Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Heard, Christopher" <Christopher.Heard AT pepperdine.edu>]

And yet, "El" is *also* a proper name, of the Canaanite god El (as in  
Yisra-El ...?).

On Jul 21, 2005, at 3:01 AM, Yigal Levin wrote:

> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Read, James C" <K0434995 AT kingston.ac.uk>
>
> > I read somewhere that while yhwh was unique to the el shadai that the
> > term el was used for many gods both false and true. That while el  
> > merely
> > describes a title of divinity the name yhwh indentifies that  
> > divinity as
> > the one and only god of the hebrew. e.g. 'yhwh god of hosts'
>
> This is correct. "El", "Eloah", "Elohim", like Aramaic "Elah", Arabic
> "Allah", Akkadian "Illu" etc. is the generic term for "god(s)". In a
> multi-theistic world, specific gods had specific names: Hadad, Dagan,
> Chemosh, Marduk, Ashur, Amun and also YHWH. "El Shaddai" is a  
> title, not a
> proper name. In the Bible, it is used of YHWH.
>
> Here's food for thought: in 1 Sam. 17:43, Goliath "cursed David by his
> elohim". Every translation that I've seen has "cursed David by his  
> gods",
> meaning that Goliath cursed by his own gods (hence the lowercase  
> g). But the
> Hebrew could just as easily be read "cursed David by his God" since  
> the pl.
> Elohim is also used as the title of the single God of Israel.
>
>
> Yigal
>
>
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--
R. Christopher Heard
Assistant Professor of Religion
Pepperdine University
Malibu, California 90263-4352
http://faculty.pepperdine.edu/cheard
http://www.iTanakh.org
http://www.semioticsandexegesis.info