Biblical Hebrew Forum

["JAMES CHRISTIAN READ" <JCR128 AT student.apu.ac.uk>]

Yitzhak wrote:
What is a "concept with a proper name"?
END QUOTE

I know I can sometimes not be very good at not explaining 
myself but I really am finding it difficult to understand 
which part I haven't explained properly. Allow me to try 
and explain myself with some examples.

e.g. Heaven, Hell, Paradise. These three concepts have 
become so singular in there usage that we use them in 
English as proper nouns without a definite article. 
In the same way it is quite possible that the 'deep' 
referred to in the hebrew passage was a concept to the 
hebrews so singular in its usage that it was used as a 
proper noun. We elevate nouns to the status of proper 
nouns when there is only one of them. For example, 
London. We use the word London as a proper noun because 
in the UK (as far as I know) there is only one London 
and so phrases such as 'a London' simply don't make 
sense. However, this does not constitute evidence in 
any way that I am referring to a foreign god of the 
same name.
Imagine if an scientist wrote a report about the planet 
Jupiter and someone 3,500 years later said that this 
scientist was copying from an ancient Roman myth and 
his reference to Jupiter was a reference to the Roman 
god of the same name. There is only one Jupiter in our 
solar system and Jupiter is the accepted way in the 
English language of referring to this planet.
Is it not also possible that the hebrew passage is just 
using the correct proper name for the singular concept 
of tehom with no intention whatsoever of talking about 
a foreign god? Because it would certainly seem so when 
you read the rest of the account for many reasons:

a) Tehom is not personified in any way
b) Tehom is not killed by elohim in the account
c) There is no further reference to Tehom whatsoever
d) The very phrase in which Tehom appears is otherwise 
a description of the lifeless and unformed state of the 
heavens and the earth after elohim's initial act of 
creation
e) The creation account in question just happens to be
part of a wider body of literature which claims that
all other gods are merely lifeless idols


All things considered, it would seem that if there is
any connection between the two accounts it could only
be that Babylonian culture chose to name one of its
ancient gods after the physical entity it represented
and nothing more. The fact that their Enuma Elish
portrays Tiamat as being divided in half to form the
waters above and below could well be an embellishment
of a common tradition of creation passed down through
the generations including Noah (Babylon's Gilgamesh).Tehom is not killed by 
elohim in the account
c) There is no further reference to Tehom whatsoever
d) The very