Derivation of the Name. — I. From Abram, .1 Jrcc?, and by euphony Hebrcei (August., Ambrose). Displaying, as it does, the utmost ignorance of the language, this deri- vation was never extensively adopted, and was even re- tracted by Augustine {Retract. 16). The euphony al- leged by Ambrose is quite imperceptible, and there is no parallel in the Lat. )neridie=mediclie.
II. According to the sacred writer, "'^SS', Hebi-ew, la a derivative from 13", Eber, the ancestor of Abraham; at least the same persons who are called Hebrews are caUed 13^' ^Sl, sons of Eber (Gen. x, 21); and -QS, Eber (Numb, xxiv, 24) ; and this is tantamomit to a der- ivation of the name Hebrew from Eber. In support of this, it may be urged that ^'^'Z'J is the proper form which a patronymic from "i3" woidd assiune; acccra- ing to the analogy of ""HXI^, a Moabite, ^1'\, a Danite, ■inbD, a Calebite, etc. (Hiller, Onomast. Sac. c. xiv, p. 231 sq.). What adds much force to this argument is the ev- ident antithesis in Gen. xiv, 13, between i12S'n ni3X and il'CXn i<"l^"a; the fonner of these is as evidently a patronymic as the latter. This view is supported by Josepiius, Suidas, Bochart,Vatablus, Drusius, Vossius, Buxtorf, Hottinger, Leusden,Whiston, and Bauer. The- odoret {Qucest. in Gen. 61) lu-ges against it that the He- brews were not the only descendants of Eber, and, there- fore, could not appropriate his name ; and the objection has often been repeated. To meet it, recourse has been had to the suggestion, first adduced, we believe, by Ibn Ezra (Comment, ad Jon. i, 9^ that the descendants of Abraham retained the name Hebrew from Eber, because
HEBREW
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HEBREW
they alone of his descendants retained the faith which lie held. This may be, bnt we are hardly entitled to (issttiiie it in order to account for the fact before us. It is better to throw the oiiii.i probancU on the objector, and to demand of liim, in our ignorance of what determined the use of such patronymics in one line of descent and not in others, that he should show cause why it is in- conceivable that Abraham might have a good and suffi- cient reason for wishing to peqietuate the memory of his descent from Eber, which did not apply to the other descendants of tliat patriarch. "Why might not one race of the descendants of Eber call themselves by pre-emi- nence sons of Eber, just as one race of the descendants of Abraham called tliemselves by pre-eminence sons of Abraliam. But Eber, it is objected, is a name of no note in the history; we know nothing of him to entitle Jiim to be selected as the person after whom a people sliould call themselves. But is fiur ignorance to be the measure of the knowledge nf Alualiam and his descend- ants on such a point V IIc.uim' /rr know nothing to distinguish Eber, does it lollnw ilial ^//r// knew nothing? Certain it is that he was of sufficient importance to re- flect a glory on his father Shem, whose highest desig- nation is " the father of all the children of Eber" (Gen. x,'21); and certain it is that his name lingered for many generations in the region where he resided, for it was as " Eber" that the Mesopotamian prophet knew the de- scendants of Jacob, and spoke of them when they first made their appearance in warlike force on the borders of the promised land (Numb, xxiv, 24).
On the other hand, it is contended that the passage Gen. X, 21 is not so much genealogical as ethnograph- ical ; and in this view it seems that the words are in- tended to contrast Shem with Ham and Japhet, and especially with the former. Now Babel is plainly fixed as the extreme east limit of the posterity of Ham (ver. 10), from whose land Nimrod went out into Assyria (ver. 1 1, margin of A. Vers.) : in the next place, Egj^pt (ver. 13) is mentioned as the western limit of the same great race ; and these two extremes having been ascer- tained, the historian proceeds (ver. 15-19) to fill up his ethnographic sketch with the intermediate tribes of the Canaanites. In short, in ver. (l-'iO we liavc indications of three geographical points wliich distinguish the pos- terity of Ham, viz. EgjTit, Palestine, and Babylon. At the last-mentioned city, at the river Euphrates, their proper occupancy, unaffected by the exceptional move- ment of Asshur. terminated, and at the same point that of the descendants <if Shem began. Accordingly, the sharpest contrast that could be devised is obtained by gcnerally classing these latter nations as those bei/ond the river Euphrates; and the words "father of all the chihlren of Eber," i.e. father of the nations to the east of tlic Eupliratcs, find an intelligible place in the context.
It must also be confessed that in the genealogical scheme in Gen. xi, 10-2G, it does not appear that the Jews thought of Eber as a source ])rimary, or even sec- ondary' of the national descent. The genealogy neither starts from him, nor in its uniform sequence does it rest upon him with any emphasis. Tiicre is nothing to dis- tinguish Eber above Arjihaxad, Peleg, or Serug. Like them, lie is but a link in the chain by which Shem is connected with Abraham. Indeed, the tendency of the Iraelitish retrospect is to stop at Jacob. It is with Ja- col) that their history as a nation begins: beyond Jacob they held their ancestry in common with the" Edomites; beyond Isaac they were in danger of being confounded with the IshmaeUtes. The |)redoininaut figure of the emiihatically //(V>/(w Aliraliam might temjit them be- yond those iioiiits of allinity with otlicr races, so distaste- ful, so anti-national; but it is almost inconceivable that they would voluntarily originate and perpetuate an ap- pellation of themselves which landed them on a plat- form of ancestry where they met the whole population of Arabia ((ien. x, 'if), 30).