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Bible Dictionaries
Sea
Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible
or SEA in Scripture generally means the Mediterranean, when the context introduces no distinction by which the particular sea is defined, e.g. in Numbers 33:8 , Joshua 24:6 f. etc. ‘The Great Sea ’ is the Mediterranean ( Numbers 34:6 , Ezekiel 47:10 etc.). ‘The Sea of the Arabah ’ is the Dead Sea ( 2 Kings 14:25 etc.). The ‘ Sea of Chinnereth ’ is the Sea of Galilee ( Numbers 34:11 etc.). The ‘ Sea of the Philistines ’ is the Mediterranean off the Philistine coast ( Exodus 23:31 ). Yâm Sûph , ‘Sea of Weeds’ ( Exodus 10:19 etc.), is identical with ‘the Red Sea ’ of Hebrews 11:29 , Jdt 5:12 etc., and is always so translated. The Nile, as in modern Arabic ( el Bahr ), is called ‘the sea’ ( Isaiah 18:2 etc.), so also the Euphrates ( Isaiah 21:1 , Jeremiah 51:36 ). ‘The sea’ of Jazer is a scribal error ( Jeremiah 48:32; cf. Isaiah 16:8 ). yâm , ‘sea,’ Is the usual word for ‘West’; the Mediterranean forming the W. boundary of Palestine ( Genesis 12:6 etc.). The phrase ‘from sea to sea’ ( Amos 8:12 etc.) probably signified the ends of the earth. The Influence of the Babylonian myth of the conflict of the gods with the primeval sea may be traced in certain Scripture representations of the sea ( Job 7:12 etc. See art. ‘Cosmogony’ in Hastings’ DB [Note: Dictionary of the Bible.] ). TÄ•hôm (EV [Note: English Version.] ‘deep’) of Genesis 1:2 etc. resembles the Bab. [Note: Babylonian.] Tiâmat . By the dismemberment of this monster the ordered world is produced ( Genesis 1:6 ). The turbulent and dangerous character of the sea is often referred to in Scripture ( Psalms 46:2; Psalms 89:9 , Isaiah 17:12 , Jeremiah 49:23 etc.). From the sea came up the monsters of Daniel’s vision ( Daniel 7:2 ff.); so also in the Apocalypse ( Revelation 13:1 ). If in the literature of the Hebrews there is manifest a certain horror of, and shrinking from, the sea, which seem strange to a seafaring people, we must remember that, as a nation, Israel never knew the sea; nor need we wonder if, viewed from their mountain heights, stretching vast and mysterious into the far horizons, it seemed to them the very home of storms and vague terrors. So when the Jewish seer depicts the future home of the blessed there is ‘no more sea’ ( Revelation 21:1 ). Cf. Dualism, 1 , Rahab, 2.
W. Ewing.
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Hastings, James. Entry for 'Sea'. Hastings' Dictionary of the Bible. https://www.studylight.org/dictionaries/eng/hdb/s/sea.html. 1909.
