rn$K,  "letter,"  in 
the  post-exilic  books,  the  usual  term  applied  to  official  cor- 
iv-pondence  or  decrees  issued  by  the  king,  is  not  derived 
from  the  Persian  eiu/arMen,  "to  write."  It  is  a  Semitic 
word,  as  is  proved  by  the  Assyrian  fyirtu.)  the  name 
given  to  an  official  letter  addressed  by  an  Assyrian  officer 
stationed  in  the  city  of  Erech  to  "the  king,  his  lord," 
probably  king  Esarhaddon.2  We  meet  with  the  word  also 
elsewhere,  as  in  the  lists  of  synonyms,  where  tipirtu, 
"missive,"  is  mentioned  as  a  synonym  of  egirtu  (see 
W.  A.  I.  v.  32,  5—7).  There  is  little  doubt  that  these 
and  similar  words  are  of  a  late  date  in  Hebrew,  but 


1  As  a  Babylonian  word,  l.irtu  demands  of  course  a  Babylonian 
etymology.  It  would,  therefore,  be  wrong  to  connect  the  word  with  a 
root  11:.  The  Babylonian  and  Assyrian  birtu,  which  passed  into  Hebrew 
under  the  form  rvya,  must  be  referred  to  the  common  Assyrian  root 
ianJ  "to  bind'  (a  synonym  of  rakdsu),  from  which  birttu  "bond"  or 
"fetters"  is  derived.  Birtu  denotes  a  strong  fortification  and  is  espe- 
cially applied  to  a  castle.  Compare  the  passage  Khors.  139:  Ularlri* 
lirtam  "I  caused  a  fortress  to  be  built,"  where  uiarlrit  literally 
means  "I  caused  to  be  joined  together."  The  Hebrew  D'tja")  "mounds 
of  earth"  or  "hills,"  from  D3*i  "to  bind,"  has  an  exact  equivalent  in 
the  Assyrian  >>i,-iif<>  "hills,"  from  barA  "to  bind."  Sddd  u  biruti  "moun- 
tain and  hills"  is  a  phrase  of  frequent  occurrence  in  the  inscriptions, 
see  Sennach.  Rass.  87.  The  Assyrian  half*,  "stronghold,"  a  synonym 
«.t  liirtu,  and  the  Hebrew  f&n,  "armed"  and  B^n,  "loins"  are  de- 
rived from  the  root  ybn  "to  be  strong",  which  in  both  dialects  is 
distinct  from  the  root  ^D,  Assyr.  fraMfu,  "to  pluck  out" 

1  See   W.  A.  I.  iv.  54  No.  2. 


—     24     — 

we  need  not-  therefore  have  recourse  to  Persian  or  Greek 
etymologies.  Words  that  occur  on  the  tablets  of  Asurbani- 
pal's  royal  library  are  exempt  from  the  charge  of  such 
origin. l 

As  to  some  other  Hebrew  words,  their  foreign  origin 
is  disproved  by  their  mere  occurrence  in  Assyrian.  It  is 
scarcely  credible  that  the  ninth  edition  of  Geseuius's  dictio- 
nary still  doubts  the  Semitic  origin  of  ^iX,  "ship,"  and  ad- 


1  The  light  we  gain  in  this  respect  from  the  cuneiform  inscrip- 
tions is  not  confined  to  Hebrew;  it  extends  to  Semitic  lexicography  in 
general.  A  considerable  number  of  Targumic  and  Talmudic  words, 
which  Levy  derives  from  the  Greek  in  his  dictionaries,  occur  in  the 
Assyrian  and  Babylonian  language,  some  in  the  very  oldest  documents. 
xblSX,  "city  gate";  XJfiOX,  "north  wind";  XB"J,  "board,  plank";  XIQIQ 
or  XJO^G,  "sign,"  O^X,  "overseeer"  or  "watchman,"  which  have  been 
too  rashly  explained  by  the  Greek  dfx^oXTj,  o&svoj,  odreoov,  ofjjAa  and 
oirj[Aeiov,  oupo?,  have  their  ancient  Assyrian  equivalents  in  abulu,  istrini<. 
dappu,  simtu,  svmdnu  and  urdsu  (for  the  latter  word  see  Asurn.  ii.  90. 
100).  The  Aramaic  laftd,  "carrot,"  which,  in  spite  of  its  genuine 
Semitic  type  (from  nsV,  "to  wind"),  has  been  derived  from  the  Greek 
paz-j;,  occurs  in  the  form  lapti  in  a  small  Babylonian'tablet  containing 
about  seventy  names  of  plants,  which  the  Babylonian  king  Marduk- 
bal-iddina  ordered  to  be  set  in  certain  sections  of  his  garden  (ganndti). 
Among  the  plants  there  enumerated  we  find  also  such  names  as  buklu. 
yarkanu,  "vegetables,"  ku-uk-ka-ni-tum,  i.  e.,  kukdnitu  (from  an  Assyrian 
stem  pip,  synonymous  with  sahdru  and  lapdtu,  "to  wind"  comp.  tlip 
well-known  "I'^p^p  in  the  book  of  Jonah),  lisdn  kalbti,  (comp.  Arabic 

_JUCM  -jL**J)>  and  pikkuti  (nsnpQ).  !%en  words  the  foreign  ety- 
mology of  which  seemed  to  be  tolerably  certain  have  vindicated  their 

t>  ^  "i 
Semitic  character.    Thus  the  Aramaic  "p"nx,  poj?],  "chamber,"  which 

is  generally  compared  to  the  Persian  ender&n,  is  proved  to  be  Semitir 
by  the  Assyrian  idrdnu,  "dark  chamber"  or  "room,"  derived  from  11N, 
"to  be  dark";  comp.  Addaru,  "the  dark  month,"  in  chapter  ii. 


mils  the  possibility  of  an  Egyptian  etymology.  All  doubt 
IB  removed  by  the  Assyrian  uniitu,  pi.  nnati,  "utensil,  vessel," 
a  synonym  of  kalu,  kaKttu,  Hebrew  ibs,  "vessel,"  also  "boat," 
as  in  Is.  xviii.  2.  If  we  except  the  geographical  names 
and  the  proper  names,  including  the  title  Pharaoh,  there  is 
hardly  a  single  word  of  certain  Egyptian  origin  to  be  found 
in  the  vocabulary  of  the  old  Hebrew  language.1  The  word 
of  which  the  Egyptian  origin  seemed  to  be  most  certain  is 
the  well-known  IJpSS  in  Gen.  xli.  43,  of  which  there  are 
about  ten  different  explanations  from  the  old  Egyptian  and 
Coptic  languages,  the  most  plausible  of  them  being  Ben- 
fey's  a-bor-k,  "fall  down."  It  ought  not  to  be  forgotten, 
however,  that  this  word,  called  out  before  Joseph  riding  in 
the  royal  chariot  and  adorned  with  all  the  insignia  of  a 
grand  vizier,  might  just  as  well  be  his  title,  as  is,  indeed, 
the  opinion  of  many  ancient  and  modern  translators,  who 
render  it,  like  Luther  in  the  last  edition  of  his  version  (is- 
sued 1545),  " Landesvater"  (pater  tenerrimus,  T%  patriae,  in 


1  Kven  lio,  "river"  or  "channel,"  which  is  commonly  regarded 
as  an  Egyptian  word  and  explained  by  the  Egyptian  aur  "Nile,"  is  un- 
doubtedly a  genuine  Hebrew  word.  This  opinion  is  supported  hy  the 
passage  Job  xxv'iii.  10,  where  D^SO  means  "fountains  in  the  rocks"  or, 
according  to  some  commentators,  "subterraneous  passages  hewn  out  in 
tin-  rocks."  See  also  my  remarks  in  Paradiet,  p.  312.  The  Assyrian 
form  of  the  word,  ya'ilrS  "streams,"  occurs  in  an  inscription  of  Raman- 
nirari  I  (c.  1320  B.  C.).  Another  derivative  of  the  same  root  1JO  or 
IX',  which  I  believe  means  "to  send,"  may  be  seen  in  the  large  in- 
scription of  Nebuchadnezzar  (col.  vi.  46),  where  the  vast  ocean 
ti'iimfu  gallatu,  is  called  ya-ar-ri,  i.  e.,  ydri  marti  "the  bitter  stream" 
on  account  of  its  salt-water.  The  Hebrew  name  of  the  Nile,  "X^  i  A>- 
syr.  Yaru-'u-v),  is  probably  an  adaptation  of  the  Egyptian  word  to  the 
good  .Semitic  name  for  "stream,"  yo'iirw,  y«rw,  ~X" 


26     — 

the  Enarrationes).  Luther  comments  on  the  word  as  fol- 
lows: "As  for  the  meaning  of  abreck,  we  will  let  the 
grumblers  search  till  doomsday.  Let  us  meanwhile  understand 
it  as  we  have  rendered  it  in  German." l  We  will  not  grumble 
about  this  word  nor  try  to  increase  the  number  of  hypo- 
theses, but  no  one  can  expect  us  to  break  our  Assyrian 
tablets  and  shut  our  eyes  intentionally  against  the  light.  It 
is  a  fact  which,  in  spite  of  Schrader  ( Keilinschriften  und 
das  AUe  Testament,  p.  152),  cannot  be  disputed,  that 
abarakku  is  the  Assyrian  name  of  the  grand  vizier,  that 
high  official  who  holds  also  the  office  of  eponym,  and, 
together  with  the  turtan,  is  the  highest  dignitary  of  the 
empire — higher  in  rank  than  the  Salat,  or  head  of  all  pro- 
vincial governors.  His  ideographic  form  characterizes  him 
as  "the  friend  of  the  king."  The. reading  of  his  well  known 
ideogram,  which  is  composed  of  the  two  signs  Si  and  um, 
as  abarakku  is  confirmed  by  the  tablet  Sm.  61,  where,  among 
a  number  of  charming  Sumerian  and  Assyrian  proverbs,  we 
read:  Naddnu  Sa  Sarri  tubbu  Sa  Sake,  "The  liberality  of  the 
king  ensures  the  liberality  of  the  magnate";  and  Naddnu 
Sa  Sarri  dummuku  Sa  abarakki  (in  Sumerian  Sima  lugalakii 
Saga  Sedkit),  "The  liberality  of  the  king  ensures  the  bene- 
volence of  the  abarakku,"  an  exact  equivalent  of  the  Eng- 
lish proverb  "Like  master  like  man."  Also  the  feminine 
abarakkatu  is  applied  to  goddesses  as  the  highest  adminis- 
trators of  the  sanctuary.3  As  has  already  been  seen  by 
others,  the  original  meaning  of  th$  Babylonian  abarakku  is 
"father  of  the  king,"  analogous  with  the  Turkish  title  ata- 


1  "  Was   Abrech  heisie,   lassen   icir   die   Zanker  suchen    bit   an    den 
j&ngsten  Tag;  wollent  dietceil  verrtehen,  trie  en  gcdevtscht  isf." 
*  Compare,  for  instance,   W.  A.  I.  iv.  63,  15. 


27     — 

bek,  "father-prince,"  and  Seurepo;  Tranjp,  according  to  the 
Septuagint  a  name  given  to  Hainan  as  grand  vizier  of 
Artaxerxes.1 


1  Those  who  object  to  this  explanation  of  •;~~x  on  the  ground 
that  a  Babylonian  word  is  not  likely  to  occur  in  the  history  of  Joseph 
may  be  reminded  of  C'fflO^n,  a  word  common  both  to  the  Egyptian 
episodes  in  Genesis  and  Exodus  and  to  the  book  of  Daniel  i  i.  20  and 
ii.  2). 


V. 

WE  now  proceed  to  consider  the  immediate  advantages 
resulting  to  the  understanding  of  the  Old  Testament  from 
the  close  affinity  between  Assyrian  and  Hebrew. 

Most  of  the  so-called  oaro^  XeYop,sva  and  such  words 
as  chance  to  occur  rarely  in  the  Old  Testament  have  pre- 
sented special  difficulties  to  commentators.  Thanks  to  the 
enormous  extent  and  great  variety  of  the  monumental  lite- 
rature of  Assyria  these  difficulties  are  considerably  dimini- 
shed. The  Assyrian  texts  often  furnish  us  with  plentiful 
illustrations  of  these  difficult  words,  and  sometimes  support 
textual  readings  which  some  commentators  in  their  per- 
plexity had  tried  to  emendate.  Thus,  to  quote  a  few  in- 
stances, various  explanations  have  been  proposed  for  the 
expression  3"jri"nH3S  in  Ezek.  xxi.  20  (verse  15  of  the 
Authorized  Version):  "I  have  set  the  point  of  the  sivord 
against  all  their  gates."  The  translation  "point  of  the 
sword"  is  merely  guessed  from  the  context.  Hardly  more 
successful  is  the  rendering,  based  on  the  Arabic  ^o.,  "threat 

of  the  sword"  or  "threatening  sword."  Smend,  the  latest 
expositor  of  Ezekiel's  prophecies,  following  Abu'l-Walid, 
translates  "fulgor  of  the  sword."1  The  context  requires 

1  Smend,  Der  Prophet  Ezechiel  (Leipzig  1880),  p.  141. 


some  such  rendering  as  "slaughUT,"  which  is  actually  the 
translation  to  be  ioimd  in  the  Septuagint  (390710  pop^afa;) 
and  in  the  Tin -n mini.  The  question  whether  this  translation 
is  due  to  a  mere  guess  or  based  on  the  textual  emen- 
dation Tirrnnap  is  here  immaterial.  That  both  versions 
have  hit  the  true  sense  is  proved  by  the  Assyrian  aba/in, 
a  synonym  of  tnln'tlin,  "to  slaughter,"  from  which  unhnhn. 
"rack,"  a  synonym  of  muhasu  (from  kdfii,  "to  flay"),  is 
•  If  rived.1 

One  of  the  many  Assyrian  names  for  "trap"  or  "snare" 
is  ttadiln.  We  meet  with  the  word  in  the  bilingual  text 
// .  /.  /.  iv.  2(5  No.  2,  where  we  read:  saddu  ina  pat  ktiti 
/•////,  .N'< '-///  x/tjHirrurtu  (or  saparu)  Sa  ana  tdmtim  tarpu,  itani 
fa  nunu  ul  uppu,  i.  e.  "a  trap  placed  at  the  edge  of  the 
forest,  a  ued  spread  out  over  the  sea,  a  net  which  allows 
no  fish  to  escape."  The  meaning  "trap"  is  secured  not 
only  by  the  context,  but  also  by  the  non-Semitic  equivalent 
y///-.«or,  i.  e.,  "evil  sling."  I  mention  this  word2  because  it 
appears  to  me  of  great  importance  to  a  right  understanding 
of  the  passage  Jud.  ii.  3:  "and  they  (the  peoples)  shall  be 
unto  you  D^Sb,  and  their  gods  shall  be  a  snare  (tjjsitjb) 
unto  you."  It  is  beyond  our  comprehension  how  the  ninth 
• « lit  ion  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  can  approve  of  Bachmann's 
translation:  "they  shall  be  unto  you  as  "sides,"  i.  e.,  "neigh- 
bours pressing  on  all  sides."  The  Authorized  Version,  evi- 
dently guided  by  passages  like  Num.  xxxiii.  55,  translates: 


1  See  W.  A.  I.  ii.  23,  9. 

*  Compare    also    Sarg.    Cyl.  57,    where   the    moongod    is   called 
faddt,  i.  e.,  he  who   reveals  by  his  shining  light  the  snares 
by  the  demons  in  the  dark  recesses  of  the  earth  to  the  de- 
struction of  men.     See,  for  instance,   W.  A.  I.  iv.  16  No.  2. 


—     30     — 

"they  shall  be  as  thorns  in  your  sides."  The  words  "a* 
thorns"  which  are  printed  in  italics,  prove  that  the  trans- 
lators felt  the  difficulty  of  the  expression  and  tried  to 
remove  it.  There  can  be  no  doubt,  that  D*nS  is  the  Hebrew 
equivalent  of  the  Assyrian  saddu:  O'HB  means,  therefore, 
"traps,"  as  is  already  indicated  by  the  parallelismus  mem- 
brorum,  and  the  passage  is  to  be  translated:  "they  shall 
be  unto  you  as  traps,  and  their  gods  shall  be  a  snare 
unto  you."1 

Passing  over  other  instances  like  the  verb  S"1T  Job  vi. 
17,  whose  meaning  "to  burn"  or  "to  scorch"  is  based  on 
the  wrongly  assumed  connexion  with  312Z  and  Cpto,  or  Port 
Deut.  xxxiii.  3,  which  Assyrian  proves  to  be  a  synonym 
of  SID:2,  I  conclude  this  series  of  illustrations  by  a  few 
remarks  on  the  Hebrew  nouns  IflJS  and  miDS.  These 
words  are  generally  combined  with  the  Syriac  J*),  "to  pour 
out"  or  "to  shed."  In  accordance  with  this  etymology,  "JCX 
Q^nsn  Num.  xxi.  15  is  translated  "the  stream  of  the  brooks." 

•    T  :    ~ 

This  meaning,  though  appropriate  in  the  passage  just  quoted, 
cannot  be  applied  to  passages  like  Deut.  iii.  17.  iv.  49 
(naOBSl  rntJS).  The  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary 
translates  in  Num.  xxi.  15  "the  pouring  forth  of  the 
brooks"  (Ergiessung  der  Uticke),  but  adopts  the  reaso- 
nable rendering  "under  the  slope  of  the  Pisga"  in  the 
passages  of  Deuteronomy.  The  Assyrian  i$du,  Plur.  isddti, 


1  Like  the  Heb.  is,  the  Assyr.  faddu  means  also  "side,"  for  in- 
stance, the  back  of  a  chair  is  called  ?addv.  The  stem  is  TiX,  "to  en- 
circle" or  "to  surround,"  from  which  both  meanings,  "side"  as  well 
as  "snare,"  may  easily  be  derived. 

1  Observe  how  closely  the  two  words  follow  each  other  in  the 
passage  Deut.  xxxiii.  3. 


—     31     — 

"base"  of  anything,  shows  that  "slope"  or  "foot  of  the 
mountain"  is  the  proper  meaning  of  rnTDK.  Udu  is  used 
of  the  foundation  of  a  house,  of  the  base  of  a  throne  and 
the  lower  part  of  the  sky;  compare,  for  instance,  the  hymn 
// .  //.  /.  iv.  20  No.  2 ,  where  the  rising  sun  is  adreased : 
SaniaS  ina  Hid  Same  tappuha,  i.  e.  "Oh  Samas,  thou  hast 
come  forth  from  the  horizon  of  the  heavens." 


VI. 

THE  names  of  animals,  plants,  and  precious  stones, 
which  constitute  a  separate  class  of  words  among  the  a:ra$ 
XeYOjjLEva  and  words  of  rare  occurrence  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment, may  be  conveniently  discussed  in  a  special  chapter. 
An  invaluable  aid  is  here  afforded  by  the  extensive  lists  of 
names  of  animals,  plants,  and  precious  stones,  which  the 
industry  of  the  Assyrian  scribes  has  bequeathed  to  us.  We 
feel  persuaded  that  these  lists,  when  completed  by  future 
discoveries,  will  one  day  prove  a  rich  mine  of  Semitic 
lexicography,  in  as  much  as  the  synonymous  words  which 
they  contain  and  the  ideograms  or  Sumerian  symbols  which 
they  explain  embody  valuable  suggestions  as  to  the  true 
meaning  of  these  obscure  words.  The  ideograms  by  which 
these  names  are  designated  usually  express  the  characte- 
ristics of  the  respective  animals  or  objects  which  they  re- 
present. Thus  it  is  easy  to  see  that  the  bird  hililu  (kulili), 
which  is  characterized  by  its  ideogram  as  one  riding  on  the 
trees,  must  be  the  woodpecker.  Again,  such  designations 
as  "bird  of  the  night,"  "queen  of  the  river  side,"  "golden 
bird,"  "star-eyed  bird,"  "bird  of  the  thornbush,"  "bird  of 
the  caves,"  "long-leg,"  "smasher  of  bones,"  which  we  gather 
from  their  respective  ideograms,  greatly  aid  us  in  identifying 
the  animals  in  question.  Some  of  the  unclean  birds  specified 


—     33     — 

in  Levit.  xi.  are  also  included  in  these  lists.  Thus  nr:s, 
verse  19,  occurs  in  the  form  anpatu  (W.  A.  L  v.  27,  38  d), 
and  means,  according  to  its  ideogram,  "the  bird  of  the 
li.L'ht"  (ijtpur  nuri).  If  we  may  venture  to  identify  the  ideo- 
gram of  this  bird  with  that  occurring  W.  A.  1.  i.  28,  24  a. 
Asurn.  iii.  49,  the  anpatu  was  hunted  by  the  Assyrian 
kinirs  on  the  right  bank  of  the  Euphrates  near  Karkemish. 
Asurnazirpal  boasts  of  having  captured  with  his  own  hand 
twenty  of  these  birds.1 

It  has  been  long  supposed  that  the  bird  CT  mentioned 
in  Pss.  cii.  7  as  dwelling  on  ruins,  is  a  species  of  owls. 
The  Assyrian  lists  of  birds  confirm  this  supposition.  Kasusu 
is  there  given  as  a  synonym  of  the  non-  Semitic  surdu, 
"bird  of  the  night,"  which  is  borrowed  from  the  Accadian 
(II  .  A.  L  ii.  37,  15.  64  b.  o).2  It  is  worthy  of  note  that 
Onkelos  translates  013  (Lev.  xi.  17.  Deut.  xiv.  16)  by 
&T$.>  which  occurs  in  the  form  kadu  (syn.  dkfy,  in  the 
list  just  quoted  immediately  before  the  explanation  of 
kasusu. 

Another  zoological  name  of  very  doubtful  meaning  on 
which  light  is  now  thrown  by  the  Assyrian  monuments  is 
,  occurring  in  the  pathetic  description  of  the  future 


1  TheTargumim  render  riBDX  by  nn*03»  and  sia»,  translations 
which  are  of  little  use  as  we  are  unacquainted  with  the  meaning  of 
these  words.  I  may  here  mention  that  rwsax  occurs  W.  A.  I.  ii. 
37,  34  c  in  the  form  ibnitu  as  a  synonym  of  dudu,  not  of  anpatu.  I'u- 
fortuuately  the  ideogram  is  not  perfectly  preserved. 

3  The  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  combines  C'2  with 
0^3,  "bag",  and  mentions  the  obsolete  explanation  ofBochart,  accord- 
ing to  which  013  is  the  pelecan,  as  the  bird  which  has  a  bag  attached 
to  its  head.  I  am  of  opinion  that  O^3  is  a  form  like  3VT. 

8  The  meaning  of  cx~.  which  falls  under  the  same  category,  has 
boon  already  discussed  on  p.  6. 

Delltzich,  Hebrew  and  Assyrian.  3 


34     — 

desolation  of  Babylon  in  Isaiah  xiii.  21.  The  translation 
of  the  Authorized  Version,  which  vaguely  renders  it  by 
"doleful  creatures,"  is  not  satisfactory.  This  aira£  XeYOfJ-svov 
is  generally  translated  by  "owls"  and  derived  from  a  sup- 
posed stem  nnj?,  "to  howl."  There  is  no  equivalent  in 
the  kindred  dialects,  except  in  Assyrian.  The  Assyrian  dhu 
(syn.  barbaru)  is,  however,  not  a  bird,  but  a  wild  quadruped 
described  as  sacred  to  the  god  of  fire,  and  feared  on  ac- 
count of  its  haunting  the  farmer's  courtyard  to  carry  off 
kids.  Its  name  dhu  characterizes  the  animal  as  the  evil 
one.  It  is  most  likely  the  jackal.1 

Among  the  names  of  plants,  of  which  some  of  these 
lists  consist,  one  is  of  especial  interest  to  us,  being  the 
Assyrian  equivalent  of  the  Hebrew  flbsian.  The  name  haba- 
sillatu  occurs  in  the  list  W,  A.  I.  v.  32  No.  4,  containing 
all  the  different  kinds  of  kdnu,  "reed,"  and  of  objects  made 
of  it.  The  corresponding  ideogram  characterizes  it  as  Susu, 
zikpu  or  pirhu  $a  jtdne,  i.  e.  "the  stalk  of  the  reed." 5  The 


1  Houghtons  interpretation  of  ahd  by  "hyena"  (see  Transactions 
of  the  Society  of  Biblical  Archaeology,  vol.  v.  p.  328),  which  is  adopted 
by  Cheyne,  is  based  on  the  erroneous  supposition,  that  the  ideogram 
vr-bara  means  "the  beast  (dog)  stripped."  We  know  now,  that  bara 
is  the  non-Semitic  equivalent  of  dku,  "evil"  or  "hostile"  (see  W.  A.  I. 
iv.  10 ,  27 — 28 b,  where  bara  (sic!)  sabdzw  is  translated  by  libbukl 
a-feu-u;  the  following  words  are  to  be  read:  ana  aSriSu  litur).  The 
jackal  is  written  ur-bara,  i.  e.,  the  evil  dog,  just  as  the  lion  is  written 
ur-maya,  i.  e.,  the  big  dog. 

3  The  ideogram  iS-du  (or  rtt)  occurs  both  with  the  determinatives 
of  wood  and  of  reed,  sometimes  without  either  (see  W.  A.  I.  iv.  7, 
56  a.  Paul  Haupt,  Akkadische  und  sumeri&che  Keilschrifttexte,  p.  124, 
1.  16).  Its  invariable  meaning  is  "that  which  shoots  up  from  the  root 
of  a  plant";  it  is  contrasted  by  sur&u,  "root,"  and  by  subultu,  "ear" 
(of  corn).  Mr.  Theo.  G.  Pinches  (see  Athenaeum,  2.  June,  1883) 


36 

ubiial  translations,  which  waver  between  lily,  narcissus,  rose, 
and  crocus  (comp.  ft-^^*-,  "meadow-saffran ,  colchicum 
autumnale),  are  mainly  based  on  the  supposed  connexion  of 
nbstan  with  bxa,  "onion,"  and  can,  therefore,  no  longer  be 
entertained.  The  two  passages  (Isaiah  xxxv.  1  and  Cant.  ii.  1), 
where  nbsan  occurs,  are  to  be  translated,  "The  wilderness 
and  the  solitary  place  shall  be  glad  for  them ,  and  the 
desert  shall  rejoice  and  sprout  like  the  reed" ;  "I  ara  tlte 
reed  of  Sharon  and  the  lily  of  the  valley."  Observe  espe- 
cially the  passage  in  Isaiah,  where  particular  stress  is  laid 
on  the  germinating  (me)  of  the  reed.  According  to  its 
ideogram  and  in  full  agreement  with  this  passage  in  Isaiah, 
the  Assyr.  habasillatu  means  pirfju  $a  kdne.  Though  it  is 
not  impossible  that  fyaliasillatii,  nbjian,  may  be  a  particular 
species  of  reed,  it  is  extremely  improbable,  the  explanation 
by  lubhi  Sa  hone",  i.  e.,  "husk  (lit.  garment)  of  the  reed," 
conveying  too  general  a  sense  to  admit  of  a  more  definite 

erroneously  supposes  that  I  misread  XASu  for  lubSu,  which  is  men- 
tioned, together  with  kabbdnt  and  udltu,  as  a  synonym  of  hnbn*iil<ifu  in 
the  text  above  quoted.  It  is  not  probable  that  any  Assyriologist  would 
ever  mistake  the  sign  l«  for  lub,  least  of  all  on  a  tablet  so  clearly  written  as 
W.  A.  I.  v.  32  No.  4.  The  synonyms  WJfw  and  tikpu  are  taken  from 
W.  A.  I.  v.  26,  29  e.  f.,  27  g.  h.  The  lines  26.  27  g.  h.  prove  that  the 
non-Semitic  f4-du  (or  nt)  is  as  general  a  term  as  the  Assyrian  pirhu,  which 
is  explained  by  twenty-one  synonyms  on  the  tablet  K.  4375,  published 
in  part  H'.  A.  I.  ii.  23.  —  I  may  here  suggest  that  SiU*  is  probably 
coimrctcil  with  nsiatiJ,  "lily."  If  this  suggestion  be  correct,  the  lily 
would  derive  its  Hebrew  name,  not  from  the  whiteness  of  its  flower 
(comp.  ia?'i5,  "white  marble"),  but  from  the  stiff,  reed-like  appearance 
of  its  stalk.  As  to  frabburu,  I  doubt  the  correctness  of  tin-  opinion 
advanced  by  Mr.  Pinches,  that  the  word  is  borrowed  from  the  Acca- 
ili.'in,  fcabdr*  being  a  synonym  of  labiu  according  to  W,  A.  I.  v.  '_'-. 
1'i/itu  is  tin-  ffiiiiuiu  form  of  nd ,  the  name  of  a  special  kind  of  aro- 
matic reed. 

3* 


—     36 

application.  Besides,  the  general  meaning  "reed"  fits  ad- 
mirably in  the  passages  quoted. 

Another  botanical  name  of  high  interest  occurring  in 
the  list  of  plants  ordered  to  be  set  by  king  Merodachbaladan 
(see  p.  24,  footnote)  is  hambakuku,  the  Assyrian  equivalent 
of  the  name  of  the  prophet  plpnn,  the  more  correct  form 
of  which  would  be  p1p3H  (LXX  'Ap.[3axou|j.,  'A[i.(3axoox). 
Other  instances  of  names  of  plants  used  as  proper  names 
will  readily  occur  to  every  student  of  the  Old  Testament. 

Less  substantial  is  the  help  to  be  obtained  from  the 
Assyrian  monuments  for  the  names  of  precious  stones  men- 
tioned in  the  Old  Testament.  Still,  it  is  interesting  to  know 
that  names  like  «"lBtt£  (Ex.  xxviii.  20;  xxxix.  13;  Ezek. 
xxviii.  13)  and  rnnb  (Esth.  i.  6)  occur  in  the  Assyrian 
vocabularies  and  other  texts  in  the  forms  d$pu  (W.  A.  I.  v.  30, 
6 Oh)  and  sihru  (sihirtu?  ii.  21,  9  d).1  Many  of  the  ideo- 
grams, by  which,  in  Assyrian,  the  precious  stones  are  de- 
signated, convey  too  vague  a  sense  to  assist  in  the  identifi- 
cation of  the  objects  intended.  Thus,  the  ideogram  of  Subu, 
the  Assyrian  equivalent  of  ilTS  (Ex.  xxviii.  19.  xxxix.  12), 
denotes  the  shining  or  the  precious  stone  (abnu  nasku  or 
abnu  akru)  xat'  ££oj(7]v.  If  we  compare,  however,  the  hymn 
published  in  our  Assyrische  I/esestiicke,  2nd  edition,  p.  73  ss., 


1  As  to  the  frabttX,  mentioned  along  with  the  12UJ  in  the  pas- 
sage Exodus  xxviii.  19,  we  submit  the  following  explanation.  Starting 
from  the  well  known  fact,  that  many  pa^cious  stones  received  their 
names  from  the  countries  where  they  are  found,  it  is  not  improbable 
that  iTcbriX  is  the  stone  found  in  the  country  of  Ahlamil,  which  is 
often  mentioned  in  the  Babylonian  and  Assyrian  texts  as  an  Armenian 
people  and  district.  This  conjecture  is  countenanced  by  the  circum- 
stance that  Sennacherib  repeatedly  praises  Armenia  and  the  adjacent 
countries  of  Nai'ri  as  a  rich  mine  of  certain  precious  stones;  see 
W.  A.  I.  i.  7,  No.  E.  44,  72  ss. 


37     — 

where  Tatar,  the  goddess  of  the  morning  star,  is  described 
as  "arising  over  the  earth  like  a  fire"  and  "adorned  with 
&ubl- stones,"  or  if  we  remember  that  the  channel  of  Tam- 
muz  is  written  by  the  same  ideogram  with  the  determinative 
"river,"  we  perceive  at  once  that  fatbu,  iatD,  must  be  a 
stone  of  light  colour  like  the  topas.  Thus,  the  usual  ren- 
dering "achat"  becomes  rather  improbable.  It  is  a  point  of 
extreme  interest,  that  the  hymn  W.  A.  I.  iv.  18  No.  3 
mentions  by  name,  as  it  seems,  twelve  precious  stones  of 
transcendent  splendour,  "enchased  in  gold  and  destined  to 
adom  the  shining  breast  of  the  king,"  the  "precious  stone"  xat' 
the  ^M^"  or  nisifcU)  being*  of  course,  amongst  them. 


VII. 

IT  has  been  already  pointed  out  by  Cheyne,  in  his 
excellent  commentary  upon  the  prophecies  of  Isaiah  (vol.  ii, 
1882,  p.  160  f.),  that  the  common  rendering  of  the  Hebrew 
root  bat  by  "to  dwell"  can  no  longer  be  maintained.  Owing 
to  the  unsatisfactory  translation  of  >'3bap,  Leah's  words 
after  being  delivered  of  her  sixth  son  Zebulon,  in  Gen.  xxx. 
20,  "God  hath  endued  me  with  a  good  dowry;  now  will 
my  husband  dwell  ivith  me,  because  I  have  born  him  six 
sons,"  do  not  give  a  good  sense.  Cheyne  rightly  remarks 
that  "the  word  is  commonly  so  rendered,  not  to  suit  the 
context,  but  in  obedience  to  a  prejudice  as  to  the  meaning 
of  b^OT."  The  latter  word  is  usually  translated  by  "dwell- 
ing," and  bit  is  thought  to  be  a  denominative  verb  of  it. 
The  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  states  that  "it 
occurs  in  all  dialects  only  as  a  denominative  verb."  The 
incorrectness  of  this  statement  is  proved  by  Arabic,  and 
especially  by  the  Assyrian  language^  In  Assyrian  zabdlu  is 
a  very  common  synonym  of  na$u  (Heb.  KtD2),  "to  lift,  to 
raise,  to  bear," — the  very  meaning,  as  St.  Guyard  has 
shown1,  wanted  in  the  passage  above  quoted.  The  trans- 
lation "Now  will  my  husband  exalt  or  honour  me"  not 


8  See  Journal  Asiatique.  aoilt-sept.  1878,  pp.  220  ff. 


—     39     — 

only  suits  the  context,  but  agrees  in  substance  with  the 
rendering  of  the  Septuagint,  atpertei  fie,  "he  will  prefer 
me."  Light  is  also  thrown  by  Assyrian  on  the  meaning  of 
*"ZT  itself.  The  original  meaning  of  that  word  is  not 
"<lw< •lliii'j-"  in  general,  but  "elevated  or  high  dwelling."  It 
is,  therefore,  especially  applied  to  the  heavenly  dwelling- 
places  of  the  sun  and  the  moon  (see  Hab.  iii.  11)  and  to 
the  high  temple  of  God.  "How  suitably  does  Solomon, 
after  alluding  to  Jehovah's  dwelling  in  thick  clouds,  refer 
to  the  newly  built  temple  as  a  b*3T  rP3,  'a  house  of  height' 
(1  Kings  viii.  13),  a  house  which  by  its  elevation  pointed 
men  upwards  to  the  heavenly  temple!"  (Cheyne.)1 

Again,  Hebrew  bin  means  "banner";  but  what  is  the 
meaning  of  the  verb  bn  (Psalm  xx.  6;  Cant.  v.  10)?  The 
modern  lexicographers  and  interpreters  say  that  btt  is  de- 
rived from  the  Arabic  JL».t>,  "to  cover,"  the  banner  being 
"the  cover  of  the  stick,"  and  that  the  Hebrew  bjrt  is  again 
a  denominative  verb,  meaning  "to  erect  a  banner"  or  "to 
provide  with  a  banner."2  Now,  in  the  first  place,  it  does 
not  seem  very  probable  that  the  banner  should  have  been 
called  in  any  language  "cover  of  the  flagstick."  In  the 
second  place,  the  rendering  of  b*3TJ  by  "one  provided  with 
a  banner"  in  Cant.  v.  10,  "My  beloved  is  white  and  ruddy, 
conspicuous  among  ten  thousand  like  a  man  provided  with 
a  banner,"  is  most  unnatural.  The  general  import  of  ^IM, 
which  the  Authorized  Version  translates  well  "the  chiefest," 


1  The  non-Semitic  name  of  the  famous  temple  of  Bel  in  Babylon, 
JS-tayila,  ha*  just  tho  same  meaning  as  Hebr.  bl3T  P^S;  cornp.  W.  A.  I. 
ii.  15,  45  c.  d. 

:  Fiir-t's  explanation,  who  ascribes  the  meaning  "to  shine,  to 
exalt"  to  the  Hebrew  stem  bjl,  would  be  far  preferable. 


—     40     — 

is  clear,  but  what  is  the  original  meaning?  Assyriology 
solves  the  riddle.  In  Assyrian  the  banner  is  likewise  called 
diglu.  We  read  in  a  hymn  addressed  to  the  sungod,  "Thou 
art  the  light  of  the  furthermost  ends  of  heaven,  thou  art 
the  banner  (diglu)  of  the  vast  earth;  the  vast  nations  look 
upon  thee  and  rejoice."1  The  verb  from  which  diglu  is 
derived  occurs  hundreds  of  times  in  the  Assyrian  texts,  its 
simple  meaning  being  "to  see."  The  banner  is,  therefore, 
the  object  to  which  the  eyes  of  the  soldiers  are  directed — 
undoubtedly  a  far  better  explanation  than  "cover  of  the 
flagstick."  blJH  in  Cant.  v.  10  is,  therefore,  to  be  trans- 
lated, "My  beloved  is  looked  up  to  among  ten  thousand" — 
among  ten  thousand  the  eyes  of  every  one  are  directed  only 
to  him.  In  the  same  manner  the  translation  of  the  paren- 
thetic words  in  Psalm  xx.  6,  expressing  the  cheerful  con- 
fidence of  the  believer  in  Jehovah's  name  and  help,  "We 
will  rejoice  in  thy  salvation,  and  in  the  name  of  our  God  we 
will  set  up  our  banners,"  had  better  be  replaced  by  "We 
will  rejoice  in  thy  salvation,  and  keep  our  eyes  directed  upon 
the  name  of  our  God."  The  passage  forcibly  reminds  one 
of  an  oracle  sent  to  the  king  Esarhaddon  from  the  goddess 
of  Arbela :  "Do  not  trust  in  men,  direct  thy  eyes  upon  me, 
dugulanl,  i.  e.,  look  upon  me,  keep  thy  eyes  directed  upon 
my  name."2 

Another  verb  that  has  been  explained  in  the  most 
divergent  manner  is  TQD  (see  Gen.  xliii.  30;  Lam.  v.  10), 
from  which  the  names  of  the  heathe'n  priest  ("TQS)  and  of 


1  W.  A.  I.  iv.  19  No.  2.     The  Assyrian  words  are:    attdma  nur- 
Sunw  Sa  Jcippdt  sdmS  rUMtum,  $a  irfitim  rapaitim  digiUina  attdma;  ina- 
faldkdma  ihddd  ni$3  rapSdte. 

2  W.  A.  I.  iv.  68,  col.  ii :    ina  til  amSldti  Id  tatdkil,  mutuh  indka 
ana  dsi,  duguldni. 


—    41     — 

the  net  (rntJDtt)  are  derived.  The  last  edition  of  Geseniua's 
dictionary,  partly  following  the  Septuagint,  gives  three  diffe- 
rent meanings  to  this  one  root:  firstly,  "to  hide,"  by  which 
rPVCDE,  "net,"  is  explained  as  the  object  hidden  in  the 
water  or  on  the  earth;  secondly,  "to  be  dark  or  black," 
by  which  "fl23,  "priest,"  is  interpreted  to  mean  originally 
"blackness,"  then  the  "dark-dressed  man"  (Gesenius,  "qui 
atra  veste  incedit,  lugens,  hinc  asceta,  sacerdos");  thirdly, 
"to  contract,"  therefore,  Gen.  xliii.  30,  "His  bowels  were 
drawn  together  towards  his  brother."  The  two  different 
meanings  thus  ascribed  to  one  and  the  same  form,  "V03:, 
and  the  etymological  explanation  of  its  derivatives,  will 
hardly  satisfy  any  critical  reader.  How  plain  and  simple 
becomes  the  difficulty  by  the  comparison  of  the  Assyrian 
dictionary !  The  verb  kamdru  occurs  very  often  on  the  As- 
syrian monuments,  meaning  everywhere  "to  strike  down,  to 
throw  down,  to  overpower."  An  Assyrian  vocabulary  which 
we  have  lately  examined  shows  that  kamaru  is  a  synonym  of 
dakit  (IC1,  PDl)  and  labdnu  (comp.  the  phrase  laban  appi, 
"to  throw  down  the  face,  to  adore").  By  applying  this 
meaning  to  the  Hebrew  passages  in  question  every  difficulty 
is  removed.  Who  can  deny  that  the  following  translations 
are  at  once  the  most  simple  and  the  most  satisfactory? 
Gen.  xliii.  30:  "And  Joseph  made  haste;  for  his  love  teas 
overpowered  towards  his  brother,  and  he  sought  where  to 
weep."1  1  Kings  iii.  26:  "Then  spake  the  woman  whose 
the  living  child  was  unto  the  king,  for  her  love  was  over- 
powered towards  her  child,"  &c.  Hos.  xi.  8:  "How  shall 
I  give  thee  up,  Ephraim? mine  heart  is  turned  within 


orn  means  love  as  well  as  bowels;    the  following  passage 
Hos.  xi.  8  teaches  that  it  had  better  be  taken  in  the  former  sense. 


—     42     — 

me,  my  sympathy  (not  "repenting")  is  totally  overpowered" 
Turning  to  the  explanation  of  the  passage  Lam.  v.  10,  it 
will  be  remembered  that  images  taken  from  the  oven  are 
not  unfrequently  used  in  Assyrian  proverbs.  Thus  we  read1 
Kzma  tinwri  labiri  ana  nukkurika  marts,  "Like  an  old  oven 
he  is  too  weak  to  do  thee  much  harm,"  z.  e.,  like  an  oven 
he  has  no  strength,  or,  in  accordance  with  the  Eastern 
custom,  like  a  pot  the  sides  of  which  are  burst  by  too  long 
use  and  by  exposure  to  violent  heat,  he  is  powerless.  The 
passage  in  Lam.  v.  10  is  therefore  to  be  translated  "Our 
skin  Jias  been  overpowered  like  an  oven,"  z.  e.,  has  become 
powerless,  or  lost  its  vigour  and  power  of  resistance,  "by 
the  burning  of  the  famine."  Finally,  as  to  the  name  of 
the  net  and  the  heathen  priest,  the  former  is  called  rnttStt 
as  the  instrument  by  which  the  prey  is  overpowered  or  thrown 
down  (compare  the  frequent  Assyrian  phrase  "Like  a  net 
ashup-hb"  "I  threw  him  down,"  from  ^HD);  while  the 
priests,  or  DVTCD,  are  the  persons  who  throw  themselves 
down  on  their  faces  and  adore  (comp.  'ISO  and  labdn  appi). 
The  Syriac  l^oa,  "sad,  dejected,"  confirms  the  correctness 
of  my  view. 

In  the  same  manner  other  Hebrew  verbs  of  frequent 
occurrence,  for  instance  mo2,  could  be  explained,  not  by 
any  hypothesis,  but  merely  by  following  the  invaluable 
vocabularies  of  the  old  Babylonian  and  Assyrian  scholars 
as  Avell  as  the  context. 


1  W.  A.  I.  ii.  16,  10—13  d. 

2  The  verb  bna  has  been  already  discussed  on  p.  5. 


vm. 

HEBREW  lexicography  is  bound  to  look  for  help  to 
the  Assyrian  dictionary  chiefly  in  those  cases  where  a  verbal 
root  is  only  preserved  in  derivatives.  In  the  majority  of 
these  cases  Hebrew  lexicography  is  quite  unable  to  give 
the  original  meaning  of  a  word.  Thus  we  know  that  ]nh 
is  the  father-in-law,  but  we  cannot  tell  why  he  is  so  called, 
the  verb  ]nn  occurring  only  as  a  denominative  verb.  Again, 
we  know  that  oatD  means  "staff,"  but  we  are  quite  in  the 
dark  about  the  original  meaning  of  the  root  tJ2T05.  Of 
course,  no  blame  of  any  kind  attaches  to  Hebrew  lexico- 
graphy for  having  recourse  in  such  cases  to  the  kindred 
dialects.  What  I  do  censure  is  the  indiscreet  use  made  of 
Arabic,  the  pernicious  practice  of  forcing  Arabic  meanings 
on  Hebrew  words  with  an  obviously  different  sense,  an 
error  which  is  greatly  aggravated  by  the  bold  confidence 
with  which  these  etymological  speculations  are  put  forward. 
Could  any  linguist,  however  little  acquainted  with  the  laws 
of  comparative  philology,  think  it  possible  that  the  eighth 
edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  proposes  in  right  earnest 
the  following  development  of  meanings  for  "jnh,  "father-in- 
law"  ?  "Jfin,  like  the  Arabic  .Tvx^,  means  "to  circumcise," 
and,  further,  "to  incise,  to  penetrate,  to  go  into"  another 


44     — 

family.  Both,  father-in-law  and  mother-in-law,  are  called 
frh  and  rcrih,  because  through  the  marriage  of  their 
daughters  they  press,  or  gain  entrance,  into  another  family. 
Is  it  possible  to  conceive  such  a  strange  idea?  And  is 
it  not  to  be  regretted  that  young  beginners  in  Hebrew, 
who  look  upon  Gesenius's  dictionary  as  their  safest  guide, 
are  thus  misled,  and  that  ideas  of  so  preposterous  a  character 
are  instilled  into  their  minds  concerning  "Semitic  modes  of 
thought"?1  Arabic  scholars  are  perfectly  justified  in  reject- 
ing all  those  hazardous  explanations  'of  Assyrian  words  by 
the  Arabic  dictionary2;  but  why  do  they  not  stop,  for  the 
sake  of  Semitic  science  in  general,  such  an  abuse  of  Ara- 
bic in  the  treatment  of  Hebrew?  The  Assyrian  language, 
which,  as  we  have  seen,  is  not  only  intimately  related  to 
Hebrew,  but  possesses  a  literature  three  times  larger  than 
the  Old  Testament,  supplies  all  these  verbal  stems  which 
are  wanted,  showing  them  in  living  use  in  numerous  in- 
stances. The  truth  of  this  statement  will  be  fully  proved 
by  our  Assyrian  dictionary,  which,  we  hope,  will  demon- 
strate conclusively  that  the  sacred  tongue  of  David  and 


1  Compare  what  is  said  in  the  preface  of  the  eighth  edition  of 
Gesenius's  dictionary  about  the  "Semitischen  Torstellungskreise."  We 
remark  with  satisfaction  that  the  ninth  edition  has  given  up  the  above 
mentioned  explanation  of  the  name  of  the  parents-in-law.  According  to 
the  ninth  edition  they  are  thus  called  as  those  who  decide,  the  decision 
as  to  which  husband  their  daughter  is  *i  be  given  being  left  to  them. 

4  As  ablu,  "son,"  by  JuJ&,  "to  be  childless";  situ,  "the  other," 
sittu,  "the  rest,"  by  ou«f>  ma'dltu,  "bed,"  by  JuuO,  "inclination," 

u    — 

puhru,  "total  number"  or  "body"  (of  people),  by  ,.,SXJ.  "sea,     &c. 


—     46     — 

Isaiah   haa   no  longer  need   to   languish   in    the  fetters   of 
Arabic  lexicography. 1 

The  Assyrian  verb  ffabinn,  from  which  the  words  for 
affinity  are  derived,  meant  originally  "to  surround,  to  pro* 
teet."  The  Assyrian  magician  sees  in  a  dream  the  king 
Asurbanipal  fighting  in  the  midst  of  his  enemies,  but  he 
sees  at  the  same  time  the  goddess  Istar  protecting  him  and 
surrounding  him  (hatinat)  on  every  side.2  The  verb  tyttuini 
is  very  common  in  the  sense  of  "to  protect,  to  help,  to 
support"8;  the  parents-in-law  are  called  ]nh  and  n:nh  as 


1  The  excessive  comparison  of  Arabic  has  frequently  induced  the 
continuators  of  Gesenius's  work  to  set  aside  the  correct  views  of  the 
original  compiler,  which  are  often  confirmed  by  the  evidence  of  Assyrian 
research.  Thus,  the  Hebrew  name  of  the  mule,  TB,  is  explained  in 

the  two  last  editions  of  the  dictionary  by  the  Arabic  ^Jo,    "to  be 

single"  or  "to  live  apart,"  the  mule  being  called  T^D  as  the  isolated 
.•mimal ,  incapable  of  propagating  itself.  Gesenius  rejects  this  expla- 
n:iti"ii  as  \vi-ll  as  the  improbable  opinion  of  Bochart  ("quia  natus  sit 
ex  parentibus  qui  a  consorte  natural!  separati  cam  alienis  copulentur") 
with  the  judicious  remark:  "Utrumque  longius  petitum  est"  According 
to  his  own  view,  the  mule  derived  its  Hebrew  name  from  its  extreme 
celerity.  This  etymology,  which  is  based  on  the  comparison  of  the 

r 
Svriac  ?r»,  "to  fly,  to  flee,"  is  further  strengthened  by  Assyr.  parddtt, 

"to  be  impetous,"  from  which  the  well-known  noun  and  adjective 
puridu,  "impetuosity,  vehemence,  power"  and  "impetous,  quick"  is  de- 
rived ;  comp.  W.  A.  I.  iv.  5,  47  b :  "the  messenger  ana  Ea  puridu  illik 
went  speedily  to  the  god  Ea."  For  analogous  change  of  the  two 
meanings  "powerful"  and  "quick"  comp.  Heb.  "WO  1  Sam.  xx.  19. 

*  Smith ,  Asurbanipal  p.  125  f. :  ina  kirimmiia  fdbti  tahfinkdma 
taMi-na  gimir  Idntka,  pnnuia  ifdtv  innapife  ttfii  ana  kaSdd  nalcireka,  fc., 
i.  f.,  ,,by  her  fair  body  she  shielded  thee  and  encompassed  thee  on  all 
sides;  out  of  her  face  fire  was  kindled  to  vanquish  thy  enemies,"  &c. 

»  See   W.  A.  I.  ii.  89,  2  f.    Sarg.  Cyl.  4  and  other  passages. 


—     46     — 

those  who.  protect  and  support  the  young  family.  That  this 
explanation  is  in  harmony  with  "Semitic  thought"  is  con- 
firmed by  the  synonyms  on,  "father-in-law,"  rfittn,  "mother- 
in-law,"  which  are  derived  from  the  same  verb  STan, 
"to  surround,"  as  STain,  "the  surrounding  and  protecting 
wall." 

Why  is  the  stick  called  I3STZJ  in  Hebrew  ?  Gesenius's 
dictionary  combines  the  word,  without  putting  any  query, 

with    the    Arabic    fa.|.Wj    "to    be    lank"    (of  the   hair).     It 

cannot  be  questioned  that  a  stick  or  a  rod,  especially  one 
used  for  punishment,  may  be  "lank";  still,  this  etymology 
must  now  be  given  up,  because  Assyrian  shows  clearly 
that  sibtu,  "the  stick,"  is  derived  from  Sabdtu,  "to  strike, 
to  beat,  to  slay,"  the  stick  being  the  instrument  of  beating.1 
We  may  add  that  Fiirst,  aided  by  the  Targumic  and  Tal- 
mudic  idiom,  has  already  proposed  this  etymology. 

Like  all  Semites,  the  Hebrew  people  called  the  flock, 
both  of  sheep  and  goats,  I&MZ.  We  did  not  know  why,  be- 
cause no  Semitic  language  has  the  verb  "}fc?2  in  living  use. 
The  latest  editions  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  think  it  probable 
that  the  name  of  the  flock  is  to  be  compared  with  the 

Arabic    _JL«o,  "to  be  small,  sick,  emaciate."     Poor  Semitic 

people!  Indeed,  if  anything  could  point  to  the  desert  as 
their  original  home,  small  and  emaciated  sheep  and  goats 
would  do  so.  The  Babylonians  «iand  Assyrians ,  like  the 
other  Semitic  nations,  called  the  flock  senu,  but  they  have 


1  For  the  verb  Sabrftu,  "to  beat,  to  slay,  to  kill"  compare  W,  A. 
I.  IT.  16,  9  b;  21,  21  b.  Assyr.  Sibfu  means  both,  "scepter"  and 
"slaughter." 


47 

preserved  at  the  same  time  the  verb  ^KS  in  numerous 
passages.  It  is  one  of  the  most  common  synonyms  of  l&bu, 
"to  be  good,  benevolent,"1  the  flock  being  called  fettu  be- 
cause of  the  lameness  and  gentleness  of  the  animals  com- 
posing it;  this  is  real  "Semitic  thought,"  as  is  shown  by 

the  Arabic 


The  verbal  root  W  ,  from  which  V^y,  "bed,"  is  de- 
rived,   is  not  preserved  in  Hebrew.    The  word  is  generally 

e  „ 

compared  to  the  Arabic  .i^c,  "booth"  or  "shed"  or  "throne"; 
,    "wooden   structure   made  for  a   grape   vine";    and 

"to  erect  a  'ari  or  'orW."      'try    is    therefore   ex- 


plained as  a  bed  having  a  canopy,  or  a  booth  made  of 
branches,  in  which  people  used  to  sleep  during  the  hot 
summer  months,  and  J.  Low2  thinks  that  he  can  trace  this 
meaning  in  Cant.  L  16.  TB"$  means,  however,  only  "couch" 
or  "bed,"  and  the  Syriac  \ja;L  has  the  additional  sense 
of  "bier."  It  is  certainly  very  improbable  that  the  He- 
brews, Babylonians,  and  Aramaeans  had  such  luxuries  as 
four-post  beds  at  that  remote  period  when  they  still  dwelt 
together.  Also  in  Assyrian  ir$u  or  frht  is  "bed,"  and  the 
verbal  root  ereht  means,  like  ropddu  (TC'l),  "sternere,"  or 
"to  spread  out."  TD"17  is,  therefore,  simply  "stratum." 

To  quote  some  other  instances,  Hebrew  lacks  the  ver- 
bal root  from  which  rntD,  "beloved"  (Eccles.  ii.  8),  is  de- 
rived. We  have  already  shown  in  another  place  that 


1  Compare  our  remarks  in  Wilhelm  Lotz,  Die  Intckriften 

I,  p.  86  f. 
*  AramaucAf  1'flanzenmame*,  p.  89. 


Assyrian  possesses  a  root  TIC,  "to  love,"  from  which 
hidddu,  "lover,"  is  derived.  The  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's 
dictionary,  though  taking  notice  of  this  etymology  of  PttUJ, 
keeps  to  the  old  explanation,  according  to  which  the  word 
meant  originally  "lady,"  and  is  to  be  compared  to  the 

*•*     **    .- 

Arabic  s'Juu*.  The  same  edition  alleges  also  the  Tal- 
mudic  mtJ,  "chest"  or  "chestlike  seat  for  the  women  on 

T       •    ' 

the  back  of  the  camel."  All  these  explanations  are  at 
variance  with  the  principles  of  grammatical  formation, 
common  sense,  and  the  plain  fact  that  PHIZ?  means  "the 
beloved,"  not  "lady."1 

A  word  common  both  to  Hebrew  and  the  Aramaic 
dialects  is  bn:,  "valley"  or  "brook."  This  word  is  usually 
derived  from  a  supposed  verbal  root  bn:,  which  is  said  to 
be  related  to  bbn,  "to  hollow  out."  This  is,  however,  a 
mere  conjecture.  The  Assyrian  nahlu  or  nahallu  means 
likewise  "valley"  or  "ravine"  or  "brook."  The  verb  nahdlu, 
"to  compress"  or  "to  confine,"  is,  however,  preserved  at 


1  We  may  here  be  permitted  to  propose  a  new  explanation  of 
the  well  known  divine  attribute  iWS ,   which  is  usually  combined  with 

the  Arabic  Jo<Xiw,  "strong,"  the  form  itself  being  defined  as  an  ab- 
stract noun  terminating  in  ai  (see  Stade,  Hebraische  Grammaiik,  §.  301  a). 
In  the  Assyrian  list  of  synonyms  W.  A.  I.  v.  28,  82  h  sadu  is  ex- 
plained as  a  synonym  of  sakn,  "to  be  high,"  and  the  succeeding  line 
is  devoted  to  the  definition  of  &dd4,  "mountain,"  syn.  gdblum.  We  doubt 
whether  any  linguistic  grounds  can  be  urged  against  the  analysis  of 

the  word  iTO  as  the  form  J<JL£  from  JTTCJ,  "to  be  high  or  to  be  ele- 
vated." Assyrian  phrases  like  Btl  sddu  rabu,  "Bel,  the  great  rock  or 
mountain"  and  proper  names  like  Ilu-sadd'a,  "God  is  my  rock,"  are 
in  favour  of  this  etymology. 


—     49     - 

the  same  time.  The  Assyrian  mihlu  and  the  Hebrew  bn:, 
"valley,"  is,  therefore,  the  space  confined  between  two  hilli 
<>r  mountains.  The  word  was  afterwards  applied  to  the 
brook  flowing  in  the  valley. 

Hebrew  "V^nB,  "price,"  has  an  exact  Assyrian  equi- 
valent in  matym.  In  Hebrew  iflB  as  a  verb  is  not  in  use; 
in  an  Assyrian  dictionary  at  least  ten  pages  could  be  filled 
with  verbal  forms  of  mahuru,  "to  receive" — the  price,  the 
wages  is  simply  that  which  is  received. 

In  like  manner  K"O2,  "prophet,"  "HD,  "vow,"  and  many 
other  words,  are  for  the  first  time  supplied  with  a  satis- 
factory etymology  by  the  Assyrian  dictionary.  Reserving 
the  explanation  of  these  curious  words  for  future  discus- 
sion, we  cannot  forbear  expressing  our  entire  agreement 
with  the  interpretation  of  the  important  word  rP"13,  put 
forth  in  the  two  latest  editions  ofGesenius's  dictionary.  It 
is  no  small  merit  of  the  editors  to  have  discovered  that  the 
primary  meaning  of  ITH3  is  "decision  or  ordinance  or  de- 
cree," and  that  "covenant"  is  the  secondary  signification. 
There  is,  indeed,  in  Assyrian  a  verbal  stem  baru,  "to  de- 
cide," which  occurs,  for  instance,  in  an  invocation  to  Izdu- 
bar  (Sm.  1371).  The  whole  passage  deserves  to  be  tran- 
scribed: flana-ta-ma  ki-ma  Hi  ta-bar-/ri/,  ta-az-za-az  ina 
ir si-tint  ta-gam-mar  di-/naj,  di-in-ka  ul  in-nett-ni  nl  im-meS 
tr  /-iii<if-ka/,  ta-Sal  ta-/ja-fi  ta-da-ni  ta-bar-ri  u  tef-fMir,  SamaS 
Sib-fa  u  puritxa  hu-tuh-hti  i/i-kid,  Sarrdni  hikkanake  u  rubute 
hdin-sii,  tii-hni-ri  tf'-rv-ti-&u-nn  purusa-hwiu  tu-par- 
i.  e.  "Thou  art  a  judge  and  decidest  like  a  god; 
thou  staudst  upon  the  earth,  holding  judgment;  thy  judg- 
mfiit  is  not  reversed  nor  [thy  sentence]  ignored;  thou  rulest, 
thou  examinest,  thou  judgest,  thou  decidest  and  governest, 
Sauias  has  put  the  scepter  and  decision  into  thy  hand. 

Delltuch,  Hebrew  and  AmjrUu.  4 


50 

Kings,  potentates  and  magnates  bow  before  thee;  thou  fixest 
their  laws,  thou  directest  their  decrees."1 

Assyrian  is  of  equal  value  in  those  instances,  where  a 
Hebrew  verb  is  only  preserved  in  derived  conjugations, 
while  the  meaning  of  the  Qal  is  obscure.  One  instance 
may  suffice.  The  well-known  Hebrew  verb  D^bpn ,  "to 
treat  any  one  ignominiously ,  to  insult  him,"  not  occurmg 
in  the  Qal,  we  cannot  tell  the  original  meaning  of  the 
Hifil.  The  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  says,  "The 

verb  means  'to  hit,  ferire,'1"  and  compares  Arabic  IJX  "*° 

wound,"  in  the  second  form  "to  speak,  to  address  anybody" 
(originally  to  lash,  see  2t2H  in  the  eighth  edition).  Now 
the  Assvrian  has  the  two  verbs  kaldmn  and  kaldmu,  "to 


1  As  we  have  had  occasion  to  remark  in  chapter  iv,  the  advan- 
tages to  etymological  research  resulting  from  the  study  of  Assyrian 
extend  also  to  the  Semitic  sister  tongues,  more  especially  to  the  Ara- 

.     0    S>  V 

maic  dialects.  Thus  the  well-known  Syriac  word  f 1Vj*  * ' }  "inter- 
preter," of  which  the  Assyrian  form  targumdnu  has  been  recently  dis- 
covered by  Mr.  Theo.  G.  Pinches  (see  Procedings  of  the  Society  of 
Biblical  Archaeology,  Feb.  6,  1883,  p.  73),  receives  for  the  first  time 
a  satisfactory  etymology  by  the  Assyrian  verbal  root  ragdmu,  "to 
speak,"  from  which  rigmu,  "word,"  is  derived.  Targumdnu  is  "the 
speaker,"  who  speaks  for  others  by  interpreting  their  words.  Even 
the  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  keeps  to  the  traditional  ety- 
mology, according  to  which  targumnnu  is  to  be  derived  from  nil,  "to 

^w  ~  T 

throw  with  stones"  or  "to  stone,"  the  transition  of  meaning  being  ex- 
plained by  the  comparison  of  the  Latin  jacere,  "to  throw,"  with  it- 
compound  trajicere,  "to  translate."  Again,  the  Qal  of  the  Aramaic 
b^iui,  "to  persuade,"  is  proved  by  the  Assyrian  saddlu  to  be  a  syno- 
nym of  patu,  "to  be  open."  Irfitu  isddiltn  is  "the  wide  earth'':  bMtv 
xridiltu  is  a  "wide  door."  Vro  thus  answers  exactly  to  the  Hebrew 

rwe. 


51 

be  small";  kalumu  is  a  child  (If.  A.  I.  ii.  30,  43  o;  kal- 
matu  and  kalmatu  are,  as  in  Aramaic,  the  uames  for  the 
smallest  beasts,  like  the  worms;  the  vocabularies  call  ex- 
pressly kalmu  (kalmu)  a  synonym  of  Imlln.  Heb.  3£  (II  .!. 
/.  ii.  36.  40.  41  a).  Thus  Assyrian  knllumu,  "to  treat  any 
one  ignominiously,"  meant  originally  "to  estimate  lightly. " 
parvi  aestimare,  leve  habere.  Hebrew  O^bpn  is  therefore  the 
exact  synonym  of  b!jp,  5J5H. 


IX. 

THE  Assyrian  verb  is  frequently  used  in  a  sense  dif- 
fering from  that  of  its  Hebrew  equivalent,  thus  showing  the 
original  meaning  of  the  latter.  The  Assyrian  nabatii  means 
"to  be  bright"  or  "to  shine,"  and  in  the  causative  form, 
"to  cause  to  shine"  or  "to  make  bright."  The  ideas  of 
brightness  and  sight  being  so  intimately  related,  we  can 
see  at  once  the  true  etymology  of  the  Hebrew  1325,  Hifil 
E^an,  "to  look."  The  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary 

compares  the  Arabic  Jaju,  "to  spring  forth,"  and  the  Tal- 
mudic  t32D,  "to  sprout  forth,"  thus,  it  appears,  thinking  it 
possible  that  t2^an,  "to  look,"  is  literally  "to  cause  to  spring 
forth,"  sc.  "the  looks  from  the  eyes."  But  by  such  arbitrary 
additions  many  other  actions  could  be  called  E^PI.  The  same 
edition  states  that  the  original  meaning  of  nbo,  "to  forgive" 
or  "to  remit  sins,"  is  "to  loose."  This  explanation  is  given 
without  a  query,  and  the  Arabic  equivalent  is  not  even 
referred  to.  Now  the  Assyrian  saldhu  means  "to  sprinkle," 
and  is  used  with  reference  to  sacrificial  purification.  This 
etymology  is  at  once  simple  and  in  full  accordance  with 
Hebrew  modes  of  thought. 

The  etymology  of  TO,  "to  cultivate  a  field,"  and  TO, 
"cultivated  field,"  is  still  explained  in  the  latest  edition  of 
Gesenius's  dictionary  by  the  curious  assumption  that  TO  is 


—     63     — 


much  the  same  as  "^?n,  the  Hifil  of  T:,  and  that  "': 
literally  means  den  Acker  lichten,  or  "to  till  the  Held." 
There  is,  however,  no  analogy  for  such  a  mutilation  of  a 
Hifil  form.  A  single  glance  at  the  glossary  of  any  Assy- 
riological  publication  would  have  shown  the  editors  of  the 
dictionary  whence  a  much  more  likely  etymology  of  T:  is 
to  be  obtained.  In  Assyrian  TJ  means  "to  subjugate/'  and 
is  used  of  the  cultivation  of  the  ground.  JVfrw  is  "yoke." 
The  expression  has  an  exact  equivalent  in  the  Latin  "do- 
mare"  and  "subigere." 

The  question  as  to  the  primary  signification  of  the 
Heb.  T1K,  "to  curse,"  has  often  been  raised,  but  all  at- 
tempts at  a  satisfactory  explanation  have  proved  unsuccess- 
ful. Now,  the  Assyrian  verbal  stem  araru,  though  com- 
monly meaning  "to  curse,  to  lay  under  the  ban"  (compare 
urrniii.  "curse"),  is  frequently  used  in  the  sense  of  "to  bind" 
or  "to  catch."  Compare  als\>  am/,  "fowler,"  in-ibi,  "sling 
or  fetter."  We  are  inclined  to  believe  that  this  is  the  ori- 
ginal meaning  of  the  Heb.  "HX,  an  opinion  which  derives  con- 
siderable support  from  the  analogy  of  the  Heb.  "On,  "to  bind" 
and  "to  bind  by  means  of  charms"  or  "to  charm." 

By  an  attentive  study  of  the  Assyrian  dictionary 
doubts  are  often  created  as  to  the  correctness  of  etymologies 
apparently  genuine  and  long  since  accepted.  Thus,  the 
current  etymology  of  Heb.  TXp,  "to  reap"  and  "to  be 
short,"  which  is  based  on  the  comparison  of  the  Arabic 
-,^'t,  "to  cut,"  is  both  simple  and  satisfactory.  By  means 

of  the  cutting  scythe  the  harvest  is  accomplished.  The  in- 
strumentality of  cutting  is  required  to  shorten  that  which 
is  long.  Turning  to  Assyrian,  however,  we  find  a  verltal 
stem  kasarn,  "to  bind"  or  "to  collect."  *^SJ5,  "harvest" 


—     54     — 

might,  therefore,  with  equal  right  be  defined  as  the  time 
of  gathering  (compare  CppS),  and  ^£jx,  "to  be  short"  would 
literally  be  "to  be  srictum"  or  "cmvtrictum."  So  far  both 
etymologies  are  equally  natural  and  convincing.  In  addition 
to  "harvest,"  however,  "lnXj?  means  also  "bough,"  which  is 
explained,  in  accordance  with  the  former  etymology,  as  the 
"cut  off"  object.  But  are  we  to  imagine  "cut  oft"  boughs 
in  passages  like  Isaiah  xxvii.  11,  Job  xiv.  9  or  Ps.  LXXX. 
12:  "She  (the  vine)  sent  out  her  boughs  unto  the  sea,  and 
her  branches  unto  the  river"?  Gesenius,  perplexed  by  the 
difficulty  of  explaining  "HSJJ,  "bough,"  by  ~2p,  "to  cut," 
is  inclined  to  separate  "HSj?  entirely  from  ISp.  By  adopting 
the  Assyrian  etymology  of  "I2p  ("to  bind")  every  difficulty 
is  removed.  Analogous  with  :pTD,  PDlfe  and  fh$  the  bough 
was  called  "^Sp  on  account  of  its  twisted  condition. 

Few  etymologies  have  so  much  exercised  and  vexed 
the  ingenuity  of  Semitic  scholars  as  that  of  btBTS,  with  its 
two  discrepant  meanings  "to  be  similar"  and  "to  govern." 
The  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary,  adopting  the 
conjecture  of  Fleischer,  explains  bCB  by  the  Arabic  Juuo, 
"to  stand"  or  "to  stand  erect"  like  the  servant  who  stands 

erect  (Jo'L+Jt)  before  his  master.  The  following  develop- 
ment of  meanings  is  proposed  for  Jowo:  "to  place,  to  place 
oneself  or  a  thing  in  a  certain  position,  to  represent,  to 
place  a  thing  by  the  side  of  another,  to  compare."  btf'n 
is,  therefore,  said  to  mean  "representation"  and  ^tDtt,  "go- 
vernor," is  represented  as  "he  who  stands  in  the  govern- 
ment" (msbtta  is  boldly  supplied,  with  the  comparison  of 
the  Arabic  phrase  xXJU-JU  *UO-  We  think  that  many  an 
objection  could  be  brought  forward  against  this  etymology.  The 
same  verbal  stem,  masahi,  exists  in  Assyrian.  We  frequently 


read  in  the  annals  of  the  Assyrian  kings:  "I  planted  a 
park  tinnsil  i<'n/it  Jliinnnii  "in  the  likeness  of  the  mountain 
of  Chaman"  (>r  "I  Imilt  a  palace  tam&il  ekal  tlatte  "in  the 
likeness  of  a  Hittite  palace."  Mi&IAni  are  "two  equal  hal- 
ves," and  xnmhihi  means  "to  divide  into  two  equal  halves." 
MaSdlu  means,  however,  also  "to  shine."  MuSalu,  "spk-ml- 
«>ur,"  is  a  general  term  for  anything  of  a  shining  character. 
bcT3  is  the  governor  as  the  person  who  is  distinguished  by  the 
splendour  of  his  appearance. 

The  Hebrew  and  Assyrian  "TO,  Sarru,  "prince,  king," 
exhibits  the  same  primary  signification.  The  Hebrew  word 
is  usually  derived  from  a  supposed  stem  TWO,  "to  govern," 
this  meaning  being  obtained  by  the  assumption  that  "to 
govern"  is  literally  "to  divide"  or  rather  "to  dispose,"  the 
root  being  "ito,  "to  cut."  Sarru  being  the  name  of  the  king 
in  Babylonia  and  Assyria,  we  naturally  look  for  an  Assy- 
rian etymology  of  the  word.  Now  in  Assyrian  Sardru  is  "to 
<liin<-,"  Ziiriiru  is  the  magnificent  splendour  of  the  stars, 
of  the  rising  sun  (Sarur  SamSi).  It  is  a  synonym  of  the 
common  Assyrian  word  melammu  (see  W.  A.  I.  ii.  35,  7  e.  f), 
especially  applied  to  the  splendour  of  royal  majesty.  Compare 
phrases  like :  pulhe  melamme  belufi'a  ishupu&i  "the  fear  of  the 
splendour  of  my  majesty  threw  him  down."  Tiglathpileser  I 
styles  himself  "the  bright  day,  whose  splendour  overthrows 
the  four  quarters  of  the  Universe."  Observe  also  the  proud 
appellation  Samak  mdti,  "the  Sun  of  the  country,"  often  used 
by  the  Assyrian  and  Babylonian  raonarchs.  It  can,  therefore, 
hardly  be  doubted,  that  our  explanation  both  of  btJtt  and 
-1C  is  in  full  accordance  with  Oriental  modes  of  thought.1 


1  The  objection  raised  by   Paul  Haupt  (see  Nackrichten  rom  der 
Gtittittgfr  Ot».  d.  W.,  25. April  1883,  p.  105  f.)  that  the  meaning  "to  shine" 


56 

The  Heb.  "ntD,  "to  govern,"  is  evidently  formed  from  "ITB,  just 
as  Sfbti,  "to  be  king,"  is  derived  from  tfbtt,  "king."  The 
king  is  called  -fbtt,  malik,  as  he  who  decides.  The  Arabic 

meaning  of  dLLo,  "to  take  possession  of  a  thing,"  seems 
to  be  the  latest  development  of  the  meanings  of  the  stem 


is  assumed  for  too  many  Assyrian  words,  is  not  valid.  All  languages 
are  rich  in  such  terms.  The  only  difficulty  consists  in  discovering  the 
shades  of  difference  between  the  various  synonyms.  The  verb  nasdku, 
by  which  this  objection  was  occasioned,  cannot  mean  "to  string  to- 
gether"; aban  nisikti  or  simply  nisiktu  is  not  the  pearl,  but  the  precious 
stone.  Nasdku  is  a  synonym  of  akdru  (Ipl),  "to  be  precious";  aban 
nisikti  and  aban  akartu  mean  both  "precious  stone."  What  sense  does 
that  supposed  meaning  "to  string  together"  yield  in  passages  like 
W.  A.  I.  i.  7  E.  44,  72.  v.  33  b,  or  on  the  newly  discovered  monu- 
ment of  Nebuchadnezzar  I.,  where  the  king  styles  himself  rubu  nddv 
nasku,  "the  great,  the  sublime,  the  magnificent"? 


X. 

I  N  some  instances  even  the  rich  stores  of  the  Assyrian 
vocabulary  fail  to  provide  us  with  the  verbal  roots  of  certain 
derived  nouns  common  to  Assyrian  and  Hebrew.  The  Assy- 
rian language,  however,  amply  compensates  for  this  defect 
by  a  number  of  derivative  forms,  from  which  valuable  sug- 
gestions as  to  the  original  meaning  of  the  root  in  question 
may  be  gathered.  Thus  the  word  for  "stone"  is  formed  from 
the  root  ps<  in  all  the  Semitic  languages,  except  in  Arabic, 

where  a  special  word,   «^£V^>,    is   in  use.     Nevertheless  the 

Arabic  verbal  root  'o&zna,  "to  clot"  (of  the  blood),  is  stated 
to  represent  the  original  meaning  of  the  root  pX,  the  stone 
being  called  pX  as  the  hardened  object.  I  doubt  the  cor- 
rectness of  this  etymology.  In  addition  to  ahnu,  "stone," 
Assyrian  possesses  other  derivatives  of  the  same  root,  e.  g., 
iihanii,  "point  of  a  rock"  or  "tip  of  the  finger."  It  is, 
therefore,  very  probable  that  the  original  meaning  of  the 
root  p«  is  "to  be  pointed,"  and  that  pS  is  the  stone  as 
the  pointed  object.1 


1  The  etymology  of  C5S,  "bog,"  proposed  in  the  latest  editions 
of  Gesenius's  dictionary  is  another  instructive  instance  of  the  danger 
attending  the  injudicious  comparison  of  Arabic  verbs,  with  obviously 
late  meanings.  Hebrew  phrases  like  EJB:  "vsax,  "troubled  in  spirit". 


58     — 

The  question  concerning  the  original  meaning  of 
"cake  made  of  pressed  figs,"  is  likewise  satisfactorily  ans- 
wered by  the  Assyr.  dublu,  which  is  given  W.  A.  I.  ii.  35, 
43  e  as  a  synonym  of  iMu  and  nirmu,  the  synonyms  of  u$se, 
"foundation."  «"lb;n  is,  thus,  an  expression  analogous  with 
mclDX,  "cake  made  of  pressed  raisins." 

The  etymology  of  few  words  has  been  the  subject  of 
so  much  discussion  as  that  of  Dltf,  "man."  It  has  been 
supposed  that  D*lit  is  connected  with  HE'li*,  "ground," 
which  is  prima  facie  not  improbable.  The  translation  "earth- 
born,"  however,  is  not  admissible,  as  Ewald  has  conclusi- 
vely shown  on  grammatical  grounds.  It  is  impossible  to 
mention  here  the  numerous  explanations  of  the  word  which 
have  been  put  forward.  An  account  of  them  will  be  found 
in  any  linguistic  commentary  on  Genesis.  Dillmann  rightly 
remarks:  "A  certain  etymology  for  C"S  has  just  as  little 
been  found  as  for  homo."  D"!S  is  in  Hebrew  and  Phoenician 

T     T 

the  generic  name  of  man.  It  is  also  preserved  in  Himyaritic, 
but  lost  in  Arabic.  In  Assyrian  a  verbal  root  DTK  is  pre- 
served in  a  number  of  derived  nouns,  which  show  that  the 
original  meaning  of  the  root  is  synonymous  with  that  of 
,  "to  build"  or  "to  beget."  Thus  we  have  adman  u, 


and  the  analogy  of  the  Aramaic  and  Assyrian  dialects  (compare  the 
Assyrian  agdmu,  "to  be  sad")  plainly  indicate  that  the  original  mean- 
ing of  the  root  O2X  is  "to  be  troubled."  The  "bog"  is,  therefore,  called 
O5X,  Assyr.  agammu,  from  the  "troubled"«fcr  "turbid"  state  of  its  water. 
It  is  surprising  that  so  simple  an  etymology  should  have  failed  to  re- 
commend itself  to  the  attention  of  the  editors  of  the  dictionary,  who 

„     f- 
assert  that  the  Arabic  iy*^t;  "to  stink,"   which  is  undoubtedly  a  deno- 

^* 

minative  verb  derived  from  *^»,  "bog,"  represents  the  original  mean- 
ing of  the  root  CSX. 


—    59     — 

"building"  or  "dwelling-place,"  and  m//////,  "child,"  which 
is  expressly  stated  to  be  a  synonym  of  Uilaiin  (ibl),  and  is 
especially  used  of  the  young  of  a  bird.1  Compare  also  the 
analogous  expression  abal  iffuri,  "young  bird,"  with  Hebrew 
"r'^'p.  "young  pigeon."  0"W  is  therefore  synonymous  with 
]a,  meaning  "the  begotten  one"  or  "the  created  one."  The 
verbal  root  DTK  was  then  used  of  the  cultivation  of  the 
ground2;  STaii*  is  therefore  "the  cultivated  ground,"  as  in 
Gen.  iv.  2,  and  nBTO  anfc  (2  Chron.  xxvi.  10)  is  "the 
lover  of  agriculture"  or  "the  agriculturist."  The  Assyrian 
reduplicated  root  dadam  (coin)),  hdbaln,  "to  bring,"  aside 
of  abalu,  bai)  means  likewise  "to  cultivate,"  and  dadmu  is 
"dwelling-place"  or  "cultivated  land,"  or  "country"  in 
general. 

Another  word  whose  true  etymology  has  hitherto  been 
vainly  sought  for  is  HK,  "brother."  Now  the  Assyrian  equi- 
valent, <///«,  has  the  additional  sense  of  "side."  Aim. 
"brother,"  may  therefore  be  defined  as  the  person  who 
>tands  liy  the  side  of  the  firstborn  or  as  the  next  kinsman, 
or,  again,  both  words  may  be  derived  from  the  same  ver- 
bal stem  nn&t,  "to  surround"  or  "to  protect."  The  Hebrew 
name  of  the  brother  would  thus  be  analogous  with  the 
San.-krit  hhrntar. 

The  etymology  of  01*,  "mother,"  set  forth  in  the  latest 
edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  is  a  characteristic  specimen 
of  modern  Hebrew  lexicography.  OS  is  there  mysteri- 
ously explained  as  the  person  who  precedes  the  child,  the 


1  See  W.  A.  I.  ii.  37,  21  e.  f. 

*  It  may  be  interesting  to  note  that  in  the  Talmud  the  participle 

•  •t'  the  I'linl  of  n:s  is  used  in  the  same  sense,  see  Sota  34 b:    n:rr, 
•vultivated"  (Rashi:  P"h*Ba  P3Ep«,  "covered  with  fruita"). 


—     60     — 

** 
Arabic    verbal    root    +\    meaning    "to    precede"    or    "to   go 

before."  The  mother  certainly  precedes  the  child  in  point 
of  time,  but  the  same  may  be  said  of  the  father.  Another 
derivative  of  the  root  DTOS5,  namely  JTQK,  "cubit,"  is  ex- 
plained as  meaning  originally  "forearm,"  the  forearm  being 
the  mother  of  the  arm.  If  the  forearm  be  the  mother  of 
the  arm,  the  upper  arm  is  probably  the  father.  Where  is, 
then,  the  child?  Finally,  «TQX,  "nation,"  is  defined,  in  strict 
accordance  with  the  explanation  given  by  the  native  lexico- 

&*> 
legists  of  the  Arabic  equivalent  &ot,  as  the  collective  body 

of  men  following  a  common  leader,   or   *Ucf-     It  must  be 

r    & 

owned  that  these  explanations  possess  a  certain  degree  of 
ingenuity,  but  they  are  hardly  satisfactory.  The  Assyrian 
verbal  root  DEN  means  "to  be  wide"  or  "spacious."  Ummu 
is  therefore  "the  womb"  (in  which  sense  it  often  occurs  in 
Assyrian),  as  the  roomy  receptacle  of  the  child,  then  "the 
mother."  Compare  the  analogous  use  of  Hebrew  nrn, 
"womb,"  in  the  sense  of  "woman,"  in  Judges  v.  30 
(D^Piarn).  Ammatu,  "cubit,"  signified  originally  "width"  or 
"length,"  like  the  Hebrew  rniS  and  similar  terms,  and 
was  afterwards  applied  to  a  definite  measure.  HT2S5,  in 
Assyrian  ummu,  is  "the  nation,"  as  a  vast  or  numerous 
body  of  men.  NiSe  rapsdte,  "the  vast  nations,"  is  one  of 
the  commonest  expressions  occuring  in  the  annals  of  the 
Assyrian  kings. 


XL 

HAVING  thus  shown  that  the  Assyrian  language  reveals 
t'nr  tin-  first  time  for  a  large  class  ofisolated  Hebrew  nouns  the 
signification  of  the  stems  from  which  these  nouns  are  derived, 
we  now  proceed  to  prove  that  the  very  rich  cuneiform  litera- 
ture unlocks  for  us  not  only  the  meaning  of  many  word-stems, 
but  also  in  a  large  number  of  cases  reveals  the  stems 
themselves.  It  is  impossible  here  systematically  to  present 
all  the  various  classes  of  words  whose  true  etymology  is 
for  the  first  time  obtained,  and  to  illustrate  them  by  ex- 
amples. We  must  confine  ourselves  to  a  few  cases,  but 
these  will  suffice  not  only  to  show  how  necessary  is  a 
revision  of  the  Hebrew  lexicon  by  the  aid  of  the  lexicon 
<>!'  the  nearest  related  Semitic  language,  the  Assyrian,  but 
also  to  show  how  revolutionary  such  a  revision  must  prove. 

It  is  well  known  that  the  Hebrew,  like  the  South 
Semitic  languages,  had  two  n's,  which  were,  indeed,  repre- 
sented by  the  same  character  in  writing,  but  which  in  pro- 
nunciation differed  considerably  from  each  other,  and  were 
certainly  kept  distinctly  apart.  Wherever  the  Arabic  lacks 
an  equivalent  (I  omit  the  Ethiopic  intentionally),  it  has 
been  until  now  simply  impossible  to  pronounce  the  Hebrew 
stem  correctly.  The  Assyrian,  which  has  reduced  its  weak 
n  to  a  .xjiiri'itx  Irnis,  but  has  firmly  preserved  its  strong  n, 


—     62     — 

puts  an  end  to  all  doubt.  It  proves  the  incorrectness  of  a 
whole  list  of  assumptions  which  were  only  too  hastily  based 
on  Arabic  stems  with  similar,  or  even  in  part  with  quite 
different  meanings.  All  Arabic  comparisons  which  the  ninth 
edition  of  Gesenius's  dictionary  makes  for  such  words  u~ 

rnn,  "pnn,  »in,  thn,  ben,  mr,  rima,  yms,  qno,  and 

rPTD  are  unquestionably  proved  to  be  wrong  by  the  Assyrian 
equivalents  liadu,  "to  rejoice";  liarisu,  ,,moat";  hd$u ,  ,,to 
hasten";  hur$u ,  "forest";  lic&alu,  "to  crush";  xardhu,  "to 
rise"  (of  the  sun,  for  instance);  mahdzu,  "town";  maljnxn. 
"to  strike"  (used  as  in  Hebrew  of  smiting  the  thighs  as  a 
gesture  of  grief);  sahdpu,  "to  overthrow";  Mhu,  „ to  sprout" 
(&htu,  "a  sprout").  In  most  cases  no  blame  is  to  be  laid 
on  Hebrew  lexicography;  still,  the  mistake  might  easily 
have  been  avoided  of  giving  a  A  to  the  Hebrew  word  for 

"to  rejoice"  (rnn)  on  account  of  the  Arabic  tj^.,  "to  urge 
camels  by  singing  to  them,"  or  to  the  word  for  "to  rise" 
(mT)  on  account  of  a  rare  Arabic  equivalent  meaning  "to 
strew"  (—^6).  Further,  the  Assyrian  elucidates  with  surpri- 
sing clearness  stems  whose  numerous  meanings  have  often 
been  brought  into  connexion  in  the  strangest  manner,  by 
showing  that  the  supposed  single  stem  represents  really  two, 
one  with  h,  the  other  with  h.  Thus  the  Assyrian  shows 
that  Heb.  "pi,  "arrow"  (Assyr.  ussu),  and  T^n,  "to  cut  off, 
to  pierce"  (Assyr.  /jasdsu),  go  back  to  quite  different  stems; 
that  tins,  "to  open"  (Assyr.  pitu),  and  nnB,  "to  carve,  to 
engrave/'  for  instance  on  wood*  or  stone  (Assyr.  patdhu), 
have  nothing  at  all  to  do  with  each  other.  Assyrian  is 
helpful  in  still  other  ways.  The  Hebrew  verb  nH5T3  has  the 
two  meanings  "to  anoint"  and  "to  measure."  It  has  been 
supposed  that  we  have  here  a  single  verb,  because  in  Arabic 


63 

the  surveyor  is  called  _LLc,  with      ,  and  the  two  meaning* 

have  been  united  in  a  characteristic  manner  by  saying  that 
mCT2  means  |>r<»|i»'Hy  to  stroke,  to  spread,  either  with  dye 
or  oil  =  to  anoint,  or  by  passing  the  hand  over  anything  =  to 
measure.  But  in  Assyrian  "to  measure"  is  ma&nhu ,  the 
..measure"  is  mf'siljtn,  the  "surveyor"  is  musiljn.  It  appears 
at  once  that  the  Arabic  proves  nothing  at  all ;  that ,  on 

the  contrary,  _L»Jc,  precisely  like     ,SLo  (Assyr.  mal> 

^•-  ^" 

"boatman,"  is  simply  borrowed  in  Arabic. 


1  We  must  jiiTsi>t  in  tlie  non-Semitic  origin  of  the  Semitic  word 
mala hu  (malltihu),  wliicli  is  expressly  attested  by  the  Assyrians  them- 
selves, see  W.  A.  I.  V.  21,  5c.d.  Assyr.  matAhu  cannot  be  connected 
with  the  Semitic  word  for  "salt,"  nbr,  with  h.  The  fact  that  Hebrew 
rr~  occurs  only  in  passages  of  the  books  of  Ezekiel  and  Jonah  is  in 
favour  ..t  the  late  indroduction  of  the  word  into  Hebrew. 


XII. 

PASSING  on  to  other  illustrations  of  the  same  fact,  we 
find  that  the  Assyrian  often  leads  to  an  entirely  different 
stem  from  that  which  has  been  until  now  accepted. 

The  well-known  measure  "113,  "G,  xopo?,  having  the 
same  meaning  as  "IEH,  can  per  se  be  derived  from  "HS  or 
from  "113;  the  Assyrian  kdru,  from  which  the  name  of  the 
inspector  of  measures  and  weights,  rob  kdre1,  comes,  decides 
for  113,  not  T13,  which  the  ninth  edition  of  Gesenius's 
dictionary  prefers.  Be  it  incidentally  remarked  that  STTS, 
"feast,"  is  not  to  be  derived,  with  the  ninth  edition,  from 
"'"D,  but  from  m3,  as  the  Assyrian  kiretu,  having  the  same 
meaning,  teaches.  On  the  other  side,  the  ninth  edition 
derives  the  word  for  hole,  cave,  "11H,  "|J1,  whose  stem  might 
be  either  "111"!  or  Tin,  from  1TI,  although  already  the  Arabic 

w   9 

^s*  might  have  led  to  the  correct  etymology.    The  Assyrian 

hurru,  with  the  same  meaning,  settles  the  question,  and  it 
is  but  fair  to  say  that  Levy  has  already  recognized  the 
correct  stem  both  for  "113  and  fof'  lin. 

For  the  derivation  of  J"Qj2,  "stomach  of  the  ruminating 
animals"  (Deut.  xviii.  3),  where  Gesenius's  dictionary  is 


1  See   W.  A.  I.  ii.  31,  48c    and   compare    the  Talm.    -n-s 
Kiddushin,  76  b. 


uncertain  whether  to  adopt  the  stem  3~"  or  nip,  and  of 
P3p,  "belly"  (Num.  xxv.  8;,  for  which  ap  is  prop  •..-.-!  a.-* 

tha  stem,  we  need  not  refer  to  Assyrian,  the  Aramaic  tLe 
with  its  derivatives  showing  ch-arly  that  the  stem  of  both 
words  is 


The  Hebrew  name  of  the  bullock,  ir,  IB,  fem. 
may  come  from  TB  or  me.  The  Assyrian  j>uru 
teaches  that  the  stem  is  me,  the  same  stem  as  that  from 
which  "^E,  "fruit,"  is  derived.  The  original  meaning  of  tin- 
.~trm  in  (juestiou  is  "to  spring,  to  spring  up,"  a.s  the  ninth 
<  -i  lit  ion  rightly  supposes,  although  it  takes  "HE  for  this  stem. 
It  may  be  interesting  to  note  here  another  stem,  namely 
2IX,  "to  spring,"  from  which  both  the  names  for  "fruit"' 
and  for  "hare"  are  derived;  S3IS,  N2S  denoting  the  fruit, 
as  that  which  springs  forth  or  bursts  out,  while  raps  sig- 
nifies the  hare  as 


The  Hebrew  2S,  which  is  used  in  Job  viii.  12  ard 
Solomon's  Song  vi.  11  of  the  germinating  or  shooting  of 
plants,  may,  as  is  accepted  by  every  one,  come  from  the 
same  root  as  the  Aramaic  S2:x,  "fruit,"  found  in  the  book 
of  Daniel.  But  if  this  be  so,  it  is  impossible  any  long*-: 
consider  32X  as  the  stem;  for  Assyrian  inJnt  ,  "fruit,"  st. 
constr.  /////;.  as  well  as  the  verb  in  Piel,  unnulii,  "to  bear 
fruit,"  and  other  derivatives  like  iiannabu=  pirhu,  "a  sprout.  ' 
lead  undoubtedly  to  a  stem  a:S,  from  which,  as  our  original 
dictionaries  expressly  inform  us,  the  hare  antiabu  (Arab. 

^"6 

as  l'ie  springer,  received  its  name. 


The  etymology  even  of  the  most  common  Hebrew  words 
is  changed  by  the  Assyrian.  It  is  still  to-day  usual  to  say 
that  the  Hebrew  preposition  PS,  "with"  ("FIX,  "with  m 

Del  I  Inch,  Hebrew  and  Auvriin.  .", 


—     66 

corresponds  to  an  original  r:X,  so  that  "'F^,  "with  me," 
meant  originally  "a  meeting  Avith  me."  The  Assyrian  itti, 
"with,"  destroys  this  hypothesis,  for  the  Assyrian  itti,  ittu 
is  clearly  the  feminine  form  of  itti,  "side,"  pi.  itnti.  Itti, 
,,with  me,"  means  simply  "at  my  side."  Itti  and  ittu,  "side," 
are  among  the  commonest  Assyrian  words.  Certainly  no  one 
would  dare  to  adduce  the  Ethiopia  enta  against  this  ex- 
planation. On  the  other  hand,  the  Assyrian  confirms  the 
derivation  of  rtf,  "time,"  as  equivalent  to  P2S;  (a  derivation 
first  correctly  recognized  by  Fleischer);  for  in  Assyrian  by 
the  side  of  ittu,  cttu,  ,,time,"  we  meet  the  still  commoner 
masculine  form  enu,  mu,  which  corresponds  to  the  Aramaic 
]<  (]<?)>  but  has  nothing  at  all  to  do  with  the  Arabic  ,.» 


In  cases  like  CVP  or  "X12  we  admit  that  without  the 
aid  of  Assyrian  it  was  difficult  to  say  whether  the  D  and 
"Q  were  radical  or  merely  prefixes.  In  the  face  of  Assyr. 
tiimtu,  tfinntu,  "sea,"  and  ma'ddu,  "to  be  much  (miidn, 
"multitude"),  the  radical  nature  of  n  and  tt  can  no  longer 
be  denied.1 


1  With  respect  to  the  solution  of  .such  difficult  questions,  the 
constant  effort  to  compare  Hebrew  with  Arabic  has  again  been  a  bar- 
rier to  the  recognition  of  the  truth  even  in  easy  cases  like  the  stem 
rbr,  with  its  derivative  -b"P,  "worm."  The  ninth  edition  combines 
this  word  with  &*  (Arabic  AV),  "to  lick,"  a  stem  having  no  existence 

in  Hebrew.  Besides,  who  ever  saw  a  worm  that  licks  ?  A  dog  licks, 
not  a  worm.  In  three  passages  of  the  Old  Testament  (Job  xxix.  17, 
Joel  i.  6,  Ps.  xxx.  14)  the  teeth  are  cafted  n'strr;  but  in  spite  of 
this  the  form  rSspbr,  which  occurs  only  once  (Ps.  Iviii.  7)  and  arises 
from  the  evident  transposition  of  i  and  /,  is  declared  to  be  the  original 
form,  and  is  explained  from  the  Arabic  ixj,  "to  prick."  But  a  tooth 

<!'ifs  not  prick  anything.     Could  not  the  Hebrew   of  itself   teach   that 


r.7 

The   Hebrew    \vi.nl    fur    "d<-!;i  "'-^   i*    universal}' 

derived  fr.iin  ba'V  Hut  apart  from  the  fact,  that  the  form 
would  be  without  analogy,  we  deny  that  Heb.  ba^  ever 
means  "to  llo\\"  like  the  Arabic  Jo..  Heb.  ^y  has,  like  th< 
A—yr.  nliiilu  (trfilnilii),  invariably  the  meaning  "to  lead  or  to 
briii'.'."  C'XT*'-;"  d>.  xxx.  •_'.'..  xr.iv.  4)  are  aqueducts  /«?/////// 
th.-  water-  I"  tin-  tii-ld-.1  The  obscure  word  ~2"S  in  Dan. 
viii.  2.  3.  6  does  not  disprove  this  statement.  Just  a« 
~'f3'G,  "sjirinu'"  c'lines  I'min  73:,  b^STS  may  be  derived  from 
-;:.  The  stem  bs:  has  in  Assyrian  as  well  as  in  Hebrew 
tin-  ineanin^  "to  spoil"  or  "to  destroy";  compare  Heb.  nbs:, 
A»yr.  nu/iii/fi/  (syn.  ni'itii,  II .  .1.  I.  \.  31,  38  d) ,  "corpse." 
The  intransitive  Hebrew  verb  b3:  is  used  of  the  witherin.- 
aml  destruction  of  the  leaves;  Assyr.  nnl»ihi,  the  usual  verb 
for  "to  destroy."  is  especially  applied  to  the  destruction  of 
nature  occasioned  by  the  ravages  of  storms  and  incessant 
rains.  Compare  mililmltn.  "huricane"  and  phrases  like  nal>lu 
iisir.niii  ill  /ml. In" a.  "I  caused  destruction  to  rain  on  my 
enemies." 

The  well-known  word  "pIX,  "b  >x,  ark,"  is  by  Muchluu 
and  Volck  rightly  pronounced  to  be  of  doubtful  ori«rin.  Th« 
Assyrian  dictionary  ajrain  settles  the  question  by  the  simple 
fact  that  I'n'iti/,  tlie  full  equivalent  of  the  Hebrew  ""X. 
has  as  synonym  t'n'i.  The  stem  is  therefore  m&C,  and 


tin-  .-tcni  rbr  iiican>  "t->  ^-iiau."  >..  that  tin-  \\»n\\  \\oiild  l»t,-  tin- 
gnawer,  ami  tin-  t«'eth  the  gnawers?  Tin-  A»vrian  i-<nitiriii>  tlii.-*  fully, 
ju^t  a»  in  general  .snuinl  A>*vrian  rtvni-il-iyy  i»  in  i-mnplete  harmony 
\\itli  Miiuiil  Hebrew  etyinnl.,^ . 

1  Compare  die  analogous  name*  of  Assyrian  chumalB  Bkfl  /!••" 
i.f  al.Minlaut  \\atcr"  (11'.   A.  I.  i.  27  No.  2,  6). 

5* 


68 

If  we  bear  in  mind  the  fact  that  the  Assyrian  language 
was  fixed  in  literature  many  centuries  before  the  oldest 
known  Hebrew  texts  and  thousands  of  years  before  Arabic, 
we  cannot  be  surprised  that  Assyrian  has  preserved  in  not 
a  few  cases  the  oldest  forms  of  stems  lost  or  disguised  by 
the  process  of  decay  in  the  kindred  tongues.  Thus  the 
true  meaning  of  the  Semitic  word  for  "bride,"  Heb.  ~>I, 
is  obscured  in  the  cognate  dialects.  According  to  Hebrew 
as  well  as  Aramaic  the  name  can  only  be  derived  from 
bbs,  "to  encircle;"  but  none  of  the  different  explanations 
which  have  been  put  forward,  as  "the  girl  provided  with  a 
wreath"  or  "the  veiled,"  has  yet  met  with  general  approval. 
The  Assyrian  puts  an  end  to  all  doubt.  In  Assyrian  the 
bride  is  called  kaJhttii,  with  a  long  a  in  the  second  syllable. 
That  shows  at  once  that  the  stem  cannot  be  bbs.  We  are 
further  taught  that  the  original  meaning  of  the  word  is  not 
"bride,"  but  "the  bride's  chamber,"  its  ideogram  denoting 
"the  shut -up  room."  The  stem  is  clearly  the  same  stem 
J*'~D,  "to  shut  up,"  from  which  in  Hebrew  as  Avell  as  in 
Assyrian  the  prison  is  called  xb2  r^Sj,  bit  kill.  Kallntu, 
"bride  chamber,"  was  afterwards  applied  to  the  bride. 

Compare   the  analogous  use   of  the  Arabic  ^CT   "harem," 
and  the  German  Frauenximmer. 

As  we  have  had  occasion  to  remark  p.  24,  footnote,  a 
number  of  Targumic  and  Talmudic  words,  formerly  regarded 
as  being  of  Aryan  origin,  are  now  proved  by  the  cuneiform 
literature  to  be  good  Semitic,  namflly  Babylonian,  borrowed 
chiefly  in  or  since  the  time  of  the  exile.  We  stated  at  the 
same  time  that  these  words  cannot  be  derived  according  to 
Hebrew  laws  of  formation,  but  must  be  understood  as  Ba- 
bylonian words.  Now,  we  are  of  opinion  that  the  Old  Testa- 


nit-lit    contain.-    ,ikt-wise    a    number    of  words  which    an 
llaliyloniaii  origin,  because  they  have  a  satisfactory  explana- 
tion only  it  ih.  v  are  understood  as  Babylonian  words.1    One 
in-:    ii.     may  suffice.     The  Hebrew   and  Aramaic  name  of 
the  I'K-i.i  Is  is  rflTS  (Amos  v.  8;  Job.  IX.  9,  xxxvm.  :il). 


The    word    is    generally  combined    with    the    Arabic 

"i  •  have  a  large  hump"  (said  of  the  camel),  and  explained 

I  iy  the  Arabic  x*JT,  "heap,"  so  that  the  Pleiads  would 
lie  callf«l  rr"~  as  an  accumulation  of  stars.  I  do  not  think 
that  any  of  my  readers  will  find  this  interpretation  of  that 
\\oml.-rful  .irroup  of  stars  poetical  or  even  true;  those  seven 
stars,  which  arc  compared  by  Persian  poets  with  a  necklace 
or  a  bouquet  of  jewels,  could  hardly  be  compared  with  a 
heap  of  earth.  Babylonia  is  the  home  of  astronomy,  and 
most  of  those  names  of  stars,  that  occur  in  the  Old  Testa- 
ment, as  of  .Saturn,  ""I,  htiiirann,  are  of  Babylonian  origin.2 


1  The  Aramaic  dialects  exhibit  a  considerable  number  of  such 
I'>:iliyl»nisiii8.  The  two  verbs  -l"-  (.the  Babylonian  Shafel  from  tsfbn, 
2tr)  and  X3rr  (tlie  Babylonian  Sliafel  from  atf,  XX")  rank  among  the 

rurioiis  and  instructive  examples.  Observe  tlie  !C  of  the  last- 
named  form,  which  alone  disproves  Aramaic  origin.  As  Paul  Haupt 
:;rst  shown,  tlie  words  for  "tribute"  or  "tax"  that  occur  in  the 
hunks  ..i'  K/.r.-i.  Nehemiah,  and  Daniel — iba  and  nTi  (_rn:i:i — are  simply 
the  Babylonian  words  littu,  "tax''  (literally,  "what  is  brought,"  from 
-~-  and  iHHiiiliitfu ,  mandantu ,  "tribute"  (lit.  "what  is  given,"  from 
•p;  =  -(r:i:  i-mnji.  Aram.  XS'1;,  "salil»ath."  These  Babylonian  or  Amy- 
rian  words  had  been  adopted  by  the  nations  on  whom  the  tribute  was 
iin}>oM<<l  hv  th<-  monarchs  of  the  Babylonian  and  Assyrian  empire. 

1  The  same  is  the  case  with  most  of  the  names  used  up  to  the 
|irc-.-iit  .lav  t'.r  tli>-  various  constellations,  as  "tin-  Wa^jjmi."  "the  Limi." 
"the  Twin-,"  which  are  to  be  found  in  the  long  lists  of  stars  handed 
down  to  u*  through  AMirhani]>al's  library. 


70 

So  the  word  rTC^S  is  evidently  nothing  but  the  Assyrian 
kimlu,  "family,"  borrowed  by  the  Hebrews  as  rveis,  just  as 
birfu  was  'changed  into  rrP3.  The  stem  is  kamu.  "to  tie," 
the  family  being  called  kimtit  because  its  members  are  con- 
nected by  one  common  tie.  It  would  even  seem  that  the 
Hebrew  poet  himself  was  still  conscious  of  that  original 
meaning;  this  is  at  least  suggested  by  the  words  of  the 
author  of  the  book  of  Job  (xxxviii.  31):  "Dost  thou  bind 
the  bands  of  the  Pleiads?" 

In  concluding  this  treatise  we  venture  to  offer  with  due 
reserve  a  few  suggestions  as  to  the  etymology  of  the  He- 
brew word  "pB,  usually  translated  by  "species"  or  "kind." 
the  etymology  of  which  Wellhausen  rightly  'pronounces  a 
riddle.  We  formulate  our  objections  to  the  translation  "spe- 
cies" in  the  following  propositions:  1)  In  phrases  like  Gen. 
vi.  20:  "of  fowls  after  their  kind,  and  of  cattle  after  their 
kind,  of  every  kreeping  thing  of  the  earth  after  his  kiml" 
or  Dent.  xiv.  13.  14:  "the  vulture  after  his  kind  and  every 
raven  after  his  kind."  AVC  feel  the  want  of  the  plural  form.1 

2)    The    explanation  of  the  word   "pE  by  the   Arabic    ~\  Lo 

-c*"^ 

•  jcj^l,  "he  has  divided  or  opened  up  the  earth  by  the  plough 
for  the  purpose  of  sowing,"  is  far-fetched. — Guided  by  As.-y- 
rian  phrases  like  "The  gods  created  the  living  creatures 
mala  bam  "as  many  as  there  are"  or  mala  Sitma  ixihd 
"as  many  as  have  a  name,"  we  have  long  thought  that  ~**2 
simply  means  "number,"  a  meaning  which  tits  admirably 
whereever  the  word  occurs.  If  we  consider  that  the  use 
of  the  word  is  confined  to  the  so-called  Code  of  the  priests, 


1  The  e   in  Cn5^~   Gen.  i.  21,  which  is  not  the  Plural-'',    i>  ex- 
plained by  KwaM  in  his  Grammar,  §.  247 d. 


71 

K/i-k.  \T,vii.  in  ami  t«»  four  pannages  in  Deur.  xiv,  which 
mooVni  eritiei-m  places  in  the  lime  of  the  exile,  we  may 
venture  to  identity  tin-  Hebrew  "pr  with  the  Baby- 
lonian ini/ni,  ••number,"  which  ia  a  pure  Babylonian 
form  ei.ntraeteil  from  //////////,  as  bitnn,  "chihl,"  /">". 
••mi«l>t "  and  many  others  are  contract!  <1  from  //«/////< 
ami  /tin/if. 


Index 

of  the  Hebrew  words  explained. 


H 

2 

52-J  20. 

3X   16. 

^=.=    12- 

-3sa  13. 

3X  65. 

n-n-'a  22  f.  70. 

nnax  28  f. 

r-i-a  49  f. 

•> 

•)3X  57. 

-X-.  25. 

---x_  25  f. 
MX  57  f. 

- 
nban  58. 

bai'  67. 
ri'i'^  36. 

r-ax  23.                      ^  39  f. 

c-x,  n^nx  58  f.                             . 
Tnx  15.                        ;  ^      3S  f 

D 
0-3  33. 

T.-h~-b"X    12. 

1'3  64. 

nx  59. 

rrc-«a  69  f. 

D*nx  33  f.                                       n 

x';  3,  x'-3  n-> 

nrbnx  36. 
TJX  15. 

rbsan  34  ff. 

—  •  —  -»—    Qfi 

nfer  63. 
nba  12. 

'i;^X  9. 

nnn  62. 

^3  25. 

......^    q  .' 

•r-'W  62. 

0=3  50  f. 

ex,  nrx,  nsx  59  f. 
i:x  24Y 

ybn  23. 

-~3  40  ff. 

n-ja  64. 

rcix  33. 

vsn  62. 

•p^n-^DX  12. 
rz^x  10. 

-in  (Tin)  04. 
y*-\r>  62. 

nx  -  66. 

-,1~X  U7. 

•i!^hTl7.  62. 

b^a-2  67. 

nnx  53. 
Tix,  nnrx  30  f. 

Wn62. 
•jrn  43  ff. 

3^3   13  f. 
m  69. 
T^ma  62. 

n'^x  9. 

12 

T^n-a  49. 

n^rs;  r»s. 

ra-j  15. 

1'H  T  62- 

rx  <;5  f. 

r-ri-a  20. 

bs^ia  20. 

20.  68. 


V-   To  i. 

y 

JD 

--  x:-:  I'M. 

•  __«_  ..       .  ti  . 

M        t            '»            —U. 

mr  62. 

ni«  • 

_-:•  47. 

-TO  55C 

T^bV:  56. 

•-•'••  n\m     t  1     f 

nnnb-c  10. 

r-  1:1;. 

V 

•_--•:  16. 

E 

b'x3  20. 

rrcna  63. 
.4  f. 

nno  12  i. 
nsipp  24. 
no  65. 

lar  36  f. 
•j-J  46. 
•JU   16. 

2 

•np  45. 

mnd  47  t 

* 

nnis  62. 

^td  48. 

•jz:  .")2. 
nba:  67. 

s 

rwihd  35. 

bnY'sf. 

•jXS  46  f. 

•-- 

brw  48  f. 

n^a  •_".!. 

•jo"1:  15. 

1^3  52  f. 

W*  —  »     1  •  ' 

nap,  nap  64  f. 

oinn  66. 
sbin'  66  f. 

3*1     >J       IM. 

ypp^p  •_'». 

nan  30.  . 

0 

•oj?  ;•:;  f. 

M-n  bn  16  t 

o-'jaq  13. 

1 

nan  16. 

rrp  62. 

OX")  6  f. 

-,Fnn  12. 

1  r   :  - 

rinb  36. 

npia-i  13. 

•j^p    16. 

D-«PD-I  23. 

Index 

of  the  Aramaic  words  explained. 

xrx  ixs:x)  65. 

O"^X  24. 

x^n^  33. 

x'sr-.x  21. 

iba  69. 

b^r  50. 

rr-:zx  :i:!. 

XM  24. 

—  »••••        t'«l 

^i    M    O»». 

•p-inx 

xnub  21. 

X^^O  69 

xanpx  24. 

s-:-r.  x:-:^p  24. 

oa-*n  50. 

14,  HEXRIBTTA  STREET,  COVEXT  GARDEN,  Loroov; 
20,  SOUTH  FREDERICK  STREET,  EDIKBURUH. 


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