Eder

עדר


Genesis 35:21 has Migdal-Eder, where Ya'akov pitched his tent after burying Rachel at Beit Lechem in Ephratah. Migdal (מגדל) means "a tower", usually in the sense of a fortification, though it was also used as the locus for the observation of the heavens, from which some scholars have questioned whether it might not have been a Kena'ani equivalent of the Babylonian ziggurat, as in the Tower of Babel. This speculation is based on Ya'akov's dream of the ladder in Genesis 28:12, which in many ways parallels the ziggurat myths; however, as nothing even remotely resembling a ziggurat has yet been found, or even hinted at, in any of the excavations, archaeological or literary, in Yisra-El, this theory does not hold water.

Joshua 15:21 names Eder as a town in the patrimony of Yehudah near the Edomite border.

1 Chronicles 23:23 names him as a son of Mushi (מושי), in Merari's division of David's priests (cf 24:30).

Eder = "a flock", and is used figuratively for the congregation, as in Jeremiah 13:17, where "Eder YHWH" becomes a sobriquet for the children of Yisra-El.

1 Samuel 18:19 and 2 Samuel 21:8 name a son-in-law of King Sha'ul as Adri-El ha Mecholati (עדריאל הַמְּחֹלָתִי), ADRI + EL being a Kena'ani equivalent of EDER + YHWH.


Copyright © 2019 David Prashker
All rights reserved
The Argaman Press

No comments:

Post a Comment