קדוש

Forms

קָדוֹשׁ (qāḏôš) adjective^[1] Also written defectively קָדֹשׁ; construct קְדוֹשׁ, with suffixes קְדֹשִׁי, קְדוֹשׁוֹ, plural קְדוֹשִׁים / קְדֹשִׁים.^[2][4]

Etymology

It is from Biblical Hebrew קדשׁ (qdš, “holy”), formed with the pattern of גָּדוֹל (gāḏôl, “great”).^[4][5] Wiktionary traces the root to Proto-Semitic *ḳudš- (“holy”).^[6] The adjective has close cognates in Ugaritic qdš (“holy”),^[7] Phoenician qdš (“holy”),^[5][8] Aramaic קַדִּישׁ (qaddîš), Classical Syriac ܩܲܕܝܼܫܵܐ (qaddīšā)^[9][8] Arabic قُدْس (quds, “holiness”)^[6] and Amharic ቅዱስ (ḳədus).^[6][4] Akkadian qadāšu means “to become pure”, and quddušu “purified, holy”;^[10][8] Tawil matches the “holy water” of Numbers 5:17 with an Akkadian phrase for holy water built on this adjective.^[11] BDB thinks that the Arabic uses of the root, apart from a mountain name, and the Ethiopic ones show Hebrew and Aramaic influence.^[12]

The original sense of the root is uncertain: BDB and older scholars thought of “separation, withdrawal”;^[12] HALOT calls qdš an original verb and doubts the derivation from a root qd “to cut”, which would give the meaning “to set apart”.^[13]

Earliest recorded meaning

The adjective occurs 116 times in the Hebrew Bible, three of them in the archaic poems:^[14][1] Hannah sings ʾên-qāḏôš kaYHWH, “there is none holy like YHWH” (1 Samuel 2:2); the Blessing of Moses speaks of “all his holy ones” (Deuteronomy 33:3); and in Habakkuk 3:3 wəqāḏôš mēhar-pārān, “the Holy One (comes) from Mount Paran”.^[1][4]

Semantic evolution

HALOT's senses run from things to God.^[4] Places, days, water and the camp are holy, set apart from profane use; priests, Levites, the Nazirite and Israel itself are holy “to” God, and Israel is gôy qāḏôš, “a holy nation” (Exodus 19:6).^[4] The Holiness Code bases its laws on qəḏōšîm tihyû kî qāḏôš ʾănî, “you shall be holy, for I am holy” (Leviticus 11:44; 19:2).^[2][1] God is the Holy One, praised with the threefold qāḏôš of Isaiah 6:3; the title qəḏôš yiśrāʾēl, “the Holy One of Israel”, is used throughout the book of Isaiah and elsewhere only six times.^[2][4] The plural qəḏōšîm names pious people (Psalm 34:10) and the heavenly beings around God (Zechariah 14:5, Job 5:1, Psalm 89:6, Daniel 8:13).^[4][2]

The Septuagint renders it with Ancient Greek ἅγιος (hágios).^[15] The Dead Sea Scrolls use it 323 times, 208 of them in non-biblical texts.^[16] In Rabbinic Hebrew God is haqqāḏôš bārûḵ hûʾ, “the Holy One, blessed be He”, and Judah ha-Nasi is rabbênû haqqāḏôš, “our holy teacher”.^[17] Modern Hebrew קדוש (kadósh) now also means “saint” and “martyr”.^[8][6]

Timeline

• Archaic Hebrew poetry – the Song of Hannah (1 Samuel 2:2), the Blessing of Moses (Deuteronomy 33:3) and Habakkuk 3:3.^[14][1]
• Classical Biblical Hebrew – 34 occurrences from Genesis to Kings, many in the Priestly and Holiness laws.^[1][2]
• Prophets – qəḏôš yiśrāʾēl, “the Holy One of Israel”, throughout Isaiah.^[2]
• 3rd–2nd century BC – the Septuagint translates it with Ancient Greek ἅγιος (hágios).^[18][15]
• 2nd century BC – 2nd century AD – 323 occurrences in the Dead Sea Scrolls.^[19][16]

Meanings

Adjective

1. holy, sacred: of places, days, water, the camp, set apart from common use.^[4][2]
2. consecrated to God: of priests, Levites, the Nazirite and Israel.^[4]
3. of people, holy, pious; plural, the holy ones, the faithful.^[4][2]
4. of God: holy;^[1] haqqāḏôš, the Holy One;^[1] qəḏôš yiśrāʾēl, the Holy One of Israel.^[4][2]
5. (plural) the holy ones, heavenly beings, angels.^[4][2]

Word family

• קֹדֶשׁ (qōḏeš)
• מִקְדָּשׁ (miqdāš)

Descendants

• Yiddish קדוש (kodesh)^[6]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f g h i Clear Bible (2023–), MACULA Hebrew Linguistic Datasets (Westminster Leningrad Codex, with Greek alignment), github.com/Clear-Bible/macula-hebrew, CC BY 4.0
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Brown, Francis; Driver, S. R.; Briggs, Charles A. (1906), A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, with an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. קָדוֹשׁ
3. ^ Højgaard, Christian Canu; Naaijer, Martijn; Schorch, Stefan (2023), Text-Fabric Dataset of the Samaritan Pentateuch, Zenodo, doi:10.5281/zenodo.7734632
4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Koehler, Ludwig; Baumgartner, Walter; Stamm, Johann Jakob (1994–2000), The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, transl. and ed. M. E. J. Richardson, 5 vols, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. קָדוֹשׁ
5. ^ a b Gesenius, Wilhelm; Buhl, Frants (1915), Hebräisches und aramäisches Handwörterbuch über das Alte Testament, 17th ed., Leipzig: F. C. W. Vogel, p. s.v. קדשׁ
6. ^ a b c d e Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
7. ^ del Olmo Lete, Gregorio; Sanmartín, Joaquín (2015), A Dictionary of the Ugaritic Language in the Alphabetic Tradition, 3rd ed., transl. W. G. E. Watson, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. qdš I
8. ^ a b c d Klein, Ernest (1987), A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language for Readers of English, Jerusalem: Carta; Haifa: University of Haifa, p. s.v. קָדוֹשׁ
9. ^ Sokoloff, Michael (2009), A Syriac Lexicon, Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns; Piscataway: Gorgias Press, p. 1320
10. ^ del Olmo Lete, Gregorio; Sanmartín, Joaquín (2015), A Dictionary of the Ugaritic Language in the Alphabetic Tradition, 3rd ed., transl. W. G. E. Watson, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. /q-d-š/
11. ^ Tawil, Hayim ben Yosef (2009), An Akkadian Lexical Companion for Biblical Hebrew: Etymological-Semantic and Idiomatic Equivalents, Jersey City: Ktav, p. 333
12. ^ a b Brown, Francis; Driver, S. R.; Briggs, Charles A. (1906), A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament, with an Appendix Containing the Biblical Aramaic, Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. קדשׁ
13. ^ Koehler, Ludwig; Baumgartner, Walter; Stamm, Johann Jakob (1994–2000), The Hebrew and Aramaic Lexicon of the Old Testament, transl. and ed. M. E. J. Richardson, 5 vols, Leiden: Brill, p. s.v. קדשׁ
14. ^ a b Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 69
15. ^ a b Tov, Emanuel; Kraft, Robert A. (1987), CATSS Parallel Aligned Hebrew and Greek Texts of Jewish Scripture, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania (Oxford Text Archive 1111)
16. ^ a b Abegg, Martin G.; Jacobs, Jarod; Roorda, Dirk (2022), The Dead Sea Scrolls, Text-Fabric dataset, version 2.0.2, github.com/ETCBC/dss
17. ^ Jastrow, Marcus (1886–1903), A Dictionary of the Targumim, the Talmud Babli and Yerushalmi, and the Midrashic Literature, London: Luzac; New York: Putnam, p. s.v. קָדוֹשׁ
18. ^ Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 93
19. ^ Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 143