NAHOM
| Lehite GN | 1. | Burial site of ISHMAEL (1 Nephi 16:34) |
Etymology
See the name of the prophet נחום Nahum and the Old Testament book named after him. It means “[God] comforts,” or “Comforter,” from the vocable נחם nḥm, “to comfort; to console.”
Surprisingly, evidence for NAHOM as a Book of Mormon name is based primarily on historical, geographic, and archaeological—and only secondarily on etymological— considerations. Three altar inscriptions containing NHM as a tribal name, and dating from the eighth to the seventh centuries B.C., have been discussed by Warren P. Aston,[1] and S. Kent Brown.[2] Nhm appears as a place name and as a tribal name in southwestern Arabia in the pre-Islamic and early Islamic period in the Arab antiquarian al-Hamdani’s al-Iklíl[3] and in his Sifat Jazírat al-‘Árab.[4] If, as Robert Wilson observes, there is minimal movement among tribes over time,[5] the region known as “Nehem” may well have had that, or a similar, name in antiquity.
The HEBREW root נהם nhm meaning “to groan” (of persons),[6] attested in Ezekiel 24:23 and Proverbs 5:11, may reflect the actions of the daughters of ISHMAEL in 1 Nephi 16:35 in “mourn[ing] exceedingly, because of the loss of their father, and because of their afflictions in the wilderness.” Were the name originally “Neḥem,” the Semitic roots suggested in 1950 by Hugh Nibley (the Arabic naḥama, “to sigh or moan;” and the HEBREW root נחם nḥm, “comfort, consolation”)[7] would also fit the context of 1 Nephi 16.
Cf. Book of Mormon NEUM, JAROM, JACOM
Variants
Deseret Alphabet: 𐐤𐐁𐐐𐐊𐐣 (neɪhʌm)
Notes
- ↑ Warren P. Aston, “The Origins of the Nihm Tribe of Yemen: A Window into Arabia's Past,” Journal of Arabian Studies: Arabia, the Gulf, and the Red Sea, 4/1 (2014): 134-148
- ↑ S. Kent Brown, “New Light from Arabia on Lehi’s Trail,” in Echoes and Evidences of the Book of Mormon, ed. Donald W. Parry, Daniel C. Peterson, and John W. Welch (Provo, UT: FARMS, 2002), 55-125, esp. 81-82.
- ↑ Al-Hasan ibn Ahmad al-Hamdani, al-Iklíl, ed. Nabih Faris (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1940), 35, 94.
- ↑ al-Hamdani, Sifat Jazirat al-‘Árab, ed. David H. Müller (Leiden: Brill, repr. 1968), 49, 1.9; 81, 1.4, 8, 11; 83, 1.8, 9; 109, 1.26; 110, 112.2, 4, 126, 1.10; 135,1.19, 22; 167, 1.15-20; 168, 1.10, 11, where nhm is listed as either the name of a “region, territory” (Ar. balad) or a “tribe” (Ar. qabíla); Jawad ‘Ali, Al-Mufassal fi Ta’ ríkh al-‘Árab qabla al-Islām (Beirut: Dar al-‘Ilm lil-Malayan, 1969–73), 2:414, gives Nhm as the name of a “region” (Ar. ard) during the period of the mukarribs and the [ancient] kingdom of Saba” (Ar. fī ayyām al-mukarribína wa-fī ayyām mulūk Saba’); he also gives Nhm as a place name, Al-Mufassal, 4:187 and 7: 462.
- ↑ Robert Wilson, “al-Hamdani’s Description of Hashid and Bakil,” Proceedings of the Seminar for Arabian Studies 11 (1981): 95, 99-100.
- ↑ D. J. A. Clines, ed, The Dictionary of Classical Hebrew (Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001), 5:631.
- ↑ Hugh W. Nibley, “Lehi in the Desert.” Improvement Era 53 (June 1950): 517; Nibley, Lehi in the Desert and the World of the Jaredites (Salt Lake City: Bookcraft, 1952), 90-91; Hugh Nibley, Lehi in the Desert/The World of The Jaredites/There Were Jaredites (Salt Lake City: Deseret Book and FARMS, 1988), 79.
Bibliography
- Warren P. Aston "Across Arabia with Lehi and Sariah: 'Truth Shall Spring out of the Earth'." Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 15/2 (2006): 8-25.
- Warren P. Aston "The Arabian Bountiful Discovered? Evidence for Nephi's Bountiful." Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 7/1 (1998): 4-11.
- Warren P. Aston "Newly Found Altars from Nahom." Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 10/2 (2001): 56-61.
- Warren P. Aston “A History of NaHoM,” BYU Studies, 51/2 (2012): 79–98.
- Warren P. Aston “The Origins of the Nihm Tribe of Yemen: A Window into Arabia's Past,” Journal of Arabian Studies: Arabia, the Gulf, and the Red Sea, 4/1 (2014): 134-148.
- S. Kent Brown "New Light: 'The Place That Was Called Nahom': New Light from Ancient Yemen." Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 8/1 (1999): 66-68.
- S. Kent Brown “New Light from Arabia on Lehi’s Trail,” in Echoes and Evidences of the Book of Mormon, ed. Donald W. Parry, Daniel C. Peterson, and John W. Welch, 55-125. Provo, UT: FARMS, 2002.
- S. Kent Brown "Refining the Spotlight on Lehi and Sariah." Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 15/2 (2006): 44-57.
- Ross T. Christensen “The Place Called Nahom,” Ensign, 8/8 (August 1978):73.
- Lynn M. Hilton "In Search of Lehi's Trail—30 Years Later." Journal of Book of Mormon Studies 15/2 (2006): 4-7.
- Jeff Lindsay “Noham, That’s Not History (Nor Geography, Cartography, or Logic): More on the Recent Attacks on nhm,” FairMormon Blog, December 23, 2013, at [1].
- Jeff Lindsay “Noham, That’s Not History (Nor Geography, Cartography, or Logic): More on the Recent Attacks on nhm,” Mormanity, December 21, 2013, at [2].
- Daniel H. Ludlow A Companion to your Study of the Book of Mormon. Provo, UT: Brigham Young University Press, 1969.
- Neal Rappleye and Stephen O. Smoot, “ Book of Mormon Minimalists and the NHM Inscriptions: A Response to Dan Vogel,” Interpreter: A Journal of Mormon Scripture 8 (2014):157-185, online at [3].
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