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Showing posts with label Gaza Strip. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Gaza Strip. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 6, 2025

Modern Names of Places Mentioned in the Bible

 

First or representative mention.

Ammon                         Jordan                       Genesis 19:37-38                   

Arabia                          Arabia                       1 Kings 10:15; 2 Chronicles 1:14

Aram, Aramiyim         Syria                         1Chronicles 19:6; 2 Samuel 10:6-8                       

Assur/Asshur               Iran, Iraq                   Numerous mentions

Babylon                       Iraq                            Numerous mentions

Canaan                        Gaza Strip, Israel, Lebanon, West Bank   Numerous mentions

Damascus                    Syria                          Genesis 14:15

Ethiopia                       Ethiopia, Sudan         Genesis 2:13

Media                          Iran                             2 Kings 17:6

Pekod, Peqod             Iraq                             Jeremiah 50:21; Ezekiel 23:23

Togarmah                    Armenia, Turkiye, Turkestan  Ezekiel 38:6

Wednesday, April 9, 2014

A Linguistic Curiosity


There are at least 136 different language groups which are grouped by noticeable and provable similarities in grammar, sound, vocabulary, word order, and the ways in which they express ideas.  The number of known languages exceeds 7000.  All the languages within a particular language group are believed to have been derived from a common ancestor language.

Arabic and Hebrew are sister Semitic languages.  The modern Semitic languages are spoken by at least 470 million worldwide and include Arabic, Hebrew, Amharic, Aramaic, Tigrinya, Syriac, Ge’ez, Maltese, South Arabian. Mahri, Soqriti, Tigre, Inor, Soddo, Harari, Sebat bet Gurage.  Ancient Semitic languages include Akkadian, Phoenician, Ugaritic, Himyaritic, Amorite, and Canaanite.

It is unreasonable to read more into what I am about to show you than that it is merely a linguistic curiosity of dissimilar vocabulary within a language group.  It is though, very odd.

This (חֲמַ֤ס) is the Old Testament word “hamas” which means “violence.”  An example of its use is in Habbakuk 2:17.

The name of the Islamic fundamentalist activist organization, Hamas, is an acronym derived from the Arabic name of the organization, حركة المقاومة الاسلامية (Harakat al-Muqāwama al-Islāmiyya).  The name is "Islamic Resistance Movement". Hamas was founded in 1987 with the aim of liberating Palestine from Israeli occupation and establishing an Islamic state which would include what is now Israel, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip.  They now say they would accept a Palestinian state based on the 1967 pre-war Israeli borders, provided that Palestinian refugees would have the right to return to Israel if they wished and that East Jerusalem would be the new nation's capital.

The actual Arabic word “hamas” means devotion, enthusiasm, fire, or zeal.