קציעה

Pronunciation

• Tiberian: qəṣîʿâ^[1]

Forms

קְצִיעָה (qəṣîʿâ) noun, feminine^[2][1] Only in the plural קְצִיעוֹת.^[1][3]

Etymology

The origin is disputed.^[3][4] HALOT takes it, with a question mark, as a primary noun with no verbal root.^[3] Koehler, Gesenius–Buhl and Klein derive it from קָצַע (qāṣaʿ, “to scrape off”), as the bark scraped off the tree;^[3][5][4] Noonan rejects this, because it assumes that the word means the East Asian cassia tree.^[3][5][4] Since no East Asian cinnamon is known in the ancient Near East before late Classical times, and the Greek and Latin writers place the spice in Ethiopia and Arabia, Noonan holds that the word came from that region, like the myrrh and Ophir gold mentioned beside it.^[4] Holma derived the Greek word from Akkadian kasû instead.^[6]

Ancient Greek κασία (kasía) is generally connected with the Hebrew word: HALOT and BDB take it from Hebrew, while Beekes calls it an oriental loanword that may go back to Austroasiatic.^[3][1][7][8]

Earliest recorded meaning

The word occurs once, in the royal wedding psalm: mōr-waʾăhālôṯ qəṣîʿôṯ kol-biḡḏōṯêḵā, “all your garments are myrrh and aloes and cassia” (Psalm 45:9).^[3][2]

Semantic evolution

HALOT and BDB identify it as cassia, the dried flowers or powdered bark of a cinnamon-like plant used for incense and perfume.^[3][1] Noonan argues that it was a cassia-like spice of Ethiopia or Arabia rather than true cassia, Cinnamomum cassia.^[4] The Septuagint, the Vulgate, the Peshitta and the Targum all render it by their forms of the same word, Ancient Greek κασία (kasía) and Latin casia.^[4] In Jewish Aramaic the Targum also uses it for the cassia of the anointing oil (Exodus 30:24), and Rabbinic Hebrew has homonyms meaning “fig harvest, dried fig” and a compartment of the phylacteries.^[9][5]

Timeline

• Biblical poetry – the single occurrence, Psalm 45:9.^[2][3]
• 3rd–2nd century BC – the Septuagint renders it Ancient Greek κασία (kasía).^[10][4]
• 2nd century BC – 2nd century AD – once in the Dead Sea Scrolls, in a manuscript of the Psalms.^[11][12]

Meanings

Noun

1. cassia, an aromatic bark or dried flowers used for perfume; plural in Psalm 45:9.^[3][1]

Usage notes

Job's second daughter, born after his trials, is named קְצִיעָה (Job 42:14), which HALOT and BDB take as the same word, “cassia”, a name chosen for its fragrance;^[3][13] Gordon's link with Ugaritic qṣʿt “bow” is rejected by HALOT.^[3][13] The Septuagint gives the name as Kasia.^[3]

References

1. ^ a b c d e f 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. קְצִיעָה
2. ^ a b c Clear Bible (2023–), MACULA Hebrew Linguistic Datasets (Westminster Leningrad Codex, with Greek alignment), github.com/Clear-Bible/macula-hebrew, CC BY 4.0
3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m 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. קְצִיעָה
4. ^ a b c d e f g Noonan, Benjamin J. (2019), Non-Semitic Loanwords in the Hebrew Bible: A Lexicon of Language Contact, University Park: Eisenbrauns (Linguistic Studies in Ancient West Semitic 14), p. 196
5. ^ a b c Klein, Ernest (1987), A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the Hebrew Language for Readers of English, Jerusalem: Carta; Haifa: University of Haifa, p. s.v. קְצִיעָה
6. ^ Gesenius, Wilhelm; Buhl, Frants (1915), Hebräisches und aramäisches Handwörterbuch über das Alte Testament, 17th ed., Leipzig: F. C. W. Vogel, p. s.v. קְצִיעָה
7. ^ Beekes, Robert S. P. (2010), Etymological Dictionary of Greek, with the assistance of Lucien van Beek, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 10, Leiden; Boston: Brill, p. s.v. κασία
8. ^ Liddell, Henry George; Scott, Robert; Jones, Henry Stuart (1940), A Greek-English Lexicon, 9th ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press, p. s.v. κασία
9. ^ Kaufman, Stephen A., ed., Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon, Cincinnati: Hebrew Union College, cal.huc.edu, p. s.v. קציעה
10. ^ Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 93
11. ^ Sáenz-Badillos, Angel (1993), A History of the Hebrew Language, transl. John Elwolde, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, p. 143
12. ^ Abegg, Martin G.; Jacobs, Jarod; Roorda, Dirk (2022), The Dead Sea Scrolls, Text-Fabric dataset, version 2.0.2, github.com/ETCBC/dss
13. ^ 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. קְצִיעָה²