Chapter X · The Table of Peoples (Priestly-Code and Yahwist). (continued 2)

עֵבֶר is the eponym of עִבְרִים (Hebrews), the name by which the Israelites are often designated in distinction from other peoples, down to the time of Saul¹ (see Gesenius-Kautzsch § 2 b: the passages are cited in Brown-Driver-Briggs, s.v.). It is strange at first sight that while the בני עבר of verse ²¹ include all Shemites known to Yahwist, the gentilic word is historically restricted to Israelites. The difficulty is perhaps removed by the still disputed, but now widely accepted, theory that Ḫabiri in the Tel-Amarna letters is the cuneiform equivalent of the Old Testament עִבְרִים. The equation presents no philological difficulty: Assyrian ḫ often represents a foreign ע; and Eerdmans’ statement (Alttestamentliche Studien, ii. 64), that the sign ḫa never stands for עִ (if true) is worthless, for Ḫa-za-ḳi-ya-u = חִזקיהו shows that Assyrian a may become in the Old Testament i, and this is all that it is necessary to prove. The historical objections vanish if the Ḫabiri be identified, not with the Israelitish invaders after the Exodus, but with an earlier immigration of Semitic nomads into Palestine, amongst whom the ancestors of Israel were included. The chief uncertainty arises from the fact that the phonetic writing Ḫa-bi-ri occurs only in a limited group of letters,—those of ‛Abd-ḫiba of Jerusalem (179, 180 [182], 183, 185). The ideogram SA. GAS (‘robbers’) in other letters is conjectured to have the same value, but this is not absolutely demonstrated. Assuming that Winckler and others are right in equating the two, the Ḫabiri are in evidence over the whole country, occasionally as auxiliaries of the Egyptian government, but chiefly as its foes. The inference is very plausible that they were the roving Bedouin element of the population, as opposed to the settled inhabitants,—presumably a branch of the great Aramæan invasion which was then overflowing Mesopotamia and Syria (see above, page 206; compare Winckler Altorientalische Forschungen, iii. 90 ff., Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 196 ff.; Paton, The Early History of Syria and Palestine 111 ff.). There is thus a strong probability that עברים was originally the name of a group of tribes which invaded Palestine in the 15th century B.C., and that it was afterwards applied to the Israelites as the sole historic survivors of the immigrants.—Etymologically, the word has usually been interpreted as meaning ‘those from beyond’ the river (compare עֵבֶר הַנָּהָר, Joshua 24^{2 f. 14 f.}); and on that assumption, the river is certainly not the Tigris (Delitzsch), and almost certainly not the Jordan (Wellhausen, Kuenen, Stade), but (in accordance with prevailing tradition) the נהר of the Old Testament, the Euphrates, ‘beyond’ which lay Ḥarran, the city whence Abraham set out. Hommel’s view (The Ancient Hebrew Tradition as illustrated by the Monuments, 252 ff.) has no probability (compare Driver 139²). The verb עבר, however, does not necessarily mean to ‘cross’ (a stream); it sometimes means simply to ‘traverse’ a region (Jeremiah 2⁶); and in this sense Spiegelberg has recently (1907) revived an attractive conjecture of Goldziher (Mythos, page 66), that עברים signifies ‘wanderers’—nomads (Orientalische Litteraturzeitung x. 618 ff.).²

¹ After 1 Samuel it occurs only Deuteronomy 15¹², Jeremiah 34^{9. 14}, Jonah 1⁹. But see the cogent criticisms of Weinheimer in Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, 1909, 275 ff., who propounds the view that Hebrews and Israelites were distinct strata of the population.

² In Egyptian texts from Thothmes III. to Ramses IV., the word ‛Apuriu (‛Apriu) occurs as the name of a foreign population in Egypt; and had been identified by Chabas with the Hebrews of the Old Testament. The identification has been generally discarded, on grounds which seemed cogent; but has recently been revived by Hommel (The Ancient Hebrew Tradition as illustrated by the Monuments, 259), and (with arguments which seem very convincing) by Heyes (Bibel und Ägypten: Abraham und seine Nachkommen in Ägypten, 1904, 146 ff.). In view of the striking resemblance to Ḫabiri, and the new facts brought to light by the Tel-Amarna Tablets, the hypothesis certainly deserves to be reconsidered (compare Eerdmans, l.c. 52 ff., or The Expositor, 1909, ii. 197 ff.).

21. The father of all the sons of ‛Ēber] The writer has apparently borrowed a genealogical list of the descendants of Eber which he was at a loss to connect with the name of Shem. Hence he avoids the direct assertion that Shem begat Eber, and bridges over the gap by the vague hint that Shem and Eber stand for the same ethnological abstraction.—the elder brother of Yepheth] The Hebrew can mean nothing else (v.i.). The difficulty is to account for the selection of Japheth for comparison with Shem, the oldest member of the family. Unless the clause be a gloss, the most obvious inference is that the genealogy of Japheth had immediately preceded; whether because in the Table of Yahwist the sequence of age was broken (Budde 305 f.), or because Japheth was really counted the second son of Noah (Dillmann). The most satisfactory solution is undoubtedly that of Gunkel, who finds in the remark an indication that this Table followed the order: Canaan—Japheth—Shem (see page 188).—24 is an interpolation (based on 11^12‒14) intended to harmonise Yahwist with Priestly-Code. It cannot be the continuation of ²¹ as it stands (since we have not been informed who Arpakšad was), and still less in the form suggested below. It is also obviously inconsistent with the plan of Priestly-Code’s Table, which deals with nations and not with individual genealogies (note also יָלַד instead of הוֹלִיד).

21. It is doubtful if the text is in order. First, it is extremely likely that the introduction to the section on Shem in Yahwist would require modification to prevent contradiction with verse ^{22 f.} (Priestly-Code). Then, the omission of the logical subject to יֻלַּד is suspicious. The Pual of this verb never dispenses with the subject nor does the Hophal; the Niphal does so once (Genesis 17¹⁷ [Priestly-Code]); but there the ellipsis is explained by the emphasis which lies on the fact of birth. Further, a הוּא is required as subject of the clause אבי וגו׳. The impression is produced that originally עֵבֶר was expressly named as the son of Shem, and that the words הוא אבי וגו׳ referred to him (perhaps ולשם יֻלַּד את־ע֑בר הוא אבי וגו׳). Considering the importance of the name, the tautology is not too harsh. It would then be hardly possible to retain the clause אחי וגו׳; and to delete it as a gloss (although it has been proposed by others: see Oxford Hexateuch) I admit to be difficult, just because of the obscurity of the expression.—גם הוא] compare 4²⁶.—אחי יפת הגדול] Vulgate correctly fratre Yahwist majore. The Massoretic accentuation perhaps favours the grammatically impossible rendering of LXX (ἀδελφῷ Ἰαφεθ τοῦ μείζονος), Symmachus, al.; which implies that Japheth was the oldest of Noah’s sons,—a notion extorted from the chronology of 11¹⁰ coupled with 5³² 7¹¹ (see Rashi, Abraham Ibn Ezra). It is equally inadmissible (with Abraham Ibn Ezra) to take הגדול absolutely (= Japheth the great). See Budde 304 ff.—24. את־שלח] LXX prefers את־קינן וקינן ילד.

25. The two sons of Eber represent the Northern and Southern Semites respectively, corresponding roughly to Aramæans and Arabs: we may compare with Jastrow (A Dictionary of the Bible, v. 82 a) the customary division of Arabia into Šām (Syria) and Yemen. The older branch, to which the Israelites belonged, is not traced in detail: we may assume that a Yahwistic genealogy (∥ to 11^{16 ff.} [Priestly-Code]) existed, showing the descent of Abraham from Peleg; and from scattered notices (19^{30 ff.} 22^{20 ff.} 25^{1 ff.} etc.) we can form an idea of the way in which the northern and central districts were peopled by that family of ‘Hebrews.’—On פֶּלֶג, see below.—For in his days the earth was divided (נִפְלְגָה)] a popular etymology naturally suggested by the root, which in Hebrew (as in Aramaic, Arabic, etc.) expresses the idea of ‘division’ (compare the verb in Psalms 55¹⁰, Job 38²⁵). There is no very strong reason to suppose that the dispersion (פלוגתא, Targum^Jonathan etc.) of the Tower of Babel is referred to; it is possible that some other tradition regarding the distribution of nations is followed (e.g. Jubilees viii. 8 ff.), or that the allusion is merely to the separation of the Yoḳṭanites from their northern kinsmen.

פֶּלֶג (Φαλεκ, Φαλεγ, Φαλεχ)] as a common noun means ‘watercourse’ or artificial canal (Assyrian palgu): Isaiah 30²⁵, Psalms 1³ 65¹⁰, Job 29⁶ etc. Hence it has been thought that the name originally denoted some region intersected by irrigating channels or canals, such as Babylonia itself. Of geographical identifications there are several which are sufficiently plausible: Phalga in Mesopotamia, at the junction of the Chaboras and the Euphrates (Knobel); ’el-Falǧ, a district in North-east Arabia near the head of the Persian Gulf (Lagarde Orientalia ii. 50); ’el-Aflāǧ South of Ǧebel Tuwaiḳ in central Arabia (Hommel Aufsätze und Abhandlungen arabistisch-semitologischen Inhalts, 222²).

יָקְטָן (Ἰεκταν)] otherwise unknown, is derived by Fleischer (Goldziher Der Mythos bei den Hebräern, page 67) from √ ḳaṭana = ‘be settled.’ The Arab genealogists identified him with Ḳaḥtān, the legendary ancestor of a real tribe, who was (or came to be) regarded as the founder of the Yemenite Arabs (Margoliouth, A Dictionary of the Bible, ii. 743). On the modern stock of ’el-Ḳaḥṭan, and its sinister reputation in the more northerly parts of the Peninsula, see Doughty, Travels in Arabia Deserta i. 129, 229, 282, 343, 389, 418, ii. 39 ff., 437.

25. יֻלַּד] The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch, LXX ילדו; but שְׁנֵי בָנִים is possibly accusative after passive, as 4¹⁸ etc. (Gesenius-Kautzsch § 121 a, b)—האחד—אחיו] similarly 22²¹ (Yahwist).

26‒30. The sons of Yoḳṭan number 13, but in LXX (see on עובל below) only 12, which may be the original number. The few names that can be satisfactorily identified (Sheleph, Ḥaẓarmaweth, Sheba, Ḥavilah) point to South Arabia as the home of these tribes.

(1) אַלְמוֹדָד (Ἐλμωδαδ)] unknown. The אל is variously explained as the Arabic article (but this is not Sabæan), as ’Ēl = ‘God,’ and as ’āl = ‘family’; and מודד as a derivative of the verb for ‘love’ (wadda), equivalent to Hebrew יָדִיד (Winckler Mittheilungen der vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft, vi. 169); compare Glaser, Skizze der Geschichte und Geographie Arabiens, ii. 425; A Dictionary of the Bible, i. 67.

(2) שֶׁלֶף (Σαλεφ)] A Yemenite tribe or district named on Sabæan inscriptions, and also by Arabic geographers: see Hommel Süd-arabische Chrestomathie 70; Osiander in Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenländischen Gesellschaft, xi. 153 ff., perhaps identical with the Salapeni of Roman writers. Cognate place-names are said to be still common in South Arabia (Glaser).

(3) חֲצַרְמָוֶת (Ἁσαρμωθ)] The modern province of Ḥaḍramaut, on the South coast, East of Yemen. The name appears in Sabæan inscriptions of 5th and 6th centuries A.D., and is slightly disguised in the Χατραμωτῖται of Strabo (XVI. iv. 2), the Chatramotitæ of Pliny, vi. 154 (Atramitæ, vi. 155, xii. 52?).

(4) יֶרַח (Ἰαραδ)] uncertain. The attempts at identification proceed on the appellative sense of the word (= ‘moon’), but are devoid of plausibility (see Dillmann).

(5) הֲדוֹרָם (The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch אדורם, LXX Ὁδορρα)] likewise unknown. A place called Dauram close to Ṣan‛a has been suggested: the name is found in Sabæan (Glaser, 426, 435).

(6) אוּזָל (The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch איזל, LXX Αἰζηλ)] mentioned by Ezekiel (27¹⁹: read מֵאוּזָל) as a place whence iron and spices were procured. It is commonly taken to be the same as ’Azāl, which Arabic tradition declares to be the old name of Ṣan’a, now the capital of Yemen. Glaser (310, 427, 434, etc.) disputes the tradition, and locates ’Ûzāl in the neighbourhood of Medina.¹

¹ In view of the uncertainty of the last three names, it is worthy of attention that the account of Asshurbanipal’s expedition against the Nabatæans (Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, ii. 221) mentions, in close conjunction, three places, Ḥurarina, Yarki, and Azalla, which could not, of course, be as far South as Yemen, but might be as far as the region of Medina. In spite of the phonetic differences, the resemblance to Hadoram, Yeraḥ, and ’Ûzāl is noteworthy. See, however, Glaser, 273 ff., 309 ff.

(7) דִּקְלָה (Δεκλα)] Probably the Arabic and Aramaic word (daḳal, דקלא, ) for ‘date-palm,’ and therefore the name of some noted palm-bearing oasis of Arabia. Glaser (Mittheilungen der vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft, 1897, 438) and Hommel (Aufsätze und Abhandlungen arabistisch-semitologischen Inhalts, 282 f.) identify it with the Φοινικων of Procopius, and the modern Ǧōf es-Sirhān, 30° North latitude (as far North as the head of the Red Sea).

(8) עוֹבָל (The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch and 1 Chronicles 1²² עֵיבָל, LXX^Lucian Γαιβαλ)] supposed to be the word ‛Abil, a frequent geographical name in Yemen (Glaser, 427). The name is omitted by many MSS of LXX, also by LXXᴮ in 1 Chronicles 1²² (see Nestle, Marginalien und Materialien, 10), where some Hebrew MSS and Peshiṭtå have עובל.

(9) אֲבִימָאֵל (Ἀβιμεηλ)] apparently a tribal name (= ‘father is God’), of genuine Sabæan formation (compare אבמעתֿתר, Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenländischen Gesellschaft, xxxvii. 18), not hitherto identified.

(10) שְׁבָא] see on verse ⁷ (page 203). The general connexion suggests that the Sabæans are already established in Yemen; although, if ’Ûzāl be as far North as Medina, the inference is perhaps not quite certain.

(11) אוֹפִר (Οὐφειρ)] known to the Israelites as a gold-producing country (Isaiah 13¹², Psalms 45¹⁰, Job 22²⁴ 28¹⁶, 1 Chronicles 29⁴ [Sirach 7¹⁸]), visited by the ships of Solomon and Hiram, which brought home not only gold and silver and precious stones, but almug-wood, ivory, apes and (?) peacocks (1 Kings 9²⁸ 10^{11. 22}; compare 22⁴⁹). Whether this familiarity with the name implies a clear notion of its geographical position may be questioned; but it can hardly be doubted that the author of the Yahwistic Table believed it to be in Arabia; and although no name at all resembling Ophir has as yet been discovered in Arabia, that remains the most probable view (see Glaser, Skizze der Geschichte und Geographie Arabiens, ii. 357‒83). Of other identifications the most important are: Abhira in India, East of the mouths of the Indus (Lassen); (2) the Sofala coast (opposite Madagascar), behind which remains of extensive gold-diggings were discovered around Zimbabwe in 1871: the ruins, however, have now been proved to be of native African origin, and not older than the 14th or 15th century A.D. (see D. Randall-Maciver, Mediæval Rhodesia [1906]); (3) Apir (originally Hapir), an old name for the ruling race in Elam, and for the coast of the Persian Gulf around Bushire (see Hommel The Ancient Hebrew Tradition as illustrated by the Monuments, 236⁴; Hüsing, Orientalische Litteraturzeitung, vi. 367 ff.; Jensen Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenländischen Gesellschaft, l. 246). If we could suppose the name transferred to the opposite (Arabian) coast of the gulf, this hypothesis would satisfy the condition required by this passage, and would agree in particular with Glaser’s localisation. For a discussion of the various theories, see the excellent summary by Cheyne in Encyclopædia Biblica, iii. 3513 ff.; Price, A Dictionary of the Bible, iii. 626 ff.; and Driver The Book of Genesis with Introduction and Notes² XXVI. f., 131.

(12) חֲוִילָה] see page 202.

(13) יוֹבָב (Ἰωβαβ)] unknown. Halevy and Glaser (ii. 303) compare the Sabæan name Yuhaibab.

The limits (probably from North to South) of the Yoḳṭanite territory are specified in verse ³⁰; but a satisfactory explanation is impossible owing to the uncertainty of the three names mentioned in it (Dillmann).—מֵשָׁא (Μασσηε) has been supposed to be Mesene (, Maisān), within the Delta of the Euphrates-Tigris (Gesenius Thesaurus philologicus criticus Linguæ Hebrææ et Chaldææ Veteris Testamenti 823; Tuch); but the antiquity of this name is not established. Dillmann, following LXX, reads מַשָּׂא (see on 25¹⁴) in North Arabia. This as northern limit would just include Diḳlah, if Glaser’s identification, given above, be correct.—סְפָרָה (Σωφηρα) is generally acknowledged to be Ẓafār in the South of Arabia. There were two places of the name: one in the interior of Yemen, North of Aden; the other (now pronounced ’Iṣfār or ’Isfār) on the coast of Mahra, near Mirbāt. The latter was the capital of the Himyarite kings (Gesenius Thesaurus philologicus criticus Linguæ Hebrææ et Chaldææ Veteris Testamenti 968; A Dictionary of the Bible, iv. 437; Encyclopædia Biblica, iv. 4370). Which of the two is here meant is a matter of little consequence.—הַר הַקֶּדֶם] It is difficult to say whether this is an apposition to מוֹשָׁבָם (Tuch al.), or a definition of ספר, or is a continuation of the line beyond ספר. On the first view the ‘mountain’ might be the highlands of central Arabia (Neǧd); the second is recommended by the fact that the eastern Ẓafār lies at the foot of a high mountain, well adapted to serve as a landmark. The third view is not assisted by rendering בֹּאֲכָה ‘in the direction of’ (see on verse ¹⁹); for in any case Ẓafār must have been the terminus in a southern direction. The commonly received opinion is that הר הקדם is the name of the Frankincense Mountain between Ḥaḍramaut and Mahra (see Dillmann).

26. Some MSS have חצר־מות, as if = ‘court of death.’

XI. 1‒9. The Tower of Babel (Yahwist).

A mythical or legendary account of the breaking up of the primitive unity of mankind into separate communities, distinguished and isolated by differences of language. The story reflects at the same time the impression made on Semitic nomads by the imposing monuments of Babylonian civilisation. To such stupendous undertakings only an undivided humanity could have addressed itself; and the existing disunitedness of the race is a divine judgement on the presumptuous impiety which inspired these early manifestations of human genius and enterprise.

Gunkel has apparently succeeded in disentangling two distinct but kindred legends, which are both Yahwistic (compare יהוה, ♦verses ^{5. 6. 8. 9.}), and have been blended with remarkable skill. One has crystallised round the name ‘Babel,’ and its leading motive is the “confusion” of tongues; the other around the memory of some ruined tower, which tradition connected with the “dispersion” of the race. Gunkel’s division will be best exhibited by the following continuous translations:

A. The Babel-Recension: (¹) And it was, when all the earth had one speech and one vocabulary, (^3a) that they said to one another, Come! Let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly. (^{4aα, γ}) And they said, Come! Let us build us a city, and make ourselves a name. (^6aα) And Yahwe said, Behold it is one people, and all of one language. (⁷) Come! Let us go down and confound there their language, so that they may not understand one another’s speech, (^8b) and that they may cease to build the city. (^9a) Therefore is its name called ‘Babel’ (Confusion), for there Yahwe confused the speech of the whole earth. B. The Tower-Recension: ... (²) And when they broke up from the East, they found a plain in the land of Shin‛ar, and settled there. [And they said, Let us build] (^4aβb) a tower, with its top reaching to heaven, lest we disperse over the face of the whole earth. (^3b) And they had brick for stone and asphalt for mortar. (⁵) And Yahwe came down to see the tower which the sons of men had built. [And He said ...] (^6aβb) and this is but the beginning of their enterprise; and now nothing will be impracticable to them which they purpose to do. (^8a) So Yahwe scattered them over the face of the whole earth. [?Therefore the name of the tower was called ‘Pîẓ’ (Dispersion), for] (^9b) from thence Yahwe dispersed them over the face of the whole earth.

It is extremely difficult to arrive at a final verdict on the soundness of this acute analysis; but on the whole it justifies itself by the readiness with which the various motives assort themselves in two parallel series. Its weak point is no doubt the awkward duplicate (^8a ∥ ^9b) with which B closes. Gunkel’s bold conjecture that between the two there was an etymological play on the name of the tower (פִּיץ or פּוּץ) certainly removes the objection; but the omission of so important an item of the tradition is itself a thing not easily accounted for.¹ Against this, however, we have to set the following considerations: the absence of demonstrable lacunæ in A, and their infrequency even in B; the facts that only a single phrase (אָת־הָעִיר וְ in verse ⁵) requires to be deleted as redactional, and there is only one transposition (^3b); and the facility with which nearly all the numerous doublets (^3a ∥ ^3b; ^4aγ ∥ ^4b; וַיֵּרֶד (⁵) ∥ נֵֽרְדָה (⁷); ^{6aα, β} ∥ ^6aγb; ^9a ∥ ^{8a + 9b}) can be definitely assigned to the one recension or the other. In particular, it resolves the difficulty presented by the twofold descent of Yahwe in ⁵ and ⁷, from which far-reaching critical consequences had already been deduced (see the notes). There are perhaps some points of style, and some general differences of conception between the two strata, which go to confirm the hypothesis; but these also may be reserved for the notes.

¹ In Jubilees x. 26, the name of the tower, as distinct from the city, is “Overthrow” (καταστροφή).

The section, whether simple or composite, is independent of the Ethnographic Table of chapter 10, and is indeed fundamentally irreconcilable with it. There the origin of peoples is conceived as the result of the natural increase and partition of the family, and variety of speech as its inevitable concomitant (compare ללשנתם, etc., in Priestly-Code, 10^{5. 20. 31}). Here, on the contrary, the division is caused by a sudden interposition of Yahwe; and it is almost impossible to think that either a confusion of tongues or a violent dispersion should follow genealogical lines of cleavage. It is plausible, therefore, to assign the passage to that section of Yahwist (if there be one) which has neither a Flood-tradition nor a Table of Nations (so Wellhausen, Budde, Stade, al.); although it must be said that the idea here is little less at variance with the classification by professions of 4^20‒22 than with chapter 10. The truth is that the inconsistency is not of such a kind as would necessarily hinder a collector of traditions from putting the two in historical sequence.

1‒4. The Building of the City and the Tower.

(Compare the translation given above.) 1, 2. The expression suggests that in A mankind is already spread far and wide over the earth, though forming one great nation (עַם, verse ⁶), united by a common language. In B, on the other hand, it is still a body of nomads, moving all together in search of a habitation (verse ²; compare בְּנֵי הָאָדָה, verse ⁵).—broke up from the East] v.i.—a plain] the Euphrates-Tigris valley; where Babylon κέεται ἐν πεδίῳ μεγάλῳ (Herodotus i. 178).—the land of Shin‛ar] see on 10¹⁰.—3a. With great naïveté, the (city-) legend describes first the invention of bricks, and then (verse ⁴) as an afterthought the project of building with them. The bilingual Babylonian account of creation (see page 47 above) speaks of a time when “no brick was laid, no brick-mould (nalbantu) formed”: see Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, vi. 1, 38 f., 360.—3b shows that the legend has taken shape amongst a people familiar with stone-masonry. Compare the construction of the walls of Babylon as described by Herodotus (i. 179).¹ The accuracy of the notice is confirmed by the excavated remains of Babylonian houses and temples (Das Alte Testament im Lichte des alten Orients², 279)—4. With its top reaching to heaven] The expression is not hyperbolical (as Deuteronomy 1²⁸), but represents the serious purpose of the builders to raise their work to the height of the dwelling-place of the gods (Jubilees x. 19, etc.).

¹ Compare Josephus Against Apion i. 139, 149; Diodorus. ii. 9; Pliny, Naturalis Historia, xxxv. 51.

The most conspicuous feature of a Babylonian sanctuary was its zikkurat,—a huge pyramidal tower rising, often in 7 terraces, from the centre of the temple-area, and crowned with a shrine at the top (Herodotus i. 181 f.: see Jastrow The Religion of Babylonia and Assyria, 615‒22). These structures appear to have embodied a half-cosmical, half-religious symbolism: the 7 stories represented the 7 planetary deities as mediators between heaven and earth; the ascent of the tower was a meritorious approach to the gods; and the summit was regarded as the entrance to heaven (Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 616 f.; Das Alte Testament im Lichte des alten Orients², 52 f., 281 f.). Hence it is probably something more than mere hyperbole when it is said of these zikkurats that the top was made to reach heaven (see page 228 f. below); and, on the other hand, the resemblance between the language of the inscriptions and that of Genesis is too striking to be dismissed as accidental. That the tower of Genesis 11 is a Babylonian zikkurat is obvious on every ground; and we may readily suppose that a faint echo of the religious ideas just spoken of is preserved in the legend; although to the purer faith of the Hebrews it savoured only of human pride and presumption.—The idea of storming heaven and making war on the gods, which is suggested by some late forms of the legend (compare Homer Odyssey xi. 313 ff.), is no doubt foreign to the passage.

1. וַיְהִי is not verbal predicate to כל־הארץ, but merely introduces the circumstantial sentence, as in 15¹⁷ 42³⁵ etc. (Davidson § 141 and R.¹). Such a sentence is usually followed by וְהִנֵּה, but see 1 Kings 13²⁰. It may certainly be doubted if it could be followed by another ויהי with infinitive clause (verse ²); and this may be reckoned a point in favour of Gunkel’s analysis.—If there be any distinction between שָׂפָה and דְּבָרִים, the former may refer to the pronunciation and the latter to the vocabulary (Dillmann), or (Gunkel) ש׳ to language as a whole, and ד׳ to its individual elements.—דְּבָרִים אֲחָדִים] ‘a single set of vocables’; LXX φωνὴ μία (+ πᾶσιν = לְכֻלָּם, as verse ⁶). Elsewhere (27⁴⁴ 29²⁰ [with יָמִים]) אחדים means ‘single’ in the sense of ‘few’; in Ezekiel 37¹⁷ the text is uncertain (see Cornill).—On the juxtaposition of subject and predicate in the nominal sentence, see Davidson § 29 (e).—2. בְּנָסְעָם מִקֶּדֶם] rendered as above by LXX, Vulgate, Peshiṭtå, Targum^Jonathan. Nearly all moderns prefer ‘as they wandered in the east’ or ‘eastward’; justifying the translation by 13¹¹, which is the only place where מקדם means ‘eastward’ with a verb of motion. That מק׳ never means ‘from the east’ is at least a hazardous assertion in view of Isaiah 2⁶ 9¹¹. נסע (compare Assyrian nisû, ‘remove,’ ‘depart,’ etc.) is a nomadic term, meaning ‘pluck up [tent-pegs]’ (Isaiah 33²⁰); hence ‘break up the camp’ or ‘start on a journey’ (Genesis 33¹² 35^{5. 16. 21} 37¹⁷ etc.); and, with the possible exception of Jeremiah 31²³ (but not Genesis 12⁹), there is no case where this primary idea is lost sight of. Being essentially a verb of departure, it is more naturally followed by a determination of the starting-point than of the direction or the goal (but see 33¹⁷); and there is no difficulty whatever in the assumption that the cradle of the race was further East than Babylonia (see 2⁸; and compare Stade Ausgewählte akademische Reden und Abhandlungen 246, and n. 43).—בִּקְעָה] (Syrian , Arabic baḳ‛at) in usage, a wide, open valley, or plain (Deuteronomy 34³, Zechariah 12¹¹, Isaiah 40⁴, etc.). The derivation from √ בקע, ‘split,’ is questioned by Barth (Etymologische Studien zum semitischen insbesondere zum hebraischen Lexicon, 2), but is probable nevertheless.—3. הָבָה] imperative of √ יהב, used interjectionally (Gesenius-Kautzsch § 69 o), as in verses ^{4. 7.} 38¹⁶, Exodus 1¹⁰ (all Yahwist), is given by Gunkel as a stylistic mark of the recension A (Jehovist^Elohist?). Contrast the verbal use 29²¹ 30¹ (both Elohist), 47¹⁵, and plural (הָבוּ) 47¹⁶, Deuteronomy 1¹³ 32³, Joshua 18⁴. On the whole, the two uses are characteristic of Yahwist and Elohist respectively; see Holzinger Einleitung in den Hexateuch 98 f.—נִלְבְּנָה לְבֵנִים] Exodus 5^{7. 14}. So in Assyrian labânu libittu (Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, ii. 48, etc.), although libittu is used only of the unburned, sun-dried brick. See Nöldeke Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenländischen Gesellschaft, xxxvi. 181; Hoffmann, Zeitschrift für die alttestamentliche Wissenschaft, ii. 70.—לִשְׂרֵפָה] dative of product (Dillmann); שׂ׳ = ‘burnt mass’ (compare Deuteronomy 29²², Jeremiah 51²⁵).—חֵמָר (14¹⁰, Exodus 2³)] the native Hebrew name for bitumen (see on 6¹⁴).—חֹמֶר] (note the play on words) is strictly ‘clay,’ used in Palestine as mortar.—4. וְרֹאשׁוֹ בַשָּׁמַיִם] בְּ of contact, as in נָגַע בְּ (Delitzsch).—וְנַֽעֲשֶׂה—שֵׁם] ‘acquire lasting renown’; compare 2 Samuel 8¹³, Jeremiah 32²⁰, Nehemiah 9¹⁰. The suggestion that שֵׁם here has the sense of ‘monument,’ though defended by Delitzsch, Budde (Die biblische Urgeschichte 375²), al. (compare Siegfried-Stade s.v.), has no sufficient justification in usage. In Isaiah 55¹³ 56⁵ (compare 2 Samuel 18¹⁸), as well as the amended text of 2 Samuel 8¹³ (see Driver Notes on the Hebrew Text of the Books of Samuel 217 f.), the ordinary sense suffices.—נָפוּץ] the word, accusative to Gunkel, is distinctive of the recension B: compare verses ^{8a. 9b}.

4b. Lest we disperse] The tower was to be at once a symbol of the unity of the race, and a centre and rallying-point, visible all over the earth (Abraham Ibn Ezra). The idea is missed by LXX, Vulgate and Targum^Jonathan, which render ‘ere we be dispersed.’

5‒9. Yahwe’s Interposition.

The turning-point in the development of the story occurs at verses ^{5. 6}, where the descent of Yahwe is twice mentioned, in a way which shows some discontinuity of narration.—On heaven as the dwelling-place of Yahwe, compare 28^{12 f.}, Exodus 19^{11. 20} 34⁵ 24¹⁰, 1 Kings 22¹⁹, 2 Kings 2¹¹; and with verse ⁵ compare 18²¹, Exodus 3⁸.

On the assumption of the unity of the passage, the conclusion of Stade (Ausgewählte akademische Reden und Abhandlungen 274 ff.) seems unavoidable: that a highly dramatic polytheistic recension has here been toned down by the omission of some of its most characteristic incidents. In verse ⁵ the name Yahwe has been substituted for that of some envoy of the gods sent down to inspect the latest human enterprise; verse ⁶ is his report to the heavenly council on his return; and verse ⁷ the plan of action he recommends to his fellow immortals. The main objection to this ingenious solution is that it involves, almost necessarily, a process of conscious literary manipulation, such as no Hebrew writer is likely to have bestowed on a document so saturated with pagan theology as the supposed Babylonian original must have been. It is more natural to believe that the elimination of polytheistic representations was effected in the course of oral transmission, through the spontaneous action of the Hebrew mind controlled by its spiritual faith.—On Gunkel’s theory the difficulty disappears.

6. This is but the beginning, etc.] The reference is not merely to the completion of the tower, but to other enterprises which might be undertaken in the future.—9. Babel] LXX rightly Σύγχυσις; v.i.

6.—הֵן עַם אֶחָד וגו׳] incomplete interjectional sentence (Gesenius-Kautzsch § 147 b).—זֶה הַֽחִלָּם לַֽעֲשׂוֹת] literally ‘this is their beginning to act.’ On the pointing הַֽח׳, see Gesenius-Kautzsch § 67 w.—לֹא יִבָּצֵר—יָֽזְמוּ] imitated in Job 42².—בצר] literally ‘be inaccessible’ (compare Isaiah 22¹⁰, Jeremiah 51⁵³); hence ‘impracticable.’—יָֽזְמוּ] contrast for יָזֹמּוּ (Gesenius-Kautzsch § 67 dd).—7. נרדה וגו׳] LXX retains the plural in spite of the alleged reading in Mechilta ארדה אבלה (see page 14 above).—נָֽבְלָה] (see last note): from √ בלל = ‘mix’ (not ‘divide,’ as Peshiṭtå []).—אֲשֶׁר לֹא] Gesenius-Kautzsch § 165 b.—שׁמע] = ‘understand’: 42²³, Deuteronomy 28⁴⁹, Isaiah 33¹⁹, Jeremiah 5¹⁵ etc.—8. It is perhaps better, if a distinction of sources is recognised, to point וְיֶחְדְּלוּ (jussive of purpose: Gesenius-Kautzsch § 109 f), continuing the direct address of ^7b.—העיר] The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch prefers את, and (with LXX) adds ואת־המגדל.—9. קָרָא] ‘one called’ (Gesenius-Kautzsch § 144 d).—בָּבֶל] ‘mxture’ or ‘confusion.’ The name is obviously treated as a contraction from בַּֽלְבֵּל, a form not found in Hebrew, but occurring in Aramaic (compare Peshiṭtå verse ⁹, and Targum^Onkelos verse ⁷) and Arabic. On the Babylonian etymology of the name, see 10¹⁰.—9b.—יהוה] LXX + ὁ θεός.

Origin and Diffusion of the Legends.

1. The double legend is a product of naïve reflexion on such facts of experience as the disunity of mankind, its want of a common language, and its consequent inability to bend its united energies to the accomplishment of some enduring memorial of human greatness. The contrast between this condition of things and the ideal unity of the race at its origin haunted the mind with a sense of fate and discomfiture, and prompted the questions, When, and where, and for what reason, was this doom imposed on men? The answer naturally assumed the legendary form, the concrete features of the representation being supplied by two vivid impressions produced by the achievements of civilisation in its most ancient centre in Babylonia. On one hand the city of Babylon itself, with its mixture of languages, its cosmopolitan population, and its proud boast of antiquity, suggested the idea that here was the very fountainhead of the confusion of tongues; and this idea, wrapped up in a popular etymology of the name of the city, formed the nucleus of the first of the two legends contained in the passage. On the other hand, the spectacle of some ruined or unfinished Temple-tower (zikkurat), built by a vast expenditure of human toil, and reported to symbolise the ascent to heaven (page 226), appealed to the imagination of the nomads as a god-defying work, obviously intended to serve as a landmark and rallying-point for the whole human race. In each case mankind had measured its strength against the decree of the gods above; and the gods had taken their revenge by reducing mankind to the condition of impotent disunion in which it now is.

It is evident that ideas of this order did not emanate from the official religion of Babylonia. They originated rather in the unsophisticated reasoning of nomadic Semites who had penetrated into the country, and formed their own notions about the wonders they beheld there: the etymology of the name Babel (= Balbēl) suggests an Aramæan origin (Cheyne, Gunkel). The stories travelled from land to land, till they reached Israel, where, divested of their cruder polytheistic elements, they became the vehicle of an impressive lesson on the folly of human pride, and the supremacy of Yahwe in the affairs of men.

It is of quite secondary interest to determine which of the numerous Babylonian zikkurats gave rise to the legend of the Dispersion. The most famous of these edifices were those of E-sagil, the temple of Marduk in Babylon,¹ and of E-zida, the temple of Nebo at Borsippa on the opposite bank of the river (see Tiele, Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, ii. 179‒190). The former bore the (Sumerian) name E-temen-an-ki (= ‘house of the foundations of heaven and earth’). It was restored by Nabo-polassar, who says that before him it had become “dilapidated and ruined,” and that he was commanded by Marduk to “lay its foundations firm in the breast of the underworld, and make its top equal to heaven” (Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, iii. 2. 5). The latter expression recurs in an inscription of Nebuchadnezzar (Beiträge zur Assyriologie und semitischen Sprachwissenschaft, iii. 548) with reference to the same zikkurat, and is thought by Gunkel (² 86) to have been characteristic of E-temen-an-ki; but that is doubtful, since similar language is used by Tiglath-pileser I. of the towers of the temple of Anu and Ramman, which had been allowed to fall gradually into disrepair for 641 years before his time (Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, i. 43). The zikkurat of E-zida was called E-ur-imin-an-ki (‘house of the seven stages (?) of heaven and earth’); its restorer Nebuchadnezzar tells us, in an inscription found at its four corners, that it had been built by a former king, and raised to a height of 42 cubits; its top, however, had not been set up, and it had fallen into disrepair (Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, iii. 2. 53, 55). The temple of Borsippa is entombed in Birs Nimrûd—a huge ruined mound still rising 153 feet above the plain (see Hilprecht Explorations in Bible Lands during the 19th century, 13, 30 f.)—which local (and Jewish) tradition identifies with the tower of Genesis 11. This view has been accepted by many modern scholars (see Encyclopædia Biblica, i. 412), by others it is rejected in favour of E-temen-an-ki, chiefly because E-zida was not in but only near Babylon. But if the two narratives are separated, there is nothing to connect the tower specially with the city of Babylon; and it would seem to be mainly a question which of the two was the more imposing ruin at the time when the legend originated. It is possible that neither was meant. At Uru (Ur of the Chaldees) there was a smaller zikkurat (about 70 feet high) of the moon-god Sin, dating from the time of Ur-bau (circa 2700 B.C.) and his son Dungi, which Nabuna’id tells us he rebuilt on the old foundation “with asphalt and bricks” (Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, iii. 2. 95; Explorations in Bible Lands during the 19th century, 173 ff.). The notice is interesting, because, according to one tradition, which is no doubt ancient, though it cannot be proved to be Yahwistic, this city was the starting-point of the Hebrew migration (see below, page 239). If it was believed that the ancestors of the Hebrews came from Ur, it may very well have been the zikkurat of that place which figured in their tradition as the Tower of the Dispersion.

¹ On its recently discovered site, see Langdon, The Expositor, 1909, ii. page 91 ff.

2. In regard to its religious content, the narrative occupies the same standpoint as 3^{20. 22} and 6^1‒3. Its central idea is the effort of the restless, scheming, soaring human mind to transcend its divinely appointed limitations: it “emphasises Yahwe’s supremacy over the world; it teaches how the self-exaltation of man is checked by God; and it shows how the distribution of mankind into nations, and diversity of language, are elements in His providential plan for the development and progress of humanity” (Driver). The pagan notion of the envy of the gods,—their fear lest human greatness should subvert the order of the world,—no doubt emerges in a more pronounced form than in any other passage. Yet the essential conception is not mere paganism, but finds an obvious point of contact in one aspect of the prophetic theology: see Isaiah 2^12‒17. To say that the narrative is totally devoid of religious significance for us is therefore to depreciate the value for modern life of the Old Testament thought of God, as well as to evince a lack of sympathy with one of the profoundest instincts of early religion. Crude in form as the legend is, it embodies a truth of permanent validity—the futility and emptiness of human effort divorced from the acknowledgment and service of God: hæc perpetua mundi dementia est, neglecto cœlo immortalitatem quærere in terra, ubi nihil est non caducum et evanidum (Calvin).

3. Parallels.—No Babylonian version of the story has been discovered; and for the reason given above (page 226) it is extremely unlikely that anything resembling the biblical form of it will ever be found there.¹ In Greek mythology there are dim traces of a legend ascribing the diversities of language to an act of the gods, whether as a punishment on the creatures for demanding the gift of immortality (Philo, De Confusione Linguarum), or without ethical motive, as in the 143rd fable of Hyginus.² But while these myths are no doubt independent of Jewish influence, their resemblance to the Genesis narrative is too slight to suggest a common origin. It is only in the literature of the Hellenistic period that we find real parallels to the story of the Tower of Babel; and these agree so closely with the biblical account that it is extremely doubtful if they embody any separate tradition.³ The difference to which most importance is attached is naturally the polytheistic phraseology (‘the gods’) employed by some of the writers named (Polyhistor, Abydenus); but the polytheism is only in the language, and is probably nothing more than conscious or unconscious Hellenising of the scriptural narrative. Other differences—such as the identification of the tower-builders with the race of giants (the Nephîlîm of 6⁴?), and the destruction of the tower by a storm—are easily explicable as accretions to the legend of Genesis.⁴ The remarkable Mexican legend of the pyramid of Cholula, cited by Jeremias from von Humboldt,⁵ has a special interest on account of the unmistakable resemblance between the Mexican pyramids and the Babylonian zikkurats. If this fact could be accepted as proof of direct Babylonian influence, then no doubt the question of a Babylonian origin of the legend and its transmission through non-biblical channels would assume a new complexion. But the inference, however tempting, is not quite certain.

¹ The fragment (K 3657) translated in Smith-Sayce, The Chaldean Account of Genesis 163 ff. (compare The Higher Criticism and the Verdict of the Monuments², 153 f.), and supposed to contain obscure allusions to the building of a tower in Babylon, its overthrow by a god during the night, and a confusion of speech, has since been shown to contain nothing of the sort: see King, Creation Tablets, i. 219 f.; Jeremias Das Alte Testament im Lichte des alten Orients², 286.

² “Sed postquam Mercurius sermones hominum interpretatus est ... id est nationes distribuit, tum discordia inter mortales esse cœpit, quod Jovi placitum non est.”

³ Compare Sibylline Oracles iii. 98 ff. (Kautzsch, Apokryphen und Pseudepigraphen des Alten Testaments, 187); Alexander Polyhistor (Eusebius Chronicon i. 23 [edited by Schoene]); Abydenus (ib. i. 33); Josephus Antiquities of the Jews i. 118; Eupolemos (Eusebius Præparatio Evangelica ix. 17); and Book of Jubilees x. 18‒27. The lines of the Sibyl (iii. 99 f.) may be quoted as a typical example of this class of legends:

ὁμόφωνοι δ’ ἦσαν ἅπαντες

καὶ βούλοντ’ ἀναβῆναι εἰς οὐρανὸν ἀστερόεντα.

αὐτίκα δ’ ἀθάνατος μεγάλην ἐπέθηκεν ἀνάγκην

πνεύμασιν· αὐτὰρ ἔπειτ’ ἄνεμοι μέγαν ὕψοθι πύργον

ῥίψαν, καὶ θνητοῖσιν ἐπ’ ἀλλήλοις ἔριν ὦρσαν·

τοὔνεκά τοι Βαβυλῶνα βροτοὶ πόλει οὔνομ’ ἔθεντο.

⁴ So Gunkel² 88 f. On the other side, compare Gruppe, Griechische Culte und Mythen, i. 677 ff.; Stade Ausgewählte akademische Reden und Abhandlungen 277 f.; Jeremias Das Alte Testament im Lichte des alten Orients², 383 ff.

⁵ Vues des Cordilleres (Paris, 1810), 24, 32 ff.

XI. 10‒26. The Genealogy of Shem (Priestly-Code).

Another section of the Tôlĕdôth, spanning the interval between the Flood and the birth of Abraham. It is the most carefully planned of Priestly-Code’s genealogies next to chapter 5; with which it agrees in form, except that in Massoretic Text the framework is lightened by omitting the total duration of each patriarch’s life. In The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch this is consistently supplied; while LXX merely adds to Massoretic Text the statement καὶ ἀπέθανεν. The number of generations in Massoretic Text is 9, but in LXX 10, corresponding with chapter 5. Few of the names can be plausibly identified; these few are mostly geographical, and point on the whole to North-west Mesopotamia as the original home of the Hebrew race.

In LXX the number 10 is made up by the addition of Ḳênān between Arpakšad and Shelaḥ (so 10²⁴). That this is a secondary alteration is almost certain, because (a) it is wanting in 1 Chronicles 1^{18. 24} LXX; (b) Ḳênān already occurs in the former genealogy (5^{9 ff.}); and (c) the figures simply duplicate those of Shelaḥ. It has been proposed to count Noah as the first name (Budde 412 f.), or Abraham as the 10th (Tuch, Delitzsch); but neither expedient brings about the desired formal correspondence between the lists of chapter 5 and 11^{10 ff.} An indication of the artificial character of these genealogies is found in the repetition of the name Nāḥôr, once as the father, and again as the son, of Teraḥ (see Bosse, Die chronologischen Systeme im Alten Testament und bei Josephus, 7 ff.). It is not improbable that here, as in chapter 5 (corresponding with 4^{25 f.}), Priestly-Code has worked up an earlier Yahwistic genealogy, of which a fragment may have been preserved in verses ^28‒30. Wellhausen (Die Composition des Hexateuchs und der historischen Bücher des Alten Testaments² 9, Prolegomena zur Geschichte Israels⁶ 313) has conjectured that it consisted of the 7 names left of Priestly-Code’s list when Arpakšad and Shelaḥ (see on 10^{21. 24}) and the first Nāḥôr are omitted (Abraham counting as the 7th). But there is no proof that the Yahwistic genealogy lying behind chapter 5 was 7-membered; and Yahwist’s parallel to 11^{10 ff.} could not in any case be the continuation of 4^16‒22.

10. אַרְפַּכְשֶׂד] see on 10²². He is here obviously the oldest son of Shem; which does not necessarily involve a contradiction with chapter 10, the arrangement there being dictated by geographical considerations. Hommel (Aufsätze und Abhandlungen arabistisch-semitologischen Inhalts, 222¹), maintaining his theory that Arpakšad = Ur-Kasdîm, comes to the absurd conclusion that in the original list it was not the name of Shem’s son, but of his birthplace: ‘Shem from Arpakshad’!—שְׁנָתַיִם אַהַר הַמַּבּוּל] The discrepancy between this statement and the chronology of 5³² 7¹¹ 9^{28 f.} is not to be got rid of either by wire-drawn arithmetical calculations (Rashi al.), or by the assumption that in the other passages round numbers are used (Tuch, Delitzsch). The clause is evidently a gloss, introduced apparently for the purpose of making the birth of Arpakšad, rather than the Flood, the commencement of a new era. It fits in admirably with the scheme of the Book of Jubilees, which gives an integral number of year-weeks from the Creation to the birth of Arpakšad, and from the latter event to the birth of Abraham (see page 234 below).—12. שֶׁלַח (Σαλα)] probably the same word which forms a component of מְתוּשֶׁלַח (5^{21 ff.}), and therefore originally a divine name. This need not exclude a tribal or geographical sense, the name of a deity being frequently transferred to his worshippers or their territory. A place Ṣalaḥ or Salaḥ in Mesopotamia is instanced by Knobel (Dillmann). Others regard it as a descriptive name = ‘offshoot’ or ‘dismissal’; but very improbably.—14. עֵבֶר] see on 10²¹.—16. פֶּלֶג] 10²⁵. Hommel (l.c.) combines the two names and takes the compound as a notice of Shelaḥ’s birthplace: ‘Shelaḥ from Eber-peleg’ = Eber-hannāhār, the region West of the lower Euphrates (see pages 218, 220 above).—18. רְעוּ (Ῥαγαυ)] unknown; certainly not (Edessa). It is possibly abbreviated from רְעוּאֵל (36⁴, Exodus 2¹⁸ etc.: so Hommel); and Mez considers it a divine name. An Aramæan tribe Ru’ua is frequently mentioned in Assyrian inscriptions as dwellers on the banks of the Euphrates and Tigris, in or near Babylonia (Delitzsch Wo lag das Paradies? 238 ff.).—20. שְׂרוּג (Σερουχ)] a well-known city and district about half-way between Carchemish and Ḥarran, mentioned by Syrian and Arabic writers under the name Saruǧ. The name (Saruǧi) also occurs several times in the census of the district round Ḥarran (7th century B.C.), published by Johns under the title of An Assyrian Domesday Book: see pages 29, 30, 43, 48, 68.—22. נָחוֹר (Ναχωρ)] is in Yahwist the brother of Abraham (22²⁰; compare Joshua 24²); in Priestly-Code he is both the grandfather and the brother (11²⁶). The name must have been that of an important Aramæan tribe settled in or around Ḥarran (27⁴³ 28¹⁰ 29⁴). Johns compares the place-name Til-Naḥiri in the neighbourhood of Saruǧi; also the personal names Naḥirî and Naḥarâu found in Assyrian Deeds (l.c. 71; Assyrian Deeds, iii. 127; compare Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 477 f.). As a divine name Ναχαρ is mentioned along with other Aramæan deities on a Greek inscription from Carthage (Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 477); and Jensen (Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, xi. 300) has called attention to the theophorous name in the ‘Doctrine of Addai,’ as possibly a corruption of .—24. תֶּרַח (Θαῤῥα)] is instanced by William Robertson Smith¹ as a totem clan-name; (?) being the Syrian and turâḥû the Assyrian word for ‘wild goat.’ Similarly Delitzsch (Prolegomena eines neuen hebräisch-aramäischen Wörterbuchs zum Alten Testament 80), who also refers tentatively to Til-ša-turâḥi, the name of a Mesopotamian town in the neighbourhood of Ḥarran. Knobel compares a place Tharrana, South of Edessa (Dillmann); Jensen (Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, vi. 70; Hittiter und Armenier, 150 ff. [especially 154]) is inclined to identify Teraḥ with the Hittite and North Syrian god (or goddess) Tarḫu, Ταρκο, etc. (compare Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 484).—26. Peshiṭtå reads 75 instead of 70.

¹ Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia¹, 220 (afterwards abandoned). Compare Nöldeke, Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenländischen Gesellschaft, xl. 167 f.: “sicher unmöglich.”

The Chronology.—The following Table shows the variations of the three chief recensions (Massoretic Text, The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch, and LXX), together with the chronology of the Book of Jubilees, which for this period parts company with the Samaritan, and follows a system peculiar to itself (see page 134 ff. above):

MT. Sam. LXX. Jub.

1st Son After 1st Son After Total 1st Son After 1st Son

1. Shem 100 500 100 500 600 100 500 102?

2. Arpakšad 35 403 135 303 438 135 430 66?

Καιναν 130 330 57

3. Shelaḥ 30 403 130 303 433 130 330 71

4. Eber 34 430 134 270 404 134 370 64

5. Peleg 30 209 130 109 239 130 [L. 134] 209 61

6. Reu 32 207 132 107 239 132 207 59

7. Serug 30 200 130 100 230 130 200 57

8. Nāḥôr 29 119 79 69 148 79 129 [L. 125] 62

9. Teraḥ 70 135 70 75 145 70 135 70

390 1040 1170 [L. 1174] 669

From Flood (or birth of Arp.) to b. of Abr. 290 940 1070 567

The three versions plainly rest on a common basis, and it is not easy to decide in favour of the priority of any one of them. On the application to this period of the general chronological theories described on page 135 f. it is unnecessary to add much. Klostermann maintains his scheme of Jubilee-periods on the basis of LXX, (a) by allowing a year for the Flood; (b) by adopting the reading of Peshiṭtå, 75 instead of 70, in the case of Teraḥ; and (c) by following certain MSS which give 179 for 79 as the age of Naḥor at the birth of Teraḥ. This makes from the Flood to the birth of Abraham 1176 years = 2 × 12 × 49. By an equally arbitrary combination of data of Massoretic Text and LXX a similar period of 1176 years is then made out from the birth of Abraham to the Dedication of the Temple.—The seemingly eccentric scheme of Jubilees shows clear indications of a reckoning by year-weeks. Since the birth of Arpakšad is said (vii. 18) to have occurred two years after the Flood, we may conclude that it was assigned to A.M. 1309, the 102nd year of Shem. This gives a period of 187 year-weeks from the Creation to the birth of Arpakšad, followed by another of 81 (567 ÷ 7) to the birth of Abraham. We observe further that the earlier period embraces 11 generations with an average of exactly 17 year-weeks, and the later 9 generations with an average of exactly 9: i.e., as nearly as possible one-half: the author accordingly must have proceeded on the theory that after the Flood the age of paternity suddenly dropped to one-half of what it had formerly been.

[It is possible that the key to the various systems has been discovered by A. Bosse, whose paper¹ became known to me only while these sheets were passing through the press. His main results are as follows: (1) In Massoretic Text he finds two distinct chronological systems, (a) One reckons by generations of 40 years, its termini being the birth of Shem and the end of the Exile. In the Shemite table, Teraḥ is excluded entirely, and the two years between the Flood and the birth of Arpakšad are ignored. This gives: from the birth of Shem to that of Abraham 320 (8 × 40) years; thence to birth of Jacob 160 (4 × 40); to Exodus 560 (14 × 40); to founding of Temple 480 (12 × 40); to end of Exile 480: in all 2000 (50 × 40). This system is, of course, later than the Exile; but Bochartus concedes the probability that its middle section, with 1200 (30 × 40) years from the birth of Abraham to the founding of the Temple, may be of earlier origin.—(b) The other scheme, with which we are more immediately concerned, operates with a Great Month of 260 years (260 = the number of weeks in a five-years’ lustrum). Its period is a Great Year from the Creation to the dedication of the Temple, and its reckoning includes Teraḥ in the Shemite table, but excludes the 2 years of Arpakšad. This gives 1556 years to birth of Shem + 390 (birth of Abraham) + 75 (migration of Abraham) + 215 (descent to Egypt) + 430 (Exodus) + 480 (founding of Temple) + 20 (dedication of temple) = 3166. Now 3166 = 12 × 260 + 46. The odd 46 years are thus accounted for: the chronologist was accustomed to the Egyptian reckoning by months of 30 days, and a solar year of 365¼ days, requiring the interposition of 5¼ days each year; and the 46 years are the equivalent of these 5¼ days in the system here followed. (For, if 30 days = 260 years, then 5¼ days = 5¼ × 260 30 = 21 × 26 4 × 3 = 7 × 13 2 = 45½ [say 46] years.) The first third of this Great Year ends with the birth of Noah 1056 = 4 × 260 + 16 (⅓ of 46). The second third nearly coincides with the birth of Jacob; but here there is a discrepancy of 5 years, which Bochartus accounts for by the assumption that the figure of the older reckoning by generations has in the case of Jacob been allowed to remain in the text.—(2) LXX reckons with a Great Month of 355 years (the number of days in the lunar year), and a Great Year of 12 × 355 = 4260 years from the Creation to the founding of the Temple, made up as follows: 2142 + 1173² + 75 + 215 + 215 + 440³ = 4260. Significant subdivisions cannot be traced.—(3) The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch returns to the earlier Hebrew reckoning by generations, its terminus ad quem being the measuring out of Gerizim, which, according to the Samaritan Chronicle published by Neubauer, took place 13 years after the Conquest of Canaan. Thus we obtain 1207 + 1040 + 75 + 215 + 215 + 42 (desert wandering)⁴ + 13 (measurement of Gerizim) = 2807 = 70 × 40 + 7.⁵—(4) The Book of Jubilees counts by Jubilee-periods of 49 years from the Creation to the Conquest of Palestine: 1309 + 567 + 75 + 459 (Exodus) + 40 (entrance to Canaan) = 2450 = 50 × 49.]

¹ Die chronologischen Systeme im Alten Testament und bei Josephus (Mittheilungen der vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft, 1908, 2).

² Allowing a year for the Flood, and two years between it and the birth of Arpakšad.

³ See 1 Kings.6¹ (LXX).

⁴ After Joshua 5⁶ (LXX).

⁵ The odd 7 years still remain perplexing (see page 136). One cannot help surmising that the final 13 was originally intended to get rid of it, though the textual data do not enable us now to bring out a round number.

XI. 27‒32. The Genealogy of Teraḥ (Priestly-Code and Yahwist).

The verses are of mixed authorship; and form, both in Priestly-Code and Yahwist, an introduction to the Patriarchal History. In Priestly-Code (^{27. 31. 32}), genealogical framework encloses a notice of the migration of the Teraḥites from Ur-Kasdîm to Ḥarran, to which 12^{4b. 5} may be the immediate sequel. The insertion from Yahwist (^28‒30) finds an equally suitable continuation in 12^{1 ff.}, and is very probably the conclusion of Yahwist’s lost Shemite genealogy. The suppression of the preceding context of Yahwist is peculiarly tantalising because of the uncertainty of the tradition which makes Ur-Kasdîm the home of the ancestors of the Hebrews (see concluding note, page 239).

On the analysis, compare especially Budde Die biblische Urgeschichte 414 ff.—Verses ²⁷ and ³² belong quite obviously to Priestly-Code; and ³¹, from its diffuse style and close resemblance to Priestly-Code’s regular manner in recording the patriarchal migrations (12⁵ 31¹⁸ 36⁶ 46⁶: see Hupfeld Die Quellen der Genesis und die Art ihrer Zusammensetzung 19 f.), may be confidently assigned to the same source. ^28a presents nothing distinctive of either document; but in ^28b ארץ מולדת is peculiar to Jehovist (see the footnote on the verse). ²⁹ is Yahwist because presupposed in 22^{20 ff.}; and its continuation (³⁰) brings as an additional criterion the word עֲקָרָה (compare 25²¹ 29³¹), which is never used by Priestly-Code.—The extract from Yahwist is supplementary to Priestly-Code, and it might be argued that at least ^28a was necessary in the latter source to explain why Loṭ and not Haran went with Teraḥ. Budde points out in answer (page 420) that with still greater urgency we desiderate an explanation of the fact that Nāḥôr was left behind: if the one fact is left unexplained, so a fortiori might the other.

The formula וְאֵלָּה תֹּלְדוֹת does not occur again till 25¹²; and it is very widely held that in verse ²⁷ it stands as the heading of the section of Priestly-Code dealing with the life of Abraham. That is wholly improbable. It is likely enough that a heading (א׳ ת׳ אברהם) has been somewhere omitted (so Wellhausen, Budde, Holzinger, al.); but the truth is that from this point onwards no consistent principle can be discovered in the use of the formula. The hypothesis that an originally independent book of Tôledôth has been broken up and dislocated by the redaction, is as plausible a solution as any that can be thought of. See, further, on 25¹⁹.

27. On the name Abram, see on 17⁵; on Nāḥôr, verse ²² above.—Haran begat Loṭ] A statement to the same effect must have been found in Yahwist (see 12^4a). Haran has no significance in the tradition except as expressing the relationship of Lôṭ, Milkah, and Yiṣkah within the Hebraic group.

That הרן is formed from חָרָן (v.i.) by a softening of the initial guttural (Wellhausen Prolegomena zur Geschichte Israels⁶ 313) is an improbable conjecture (see Budde 443²). The name occurs elsewhere only in בֵּית־ה׳ (Numbers 32³⁶: compare בֵּית־הָרָם, Joshua 13²⁷)¹ in the tribe of Gad: this has suggested the view that הָרָן was the name of a deity worshipped among the peoples represented by Lot (Mez: compare Winckler Altorientalische Forschungen, ii. 499).—The name לוֹט is also etymologically obscure (? Arabic lāṭ = ‘cleave to’). A connexion with the Ḥorite clan לוֹטָן in Genesis 36^{20. 22. 29} is probable.

¹ Though Winckler (Altorientalische Forschungen, ii. 499) contends that both names are corruptions of חורנים.

28. The premature death of Haran (which became the nucleus of some fantastic Jewish legends) took place in the land of his nativity; i.e., according to the present text, Ur of the Chaldees, where his grave was shown down to the time of Josephus (Antiquities of the Jews i. 151; Eusebius. Onomasticon, 285, 50 ff.).

אוּר כַּשְׂדּים (verse ³¹ 15⁷, Nehemiah 9⁷: LXX χώρα τῶν Χαλδαίων) is now almost universally identified with the ancient South Babylonian city of Uru, whose remains have been discovered in the mounds of ’el-Muḳayyar, on the right bank of the Euphrates, about 25 miles South-east from Erech and 125 from Babylon (see Hilprecht Explorations in Bible Lands during the 19th century, 172 ff.). The evidence for this view is very strong. Uru is the only city of the name known from Assyriology (although the addition of the genitive כשדים suggests that others were known to the Israelites: Gesenius-Kautzsch § 125 h): it was situated in the properly Chaldæan territory, was a city of great importance and vast antiquity, and (like Ḥarran, with which it is here connected) was a chief centre of the worship of the moon-god Sin (Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament², 129 ff.). The only circumstance that creates serious misgiving is that the prevalent tradition of Genesis points to the North-east as the direction whence the patriarchs migrated to Canaan (see below); and this has led to attempts to find a northern Ur connected probably with the Mesopotamian Chaldæans of 22²² (see Kittel, Geschichte Der Hebräer i. 163 ff.). Syrian tradition identifies it with Edessa (Urhåi, Urfa). It is generally recognised, however, that these considerations are insufficient to invalidate the arguments in favour of Uru.—כַּשְׂדִּים] = Babylonian Kašdu, Assyrian Kaldu (Χαλδ-αίοι), is the name of a group of Semitic tribes, distinguished from the Arabs and Aramæans, who are found settled to the South-east of Babylonia, round the shore of the Persian Gulf. In the 11th century or earlier they are believed to have penetrated Babylonia, at first as roving, pastoral nomads (Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 22 ff.), but ultimately giving their name to the country, and founding the dynasty of Nabopolassar.—By the ancients כשדים was rightly understood of Babylonia (Nicolaus of Damascus in Josephus Antiquities of the Jews i. 152; Eupolemos in Eusebius Præparatio Evangelica ix. 17; Jerome, al.); but amongst the Jews אוּר came to be regarded as an appellative = ‘fire’ (in igne Chaldæorum, which Jerome accepts, though he rejects the legends that were spun out of the etymology). This is the germ of the later Haggadic fables about the ‘fire’ in which Haran met an untimely fate, and the furnace into which Abraham was cast by order of Nimrod (Jubilees xii. 12‒14; Jerome Quæstiones sive Traditiones hebraicæ in Genesim, ad loc.; Targum^Jonathan, Bereshith Rabba § 38, Rashi).

28. עַל־פְּנֵי] is coram (LXX ἐνώπιον), rather than ante (Vulgate: so Tuch), or ‘in the lifetime of’ (Peshiṭtå ); compare Numbers 3⁴: see Brown-Driver-Briggs and Gesenius-Buhl s.v. אֶרֶץ מוֹלַדְתּוֹ—.פָּנִים so 24⁷ (Yahwist), 31¹³ (Elohist); compare Jeremiah 22¹⁰ 46¹⁶, Ezekiel 23¹⁵, Ruth 2¹¹. A commoner phrase in Pentateuch is אר׳ ומו׳, 12¹ 24⁴ 31³ 32¹⁰, Numbers 10³⁰ (all Yahwist). From the way in which the two expressions alternate, it is probable that they are equivalent; and since מ׳ alone certainly means ‘kindred’ (43⁷ [Yahwist], compare Esther 2^{10. 20} 8⁶), it is better to render ‘land of one’s parentage’ than ‘land in which one was born’ [Peshiṭtå here and 12¹] (compare Budde 419²). Priestly-Code has the word, but only in the sense of ‘progeny’ (48⁶, Leviticus 18⁹ [H]).

29. While we are told that Nāḥôr’s wife was his brother’s daughter, it is surprising that nothing is said of the parentage of Sarai. According to Elohist (20¹²), she was Abraham’s half-sister; but this does not entitle us to suppose that words expressing this relationship have been omitted from the text of Yahwist (Ewald). It would seem, however, that tradition represented marriage between near relations as the rule among the Teraḥites (20¹² 24^{3 ff.} 29¹⁹).

With regard to the names, שָׂרַי seems to be an archaic form of שָׂרָה = ‘princess’ (see on 17¹⁵), while מִלְכָּה means ‘queen.’ In Babylonian the relations are reversed, šarratu being the queen and malkatu the princess. It cannot be a mere coincidence that these two names correspond to two personages belonging to the pantheon of Ḥarran, where Šarratu was a title of the moon-goddess, the consort of Sin, and Malkatu a title of Ištar, also worshipped there (Jensen Zeitschrift für Assyriologie, xi. 299 f.; Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 364 f.). It is needless to say that these associations, if they existed, are forgotten in the Hebrew legend.—If, as is not improbable, the tradition contains ethnographic reminiscences, verse ^{28 f.} express (1) the dissolution of an older tribal group, Haran; (2) the survival of one of its subdivisions (Loṭ) through the protection of a stronger tribe; and (3) the absorption of another (Milkah) in a kindred stock.—Of יִסְכָּה nothing is known. The Rabbinical fiction that she is Sarah under another name (implied in Josephus Antiquities of the Jews i. 151; Targum^Jonathan, Jerome, Rashi, Abraham Ibn Ezra, al.) is worthless. Ewald’s conjecture that she was the wife of Loṭ is plausible, but baseless.

29. וַיִּקַּח] singular, according to Gesenius-Kautzsch § 146 f.—30. עקרה] as 25²¹ 29³¹ (Yahwist); not in Priestly-Code (see 16^1a).—וָלָד] The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch ילד. Only again as Kethîb of Or. MSS in 2 Samuel 6²³. It is possibly here a scribal error, which eventually influenced the other passages.

31, 32. The migration from Ur-Kasdîm to Canaan is accomplished in two stages. Teraḥ, as patriarchal head of the family, conducts the expedition as far as Ḥarran, where he dies. The obvious implication is that after his death the journey is resumed by Abram (12⁵); although The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch alone gives a chronology consistent with this view (v. supra). Nāḥôr, we are left to infer, remained behind in Ur-Kasdîm; and in the subsequent narratives Priestly-Code (in opposition to Yahwist) seems carefully to avoid any suggestion of a connexion between Nāḥôr and the city of Ḥarran.

חָרָן (with virtually doubled ר: compare LXX Χαρραν; Greek Κάῤῥαι; Latin Carræ, Charra; Assyrian Ḫarrânu; Syrian and Arabic Ḥarrān) was an important centre of the caravan trade in North-west Mesopotamia, 60 miles East of Carchemish, situated near the Baliḫ, 70 miles due North from its confluence with the Euphrates. Though seldom mentioned in Old Testament (12^{4 f.} [Priestly-Code], 27⁴³ 28¹⁰ 29⁴ [Yahwist], 2 Kings 19¹², Ezekiel 27²³†), and now ruined, it was a city of great antiquity, and retained its commercial importance in classical and mediæval times. The name in Assyrian appears to be susceptible of several interpretations—‘way,’ ‘caravan’ (Tel-Amarna Tablets), ‘joint-stock enterprise’ (Delitzsch Assyrisches Handwörterbuch s.v., Die Keilinschriften und das Alte Testament³, 29²)—any one of which might denote its commercially advantageous position at the parting of the route to Damascus from the main highway between Nineveh and Carchemish. Ḥarran was also (along with Ur) a chief seat of the worship of Sin, who had there a temple, E-ḫul-ḫul, described by Nabuna’id as “from remote days” a “dwelling of the joy of his (Sin’s) heart” (Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, iii. 2. 97), and who was known in North-west Asia as the “Lord of Ḥarran” (Zinjirli inscription: compare Lidzbarski, Handbuch der nordsemitischen Epigraphik 444, An.). See, further, Mez, Geschichte der Stadt Ḥarrân in Mesopotamien; Tomkins, Times of Abraham, 55 ff. etc. This double connexion of Abraham with centres of lunar religion is the most plausible argument advanced by those who hold the mythical view of his figure as an impersonation of the moon-god.

It will be observed that while both Priestly-Code and Yahwist (in the present text) make Ur-Kasdîm the starting-point of the Abrahamic migration, Yahwist has no allusion to a journey from Ur to Ḥarran. His language is perfectly consistent either (a) with a march directly from Ur to Canaan, or (b) with the view that the real starting-point was Ḥarran, and that באור כשדים is here a gloss intended to harmonise Yahwist and Priestly-Code. Now, there is a group of passages in Yahwist which, taken together, unmistakably imply that Abraham was a native of Ḥarran, and therefore started from thence to seek the promised land. In 24^{4. 7. 10}, the place of Abraham’s nativity is Aram-Naharaim, and specially the ‘city of Nāḥôr’; while a comparison with 27⁴³ 28¹⁰ 29⁴ leaves no doubt that the ‘city of Nāḥôr’ was Ḥarran. Priestly-Code, on the other hand, nowhere deviates from his theory of a double migration with a halt at Ḥarran; and the persistency with which he dissociates Laban and Rebecca from Nāḥôr (25²⁰ 28^{2. 5 ff.}) is a proof that the omission of Nāḥôr from the party that left Ur was intentional (Budde 421 ff.). It is evident, then, that we have to do with a divergence in the patriarchal tradition; and the only uncertainty is with regard to the precise point where it comes in. The theory of Priestly-Code, though consistently maintained, is not natural; for (1) all the antecedents (11^10‒26) point to Mesopotamia as the home of the patriarchs; and (2) the twofold migration, first from Ur and then from Ḥarran, has itself the appearance of a compromise between two conflicting traditions. The simplest solution would be to suppose that both the references to Ur-Kasdîm in Yahwist (11²⁸ 15⁷) are interpolations, and that Priestly-Code had another tradition which he harmonised with that of Yahwist by the expedient just mentioned (so Wellhausen, Dillmann, Gunkel, Driver, al.). Budde holds that both traditions were represented in different strata of Yahwist (Yahwist¹ Ḥarran, Yahwist² Ur), and tries to show that the latter is a probable concomitant of the Yahwistic account of the Flood. In that he can hardly be said to be successful; and he is influenced by the consideration that apart from such a discrepancy in his sources Priestly-Code could never have thought of the circuitous route from Ur to Canaan by way of Ḥarran. That argument has little weight with those who are prepared to believe that Priestly-Code had other traditions at his disposal than those we happen to know from Yahwist and Elohist.¹ In itself, the hypothesis of a dual tradition within the school of Yahwist is perfectly reasonable; but in this case, in spite of Budde’s close reasoning, it appears insufficiently supported by other indications. The view of Wellhausen is on the whole the more acceptable.

¹ The suggestion has, of course, been made (Winckler Altorientalische Forschungen i. 98 ff.; Paton, The Early History of Syria and Palestine 42) that Elohist is the source of the Ur-Kasdîm tradition; but in view of Joshua 24² that is not probable.

31. כלתו] כַּלָּה (Syrian , Arabic kannat) means both ‘spouse’ and ‘daughter-in-law’: in Syrian and Arabic also ‘sister-in-law,’—a fact adduced by William Robertson Smith as a relic of Baal polyandry (Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia², 161, 209¹).—ויצאו אתם] gives no sense. Read with The Samaritan Recension of the Pentateuch, LXX (καὶ ἐξήγαγεν αὐτούς) Vulgate, וַיּוֹצֵא אֹתָם, or Peshiṭtå, וַיֵּצֵא אִתָּם.—32. יְמֵי־תֶרַח] LXX + Χαῤῥάν.