supposes that sheol and the grave are the two daughters of Alukah or Destiny ; each cries " give" at the same moment— the former asks for the soul, and the latter for the body of man in death ; both are insatiable, for b(jth involve all mankind iu one common ruin. He further tliinks that both these are called daughters, because each of the words is of the feminine, or, at most, of the common gender; and in the IGth verse, the grave {she- ol) is specified as one of the "things that are never sat- isfied." In further confirmation of this view, Bochart cites rabbinical writers, who state that by the word alukah, which occurs in the Clialdee paraphrase on the Psalms, they understand destiny to be signified; and also remark that it has two daughters— Eden and Ge- henna, Paradise and Hell — the former of whom never has enough of the souls of the righteous, the latter of the souls of the wicked. (See also Alb. Schultens, Com- ment, ad loc).
Jn behalf if the received translafion, it is urged that it is scarcely credilile that all the ancient translators should have confounded (diikah with alaknh ; that it is pecul- iarly unlikely that this should have Ijccn the case with the Septuagint translator of the book of Proverbs, be- cause it is believed that "this ranks next to the trans- lation of the Pentateuch for ability and fidelity of exe- cution ;" and that the author of it must have been well skilled in the two languages (Home's Infi-odiiction. ii, 43, ed. 1828). It is further pleaded that the application of Arabic analogies to Hebrew words is not decisive; and finally, that the theorj- proposed by Bochart is not es- sential to the elucidation of the passage. In the pre- ceding verse the writer (not Solomon — see ver. 1) speaks of " a generation, whose teeth are as swords, and their jaw-teeth as knives to devour the poor from off the earth, and the needy from among men ;" and then, after the abrupt and picturesque style of the East, especially in their proverbs, which is nowhere more vividly excm- jiificd than in this whole chapter, the leech is intro- duced as an illustration of the covetousness of such per- sons, and of the two distinguishing vices of which it is the parent, avarice ar.ii cruelty. May not also the " two daughters of the leech, crying. Give, give," be a figurar tive description of the two lips of the creature (for these it has, and perfectly formed), which are a part of its very complicated mouth ? It certainly is agreeable to the Hebrew style to call the offspring of inanimate things daughters, for so branches are called daughters of trees (Gen. xlix, 22, margin). A similar use of the word is found in Eccles. xii,4, "All the daughters of mu- sic shaU be brought low," meaning the lips, front teeth, and other parts of the mouth. It is well remarked by Prof. Paxton that " this figurative application of the entire genus is sufficient to justify the intcrpretatioiu The leech, as a symbol in use among rulers of every class and in all ages, for avarice, rapine, plunder, ra]iaci- ty, and even assiduity, is too well known to need illus- tration" (see Plautus, Epidic. art. 2; Cicero, ad Attic; Horace, A is. Poet. 47G ; Theocritus, Pharmactvt. ; etc.). In confirmation of this view, Prof. Stuart remarks {Com- ment, ad loc), " The Arabians have the same word, and in the Camus, their standard dictionarj', it is defined by another Arabic word, viz. Ghoul. This latter the Ca- mus again defines as meaning, (1) Calamity, (2) Forest- deril, (3) A dccmon man-eating and insatiable. The -•Vra- bians, down to the present hour, maintain that it is of- ten met with in the forests of Arabia, and they stand in great terror of it when entering a thick woods. (^Sce Lane's Modern Egyptians, i, 344.) The Syrians had a like superstition, but, like the Hebrews, they more gen- erally named the sprite Ulith. In Isa. xxxiv, 14, this last word occurs (Auth. Version screech-owl), and it is amply and finely illustrated by Gesenius (Comment, ad loc). In like manner, Western superstition is full of spokes, hobgobUns, elves, imps, and vampires; all. espe- cially the last of which, are essentially insatiable, blood- sucking spectres." (See also Gesenius, Thesaur. JJeb. p. 1038.)— Ivitto. See Si'ectke.
HORSEMAN
348
HORSEMAN":
There is, then, little doubt that aluhah denotes some species of leech, or, rather, is the generic term for any blood-sucking annelid, such as Hirudo (the medicinal leech), HcBinopis (the horse-leech), Limnatis, Trochetia, and Aula^toma, if all these genera are fomid in the marshes and pools of the Bible-lands. The leech or blood-sucker belongs to the genus vermes, order intesti- nata, Linn. It is viviparous, bruigs forth only one oif- spring at a time, and the genus contains many species. " The Ao?-«e-leech" is properly a species of leech discard- ed for medical purposes on account of the coarseness of its bite. There is no ground for the distinction of spe- cies made in the English Bible. The valuable use of the leech {Hirudo) in medicine, though midoubtedly known to Pliny and the later Roman writers, was in all probability miknown to the ancient Orientals ; still they were doubtless acquainted with the fact that leeches of the above-named genus would attach themselves to the skin of persons going barefoot in ponds ; and they also were probably cognizant of the propensity horse-leeches (^Hoemopis') have of entering the mouth and nostrils of cattle, as they drink from the waters frequented by these pests, which are common enough in Palestine and Syria. The use which, from its thirst for blood, we make of the leech, being miknown to the ancient Orientals, as it is miknown in the East at the present day, it is there spoken of with feelings of horror and aversion, particu- larly as it causes the destruction of valuable animals by fastening under their tongues when they come to drink. The lake called Birket er-Ram, the ancient Phiala, about three horn-s from Banias, is said to be so crowded with leeches that a man can gather 6000 or even 8000 in a day, while the fountain at Banias is not infested