Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

Jonathan E. Mohler:

 

 

 

1.  You wrote:  “Pharaoh's daughter is named בתיה, the daughter of Yah.  Albeit, this is not recorded in Exodus, but in 1Chronicles.  Obviously, the Hebrews gave her that name. This is an indication that, on the one hand, she was accepted into the fold of Israel, and on the other hand, that she had made Yah her God.”

 

 

You may well be right about that.  That’s an interesting name at I Chronicles 4: 18.  Unlike the authentic Egyptian names of Egyptians in the Patriarchal narratives, BTYH looks like a Hebrew name being given to an Egyptian in Chronicles.

 

 

2.  You wrote:  “This is most likely the case with אוריה, )uri-YH the Hittite.  He has made Yah his god,  having married Bath-Sheva, and has sworn allegiance to David.  Both of these names suggest conversion to Yahweh and assimilation into the Hebrew nation.”

 

 

I have to disagree with you there, and go with the scholarly view.  The final -H in the name “Uriah” is generally viewed as being a Semiticization of a non-Hebrew name, as with the names Araunah and, in my opinion, Seraiah, who are contemporaries in the Hurrian/Jebusite-dominated Jerusalem of King David in II Samuel.  Uriah is said to be a Xuti-ya/XTY [“Hittite”], which is one of the most frequently attested Hurrian names at Nuzi, and means “Praise the Divine” or “Praise Teshup”.  Thus every indication is that King David is dealing with people of Hurrian ancestry in Jerusalem [as one would expect from Joshua 15: 63], who have Semiticized Hurrian names.

 

 

Leaving off that final -H, we have )WRY, or )WR -Y, which is the expected Hebrew rendering of the Hurrian name Ev-ri  -ya.  That name means “The Divine Is Lord” or “Teshup Is Lord”.  Both )WR -Y, before adding the Semiticizing final -H, and XT -Y work perfectly in Hurrian.  In both cases, the standard Hurrian theophoric suffix, -ya, is represented by Hebrew yod/Y.  By contrast, neither such name works well in Hebrew.

 

 

Not all people in Canaan were born Hebrews with good Hebrew names.  Even persons who joined with the Hebrews, and were good people who were much appreciated by the Hebrews, were not necessarily born Hebrews with good Hebrew names.  Per Joshua 15: 63 we know that King David must have had to deal with several important non-Hebrew people in Jerusalem of Hurrian/Jebusite ancestry.  These people, each of whom has a Semiticized Hurrian name, turn out to be:  Uriah, Seraiah, and Araunah.

 

 

If there had been no Hurrian remnant in Jerusalem, with Joshua 15: 63 either being factually incorrect or not intending to refer to Hurrians, then there’s no way that later books in the Bible could come up with, as they invariably do, bona fide Hurrian names for Kenizzites, Kenites, Hittites, and Jebusites.  All four of those names are colorful Patriarchal nicknames for the Hurrians, based on attested Hurrian personal names at the Hurrian province of Nuzi in Late Bronze Age eastern Syria.

 

 

One important, if underrated, theme in the Bible is that the Hebrews had to contend with many non-Hebrew people.  Not only enemies, but also non-Hebrew people living in Canaan who threw in their lot with the Hebrews, but who had not been born Hebrews with good Hebrew names.

 

 

Jim Stinehart

Evanston, Illinois