Online Resource Library
Commentary Index | Return to PrayerRequest.com | DownloadInternational Standard Bible Encyclopedia: Ram (1)
Subjects in this Topic:
ram (ר×, raÌ„m, “high,†“exaltedâ€):
(1) An ancestor of David ( (ἈÏÏαÌν, ArraÌn); , (ἈÏαÌμ, AraÌm); in he is called the “brother,†but in , the “son of Jerahmeel†(compare ). Ram as the son of Hezron appears more likely than Ram the son of Jerahmeel, since, according to the narratives of 1 and 2 Samuel, David cannot have been a Jerahmeelite.
(2) Name of Elihu's family (). It is an open question as to whether Ram should be taken as a purely fictitious name, invented by the author of the Elihu speeches, or whether it is that of some obscure Arab tribe. In Aram is a nephew of Buz (compare Elihu the Buzite), and the conjecture was at one time advanced that Ram was a contraction of Aram; but this theory is no longer held to be tenable. The suggestion that the initial a (the Hebrew letter, )× has been changed by a scribal error into h (the Hebrew letter, )×” is more acceptable. Rashi, the rabbinical commentator, takes the quaint position that Ram is identical with Abraham.