旧约词汇 - A

A.D.

Abbreviation of anno domini, Latin for "year of our Lord".
See C.E.

Aaron

The brother of Moses, Israel's first high priest. See Chapter 3, Chapter 4.

Abel

The second son of Adam and Eve; he was murdered by his brother Cain.
See Chapter 1.

Abiathar

One of David's priests; he fell out of favor because he supported Adonijah against Solomon. See Chapter 8, Chapter 9.

Abimelech

King of Gerar who took to wife Sarah (Genesis 20) and Rebekah (Genesis 26).

Abner

The commander of Saul's army; he was killed by Joab. See Chapter 8.

Abraham

(Abram before Genesis 17; adj. Abrahamic) The first father (patriarch) of Israel; first called Abram, God made a covenant with him in which God promised to make him a great nation; Isaac was his son by Sarah, and Ishmael was his son by Hagar. See Chapter 2.

Abraham cycle

Genesis 12-25; a collection of stories focused on Abraham. See Chapter 2.

Abrahamic covenant

The covenant Yahweh made with Abraham, sealed by circumcision (Genesis 17).

Abram

Abraham's name before Genesis 17.
See Abraham.

Absalom

A son of David who murdered his half-brother Amnon, took the throne from David, and was killed by Joab. See Chapter 8.

Absolute law

Also called apodictic law, it is law stated in an unconditional manner without qualifying clauses; abslolute law is distinguished from case law. See Chapter 3.

Achan

A contemporary of Joshua who kept spoil from the conquest of Jericho, was held responsible for Israel's defeat at Ai, and was executed by the Israelites.

Acrostic

A series of poetic lines or verses whose initial letters form the alphabet, a word, or a regular pattern, as in Lamentations 1-4, Psalms 111, 112, and 119. See Chapter 16.

Adam

The first male God created; he and his mate Eve disobeyed God and were expelled from the garden of Eden. See Chapter 1 Yahwist Creation Story. The Hebrew term adam can variously designate humankind collectively (as in Genesis 1:24, 27), the first man (when used with the definite article the as in Genesis 2-3), or the personal name Adam (when used without the definite article as in Genesis 5:3). See Chapter 1.

Adonijah

A son of David who was executed by Solomon. See Chapter 9.

Adultery

Having sexual relations with someone other than one's husband or wife.

Aetiology

A story giving an explanation of the origin of a name, a place, or a custom.

Aggadah

See Haggadah.

Ahab

(869-850) King of Israel, married to Jezebel, whose Baalistic practices were opposed by the northern prophet Elijah. See Chapter 9.

Ahasuerus

The king of Persia during the time of Esther, identified as Xerxes I (486-465). See Chapter 16.

Ahaz

(735-715) The king of Judah at the time Isaiah was a prophet.See Chapter 9, Chapter 10.

Ahijah

An Israelite prophet who encouraged Jeroboam to rebel agains Solomon's administration.

Ai

A Canaanite city conquered by Joshua and the Israelites. See Chapter 6 First Campaign, Chapter 6 Holy War.

Akkadian

The Semitic language of Mesopotamia; Assyrian and Babylonian are dialects.

Allegory

A literary device in which characters and events stand for abstract ideas, principles, or forces, so that the literal sense has or suggests a parallel, deeper symbolic sense. See Chapter 16.

Almighty

(Hebrew shaddai) A name of God that connotes his power and strength.

Altar

A raised platform, made of undressed stones, dirt, metal, or wood, on which incense or sacrifices are offered.

Am ha'aretz

(pl. ammey ha'aretz; Hebrew for "people of the land") A term used in the Hebrew Bible for citizens, or some particular class of citizens; in rabbinic literature, for persons or groups that dissented from or were uninstructed in rabbinic halaka and rigorous purity and tithing norms; it sometimes signifies the unlearned, sometimes is used condescendingly (boor); it was also used of the broad mass of Jewish people of the first century C.E., who cannot be categorized into any of the sub-groups of the time.

Amaziah

Priest of Bethel loyal to Jeroboam II, opposed Amos's preaching and presence in the Northern Kingdom. See Chapter 13.

Amnon

Son of David who raped his half-sister Tamar, and was killed by Absalom.

Amoraim

Jewish teachers from the period between 200 and 500 C.E., whose work culminated in the Talmud.

Amos

One of the Twelve Prophets; eighth century prophet from Tekoa in Judah, preached to the Northern Kingdom emphasizing social justice and the coming Day of Yahweh. See Chapter 13.

Amphictyony

Greek term for a religio-political federation with its common focus a sanctuary dedicated to God; an association of neighboring states or tribes in ancient Greece that banded together for common interest and protection; this model has sometimes been used to describe the tribal confederation in the period of the judges (prior to Saul and David) in ancient Israel. See Chapter 6.

Anathoth

The hometown of Jeremiah in the tribe of Benjamin. See Chapter 11.

Ancestors

In Old Testament study this refers to the forebears of the nation of Israel; the patriarchs and matriarchs of the Hebrews, usually Abraham and Sarah, Isaac and Rebekah, Jacob and Rachel and Leah, and sometimes the twelve sons of Jacob. See Biblical Story.

Ancestral story

The accounts in Genesis 12-50 that pertain to the ancestors of the Israelites. See Chapter 2.

Ancient Middle East

(ancient Near East) The large region of southwest Asia that includes Mesopotamia and territories bordering the Mediterranean Sea; modern nations included within this designation are Turkey, Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, Iraq, Iran, and Saudi Arabia. See Introduction.

Anointing

To pour oil over the head; this was part of a ritual of designation by which priests and kings were initiated into office; an "anointed one" (Hebrew meshiach) was a divinely designated leader. See Chapter 8.

Anthropomorphism

( adj. anthropomorphic) A Greek term for the attribution of human behavior or characteristics to inanimate objects, animals, natural phenomena, or deity; with regard to deity, anthropomorphism became a point of theological discussion in Judaism, Christianity and Islam. See Part 1.

Antiochus IV Epiphanes

(175-163) Seleucid king who persecuted the Jews of Judea during the Maccabean period. See Chapter 17.

Antithetic parallelism

Type of poetic parallelism where the second line of a poetic couplet is the opposite of the first line.

Apocalypse

(adj. apocalyptic; Greek for "revelation") An "unveiling" of something hidden; apocalyptic literature is a genre of literature (attested in Jewish, Christian and Muslim traditions) in which the author claims to reveal the future and to show how the divine plan will be worked out in history, often expressing it in vivid symbolism; the final book of the Christian New Testament is sometimes called (in accord with its Greek title) "the Apocalypse" (it is also known as "the book of Revelation"). See Part 3, Chapter 17.

Apocalyptic eschatology

The view of the end times expressed in apocalyptic literature.

Apocalyptic literature

Old Testament, intertestamental Jewish and early Christian literature that consists predominantly of apocalypses; this literature is often pseudepigraphical; Daniel 7-12 is apocalyptic literature. See Part 3 Introduction, Part 3 Apocalyptic Literature.

Apocalyptic prophecy

Form of prophecy that consists mainly of apocalypses and is largely oriented to the future, as in the latter half of the book of Daniel. See Part 2.

Apocalypticism

The thought world or world view of the community that gave rise to apocalyptic literature.

Apocrypha

(adj. apocryphal; from Greek for "to hide") It is used in a technical sense to refer to certain Jewish books written in the Hellenistic-Roman period that came to be included in the Old Greek Jewish scriptures (and thus in the Eastern Christian biblical canon) and in the Latin Vulgate Roman Catholic canon, but not in the Jewish or Protestant biblical canons; they are called deutero-canonical books in the Roman Catholic tradition. See Introduction, Conclusion.

Apodictic law

See Absolute law.

Apsu

The god of the fresh water ocean in the Enuma Elish, the Babylonian creation story.

Aqedah

(Hebrew for "binding" [of Isaac]) The Jewish biblical account of God's command to Abraham to offer his son Isaac as a sacrifice (Genesis 22).

Aram

(Aramea, Aram-naharaim, Padan-Aram) The territory north and east of Palestine where Abraham's ancestors had settled and from where the wives of Isaac and Jacob came; roughly the region of modern northern Syria and northwestern Iraq.

Aramaic

A language in the same family as Hebrew, used in Daniel 2:4-7:28; Ezra 4:8-6:18 and 7:12-26; and Jeremiah 10:11; its square script replaced the Old Hebrew script in Hebrew manuscripts before the Christian Era.

Araunah

The owner of a threshing floor in Jerusalem (Jebus) where David built an altar; David bought the threshing floor and Solomon built the temple there (2 Samuel 24).

Archaeology

The science of unearthing sites containing remains of ancient habitation, with the goal of learning everything such sites have to offer about culture, society, ecology, intellectual life and religion; modern archaeology employs the tools of history, anthropology, geology, and biology to recover the hidden past.

Ark of the covenant

A gold-overlayed wooden chest with two cherubim on the lid which stored the tablets of the covenant; it was housed first in the tabernacle, then in the Most Holy Place room of the Jerusalem temple; it was the location of God's presence within Israel. See Chapter 6, Chapter 8.

Armageddon

Derived from Hebrew "mountain of Megiddo," it is the site of the final battle between God and the forces of evil in apocalyptic thought.

Atonement

(v. atone) To make right with God by satisfying the penalty for breaking relationship; in the Old Testament this was done through offering sacrifices to God. See Yom Kippur (Day of Atonement). See Chapter 4.

Atrahasis epic

A Babylonian story which recounts the creation of humankind.

Av

(sometimes spelled Ab) A month in the Jewish calendar; the 9th of Av is a day of mourning for the destruction of the Jerusalem temple in 587 B.C.E. and again in 70 C.E.