Abijah ( ') is a
Biblical Hebrew[Petrovsky, p. 35] unisex name
A unisex name (also known as an epicene name, a gender-neutral name or an androgynous name) is a given name that is not gender-specific. Unisex names are common in the English-speaking world, especially in the United States. By contrast, some c ...
[Superanskaya, p. 277] which means "my Father is
Yah".
The Hebrew form ' also occurs in the
Bible
The Bible (from Koine Greek , , 'the books') is a collection of religious texts or scriptures that are held to be sacred in Christianity, Judaism, Samaritanism, and many other religions. The Bible is an anthologya compilation of texts ...
.
Old Testament characters
Women
*
Abijah Abijah ( ') is a Biblical HebrewPetrovsky, p. 35 unisex nameSuperanskaya, p. 277 which means "my Father is Yah". The Hebrew form ' also occurs in the Bible.
Old Testament characters Women
* Abijah, who married King Ahaz of Judah. She is a ...
, who married King
Ahaz
Ahaz (; gr, Ἄχαζ, Ἀχάζ ''Akhaz''; la, Achaz) an abbreviation of Jehoahaz II (of Judah), "Yahweh has held" (; akk, 𒅀𒌑𒄩𒍣 ''Ya'úḫazi'' 'ia-ú-ḫa-zi'' Hayim Tadmor and Shigeo Yamada, ''The Royal Inscriptions of Tiglath ...
of Judah. She is also called Abi. Her father's name was Zechariah; she was the mother of King
Hezekiah
Hezekiah (; hbo, , Ḥīzqīyyahū), or Ezekias); grc, Ἐζεκίας 'Ezekías; la, Ezechias; also transliterated as or ; meaning "Yahweh, Yah shall strengthen" (born , sole ruler ), was the son of Ahaz and the 13th king of Kingdom of Jud ...
*A wife of
Hezron
Hezron () is a name which occurs several times in the Hebrew Bible.
It may refer to:
* A plain in the south of Judah, south of Kadesh-barnea. (Book of Joshua, )
* A son of Reuben (son of Jacob). (Book of Genesis 46:9)
* A grandson of Judah (son ...
, one of the grandchildren of
Judah
Men
*
Abijah of Judah, also known as Abijam (, ', "My Father is Yam
ea), who was son of
Rehoboam and succeeded him on the throne of
Judah
* A son of
Becher, the son of
Benjamin
* The second son of
Samuel. His conduct, along with that of his brother, as a judge in
Beersheba
Beersheba or Beer Sheva, officially Be'er-Sheva ( he, בְּאֵר שֶׁבַע, ''Bəʾēr Ševaʿ'', ; ar, بئر السبع, Biʾr as-Sabʿ, Well of the Oath or Well of the Seven), is the largest city in the Negev desert of southern Israel. ...
, to which office his father had appointed him, led to popular discontent, and ultimately provoked the people to demand a
monarchy
A monarchy is a government#Forms, form of government in which a person, the monarch, is head of state for life or until abdication. The legitimacy (political)#monarchy, political legitimacy and authority of the monarch may vary from restric ...
.
* A descendant of
Eleazar
Eleazar (; ) or Elʽazar was a priest in the Hebrew Bible, the second High Priest, succeeding his father Aaron after he died. He was a nephew of Moses.
Biblical narrative
Eleazar played a number of roles during the course of the Exodus, from cr ...
, the son of
Aaron, a chief of the eighth of the twenty-four orders into which the priesthood was divided by
David
David (; , "beloved one") (traditional spelling), , ''Dāwūd''; grc-koi, Δαυΐδ, Dauíd; la, Davidus, David; gez , ዳዊት, ''Dawit''; xcl, Դաւիթ, ''Dawitʿ''; cu, Давíдъ, ''Davidŭ''; possibly meaning "beloved one". w ...
and an ancestor of
Zechariah, the priest who was the father of
John the Baptist
John the Baptist or , , or , ;Wetterau, Bruce. ''World history''. New York: Henry Holt and Company. 1994. syc, ܝܘܿܚܲܢܵܢ ܡܲܥܡܕ݂ܵܢܵܐ, Yoḥanān Maʿmḏānā; he, יוחנן המטביל, Yohanān HaMatbil; la, Ioannes Bapti ...
. The order of Abijah is listed with the priests and
Levites
Levites (or Levi) (, he, ''Lǝvīyyīm'') are Jewish males who claim patrilineal descent from the Tribe of Levi. The Tribe of Levi descended from Levi, the third son of Jacob and Leah. The surname ''Halevi'', which consists of the Hebrew de ...
who returned with
Zerubbabel
According to the biblical narrative, Zerubbabel, ; la, Zorobabel; Akkadian: 𒆰𒆍𒀭𒊏𒆠 ''Zērubābili'' was a governor of the Achaemenid Empire's province Yehud Medinata and the grandson of Jeconiah, penultimate king of Judah. Zeru ...
son of
Shealtiel
Shealtiel ( he, שְׁאַלְתִּיאֵל, ''Shəʾaltīʾēl''), transliterated in Greek as Salathiel (Greek: Σαλαθιηλ, ''Salăthiēl''), was the son of Jehoiachin, king of Judah. (1 Chronicles, ) The Gospel of Matthew 1:12 also list ...
and with Joshua.
* A son of
Jeroboam
Jeroboam I (; Hebrew: ''Yārŏḇə‘ām''; el, Ἱεροβοάμ, Hieroboám) was the first king of the northern Kingdom of Israel. The Hebrew Bible describes the reign of Jeroboam to have commenced following a revolt of the ten northern I ...
, the first king of Israel. On account of his severe illness when a youth, his father sent
his wife to consult the prophet
Ahijah regarding his recovery. The prophet, though blind with old age, knew the wife of Jeroboam as soon as she approached, and under a divine impulse he announced to her that inasmuch as in Abijah alone of all the house of Jeroboam there was found "some good thing toward the Lord", he only would come to his grave in peace. As his mother crossed the threshold of the door on her return, the youth died, and "all Israel mourned for him". According to ''
The Jewish Encyclopedia
''The Jewish Encyclopedia: A Descriptive Record of the History, Religion, Literature, and Customs of the Jewish People from the Earliest Times to the Present Day'' is an English-language encyclopedia containing over 15,000 articles on th ...
'', the good that he did "Rabbinical Literature:The passage, I Kings, xiv. 13, in which there is a reference to "some good thing
ound in himtoward the Lord God of Israel," is interpreted as an allusion to Abijah's courageous and pious act in removing the sentinels placed by his father on the frontier between Israel and Judah to prevent pilgrimages to Jerusalem. Some assert that he himself undertook a pilgrimage."
* This name (possibly) appeared on the
Gezer calendar
The Gezer calendar is a small limestone tablet with an early Canaanite inscription discovered in 1908 by Irish archaeologist R. A. Stewart Macalister in the ancient city of Gezer, 20 miles west of Jerusalem. It is commonly dated to the 10th ce ...
, a Paleo-Hebrew inscription dating to the 9th or 10th century BC, making it one of the earliest if not the earliest Yahwistic
theophoric names
A theophoric name (from Greek: , ''theophoros'', literally "bearing or carrying a god") embeds the word equivalent of 'god' or God's name in a person's name, reflecting something about the character of the person so named in relation to that deit ...
outside the Bible.
Russian name
The variant used in the
Russian language is "" ('),
with ""
or "" ('),
being older forms.
Included into various, often handwritten, church calendars throughout the 17th–19th centuries, it was omitted from the official
Synodal
Menologium
Menologium (), also written menology, and menologe, is a service-book used in the Eastern Orthodox Church and those Eastern Catholic Churches which follow the Byzantine Rite.
From its derivation from Greek , ''menológion'', from μήν ''m ...
at the end of the 19th century.
[Superanskaya, pp. 22, 23, and 277] In 1924–1930, the name (as "", a form of "'"
) was included into various Soviet calendars,
which included the new and often artificially created names promoting the new Soviet realities and encouraging the break with the tradition of using the names in the Synodal Menologia.
Toronto Slavic Quarterly
The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 as King's College, the first institution ...
. Елена Душечкина.
Мессианские тенденции в советской антропонимической практике 1920-х - 1930-х годов
In Russian it is only used as a female name.
Diminutives of this name include "" (') and "" (').
References
Notes
Sources
*Н. А. Петровский (N. A. Petrovsky). "Словарь русских личных имён" (''Dictionary of Russian First Names''). ООО Издательство "АСТ". Москва, 2005.
*А. В. Суперанская (A. V. Superanskaya). "Словарь русских имён" (''Dictionary of Russian Names''). Издательство Эксмо. Москва, 2005.
*
**
{{Given name
Feminine given names
Masculine given names
8th-century BC women
Set index articles on Hebrew Bible people
Women in the Hebrew Bible
Samuel