Syndication
Oaks or Terebinths?
Print this article
Email this article
Other articles by Philologos
More in PhilologosForward reader Bill Morris writes:
“While perusing last week’s Torah reading in my ‘Etz Hayim’ (Jewish Publication Society, 1985) translation, I was struck by the phrase in its opening verse (Genesis 18:1) about God appearing to Abraham by ‘the terebinths of Mamre.’ Although the word ‘terebinth’ doesn’t flow easily off the tongue, it is mellifluous and sounds like it means something extremely impressive. In the Hebrew, the phrase is elonei mamrei, elonei being the genitive plural of elon. Yet when I looked elon up in my Alcalay Hebrew-English dictionary, I was told that it means oak, not terebinth. I then looked up terebinth in an English dictionary and found that it is a tree or bush in the cashew/pistachio family from which turpentine is made. (The word turpentine actually derives from terebinth.) So my question is: Is there a basis for elon meaning terebinth rather than oak? And if not, how did this mistranslation occur? And why does my Stone Chumash [Pentateuch] have neither oaks nor terebinths, bur rather ‘plains of Mamre’?”
If it sounds like there’s a lot of confusion about where it was that God appeared to Abraham, that’s because there is.
Confusion number one is between the Hebrew word alon, which means oak, and elah, which means terebinth. The word elon in Genesis, which has the initial vowel of elah and the final syllable of alon, looks like a hybrid of the two that allows one to choose the meaning one wishes. Yet it needs to be remembered that the Hebrew text of the Bible was originally written without vowel signs (and still is written that way in a Torah scroll), so that the original pronunciation may have been alonei and not elonei.
In any case, this is how the first translation ever made of the Bible, the second-century BCE Greek Septuagint, interpreted the word, for it gives us pros te drui te Mambre, that is, “by the oak of Mamre.” (Why “oak” is in the singular, I don’t know.) Yet, the next translation we know of, the first-century C.E. Aramaic version of Onkelos, a standard Jewish text to this day, has the puzzling b’meishrei Mamre, which can mean either “in the plains of Mamre” or “in the encampment of Mamre.” Since the verse in Genesis continues, “And he [Abraham] was sitting in the entrance to his tent [ohel],” perhaps Onkelos was working with a variant text that had ohalei, “the tents [or encampment] of,” rather than alonei. Although this may not seem terribly likely, I can’t think of any other explanation.
Be that as it may, when Jerome produced his fourth-century C.E. translation of the Bible into Latin, which was adopted by the Catholic church and heavily influenced all early Bible translations into European languages, he followed Onkelos by choosing — don’t ask me why — not “in the tents” but “in the plains” of Mamre (that is, in convalle Mamre). This was picked up by the 1611 King James Bible, which passed it on to other translations — hence Mr. Morris’s Stone Chumash. But not all English Bible translators agreed. Already in 1530, William Tyndale translated alonei mamre as “the oak grove of Mamre,” and many modern English Bibles have gone along with him.
As for terebinth, I don’t know who first introduced it, but it does not appear to go back very far. The earliest translation to which I have been able to trace it is the 1936 Soncino Press version of the Pentateuch by J.H. Hertz, a British rabbi.
So which is it: Plains, encampments, oaks or terebinths?
Plains and encampments, I think, can be dismissed immediately. They cannot possibly be the correct translation of elonei mamre.
That leaves oaks and terebinths. I’ll take oaks.
Here’s why. In the first place, while “oaks” is the oldest translation we have of elonei, “terebinths” is the most recent. The Septuagint rendition may represent a genuine tradition passed down from the time the book of Genesis was composed. The Soncino Press edition obviously does not.
Moreover, terebinths, whose small leaves indeed smell a bit like turpentine when crushed, may have an impressive-sounding name, but they are not very impressive in appearance. The terebinth is an evergreen shrub that rarely grows to more than 7 or 8 feet and is found all over Israel, where it is one of the most frequent plants in the hillside maquis; terebinths grow wild in my garden and can spread like weeds if you do not keep them in check. The common Palestinian oak, on the other hand, develops into a tall, stately tree. A whole forest or grove of such trees, now seen in only a few places but less rare in Abraham’s time, is an impressive sight indeed.
Would the Bible have bothered to point out that Abraham was sitting by some perfectly ordinary shrubs? And why single out “the terebinths of Mamre” when terebinths were everywhere? But if Mamre had a well-developed oak grove, that would have been a landmark worth referring to. The rudely monosyllabic oak wins this match against the mellifluous terebinth, hands down.
What’s in a name, Mr. Morris? Sometimes less than you might like to think
Questions for Philologos can be sent to philologos@forward.com.
Comments
Another ancient version, the Pe[word deleted]ta in Syriac, has בלוטא oak.
See Lamsa translation
http://www.aramaicpe[word deleted]ta.com/OTtools/LamsaOT/1_genesis.htm
This isn't the only place in the Torah that the word elonei appears; it's also found in Gen. 13:18 and 14:13 and in Deut. 11:30. In all of these places, Onkelos consistently translates it as meishrei, even where it's got nothing to do with tents or encampments (as in Deuteronomy, where it's giving the location of Mts. Gerizim and Ebal). So the hypothesis that Onkelos' Hebrew text read ohalei in all four places is pretty difficult to sustain, and so is the casual dismissal of "plains" as the correct translation of elonei. At most what we have is a difference of opinion between the authors of the Septuagint and Onkelos, with no real reason to choose one over the other.
Further, in Gen. 14:6 there is mention of a place called "El-paran," which the Septuagint translates as "the terebinth of Paran" (τερεμίνθου τῆς Φαραν). Most of the English translations assume that "El" is part of the place name and so leave it untranslated, but Onkelos translates it as "plain" (meishra), and Rashi there argues that "el" and "elonei" are the names of those specific plains (though Nachmanides disagrees and says that they are groves of some kind). So according to the Septuagint rendering, here's at least one place where a terebinth - as unassuming a tree as it may be - is used as a landmark, therefore making it tenable to assume that "elonei" might mean the same thing.
About Nachum Lamm's comment on ArtScroll's translation of "Eilim": the use of this term to represent the Jewish People comes from Isaiah 61:3 ("eilei ha-tzedek"), where from context the meaning is indeed clearly some kind of tree (as indeed the commentaries, and the English versions, translate it). There, too, the JPS renders it "terebinths of righteousness."
I have been faithfully reading the philologos comment for years. I found the terebinth fascinating because it came up several times in our weekly readings of the parsha, many parshas. Our leaaders never came up with the philologos' explanation. So, thank you.
Philologos missed the explanation.
1. “eilon moreh” first appears in Genesis 12: 6 “Plain of Moreh.” The Bible’s “eilon” is usually translated as “terebinth,” which is a tree. This might suggest to some readers that Abram settled in the midst of tree worshippers, since the worship of trees was quite prevalent during Abram’s lifetime and for many centuries after his demise. Onkelos – like Saadiah, Pseuodo-Jonathan, the Samaritan Bible, and other ancient versions – removes this possible misconception and renders “plain.” (Onkelos on the Torah, Israel Drazin and Stanley Wagner, Jerusalem: Gefen, 2006.) Everett Fox, in his translation, adds in a note that “entrance to his tent” is often a scared spot in the Bible.
2. The translators of the Artscroll Stone edition of the Torah would take umbrage, if not outright offense, at Philolgos' suggestion that their translation was influenced by Jerome and the Kings James Bible as these are not Jewish works, and thus not permitted to be used. The translators of the Stone Chumash have no interest in an accurate philological translation of the Torah , rather they want a translation truthful to traditional Rabbinic interpretation. As they write “The new translation attempts to render the text as our Sages understood it” (page xiv). So they translate “eilon moreh” according to Onkelos. Onkelos represents the earliest and definitive Rabbinic translation/interpretation of the text. Onkelos is very close to a literal translation, so when it deviates from the literal Hebrew text it is not accidental but rather shows how the Rabbis understood the text. A well known custom is to read the weekly portion 3 times before the Sabbath “shtay’im b’mikra ve- ahas b’ targum.” This emphasizes the centrality of the targum. A large portion of Rashi’s comments simply say “like the Targum” meaning don’t look at the literal Hebrew meaning but follow Onkelos’s interpretation.
3. The proof of Onkelos’ fear is realized in Rabbi J H Hertz’s commentary on the first appearance of “eilon moreh,” in Genesis 12:6: “Some translate ‘the directing terebinth,’ ie the oracular (sic) tree held sacred by the tree-worshipping Canaanites. Such trees were attended by priests, who interpreted the answers of the oracle to those who came to consult it.” So Onkelos anticipated such enlightened interpretation 1800 years before it happened!
The text of the translation of the “Hertz Pentateuch” is the Jewish Publication Society’s 1917 translation; Rabbi Hertz wrote the commentary.
4. Rabbi J H Hertz was born in Austo-Hungary and immigrated to New York City at age 12 in 1884. He was educated at New York City College (BA), Columbia University (PhD) and the Jewish Theological Seminary of America (Rabbi, 1894)he was the first graduate from JTS. His first Ministerial post was at Syracuse, New York. In 1898, he moved to South Africa (Transvaal), to the Witwatersrand Old Hebrew Congregation, Johannesburg. He stayed there until 1911, despite attempts by President Paul Kruger in 1899 to expel him for his pro-British sympathies and for advocating the removal of religious disabilities of Jews and Catholics in South Africa. He was also Professor of Philosophy at Transvaal University College, 1906-8. In 1911, he returned to New York to the Orach Chayim Congregation on Lexington Ave at 94th St. In 1913, Rabbi Hertz was appointed Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the British Empire (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joseph_H._Hertz)
We seem to have four possible translations for elone: (1) oak; (2) terebinth; (3) plain(s); (4) valley.
1) The Jewish Encyclopedia says that elon, elah, alah, etc. get mixed up in Tanakh all the time. Brown-Driver-Briggs confirms this. From the pictures I've seen of them, the trees look pretty similar, and they are both shade trees. Maybe the terebinths in modern Israel never get a chance to grow to full size? So to begin with we can't expect that elon will be translated one way, elah another.
2) For example, Jerome, in his Commentary on Isaiah, v. 1:30, comments that Symmachus (another Greek translator, roughly contemporary with Onkelos, who was probably 2nd century CE) translates the Hebrew word "elah" as quercus, "oak," rather than as terebinthus.
3) In the Vulgate, Jerome avoids the oak/terebinth issue and translates elone Mamre as Convallis Mamre, "Valley of Mamre." BUT in his Book on Hebrew Place-Names, under Arbee (i.e. Kiryat Arba) and also under Drys (i.e. the Greek name for Elone Mamre), Jerome gives the Latin name of the place, Elone Mamre, as Quercus Abraham, "The Oak of Abraham"! So he IS involved in the oak/terebinth issue.
4) In both entries he adds the following note (the wording is slightly different in the two places): "The Oak of Abraham is also called Mamre, and it used to be exhibited until my childhood and the reign of Constantine [Jerome was born c. 147 CE and Constantine I died 137 BCE] -- a TEREBINTH, very old and proving its years by its size. Abraham lived beneath it. The place of the TEREBINTH is superstitiously revered by all the pagans around, because under it Abraham received the angels with hospitality." Josephus mentions this terebinth in Book VII of the Jewish War, though he doesn't absolutely identify it with Mamre. (There's still an "Abraham's Oak" around Hevron, according to various Googlable webpages.)
5) Apart from the phonetic/visual similarity of the two trees, are there any other reasons for mixing them up? (1) Maybe the fact that there was a terebinth on the site of Elone Mamre was enough to prompt Symmachus (who may have actually seen the terebinth) to suppose that alon could actually mean "terebinth," as in Isaiah 1:30. (2) People in Tanakh show up sitting under terebinths, e.g. in 1 Kings 13:14 -- the Man of God is sitting beneath a terebinth. As Seth says, both oaks and terebinths are sites of ritual. (2) In Gen 35:4 there is a "terebinth [elah] that is near Shechem." Jacob buries his household's idols there. Perhaps this was identified with Elone Mamre.
6) And both Symmachus and Jerome would have gotten no help from the Septuagint. Jerome would have rejected the Septuagint on principle, reasonably in this case, since the Septuagint is very confusing on this issue. For instance, it translates Isaiah 6:13 as terebinthos kai balanos. Balanos is another word for "oak," but why use a different word? And in Hosea, it gives alon as drys again, but it translates elah as dendron syskiazon, "a shady tree." I can certainly believe that Jerome would have been suspicious of the Septuagint's translation of elone Mamre as drys Mambre, "oak of Mamre."
7) Does this mean Jerome, too, accepted that a terebinth could be called an oak? He knew they were different trees. In the Vulgate, Jerome keeps the translations quercus=alon and terebinthus=aleh distinct. For instance, Isaiah 6:13, "ka'elah v'kha'alon" is translated sicut terebinthus et sicut quercus, "like a terebinth and like an oak." Similarly in the only other verse in which the two trees appear together, Hosea 4:13.
8) It sounds like he believed Abraham sat under a TEREBINTH, but that the name of the place in Latin was nonetheless QUERCUS (oak). After all, the locals around Hebron told him that there used to be a big TEREBINTH there.
9) Isidore, 200 years later, seems to agree with this deduction. In his book On the Birth and Death of Patriarchs, ch. 6, writes about Hebron: "[Josephus] says there is a great terebinth tree there. Saint Jerome writes that it lasted until the reign of Constantine. This is the same as the Oak of Mamre."
10) Obviously, this is pretty confusing. It is perfectly consistent with Jerome's M.O. that, faced with a Hebrew problem that he couldn't untangle, he would borrow from the Jewish translation tradition. Hence convallis. We do NOT have to believe Jerome read Onkelos, only that he spoke to people, in Greek or Hebrew, who were familiar with the exegetical tradition that Onkelos was part of.
11) How does one tradition produce both convallis "valley" and meishrei, "plains"? The distinction doesn't actually exist. Meishra is Onkelos's standard translation for emeq, which means "non-mountain" -- either valley or lowland (see BDB). 1 Samuel 17:2, which mentions a place called Emeq ha-elah, "Lowland of the Terebinth." (This may be Wadi es-Sant, near Shefela, near Jerusalem.) Moreover, there is an Emeq Hevron mentioned in Gen. 37:14, and Onkelos translates it as meishar Hevron. Perhaps Emeq ha-Elah and Emeq Hevron were assumed to be the same place, and both were identified with Elone Mamre. Elone = emeq = meishar / meishrei. Jerome comes along and hears that Elone Mamre is an emeq, "valley" (actually a lowland). So he translates elone as convallis. His translation of the place mentioned in 1 Sam 17:12 is Vallis Terebinthi, "Valley of the Terebinth." [Maybe this also has something to do with El Paran at Gen. 14:6 that Alex mentions, or maybe that comes from a textual variant: the Septuagint translator found an elah where we have el. There's got to be a dissertation about this out there somewhere!]
12) Finally, St. Ambrose, contemporaneous with Jerome, sometimes calls Elone Mamre Quercus Mambre, sometimes Ilex Mambre. An ilex is a type of oak, both in Latin and in English. However, although a tree exists whose scientific name is Quercus ilex, the "Abraham Oak" that is pointed out to this day near Hebron is a Quercus pseudo-coccifera.
>The translators of the Artscroll Stone edition of the Torah would take umbrage, if not outright offense, at Philolgos' suggestion that their translation was influenced by Jerome and the Kings James Bible as these are not Jewish works, and thus not permitted to be used.
That may be so, but they obviously use the 1917 JPS edition for English style, having picked up many King Jamesisms from it (eg, "Am I my brother's keeper?).
Furthermore, they're well aware that these are King Jamesisms.
I LOVE your articles.Just had to send a fan post. Not just the erudition, but the charming way you write such heavy duty learning.
I now see a hot bed of comment...learning never stops.
The OAKS of Mamre. A case of very ancient SACRED Oaks -such as the one that Deborah the Prophetess sat under -professionally that is. Keep digging; this is the right direction.
There's an article in the Jewish Encyclopedia about this question: <a href="http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=1&letter=O">http://www.jewishencyclopedia.com/view.jsp?artid=1&letter=O</a>
It helps me when I play a part in a play where I hosted the angel in the grove of mamre. I suppose Lovely oaktrees give shelter and content.Thank you for your research anyway.
I just came across your machloket re Oaks or Terebinths and I differ with you.Oaks at that time were pagan "sacred trees" and Mamre was a sacred place because of such an oak. It was of course, intolerable to the soferim that Abraham would have rested at such a place under such a tree- hence the semantic acrobatics in various translations as in Onkelos etc. Likewise look as Joshua 24:26 where Artscroll translates "tachat ha'alah" as "beneath the doorpost". Ridiculous. It's tikkun soferim to "clean up" the T'nach from connection of revered Ivrim with pagan sacred places and objects. Perhaps you look into this and print a correction..
The Soncino Hertz Pentateuch does not use its own translation: The first edition used a Jewish revision of the Revised Version, itself a version of the King James, and the second (which followed almost immediately) used the 1917 JPS translation, which reads "terebinths." The 1917 JPS, in turn, drew on King James, but apparently not here.
The Artscroll Siddur also, rather inexplicably, translates "Eilim" (rams) as "terebinths" in the Hoshanot prayers.