Page:Judaism and Islam, a prize essay - Geiger - 1898.pdf/112

 94 JUDAISM AND ISLAM.

he even bade them share water with her. 1 But the unbe- lievers of his time (according to one passage 2 only nine in number) hamstrung her, and so divine punishment over- took them. I find no similar occurrence in Jewish writings, but the likeness of the name points to Shelah 3 who how- ever, as the father of Eber, would have deserved mention before him. 4 On the whole, the word is so general in its meaning of " a pious man " that we cannot treat it here with certainty as having been originally a proper name. 5 Perhaps the story of the houghing is founded on the words in Jacob's blessing of his sons, 6 and the sharing of the water on the etymology of the name Samfid. 7 Moreover Sanrad was, according to the commentators, the son of Gether the son of Aram, the son of Shem, the son of Noah, which fits in fairly well with the date already assigned to Shelah. 8 It is however impossible

1 Sura LIV 28, XCI. 12.

2 Sura XXVII. 49.

3 nli? See Genesis, x. 24. This is also D'Hevbelot's view. See his Bib. Orient, tinder Salih.

4 Ismail ben 'All asserts however that Sdlih lived after Hud. (Maraco. Prodr., iv. 93).

5 Later Arabians call Shelah also JLi as in the passage quoted above from Elpherar, who gives however a different genealogy for Salih in his comment on Sura VII. 71. Still, in a copy of the Samaritan Arabic translation of the Pentateuch !~lb$> is translated by e^". (Compare De Saoy in Eiohhorn's BiUioihelc der Bill, liter., X, pp. 47, 110, 111.)

6 Genesis, xlix, 6. "fitf snj

7 From & ' to demand water."

8 The *.sS\ v^ ^ mentioned in Sura XV. 80 are supposed to be the

same as the Samudites, as Elpherar also says ; but this opinion has no foundation and appears improbable, because in this passage where chrono- logical order seems to be observed, the stories of Abram and the Angels, of Lot in connection with Abram, and of the Midianites are given earlier.