Eber (; ; ) is an ancestor of the Ishmaelites and the Israelites according to the Generations of Noah in the Book of Genesis () and the Books of Chronicles ().
Lineage
Eber (Hebrew: Ever) was a great-grandson of
Noah's son
Shem and the father of
Peleg, born when Eber was 34 years old,
and of
Joktan. He was the son of Shelah, a distant ancestor of
Abraham. According to the
Hebrew Bible, Eber died at the age of 464.
In the Septuagint, the name is written as Heber/Eber (῞Εβερ/Ἔβερ), and his father is called Sala (Σαλά/Σάλα). His son is called Phaleg/Phalek (Φαλέγ/Φάλεκ), born when Heber was 34 years old, and he had other sons and daughters. Heber lived to an age of 464 years.[ Genesis 11:14–17]
Name
The triliteral root , , is connected with crossing over and the beyond.[Marcus Jastrow, A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature (London, W.C.: Luzac & Co.; New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons; 1903), p. etc.] Considering that other names for descendants of Shem also stand for places, Eber can also be considered the name of an area, perhaps near Assyria.
Medieval scholars such as Michael the Syrian, Bar Hebraeus, and Agapius of Hierapolis noted that the prevailing view was the Hebrews (, also derived from the letters ʿ-b-r) had received their name from ʿEber,[ Who Were the Hebrews?]
In some translations of the New Testament, he is referred to once as Heber/Eber (Luke 3:35, "] the son of Serug, the son of Reu, the son of Peleg, the son of Heber, the son of Selah"). He is distinct from Ḥeber, the grandson of Asher, who is mentioned in Genesis 46:17 and in Numbers 26:45; Ḥeber is חבר with a heth while ʿEber has an ayin.
Hebrew
The 13th-century Muslim historian Abu al-Fida relates a story noting that the patriarch Eber, the great-grandson of Shem, refused to help with the building of the Tower of Babel. As a result, his language was not confused when the tower was abandoned. He and his family alone retained the original Adamic language, which he identified as Hebrew language, a language named after ʿEber.[Morris Jastrow, Ira Maurice Price, Marcus Jastrow, Louis Ginzberg, & Duncan B. MacDonald; " Babel, Tower of", Jewish Encyclopedia; Funk & Wagnalls, 1906.]
In Islam
In Islam, Ābir ibn Shālakh(Arabic: عابر بن شالخ) is sometimes referred to in classical Islamic writings as the "father" of the "prehistoric, original Arabs" (the ʿArab al-ʿĀriba), who lived in the Arabian Peninsula after the Deluge.[Buhl, Fr., "Ḏj̲urhum", in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, First Edition (1913-1936), Edited by M. Th. Houtsma, T.W. Arnold, R. Basset, R. Hartmann.] ʿEber was also identified with the Muslim prophet Hud by some of the early Muslim authorities, who has a surah named after him in the Quran.[Wensinck, A. J., "Hūd", in: Encyclopaedia of Islam, First Edition (1913-1936), Edited by M. Th. Houtsma, T.W. Arnold, R. Basset, R. Hartmann.] Other sources identify the prophet Hud as ʿEber's son.
See also
External links
