Mythology among the Hebrews and Its Historical DevelopmentGoldziher, Ignác
Religion
Mythology among the Hebrews and Its Historical Development
Goldziher, Ignác
Jewish mythology; Judaism -- History -- To 70 A.D.
The identity of Abel and Jabal appears conspicuously in another
circumstance. Abel is introduced as a Herdsman. In the system of the
harmonising genealogy of Genesis, in which Jabal appears some
generations later, he is described as the ‘_Father of those that dwell
in tents and with cattle_’ (Gen. IV. 2, 20). Both features or rather
this identical feature told of both these Patriarchs, have a foundation
and are equally true. But in the method of the critical school of
Biblical exegesis these two accounts involve a contradiction which it is
attempted to solve, either by the usual supposition of different
narrators, or by minutely pressing the literal meaning of words and
setting up delicate distinctions. The acute Knobel, for instance,
pretends to know that 'Even Abel had kept cattle, but only small cattle,
and these only in his own district; Jabal invented the moving about with
cattle from one district to another.[315] It concerns us not to know how
far Jabal extended the area of his pasture, and within what narrow
limits Abel confined his: our assumption of the mythological identity of
the two designations solves the inconsistency without any resort to
minute distinctions.
Equally clear is also the Solar character of the name Cain (Ḳayin). This
word, which, with other synonymous names of trades, occurs several times
on the so-called Nabatean Sinaitic inscriptions,[316] signifies
_Smith_,[317] maker of agricultural implements, and has preserved this
meaning in the Arabic ḳayn[318] and the Aramaic ḳinâyâ, whilst in the
later Hebrew it was lost altogether, being probably suppressed through
the Biblical attempt to derive the proper name Cain etymologically from
ḳânâ ‘to gain.’ In Hebrew therefore it appears only as the name of the
first fratricide and of his duplicate Tubal-cain (Tûbhal-ḳayin), the
brother of Jabal, who is called the founder of the smith’s trade (Gen.
IV. 22), and stands to Cain in very much the same relation as Jabal does
to Abel.
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