certainly corrupt, and the passage is one of many into which either the carelessness of scribes or the obscurity of the chronicler’s sources has introduced hopeless confusion. But the most remarkable set of names is found in 1 Chron. xxv. 4, where _Giddalti_ and _Romantiezer_, _Joshbekashah_, _Mallothi_, _Hothir_, _Mahazioth_, are simply a Hebrew sentence meaning, “I have magnified and exalted help; sitting in distress,(47) I have spoken(48) visions in abundance.” We may at once set aside the cynical suggestion that the author lacked names to complete a genealogy and, to save the trouble of inventing them separately, took the first sentence that came to hand and cut it up into suitable lengths, nor is it likely that a father would spread the same process over several years and adopt it for his family. This remarkable combination of names is probably due to some misunderstanding of his sources on the part of the chronicler. His parchment rolls must often have been torn and fragmentary, the writing blurred and half illegible; and his attempts to piece together obscure and ragged manuscripts naturally resulted at times in mistakes and confusion. These examples of interesting etymologies might easily be multiplied; they serve, at any rate, to indicate a rich mine of suggestive teaching. It must, however, be remembered that a name is not necessarily a personal name because it occurs in a genealogy; cities, districts, and tribes mingle freely with persons in these lists. In the same connection we note that the female names are few and far between, and that of those which do occur the “sisters” probably stand for allied and related families, and not for individuals. As regards Old Testament theology, we may first notice the light thrown by personal names on the relation of the religion of Israel to that of other Semitic peoples. Of the names in these chapters and elsewhere, a large proportion are compounded of one or other of the Divine names. _El_ is the first element in _Elishama_, _Eliphelet_, _Eliada_, etc.; it is the second in _Othniel_, _Jehaleleel_, _Asareel_, etc. Similarly _Jehovah_ is represented by the initial _Jeho-_ in _Jehoshaphat_, _Jehoiakim_, _Jehoram_, etc., by the final _-iah_ in _Amaziah_, _Azariah_, _Hezekiah_, etc. It has been calculated that there are a hundred and ninety names(49) beginning or ending with the equivalent of Jehovah, including most of the kings of Judah and many of the kings of Israel. Moreover, some names which have not these prefixes and affixes in their extant form are contractions of older forms which began or ended with a Divine name. Ahaz, for instance, is mentioned in Assyrian inscriptions as Jahuhazi—_i.e._, Jehoahaz—and Nathan is probably a contracted form of Nethaniah.