NIMROD
109
NIMROD
the strangest opinion is that of Yon Bohlen (^Genesis, p. 120), who makes him the same with Mcrodach-Ba- ladan ! (comp. Tuch, Gen. p. 233 ; Gesen. Thes. ii, 818, note). — Winer, ii, 157. The only subsequent notice of the name Nimrotl occurs in Mic. v, 6, where the '• land of Nimrod" is a synonyme either for Assyria, just before mentioned, or for Babylonia.
There is no ground for regarding Gen. x, 9-11 as a later interpolation, an opinion maintained by Vater, Schumann, and others, and virtually adopted by Prof. Kawlinson. Nimrod is there briefly characterized thus : "lie began to be a mighty one in the earth. He was a mighty hunter before the Lord: wherefore it is said. Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter before the Lord." This narrative is so brief that it is rather obscure. For the Hebrew word rendered "mighty" the Sept. gives ■yi'yaf, as if in allusion to his phj'sical stature in con- nection with his power, or to Gen. vi, 4, as if the old anteililuvian Titans had been reproduced in Nimrod. It is hard to determine in what sense the phrase a "mighty one" or a "mighty hunter" is used. If the name Nimrod be a Shemitic one, then it plainly means " let us rebel or revolt ;" but if it be, as some suppose, a Turanian word, its meaning is at present unknown. Much depends on the sense of tlie phrase "before the Lord." Many, like Perizonius, Bochart, and others, give it only an intensive meaning — Deojudice, or quasi niaxime — that is, in the Lord's estimation he was a mighty hunter. But with Hengstenberg we demur to the notion that the Hebrew superlative absolute can be expressed in this way with the solemn name of Jehovah. The phrase is by no means parallel to the so-called ab- solute superlative in such phrases as " trees of the Lord" (Psa. civ, IG), or "a city great to God" (Jonah iii, 3), or "a child fair to God" (Acts vii, 20). The instances quoted by grammarians and lexicographers will not sustain the usage, and Nordheimer shrinks from the full vindication of it {Ihb. Gram. p. 791). For example, the phrase occurs in Gen. xxvii, 7, " That I may bless thee before the Lord," that is, in his presence and with his seal and approval. A similar phrase, in which the name God is used, is found in Isa. Ivi, 14, " That I may walk before God," that is, in the cnjoj-ment of his bless- ing and protection. And so in many places in which the idiom is not to be diluted into a mere superlative. Abarbanel, Gesenius, and Van Bohlen explain the clause " before the Lord" as meaning here " whom God favors." Prof. Eawlinson also goes so far as to say that " the language of Scripture concerning Nimrod is laudatory rather than the contrary" {Ancient Monarchies, i, 217). But the preposition "^.JSP has often, as Gesenius admits, a hostile sense — in front of, for the purpose of opposing (Numb, xvi, 2 ; 1 Chron. xiv, 8 ; 2 Chron. x\", 10) ; and the Sept. gives it such a sense in the verse under con- sideration— tvavTiov KvfAov — " against the Lord." The Targums and Josephus give the preposition this hostile meaning. The context also inclines us to it. That the mighty hunting was not confined to the chase is ap- parent from its close connection with the building of eight cities. Tuch indeed denies that such a connection is indicated by the 1 in ver. 10, and Keil as roundly asserts it ; but there is no need to lay stress on any con- secutive force in the conjunction — the connection and its results are ajiparent in the context. The prowess in hunting must have co-existed with valor in battle. What Nimrod did in the chase as a hunter was the earlier token of what he achieved as a conqueror. For hunting and heroism were of old specially' and naturally associated, as in Perseus, Ulysses, Achilles, and the Per- sian sovereigns^ one of whom, Darius, inscribed his ex- ploits in hunting on his epitaph (Strabo, xv). The Assyrian monuments also picture many feats in hunt- ing, and the word is often employed to denote cam- paigning. Thus Tiglath-pileser I "hunts the people of Bilu-Nipru," and one of his ancestors does the same thing. Both are represented as holding " the mace of
power," a weapon used in hunting, and at the same time the symliol of royalty. Sargon speaks of three hundred and fifty kings who ruled over Assyria, and " hunted" the people of Bilu-Nipru. Bilu-Nipru means Babylon, and nipnt, from napar, to hunt, may be con- nected with Nimrod, or Nebrod, as in the Sept. the name is spelled. The chase and the battle, which in the same country were connected so closely in after- times, may therefore be virtually associated or identified here. The meaning then will be, that Nimrod was the first after the flood to found a kingdom, to unite the fragments of scattered patriarchal rule, and consolidate them under himself as sole head and master; and all this in defiance of Jehovah, for it was the violent in- trusion of Hamitic power into a Shemitic territory. The old hero's might and daring passed at length into a proverb, or became the refrain of a ballad, so that hunters and warriors of more recent times were ideally compared with him — " Even as Nimrod the mighty hunter." — Fairbairn.