Names of Jerusalem

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    Names of Jerusalem refers to the multiple names by which the city of

    Jewish scripture.[2]

    Today, Jerusalem is called Yerushalayim (

    Arabic: بَـيْـت الْـمَـقْـدِس, lit. 'Holy House'), referring to the Temple in Jerusalem, called Beit HaMikdash in Hebrew.[3]

    Early extra-biblical and biblical names

    Jerusalem

    Further information: Abdi-Heba, Amarna letter EA 287, and Amarna letter EA 289
    F40 G43 M8 G1 G17 G17 N25
    ꜣwšꜣmm[4]
    in hieroglyphs
    Era: Middle Kingdom
    (2055–1650 BC)

    A city called Ꜣwšꜣmm in the Execration texts of the Middle Kingdom of Egypt (c. 19th century BCE) and typically reconstructed as (U)Rušalim is usually identified as Jerusalem.[5][6][7] Nadav Na'aman proposed that the name should instead by understood as r'š (head) + rmm (exalted), meaning 'the exalted head', and so not referring to Jerusalem, but Na'aman withdrew this objection in 2023.[8][9]

    Jerusalem is called either Urusalim (URU ú-ru-sa-lim) or Urušalim (URU ú-ru-ša10-lim) in the Amarna letters of Abdi-Heba (1330s BCE).[10]

    The Sumero-Akkadian name for Jerusalem, uru-salim,[11] is variously etymologised to mean "foundation of [or: by] the god Shalim": from West Semitic yrw, ‘to found, to lay a cornerstone’, and Shalim, the Canaanite god of the setting sun and the nether world, as well as of health and perfection.[12]

    Jerusalem is the name most commonly used in the

    Christian Bibles as Syriac Ūrišlem (ܐܘܪܫܠܡ) as well as Latin Hierosolyma or Ierusalem. In Arabic, this name occurs in the form Ūrsālim (أْوْرْسَـالِـم) which is the Arabic name promoted by the Israeli government.[13]

    The name "Shalem", whether as a town or a deity, is derived from the same root Š-L-M as the word "shalom", meaning peace,[14][15] so that the common interpretation of the name is now "The City of Peace"[16][17] or "Abode of Peace", indicating a sanctuary.[18][19]

    The ending -ayim indicates the

    lamed and the mem, that provides the basis for this reading. In extra-biblical inscriptions, the earliest known example of the -ayim ending was discovered on a column about 3 km west of ancient Jerusalem, dated to the first century BCE.[22]

    In Genesis Rabbah 56:10, the name is interpreted as a combination of yir'eh, "He will see [to it]," and Shalem, the city of King Melchizedek (based on Genesis 14:18). A similar theory is offered by Philo in his discussion of the term "God's city."[23] Other midrashim say that Jerusalem means "City of Peace".[24]

    In Greek, the city is called either Ierousalēm (Ἰερουσαλήμ) or Hierosolyma (Ἱεροσόλυμα). The latter exhibits yet another re-etymologization, by association with the word hieros (Greek: ἱερός, "holy").[25][26] In early Greek manuscripts, Ἱερουσαλήμ is presented as a "holy name": ΙΛΗΜ.[citation needed]

    Shalem

    The name Shalem/Salem (שלם šālêm) is found in the account of

    El Elyon
    ).

    That the name Salem refers to Jerusalem is evidenced by Psalm 76:2 which uses "Salem" as a parallel for "Zion", the citadel of Jerusalem. The same identification is made by Josephus and the Aramaic translations of the Bible.

    Language Name Translit.
    LXX
    		 Σαλήμ[27] Salēm
    Greek (variant) Σόλυμα[28] Solyma
    Biblical Latin Salem
    Arabic
    		 سَـالِـم Sālim
    Hebrew
    		 שָׁלֵם Šālēm

    Shalem was the Canaanite god of dusk, sunset, and the end of the day, also spelled Shalim.[29] Many scholars believe that his name is preserved in the name of the city Jerusalem.[30] It is believed by some scholars that the name of Jerusalem comes from Uru + Shalem, meaning the foundation of Shalem or founded by Shalem or city of Shalem, and that Shalem was the city god of the place before El Elyon.[31]

    Zion

    Main article: Zion

    Mount Zion (Hebrew: הר צִיּוֹן Har Tsiyyon) was originally the name of the hill where the Jebusite fortress stood, but the name was later applied to the Temple Mount just to the north of the fortress, also known as Mount Moriah, possibly also referred to as "Daughter of Zion" (i.e., as a protrusion of Mount Zion proper).

    From the

    Babylonian exile
    (6th century BCE), Zion has come to be used as a synonym of the city of Jerusalem as a whole.

    Other biblical names

    Middle Persian

    According to "Shahnameh", ancient Iranian used "Kangdezh Hûkht" کَـنْـگ دِژ هُـوْخْـت or "Dezhkang Hûkht" دِژ کَـنْـگ هُـوْخْـت to name Jerusalem. "Kang Diz Huxt" means "holy palace" and was the capital of "Zahhak" and also "Fereydun's" kingdom.[33] [34] Another variant of the name is Kang-e Dozhhûkht (Dozhhûkht-Kang), which is attested in Shahnameh. It means "[the] accursed Kang".[35]

    Greco-Roman

    Aelia
    , and to the hill temple of Jupiter built on the remains of the Temple. During the later Roman Era, the city was expanded to the area now known as the Old City of Jerusalem. Population increased during this period, peaking at several hundred thousand, numbers only reached again in the modern city, in the 1960s.

    From this name derives

    Arabic: إِيْـلْـيَـاء, romanized: ʼĪlyāʼ, early in the Middle Ages, and appears in some Hadith (Bukhari 1:6, 4:191; Muwatta
    20:26), like Bayt ul-Maqdis.

    Islamic

    Jerusalem fell to the

    Muslim conquest of Palestine
    in 638. The
    19th century
    ).

    The modern

    Arabic name of Jerusalem is اَلْـقُـدْس al-Quds, and its first recorded use can be traced to the 9th century CE, two hundred years after the Muslim conquest of the city. Prior to the use of this name, the names used for Jerusalem were إِيْـلْـيَـاء Īlyā' (from the Roman era name) and بَـيْـت الْـمَـقْـدِس Bayt al-Maqdis (after the Temple), alternatively vocalized as بَـيْـت الْـمُـقَـدَّس Bayt al-Muqaddas.[36]

    Al-Quds is the most common Arabic name for Jerusalem and is used by many cultures influenced by Islam. The name may have been shortened from مَـدِيـنَـة الْـقُـدْس Madīnat al-Quds, a calque of the Hebrew nickname for the city, Ir HaKodesh (עיר הקודש "the Holy City" or "City of the Holy Place"). The variant اَلْـقُـدْس الـشَّـرِيْـف al-Quds aš-Šarīf ("Al-Quds the Noble") has also been used, notably by the Ottomans
    in the Turkish form Kudüs-i Şerîf.

    • Azerbaijani – Yerusəlim, Qüds, or Qüdsi-Şərif
    • Kurdish
      – ئۆرشەلیم/ Orşelîm or قودس/Quds,
    • Persian – قدس, Qods
    • Standard Hebrew
      – הַקֹּדֶשׁ‎, HaKodesh
    • Tiberian Hebrew – הַקֹּדֶשׁ‎, HaQodhesh lit. "The Holy"
    • Turkish – Kudüs[37] or Yeruşalim
    • Urdu
      – قدس, Quds, قدس شریف, Quds Śarīf or یروشلم, Yaroślam

    Bayt al-Maqdis or Bayt al-Muqaddas is a less commonly used Arabic name for Jerusalem though it appeared more commonly in early Islamic sources. It is the base from which

    semantic extension from the Hadiths used in reference to the Temple in Jerusalem, called Beit HaMikdash (בית המקדש "The Holy Temple" or "Temple of the Sanctified Place") in Hebrew.[3]

    • Avar – Байтул Макъдис, Baytul Maqdis
    • Azerbaijani – Beytül-Müqəddəs
    • Indonesian – Baitulmaqdis
    • Kurdish
      – بەیتی موقەددەس/ Beytî Muqeddes
    • Malay – Baitulmuqaddis
    • Persian – بيت مقدس, Beit-e Moghaddas
    • Turkish Beyt-i Mukaddes
    • Urdu
      – بيت المقدس, Bait-ul-Muqaddas

    Arabic: اَلْـبَـلَاط al-Balāṭ is a rare poetic name for Jerusalem in Arabic, loaned from the Latin palatium "palace". Also from Latin is إِيْـلْـيَـاء ʼĪlyāʼ, a rare name for Jerusalem used in early times Middle Ages, as in some Hadith (Bukhari 1:6, 4:191; Muwatta
    20:26).


    Ṣahyūn (

    Arabic: صهيون, Ṣahyūn or Ṣihyūn) is the word for Zion in Arabic and Syriac.[38][39] Drawing on biblical tradition, it is one of the names accorded to Jerusalem in Arabic and Islamic tradition.[39][40]

    Sign languages

    Jewish and Arab signers of Israeli Sign Language use different signs: the former mimic kissing the Western Wall, the latter gesture to indicate the shape of the Masjid Al-Aqsa (i.e. the Dome of the Rock).[41]

    See also

    References

    1. Midrash ha-Gadol Genesis
      46, 8;
    2. Jerusalem municipality website lists 105 Hebrew names
      .
    3. ^ a b Carrol, James. "Jerusalem, Jerusalem: How The Ancient City Ignited Our Modern World", 2011. Retrieved on 24 May 2014.
    4. ^ M. Vygus. Middle Egyptian dictionary, p. 547
    5. ^ David Noel Freedman; Allen C. Myers; Astrid B. Beck (2000). Eerdmans dictionary of the Bible. Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing. pp. 694–695.
      ISBN 978-0-8028-2400-4
      . Retrieved 19 August 2010.
    6. ^ G. Johannes Botterweck, Helmer Ringgren (eds.) Theological Dictionary of the Old Testament (tr. David E. Green), William B. Eerdmann, Grand Rapids Michigan, Cambridge/UK 1990, vol. VI, p. 348.
    7. ^ Zellig Harris (1939). Development of the Cannanite dialects: an investigation in linguistic history. American Oriental Society. p. 34. Ꜣwšꜣmm 'Jerusalem' (Ächtungstexte f 18)
    8. ^ Nadav Naʼaman, Canaan in the 2nd Millennium B.C.E., Eisenbrauns, 2005 p. 177ff.
    9. S2CID 259120316
      .
    10. ^ Urusalim e.g. in EA 289:014, Urušalim e.g. in EA 287:025. Transcription online at "The El Amarna Letters from Canaan". Tau.ac.il. Retrieved 11 September 2010.; translation by Knudtzon 1915 (English in Percy Stuart Peache Handcock, Selections from the Tell El-Amarna letters (1920).
    11. ^ See Victor P. Hamilton, The Book of Genesis, Chapters 1-17, p. 410 (1990). Hamilton also asserts that Sumerian uru is yerû, meaning "city."
    12. ^ Anchor Bible Dictionary "SHALEM (DEITY) – the Anchor Bible Dictionary". Archived from the original on 2014-02-21. Retrieved 2014-02-11.; Holman Bible Dictionary, http://www.studylight.org/dic/hbd/print.cgi?n=3384 ; National Geographic, http://education.nationalgeographic.com/media/file/Jerusalem_ED_Sheets.FasFacts.pdf Archived 2014-02-21 at the Wayback Machine ("As for the meaning of the name, it can be assumed to be a compound of the West Semitic elements "yrw" and "s[h]lm," probably to be interpreted as "Foundation of (the god) Shalem." Shalem is known from an Ugaritic mythological text as the god of twilight.").
    13. ^ "Why Is Jerusalem Called Jerusalem?". Haaretz. 2015-05-17. Retrieved 2019-11-21.
    14. ISBN 0-00-637531-6. Archived from the original
      on 19 March 2016. Retrieved 26 April 2007. The epithet may have originated in the ancient name of Jerusalem—Salem (after the pagan deity of the city), which is etymologically connected in the Semitic languages with the words for peace (shalom in Hebrew, salam in Arabic).
    15. ^ Ringgren, H., Die Religionen des Alten Orients (Göttingen, 1979), 212.
    16. ISBN 9781585953653
      . Retrieved 17 December 2011.
    17. ISBN 1-4102-1725-6
      . Retrieved 17 December 2011.
    18. ISBN 978-90-04-15388-2
      . Retrieved 17 December 2011.
    19. ^ Denise DeGarmo (9 September 2011). "Abode of Peace?". Wandering Thoughts. Center for Conflict Studies. Archived from the original on 26 April 2012. Retrieved 17 December 2011.
    20. ISBN 0-405-10298-4
      . A similar view was held by those who give the Hebrew dual to the word
    21. ISBN 0-7905-2935-1. The termination -aim or -ayim used to be taken as the ordinary termination of the dual of nouns, and was explained as signifying the upper and lower cities. (see here
      )
    22. S2CID 219879544
      .
    23. ^ With Letters of Light: Studies in the Dead Sea Scrolls, Early Jewish Apocalypticism, Magic and Mysticism, eds. Daphna Arbel and Andrei Orlov
    24. ^ Bar Ilan University, Prof. Yaakov Klein
    25. ^ Alexander Hopkins McDannald (editor), The Encyclopedia Americana, Volume 16, Americana Corporation, 1947, entry Jerusalem
    26. ^ Gerhard Kittel (editor), Gerhard Friedrich (editor), Geoffrey W. Bromiley (editor),Theological Dictionary of the New Testament: Abridged in One Volume, Eerdmans, 1985, entry Sion [Zion], Ierousalem [Jerusalem], Hierosolyma [Jerusalem], Hierosolymites [inhabitants of Jerusalem]
    27. ^ E.g. found in the Septuagint and the writings of Philo; cf. Melchizedek as "king of peace" (Σαλήμ) in Heb. 7.1–2, based on Gn. 14.18; cf. also Philo, leg. all. 3.79.
    28. ^ Cf. e.g. Flavius Josephus, Ant. J. 1.180.
    29. ^ Shalem; Shalim.
    30. ^ E.g., L. Grabbe, "Ethnic groups in Jerusalem", in Jerusalem in Ancient History and Tradition (Clark International, 2003) pp. 145-163; John Day, Yahweh and the gods and goddesses of Canaan, Sheffield Academic Press 2002, p. 180; see also Shalim.
    31. ^ Yisrael Shalem Archived 2007-01-17 at the Wayback Machine, "Jerusalem: Life Throughout the Ages in a Holy City", Ingeborg Rennert Center for Jerusalem Studies, Bar-Ilan University (2012). See also Karel van der Toorn, et al., Dictionary of Deities and Demons in the Bible, under entry ZEDEQ, p. 931.
    32. ^ See Encyclopedia Judaica: Ariel.
    33. doi:10.22067/jls.v47i3.44857
      .
    34. ^ C.Mowlā'i /Kang Diz Huxt and Kuling Dus-Hut (An Investigation into the Name of Żahhāk's Palace in the Shāh-nāma and in Sanī Mulūk al-Arż v-al-Anbiyā’) / Journal of Research Literary Studies, 2014, 47(3):145-156
    35. ^ Lurje, Pavel. "KANGDEZ". Encyclopaedia Iranica. Retrieved 15 April 2017.
    36. ^ El-Awaisi, Khalid. "From Aelia To Al-Quds: The Names Of Islamic Jerusalem In The Early Muslim Period", 2011. Retrieved on 16 June 2019.
    37. ^ See 'JERUSALEM', Engraved by Lodge in George Henry Millar, The New & Universal System Of Geography (London: Alexander Hogg, 1782)
    38. ^ Palestine Exploration Fund (1977). Palestine Exploration Quarterly, Volumes 109–110. Published at the Fund's Office. p. 21. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
    39. ^
      ISBN 978-0-521-59984-9
      .
    40. ISBN 978-0-7425-4645-5
      .
    41. ^ Siroa, Sammy. "כיצד נותנים כינויים ושמות בשפת סימנים? סמי סירואה אצל אורלי וגיא- תוכנית רביעית". YouTube. Archived from the original on 2021-12-22. Retrieved 15 February 2021.

    Bibliography

    • Patterson, David (2005), Hebrew Language and Jewish Thought,
      ISBN 9780415346979

    External links
    Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Names_of_Jerusalem&oldid=1217562143"