Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Yigal Levin" <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>]

Dora,

If you're referring to the Bene Yamin attested at Mari:

1. There is nothing in the Mari texts that shows any connections with anyone
"through the entire transjordan from the Euphrates region to the Negev."
Mari was sutuated on the central Euphrates and had ties throughout
Mesopotamia, Syria and as far south as Hazor. There is nothing in the texts
that show that the Bene Yamin were anything more than a local (east-central
Syria) tribal group.

2. Any direct link between anything in 18th century Mari and in 12th century
(or later) Israel is extremely conjectural. Mari is very useful for
illuminating the Northwest Semitic cultural background that eventually
produced Israel, but that's it. The fact that there were similarly named
tribes in both Mari and in Israel does NOT mean that the two are the same
tribe, but just that the name did originate as a geographical term, which
became the name of the tribe in that area.

Yigal
----- Original Message -----
From: "Dora Smith" <villandra AT austin.rr.com>
To: "Yigal Levin" <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>; "b-hebrew"
<b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Sent: Friday, July 02, 2004 5:22 PM
Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Benjamin


> The Banu-yamin were actually a large confederation of tribes that would
have
> ranged through the entire transjordan from the Euphrates region to the
> Negev.   Some group of them could easily have been allied with the groups
> that formed Israel.
>
> Yours,
> Dora Smith
> Austin, Texas
> villandra AT austin.rr.com
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Yigal Levin" <leviny1 AT mail.biu.ac.il>
> To: "b-hebrew" <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
> Sent: Friday, July 02, 2004 10:10 AM
> Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Benjamin
>
>
> > At the risk of repeating some of the things already said in the thread
on
> > "Judah", certainly both meanings are used in different contexts. On one
> > hand, Ben-Yamin was the most "southern-born" of all of Jacob's sons,
since
> > all the others were born in Haran. Assuming this story to be somewhat
> > aetiological, the Benei Yamin were the southernmost of all the tribes of
> the
> > origial "Israel" (that is, excluding Judah), sitting at the southern
edge
> of
> > Mount Ephraim (18th century Mari, by the way, supplies us with another
> tribe
> > called "Benei Yamin", who lived south of the city). The "pre-monarchal"
> > stories emphasize Benjamin's status as "Joseph's younger brother". And,
as
> I
> > said, at least some of the references to the Benjaminites' "left
> handedness"
> > seem to me to be puns.
> >
> > On the other hand, the etymolgy given in Gen. 35:18 is quite clear: his
> > mother called him Ben-oni and his father called him Ben-yamin. "On"
means
> > "strength", usually sexual: look at Jacob's blessing for Reuben: "you
are
> my
> > firstborn, my might (KoXiY) and the begining of my strength (ONi)".
> >
> > Yigal
> >
> > ----- Original Message -----
> > From: "Stoney Breyer" <stoneyb AT touchwood.net>
> > To: <b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org>
> > Sent: Friday, July 02, 2004 3:39 PM
> > Subject: RE: [b-hebrew] The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune --
> > 1Chron
> >
> >
> > > GFS:It does, however, refer to the south.
> > >
> > > SB: Does it? In light of their consistent characterization mightn't
the
> > > b'nei Yamin be banditti calling themselves something like 'Sons of the
> > > Strongarm' - and denoting their elite as something like the Masonic
> > > 'handfast'?
> > >
> >
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
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>
>
>