AMINADAB
| Lehite PN | 1. | NEPHITE dissenter who went over to the LAMANITES (Helaman 5:39 (x2), 41) |
Etymology
AMINADAB is a name given to figures in both ISRAELITE and NEPHITE history (in English translations of the Bible, the name is given as Amminadab;[1] cf. KJV Exodus 6:23; Numbers 1:7; 2:3; 7:12, 17; 10:14; Ruth 4:19, 20). Cf. Heb. ʿammi nadab, "my people are [is] generous."
Compare the Edomite PN ʾamyndb, Amminadabbi (HWN in SC 195). Nibley compares the "reformed" EGYPTIAN name, “Amanathabi,” chief of a Canaanite city under EGYPT;(HWN in John W. Welch, Darrell L. Matthews, and Stephen R. Callister, eds., Lehi in the Desert; The World of the Jaredites; There Were Jaredites (vol. 5 of The Collected Works of Hugh Nibley; Salt Lake City/Provo: Deseret Book/FARMS, 1988), 25). Unlikely is the suggestion that this name contains the name of the EGYPTIAN god Amon (HWN in LID 31, and ABM 235).
In exploring a possible metonymy in this name, it has been pointed out that “although AMINADAB’s NEPHITE kinsmen had been among the most noble, he himself had apostatized from them. Perhaps some memory of his heritage, carried with him in his name, made him more receptive to understanding the miracle he witnessed in Helaman 5:36. Perhaps MORMON preserved this name in the record for the very purpose of reinforcing MORMON’s conviction of the nobility of the NEPHITE cause as witnessed by this influential miracle” (JWW). This seems to be stretching the search for metonymy too far (JH).
See Book of Mormon AMINADI, AMMAH
Variants
Deseret Alphabet:
Notes
- ↑ In Hebrew the m is doubled with a dagesh which would not necessarily appear in the reformed Egyptian of the Gold Plates.
