It has been coiucuoed that, in most of the OT passages where tannin and liwydthdn occur, a mythological or semi - mythological allusion is present. Such an allusion is discovered, for in- stance, in Is 27' ' In that day the LoKD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish liwydthdn the fleeing serpent (oi; s^'Ci, LXX t^is ^fiVywc, Aq. 6<pi^ fjLOx^is, Symm. 40(5 ffvyKXeiuf) and liwydthdn tlio coiled serpent (pn^iTi:, oqj, LXX i<pis anoXiis, Aq. and Symm. c0ij iveaKiauiiiinos), and he shall slay the tannin that is in the sea.' The language here cer- tainly recalls the Babylonian mytliology with its account of the primeval conflict between Marduk and Tiamat (see art. Cosmogony). The ' fleeing serpent ' (cf. Job 26'-'-) is portrayed on a Bab. seal, with Marduk in pursuit ; the ' coiled serpent ' mi;;hl be the earth-encircling ocean. These two lixr yutlulns are held to be simply ditterentiations of Tiamat, whose con.sort, Kiiigu, may be 'the dragon in the sea' (so tiunkel, followed by Cheyne, et at.). At the same time Gunkel (p. 40) admits that they are employed by ' Isaiah ' to symbolize kingdoms. In Is 51' (on which see art. Rahab) the " dragon' (symbolical, as the context shows, of Egypt at tlie time of the Exodus) appears, as in the Bab. cos- mogony, as having been destroyed by God long ago (so also in Ps 74'^'" ' Thou brakest tlie heads ot the tanninS7n in the waters, thou didst crush the heads of liwyathdn in pieces,' 89'" al.), whereas in 27' the monster is thought of aiiparently as im- prisoned in the sea, and destined to ue destroj'cd at last by Jahweh's sword (cf. Job 3", where, as was noted above, magicians have the power to ' rouse up ' liivydt/idn ; 7'^, where watchers are set over the tannin ; and Am 9', where the serpent [oiji, opaKuf] is in any case no venomous marine snake, for such are not found in the Mediterranean, but 'an imaginary monster, supposed by the Hebrews to have its home at the bottom of the ocean, and to be at the disposal of the Almighty ' [Driver, ad loc; similarly Nowack, who has no doubt that there is a reference to the sea-monster of myth- ology])- Again, in Kzk "29'"" and 3'J"" the tannin to which Pharaoh is compared, althoujjh it has points in common with the crocodile, is held to
• The word • dra^'on * In A V should probably be viewed merely as an old and poc-tical word for a lur^'e (tcn>ent (not necessarily a fabulous monster). See exain(>les uf its use in this sense in old writers as quoted by Murray in Ojif. limj. Dictionary^ »,v.
t This is the only occurrence of ' sea-moubtor' in AV.
128
SEBA
SECUKDUS
find its only true equivalent in the monster Tiamat. The treatment to be meted out by God to E^liaraoh recalls, we are told, the way in which Tiamat and her allies were vanquished and afterwards treated by Marduk ; compare, for instance, EzU 3'2" ' I will spread out my net for thee,' etc., with Creation tablet iv. 11. 95, 112, ' Bel (Marduk) threw wide his net, made it encompass her ' ; ' In the net they lay, in the meslies they eat.' But the net is a common OT figure, and may be used here independently. Upon the whole, while it is practically certain tliat the Tiamat myth had reached Palestine and tliat there are allusions to it in the OT, it will liardly be questioned that Guukel exaggerates its inlluence.
The 'dragon' of Neh 2" is probably a serpent regarded as tlie tutelary deity of the spring, and believed to give living power, perhaps healing virtues, to its waters (of. W. K. Smith, RS^ 156, IGl P 172, 176]).
It does not fall within the scope of the present article to discuss the ' dragon ' of tlie Greek Book of Daniel (see art. BEL and the Dragon), the ' dragons ' of Ad. Est 10' 11" or of Ps-Sol 2^"-, or the 'dragon ' of Rev 12'''- 13- *• " 16'^ 20=, for which last see Revelation (Book of), p. 256, and Bousset's Comm. ad loc. See also art. Raiiab.
Literature. — Giinkel, SckGp/un/j u. Chaos, esp. pp. 2&-90; Chevne'8 artt. 'Behemoth and Leviathan' and 'Dragon' in Enci/c. BibL: Weber, Jiid. Theol^ 160, 202, 402, 404 (ou Jewish fancies about Leviathan); the Comin., esp. those of A. B. Davidson, Dillm., Budde, and Duhra on Job ; of Cheyne, Dillm. .Kittel, and Marti on Isaiah \ and of Bertholet and Kraetzschmar (both disinclined to admit in Ezk 293 322 the mythological allusioas contended for by Gunkel) on EzekieL
J. A. Selbie. SEBA (N3P). — Son of Cush, Gn 10' = lCh 1». SincR Seba is mentioned in connexion with Cnsh in Is 43' and 45", it is probable that this genealogy is a gloss on the pas.sages of Isaiah, or, at any rate, based upon them. Of Seba this author knows that its inhabitants were tall ; and since he prophesies that they should be brought in chains to Jerusalem, it seems reasonable to identify them with a race mentioned in the oracle of Is 18^- ', who were to be brought as an offering to the temple, who also were connected with a nation living bejond the rivers of Cush, and who are described as 'drawn out, clean - shaven, and of power from ancient times.' The rest of the description is at present unintelligible. There is a further reference to tliem in I's 72'", where, however, they are merely typical of a distant race, and coupled with the familiar Slieba on the ground of the resemblance of their niimes. On this resemblance Glaser (Skizze, ii. 387 fl.) bases his theory that they repre- sent the Sabajans of Jebel Shammir in Nejd — a theory which is to be rejected on the ground that the only autlior who knows an3'thing definite about tlieni keeps them carefully apart from the Sabi-eans, and mentions them in connexion with Cush and E^ypt. Since from the 8th cent. B.C. Cush had played an important part in politics, it is probable that an educated man would have some idea of the locality of Cush, and therefore any attempt to seek for Seba anywhere but in the heart of Africa should be rejected. The researches of Mr. Theodore Bent (Ruined Cities of Mashona- Innd, 1892) have certified the existence in the heart of Africa of tlie vestiges of ancient States, the names of which are lost to history. The description given by him of the ancient State of Mashonaland bears some resemblance to that given in Is 18, possibly on the ground of Egyptian de- spatches or the statements of Ethiopians then dominant in Egypt. ' There is,' says a Portuguese traveller quoted p. 207, ' a tower or edifice of worked masonry, which appears evidently not to be the work of black natives of the country, bat