Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

HEBREW, HEBREWS

A non-ethnic term (Heb. ʿiḇrî) that non-Israelites used in referring to Israelites, and that Israelites used in referring to themselves when conversing with non-Israelites.

As a patronymic, the term is thought to be derived from the name of Abraham’s ancestor, Eber (Gen. 10:24-25; 11:14-26; 1 Chr. 1:18-19), as suggested by the genealogical references to Abraham and his descendants (Gen. 14:13; 39:14; 40:15; 43:32; Exod. 2:6; Deut. 15:12; 1 Sam. 4:9; 29:3; Jonah 1:9; Acts 6:1; 2 Cor. 11:22; Phil.3:5). It is used for Abraham and for his posterity prior to the eschatological event in which Jacob received the name Israel.

In linguistic usage Hebrew designated the Judahite language, a member of the Canaanite branch of Northwest Semitic languages. The term “Hebrew” as a denotation of the language per se is first seen in the prologue to Sirach. In the NT “Hebrew” (Gk. Hebraíos) or “language of the Hebrews” (Hebraïs) denotes a language or languages used by Jews (John 5:2; 19:13, 17, 20; 20:16; Acts 21:40; 22:2; 26:14; Rev. 9:11; 16:16). There is some uncertainty as to whether references to Hebrew in the Apocrypha (4 Macc. 12:7; 16:15) and the NT denote Hebrew or Aramaic.

Various 2nd-millennium ancient Near Eastern texts refer to people classified as habīru/ʿapīru, a term that some think denotes “Hebrews.” The habīru may be social outcasts, fugitives, refugees, or mercenary groups, but it is unlikely that they formed an ethnicity. Ancient Near Eastern references suggest that the habīru in Canaan, mentioned in the Amarna Letters, were not the Israelites. A relationship between the term habīru in the Nuzi servant contracts and the Hebrew slave of Exod. 21:2; Deut. 15:12 is unlikely, in part because the Nuzi archives are from a different time than the biblical narrative. In the Nuzi texts habīru denotes a “foreign servant” who sold himself into slavery; in Deut. 15:12 the Hebrew servant is called the “brother” of those being addressed.

The LXX translates “Abram the Hebrew” (Gen. 14:13) as “Abram, the one who crossed over” (cf. Heb. ʿbr). This has been tied to Abraham’s having come from the other side of the Euphrates (Josh. 24:2-3) and, although not generally accepted, to the Israelites’ crossing of the Jordan. Early rabbinic interpretation treats “Hebrew” as a reference to those who had crossed over the Reed/Red Sea. Since this may be eschatological, it implies that a Hebrew is one who experienced death and resurrection.

A case can be made for viewing the contrast between Egyptians and Hebrews in Gen. 43:32; Exod. 1:19; 2:11 as connoting ethnic distinctions; the parallelism between Yahweh the God of Israel (Exod. 5:1) and the God of the Hebrews (v. 3) could lead to such an understanding. However, as used in the OT or the Apocrypha, the term Hebrew does not usually denote an ethnicity. It is used by non-Israelites (OT) or non-Jews (Apocrypha) speaking of Israelites (Gen. 41:12) or Jews (Jdt. 12:11; 14:18), respectively. When used by someone who is not an Israelite, the term may have some derogatory connotation or imply that the Israelite is not free (e.g., Potiphar’s wife [Gen. 39:14, 17] and the chief butler [41:12] in referring to Joseph). When used by an Israelite speaking to a non-Israelite, it frequently implies that the Israelite is not free (e.g., Joseph refers to the place from whence he comes as “the land of the Hebrews”; Gen. 40:15) or only figuratively free (e.g., when speaking to the non-Israelite sailors, Jonah defines himself as a Hebrew; Jonah 1:9). Such meanings are frequent in Gen. 30–Exod. 10, , particularly when Israel is not free (e.g., in Exod. 5:1-3 Moses refers to the “God of the Hebrews” when Israel is in slavery to Egypt).

There is no ethnic connotation when “Hebrew” is used in the legislation concerning the manumission of Hebrew slaves/servants as found in Exod. 21 (social and economic rules in the Covenant Code, having a different origin from the Covenant Code that follows 22:17[MT 16]) and Deut. 15 (which forms part of the Mosaic law) and possibly Jer. 34:9, which also refers to Hebrew slaves. What is permitted regarding a Hebrew in Exod. 21 is forbidden for an Israelite in Lev. 25; ; and there is a distinction between voluntary nonpermanent labor and the harsh type of enforced service forbidden in Lev. 25:43-44.

There is no ethnic connotation in the reporting of the relationship between the Israelites and the Hebrews in 1 Sam. 4; 13–14; 29. The distinction may be between Israel as a whole and select groups of Israelites or of those who joined together with the Israelites, thereby becoming part of all Israel. The Hebrews of 1 Sam. 13–14 seem to be non-Israelite mercenaries at the same time that they seem identical to “all Israel.” The Philistines refer to Israelites while calling them Hebrews (1 Sam. 14:11), an identification that is related to what is found in 13:19-20. But there is no ethnic reference in 1 Sam. 13:6-7, where the distinction may be between two different groups within “all Israel”: v. 6 notes those excused from military service and v. 7 notes Israelite deserters from Saul’s army. In 1 Sam. 14:21 those Hebrews who fought for the Philistines are to be treated as Israelite traitors. But those Hebrews who come back to Saul (1 Sam. 13:7a) together with the Israelites who had taken refuge in the hill-country of Ephraim (14:22) joined together in Saul’s army.

In the NT “Hebrew” designates certain sectarian groups of Jews. It may designate someone who is superficially hellenized (Acts 6:1), or it may merely distinguish between Jews and Gentiles (2 Cor. 11:22; Phil. 3:5).

Bibliography. G. E. Mendenhall, “The Hebrew Conquest of Palestine,” BA 25 (1962): 66-87; repr. BA Reader 3, ed. E. F. Campbell and D. N. Freedman (Garden City, 1970), 100-20.

Sara Mandell

Prayer Tents Bible References - Prayer Tents

HEBREW, HEBREWS

Eerdmans Dictionary of the Bible (2000)