Magog

מגוג


Genesis 10:2 names him as a son of Yaphet ben No'ach, which is to say a member of the third group of peoples into which the ancient world was divided, named as the sons of No'ach: Shem (the Semites of Mesopotamia), Cham (the Hamites of Africa), and Yaphet (the Japhethites of the northern Mediterranean).

Ezekiel 38/39 reckons Magog to be a land of the extreme north, and associates it with the Scythians (who are probably the ancestors of the Scots - see "The Leprachauns of Palestine"). The Arabs reckon the king of Magog to be Gog (or more likely Gog MaGog, the Ma being the same, and probably the origin, of Celtic Mac = Yehudit ben/son of, Arabic ibn). Arabic has Yājūj and Mājūj; the Chinese have Chin Machin, with "ma" meaning place or region; which parallels a secondary use of Yehudit ben (בן.)

In proto-Jewish apocalypse literature, all of it post-Biblical but pre-Talmud, Gog Magog, or Gog and Magog, are the messengers, or the actual commanders, of the apocalypse that will destroy Yisra-El (predictions had them coming from the east, as the Babylonians and Assyrians had done previously; in the event they came from the west, first the Greeks, then the Romans). Similarly, in the Christian eschatological and apocalyptic writings, Gog and Magog are to invade the Holy Land as the prelude to Armageddon (see also notes to Magdi-El). Yājūj and Mājūj had a similar role in pre-Islamic Arabia, which has been continued into Islam, though, as per the illustration, a wall of bricks as well as faith is buildable to hold them back.

Gog in Yehudit is probably totally unconnected with the word Gag (גג), but happens to be spelled the same so I am including it; besides being "a roof", a Gag was specifically the flat surface of an altar, upon which sacrifices were made (Exodus 30:3 and 37:26) (the part that distinguishes a dolmen from a menhir in the megalithic world).

1 Chronicles 5:4 names Gog, somewhat surprisingly, as a descendant of the tribe of Re'u-Ven, probably a consequence of the geographical location of Re'u-Ven rather than any deeper ethnic connection.


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