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| Danaë (or Dinah or Diana) |
By far the most complex of all the tribes, and also one of the most important in terms of our knowledge and understanding of the Biblical world as a whole; you might want to read the essay "The Leprachauns of Palestine" before you continue on this page, and then let this page help you answer the questions which that essay will have provoked. You might also want to read Homer's "Iliad" and Virgil's "Aeneid" as well, but I leave that to you!
Genesis 14:4 names Dan as the place to which Av-Raham pursued his foes in the War of the Kings; this is usually reckoned to be La'ish (Judges 18:29), the city at the source of the River Yarden (Jordan) in Ashur (Assyria) - an oddity of dates in either case, the tribe of Dan thereby preceding their eponymous ancestor! Modern archaeologists believe it to have been the royal city of Dan, and that the tribe of Dan moved from the Mediterranean coast where it was first established (Joshua 19:40) after the first invasions of the Pelishtim (Philistines).
However, all the evidence relating to the Greek people known as the Danaans suggest that the tribe of Dan was itself in fact a sub-group of the Pelishtim, which is to say the same Phoenician-Greek ethnic group from which the Pelishtim also later emerged. Given that the Phoenicians (properly the Phoinikim) originated from Tsur (Tyre), which is just a few score miles due west of La'ish (ליש), it is very probable that the Dana'ans of La'ish were the original Dana'ans, and that the "move" of the tribe was simply more new-arrivals coming up from the coast to join them. The northern territory of Dan borders Padan Aram, whence came Ya'akov the Aramaean. Naphtali, who borders Dan to the south and west, was the other son of Bilhah, Rachel's "hand-maiden" (Genesis 30:6); although Dinah (דנה) whose name is the feminine form of Dan, is said to have been mothered by Le'ah (Genesis 34:1).
Genesis 46:23 names Dan's sons as Chushim (חושם), which is probably an error for Chusham (חושם).
Genesis 49:16/18 gives Ya'akov's blessing:
Genesis 49:16/18 gives Ya'akov's blessing:
"Dan shall judge his people, as one of the tribes of Yisra-El; Dan shall be a serpent by the way, an adder in the path, that bites the horse heels, so that his rider shall fall backward. I have waited for your salvation, O Lord."דן ידין עמו באחד שבטי ישראל יהי דן נחש עלי דרך שפיפן עלי ארח הנשך עקבי סוס ויפל רכבו אחור לישועתך קויתי יהוה
"DAN YADIN AMO KE ACHAD SHIVTEY YISRA-EL YEHI DAN NACHASH ALEY DERECH SHEPHIPHON ALEY ORACH HA NOSHECH IKVEY SUS VA YIPOL ROCHVO ACHOR LISHU'AT'CHA KIVITI YHVH"The first sentence seems almost to state categorically that Dan was not really a tribe of the Beney Yisra-El at all, but shall judge "as one of the tribes". It is also an unusually prosaic statement for the otherwise intensely metaphoric oracles of the other tribes; and indeed of the second line of this tribal oracle.
"Judge" is the literal meaning of DAN; DIN is "Justice", and in the religious world a DAYAN is a member of the Rabbinic court, the Beit Din.
Nachash (נחש) in the blessing (or oracular prophecy) is a snake. It first appears as the serpent of Eden, then later as Nechushtan (נחשתן), the brass serpent of Mosheh: first his rod, then his staff, finally his military banner which the Beney Yisra-El continued to worship until Chizki-Yahu (Hezekiah) deliberately destroyed it (2 Kings 18:4). The word for brass is Nechash (נחש), which makes for an extraordinary pun in Ezekiel 1:7, by which the mineral brass is evinced as a metaphor of the feet of the angels from the materials used to make the brass serpent. Commonly Nachash relates to the magic arts, and to divination in particular (see under CHAZO). Leviticus 19:26, Deuteronomy 18:10, 2 Kings 17:17 and 21:6 use it to describe various forms of sorcery and witchcraft. Yoseph claims to practice it in Genesis 44:15. It appears as an enchantment in Numbers 23:23 and as an omen or augury in Numbers 23:3 and 15. Job 26:13 links the two by making it the constellation of the dragon - the brass serpent in its cosmological manifestation, but also a reference to Tahamat and Behemot, the sea and land serpents of original Creation. Exodus 6:23 and Numbers 1:7 have Nachshon (נחשון) ben Avi-Nadav as the name of a wizard; 1 Chronicles 4:12 gives a town of that name; 1 Samuel 11:1 and 2 Samuel 10:2 have a Nachash as a king of the Beney Amon (Ammonites). King Yeho-Yachin's mother was named Nechushta (נְחֻשְׁתָּא) in 2 Kings 24:8.
Why then is Dan a serpent, whether "by the roadside", or anywhere else for that matter, including in Eden, or in one of the temples of the Underworld deities, where oracles were given through serpent-masks?
Shephiphon (שפיפן) is rendered as "an adder", but there is no evidence of any root in Yehudit or the adjacent languages to justify this. Shephuphan (שפופן) appears in 1 Chronicles 8:5 as a son of Bela ben Bin-Yamin, and Shephupham (שפופם) in Numbers 26:39 as a son of Bin-Yamin himself. Beyond this, the riddle remains enigmatic, with the third line particularly perplexing. See also my notes to Shepho.
Joshua 19:40 ff lists Dan's territory and cities; he was the recipient of the seventh lot, the system by which the tribes were allocated their territories.
Judges 18:1/31 tells some of the history of the tribe, and verse 1 makes it very clear that they were not originally a Yisra-Eli tribe at all - "for until that day all their inheritance had not fallen to them among the tribes of Yisra-El". This tale of Miychah (מיכה - Micah) and his graven image makes equally clear that they were pantheistic pagans who worshipped idols through the priesthood of Miychah (not to be confused with the later prophet of the same name) on Mount Ephrayim. All the places referred to in the Judges story suggest they were centred upon the Lebanese city of Tsiydon (Sidon), which provides further evidence for them being Phoenicians (Dana'ans), and their origins not their exile being La'ish.
The city of Dan was originally called La'ish (Judges 18:7 and 18:29). In 1 Kings 12:28 Yerav-Am (Jeroboam) raised a golden calf there - sacred to Pan and the nymphs - at the point where the river Yarden (Jordan) springs (at Banyas, also known as Paneas or Caesarea Philippi). Was this the same graven image that Miychah established? If so, they worshipped the moon-goddess as a cow, which is precisely what the Phoenicians did, naming that goddess Danaë - and for that little matter, see my notes on Dan's quarter-mother, Le'ah.
2 Samuel 24:6 gives Danah Ya'an (דנה יען) which is thought to be an error for Ya'ar (יער) = "a wood"; Danah in this context probably comes from a different root, Danan (דנן) and means "lowlands". The town of Danah mentioned in Joshua 15:49 likewise comes from this root.
Shephiphon (שפיפן) is rendered as "an adder", but there is no evidence of any root in Yehudit or the adjacent languages to justify this. Shephuphan (שפופן) appears in 1 Chronicles 8:5 as a son of Bela ben Bin-Yamin, and Shephupham (שפופם) in Numbers 26:39 as a son of Bin-Yamin himself. Beyond this, the riddle remains enigmatic, with the third line particularly perplexing. See also my notes to Shepho.
Joshua 19:40 ff lists Dan's territory and cities; he was the recipient of the seventh lot, the system by which the tribes were allocated their territories.
Judges 18:1/31 tells some of the history of the tribe, and verse 1 makes it very clear that they were not originally a Yisra-Eli tribe at all - "for until that day all their inheritance had not fallen to them among the tribes of Yisra-El". This tale of Miychah (מיכה - Micah) and his graven image makes equally clear that they were pantheistic pagans who worshipped idols through the priesthood of Miychah (not to be confused with the later prophet of the same name) on Mount Ephrayim. All the places referred to in the Judges story suggest they were centred upon the Lebanese city of Tsiydon (Sidon), which provides further evidence for them being Phoenicians (Dana'ans), and their origins not their exile being La'ish.
The Yisra-Eli equivalent of Danaë, however, is not Le'ah, but Dan's sister Dinah, and the link is self-evident. A temple to Augustus was later built on the Banyas site by Herod. Matthew 16:13 and Mark 8:27 refer to it as Caesarea Philippi. a heathen city which Jesus avoided. The mound over the grotto is called Tel-el-Qadi, Qadi being Arabic for Judge, and no surprise therefore that Israeli archeologists have renamed the site as Tel Dan.
What the above leads us to ask is: was Dan the name or the function, and should we actually refer to it as the tribe of Miychah? Miychah was Judge over the tribe, in the sense used in the Book of Judges - local priest-kings who ruled the spiritual and temporal realms with equal authority, being the gods' representative on Earth. However Miychah is itself almost certainly an abbreviation, since it means "who is like". A comparative noun is required. Miycha-El (מיכאל) and Miycha-Yah (מיכיה) are the two that appear in the Tanach, each on numerous occasions. Miycha-El in its original form was the Kena'anite father-god El, Miycha-Yah the Ionian Phoenician equivalent of the moon-goddess as cow: namely Io or Yah.
Michal, King Sha'ul's daughter, may also be a diminutive form of the same name. Thus Miychah would appear to be the priest of Yah or Danaë (Dinah), acting as Judge, and so, finally, we can conclude that the tribal name Dan is in fact perfectly accurate. These were the Dana'ans.
2 Samuel 24:6 gives Danah Ya'an (דנה יען) which is thought to be an error for Ya'ar (יער) = "a wood"; Danah in this context probably comes from a different root, Danan (דנן) and means "lowlands". The town of Danah mentioned in Joshua 15:49 likewise comes from this root.
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