NAHARAI (193 ; Γελωρέ ; Naarai).—The armour- bearer of Joab, a native of Beeroth (2S 23%). In the parallel list (1 Ch 11%) the name is written Nahari (273; Β Ναχώρ; A Naapai; AV, RV Naharai), the form given by the AV at 2 S 23%7,
NAHASH (vp; ‘serpent,’ Nads).—It is probable that all the passages in which this name is found refer to the same individual. He was king of the Ammonites at or before the beginning of Saul’s reign, and did not die until David had been some agri established at Jerusalem (2S 10', 1 Ch 19}).
uch a length of reign is quite possible even if we
NAHOR
accept the tradition that Saul reigned forty years (Jos, Ant. γι. xiv. 9, Ac 13"), but there are many indications that this estimate is excessive. It wag ‘about a month after’ Saul’s election by lot at Mizpah (1 S 10% LXX, reading &ynpp for w 422, so Jos. Ant. VI. ν. 1) that Nahash made that attack on Jabesh-gilead which called forth all Saul’s latent capacities as a leader, and thus vindicated to all Israel the choice of the Lord. The later nar- rative, on the other hand, implies (1S 12”) that the attack of Nahash had been the immediate cause of the people’s demand for a king. This discrep- ancy may = solved, of course, by supposing that Samuel refers to Nahash as having been a standing menace to Israel, and that the invasion of 15 11 had been preceded by many similar incursions. Josephus (Ant. vi. v. 1) takes this view, and says that Nahash was in the habit of putting out the right eyes of all Israelites beyond Jordan that came into his ROWED, ‘that when their left eyes were covered by their shields they might be wholly useless in war.’ The same writer asserts (Ant. VI. v. 3) that Nahash was slain on this occasion; but that is merely his inference from the completeness of the Ammonite defeat. We are not told anything more about Nahash until the notice of his death (258 10! 2), where we learn that he had ‘shown kindness to David in time past,’ probably after he left Achish (1S 215), and because they were both Saul’s enemies (so Jerome, Qu. Heb., in loc., and 1 Ch 1935. Again, when David was at Mahanaim, ‘Shobi the son of Nahash of Rabbah of the chil- dren of Ammon’ was one of those who befriended him (28 17%). There seems no reason why we should suppose with Ewald (HJ iii. 185) that this Nahash was only a member of the royal house, and not the king himself. These two notices seem to indicate some special connexion of Nahash with David, and lend some confirmation to Stanley’s theory that the mother of David and his brothers had been originally wife of Nahash the king, and mother of Abigail and Zeruiah (2 S 17*);* see J ESSE. It is fair to add that Wellh. (Text d. BB Sam. p- 201), followed by Gray (Heb. Prop. Names, 91), regards wp; n2 as a textual error introduced from vnrya of v.2”, which itself he thinks probably stood originally in the margin. Budde (SBOT, ad loc.) is inclined to think that Wellh. may be correct, al- though he himself emends vq; to (Jesse), which agrees with the facts (cf. 1 Ch 915) and is supported by Lue. Ἰεσσαί. N. J. Ὁ. WHITE.
NAHATH (nn:).—1. A ‘duke’ of Edom, Gn 36% (A Νάχομ, D* E Νάχοθ) 7 (A D Νάχοθ, E Néxwp)= 1 Ch 157 (B Naxes, A Νάχεθ). The clan of which he is the eponymous head has not been traced. 2. A Kohathite Lavite, 1 Ch 6761 Heb. 1] (BA Καῖναθ, Lue. Ndaé), called in v.4 Toah, and in 1 § 1! Tohu. Kittel (on 1 Ch 6% in SBOT) holds this last to be most probably the original form of the name (so also Driver, Text of Sam. p. 3). As Kittel points out, mh might readily be corrupted into either ma ornoa, and the latter again into nq}. 3. A Levite in the time of Hezekiah, who was one of the over- seers, under Conaniah and Shimei, in charge of the oblations and tithes and dedicated things, 2 Ch 31% (B Μάεθ, A Νάεθ). J. A. SELBIE.
NAHBI (‘373, B Nafel, A NafSd).—The name of one of the twelve men sent by Moses to spy out the land, Nu 13%. He was the representative of the tribe of Naphtali.
NAHOR (ὑπ: ; LXX and NT Naywp: in AV Jos 24°, Lk 3%, Nachor).—1. The grandfather of Abra- ham, son of Serug, and father of Terah (Gn 1155:
* Another explanation makes of Nahash a female nane, sup posing her to be the mother of Abigail.
NAHOR
P, 1Ch 1%, Lk 3%). 2. Grandson of the pre- ceding; son of Terah, and brother of Abraham and Haran (Gn 11”: P; οἵ. Jos 945). In Gn 11” (J) he is said to have married Milcah, the daughter of his brother Haran; and in 22° (J) twelve sons of Nahor are enumerated, viz. eight by Milcah: Huz,—i.e. ‘Uz, RV Uz, the people of Job’s fatherland,—Buz (the tribe of Elihu, Job 323), Kemuel (the father of Aram), Chesed, Hazo, Pildash, Jidlaph, and Bethuel (father of Laban and Rebekah ; ef. Gn 9415: #447 29) ; and four by a concubine Re’umah: Tebah, Gaham, Tahash, and Maacah. In 24” (J) the city in Aram-naharaim to which Abraham’s servant goes to find a wife for Isaac, i.e. (27* 20) Haran, is called the ‘city of Nahor’; and in 3153 (JE) Laban, in concluding the covenant with Jacob, on the borders of Gilead, appeals to ‘the God of Abraham, and the God of Nalin? the God, that is, or rather, perhaps, the gods,* of their respective ancestors,—to judge be- tween them. ‘These are all the passages in which Nahor is mentioned. His ‘sons’ are certainly in several cases (see Buz, ‘Uz, ARAM, HAzo, TEBAH, Ma‘ACAH, CHESED),t and probably in most, not individuals, but tribes (ef. ISHMAEL, vol. ii. p. 503°, 504"; JACOB, p. 533-534"): he is thus the unit from which were derived by the Hebrew genealogists a oup of Aramzean tribes, resident on the E. or Εν of Canaan, just as other groups of tribes were derived from Ishmael (Gn 25?*"°), or from Abraham’s concubine Keturah (25'4). Whether or not Nahor was an historical individual, must Temain an open question: his relationship to Abraham, whether real or assumed, served in either case as a measure of the degree of relation- ship which was held to subsist between the tribes referred to him and the descendants of Abraham (cf. above, dl.cc.). If the name be not that of an individual, it will naturally be that of a lost tribe, resident once about Haran in Mesopotamia, of which the ‘sons’ of Nahor were regarded as off- shoots, and recollections of which were preserved by the Hebrews (cf. Ewald, Hist. i. 310f., 268 1.) : in this case, the marriage of Nahor with his niece Mileah will represent the amalgamation of two kindred tribes (Dillm. on Gn 11”, who compares 16! 911 36%). As contrasted with Abraham, the ancestor of the Israelites (and Edomites), Nahor appears as the ancestor of a group of Aramean tribes,t the most prominent members of which (on account of their connexion with Isaac and Jacob) are LABAN and Rebekah. The contrast between the two parallel branches appears plainly in Gn 31% (quoted above), and Jos 243 ‘ Your fathers dwelt οἱ old time beyond the River, even Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor: and they served other gods.’ The allusion in the last cited passage is to the common home of the ancestors of the Abrahamide and Nahoride, ‘beyond’ the Euphrates, i.e. in Aram-naharaim, or ‘Mesopotamia,’ between the Euphrates in the upper part of its course, and the akon (now the Khabour), in which was the ancient and important ‘city of Nahor’ (see above), the site of which is well known (see HARAN). There seems, it may be added, to be much probability in Dillmann’s view (on Gn 11*-*! 12'; cf, 2447) that, according to J, Haran was the native and not merely the adopted home of Nahor and Abraham (ef. above, vol. i. p. 15*). S. R. DRIVER.