Note 142 — Fabre d’Olivet

Rama is, in Sanskrit, the name of that which is dazzling, elevated, white, sublime, protective, beautiful, excellent. This word has exactly the same sense in the Phœnician רמ (ram). Its primitive root, which is universalized by the hémantique letter מ (m), is רא (ra), which has reference to the harmonic movement of good, of light, and of sight. The name of the adversary of Rama, Rawhan, is formed from the root רע (rawh) which expresses, on the contrary, the disordered movement of evil and of fire, and which, becoming united with the augmentative syllable ון (ôn), depicts whatever ravages and ruins; this is the signification which it has in Sanskrit.