Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

b-hebrew - Re: Israel

b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Biblical Hebrew Forum

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: Cindy Smith <cms AT dragon.com>
  • To: BARRE AT FREEDSL.COM
  • Cc: B-HEBREW AT FRANKLIN.OIT.UNC.EDU, cms AT dragon.com
  • Subject: Re: Israel
  • Date: Fri, 1 Sep 2000 16:44:39 -0500


>From: MX%"barre AT freedsl.com" 1-SEP-2000 06:47:16.41
>To: MX%"b-hebrew AT franklin.oit.unc.edu"
>Subj: Israel

>What does "Israel" literally mean, please?

I believe it means "one who struggles with God." It comes from
Exodus 32:25-33 where Jacob struggles with a man all night long, and
when he could not prevail against Jacob, he said, "You shall not
longer be spoken of as Jacob, but as Israel, because you have
contended with divine and human beings and have prevailed" (v 29).
Jacob believed he saw God but Hosea 12:5 explicityly calls him an
angel. This is folk etymology, however, which is common in the Old
Testament. Yisra, in this folk etymology, comes from sarita,
"you contended" and El means God. I leave it to the experts to decide
what the name Israel means in scholarly etymology.

>LMB

>L.M. Barre, Ph.D.
>Angelfire.com/ca2/AncientIsrael
>Get DSL high-speed Internet access FREEÂ…with FreeDSL at
>http://www.freedsl.com


Cindy Smith Spawn of a Jewish Carpenter
GO AGAINST THE FLOW! \\ _\\\_ _///_ // A Real Live Catholic in Georgia
cms AT dragon.com >IXOYE=('> <`)= _<< "Delay not your conversion
cms AT romancatholic.org// /// \\\ \\ to the LORD, Put it not off
cms AT 5sc.net from day to day" Ecclus/Sira 5:8




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page