The fuller and seemingly more original form, ‘J", the God of hosts,’ used by Amos + and Hosea, might suggest—though the inference is not a necessary one—that the expression was in their days of comparatively recent origin. The origin of the title is matter of conjecture. s3y (‘ host’) is used in Heb. in the sense of an army of men, as in the common expression ‘captain of the host’: the angels, and stars, were, however, also pictured by the Hebrews as constituting a ‘host,’ and are spoken of as the ‘HOST OF HEAVEN’ (which see).
he title thus signifies ‘J” of armies’; and the question is, What armies are intended? One opinion is that the armies are those of Israel—the supposition upon this view being that the title originally denoted J” as a warrior, the triumphant leader of Israel’s forces against its heathen foes (cf. Ex 15%, Nu 211 [the ‘Book of “55 wars’), Jg 53, 1S 177-9. 45 1817 958, 9S 5%, Ps 248 449 60! Dt 23’, Is 134 314 [where the word for ‘fight’ is cognate with that for ‘hosts’] 4213); but, as it occurs in many passages where a distinctively martial sense would be inappropriate, and as, moreover, it is used often when God is represented as judging Israel, that the sense expressed by it was gradually enlarged under the πάρος of the
other applications of the word ‘host’ just men-
tioned, so that it came to denote Him as the God who had also other ‘hosts,’ or agencies, at His command, and could employ, for instance, the armies of heaven (cf. Jg 5%, 2 K 6”) on His people’s behalf, and even the powers and forces of nature in general. This is substantially the view of Herder (Geist der Ebr. Poesie, ed. 1825, ii. 81f.); it has been developed most fully by Kautzsch in Herzog’s Real-Encyk.? s.v. ‘Zebaoth,’ and ZAW, 1886, p. 17 ff. ; it is also that of G. A. Smith, XJ Proph. i. 57f., Riehm, HWB, s.v. ‘Zebaoth,’ and Dillm. AT Theol. 220f. In support of it Kautzsch points to the association οἱ the title, in the first passages in which it occurs in the hist. books, with the ark (1S 15: 1 [the ark was now at Shiloh, 45] 44, 2S 6%), the significance of which in time of war is very evident (Nu 10**, Jos 64,15 4°%,2S 11"). The larger ideas asso- ciated with the title afterwards are apparent from the solemnity and emphasis with which the prophets habitually use it (observe, e.g., the climax in Am 418 577, Jer 3185, Is 48? 54°), and from such passages as Am 438, 15 515 54°, Jer 1016 31%, where it is applied to J” as Creator and Ruler of the world; these ideas, it may be noted, appear already in Hos and Am. Another opinion is that the armies intended were originally the hosts of angels. Thus Ewald (Hist. iii. 62, Lehre der Bibel von Gott, τι. i. 339f.), adopting this view, made the clever and original conjecture that the title may have arisen first on occasion of some victory under the Judges, when it seemed as if J” descended (cf. Jg 513) with His celestial hosts to the help of the armies of Israel: ‘born’ thus ‘in the shout of victory,’ it fixed itself on the memory of the people, and im- plying, as it did, that J” was the commander and
*Am 9 t., Is 1-39 (incl. 134 18 2423 256) 56 t., Is 40-66. 6t., Jer
82 t., Hag 14 t., Zec 1-8. 44 t., Zec 9-14. 9 t., Mal 24 τ. t In LXX also (‘ the Lord J”, the God of Hosts’) in Am 95,
LORD'S DAY
organizer of the hosts of heaven (including stars as well as angels), it was suggestive of His omnipo- tence, and became in the le a ‘the loftiest and most majestic title’ of Israel’s God. Oehler, OT Theol. § 196 end, and Schultz, OT Theol. ii. 141, also think that the expression was used origin- ally with reference to the hosts of angels. A third view is that of Smend (AT Rel.-gesch. 185 ff.), according to whom the title was used probably first by Amos, the ‘hosts’ intended by him being the forces and elements of nature (cf. 9*%-). Such a sense is, however, too abstract to stand at the origin of the expression ; nor is it borne out by the usage of Nas in independent passages (not even by Gn 2', Ps 103”, cited by Smend).
Borchert, in SK, 1896, p. 619ff., argues forcibly in support of the view that angels were originally denoted by the expression. He points out, as against the first view mentioned above, (1) that ΠΊΝΩΝ ‘hosts’ is hardly used of the armies of Israel except in three Psalms (449 6010=10811) of uncertain date, and in the late source P (Ex 626 74 1217.41.51, Nu 18. 02 23. 96. 10] 4Π΄. 331),* where it forms part of the unhistorical conception of the nation at the Exodus as consisting of a vast organized army ; (2) that the passages in which the title is brought into connexion with the ark are, relatively, few, and that the connexion itself is no specific or distinctive one; and (3) that the books which principally use the title ‘J” of hosts’ do not speak of the
hosts’ of Israel (and conversely), and that, in general, it is very rarely used in a connexion which Se ke them. On the other hand, passages such as Gn 2812, 1 K 2219, Is 62f, Pg 291, show that J” was habitually pictured as attended by angels, —the objection that, where angels are intended, ‘host’ (not ‘hosts’) ‘of heaven’ is used, being met by the consideration that such beings are not necessarily conceived as a single detinite host, but might, from their numbers, be with equal justice conceived as forming ‘hosts’: they attend Him naturally as King ; the title thus gives expression to J’’s royal state (cf. Is 65, Jer 4618 4815, Pg 2410), and consequently, without any change in the meaning of ‘hosts,’ such as is postulated in the other explanation, it is at once adapted to express those ideas of oe majesty and power which are undoubtedly associated with it by the prophets.