must supply the words, "of rock remained to be broken through." קל אש voice of one, ק (pass on to line 3).
Line 3.—רא אל רעו called to his fellow-workman, כי for. הית there being, זדה excess, an unusual word, the cognate זדזן occurs in the sacred text, in the sense of pride, arrogance. בצר in the rock. צר rock with the prep. ב in מימן on the right (ימן the right hand, with מ). After this word is another break in the text. ובימה and in the west, westward. ימה = the ordinary ים sea. Used also to indicate the west, i.e., the region of the Great Sea, or Mediterranean, which lay to the west of Palestine.
Line 4.—נקבה of the excavation, to be read with preceding word "westward," or "on the west side of the excavation." הכו they struck through. Hiph. of נכה third person pl. החצבן an unusual noun, חצבן with the article, the excavation, from חצב to cut, to hew out. אש each, לקרת to meet, from קרה to meet accidentally, to light upon, as in Ruth ii, 3. רעו his fellow, as before. גרזון על גרזון pick upon pick, וילכו and flowed, third person pl. pret. kal.,from ילך, synonymous with הלך to go, walk, flow, &c., a very common Hebrew, Phœnician, and Arabic root.
Line 5.—המים the waters. מן from, המוצא the outlet, spring, the root-idea of the word is going forth, egress, often occurs in Old Testament, as of the upper Gihon outflow, 2 Chron. xxxii, 30. אל to, הברכה the pool, occurs frequently in Old Testament, "the upper pool," Isa. vii, 3, xxxvi, 2. Arabic birket, Spanish alberca, a pond, Portuguese alberca, a trench, drain. The next word Major Conder takes to mean for two hundred, Professor Sayce translates it for the distance of, מתי from a root implying extension, אלף a thousand, אמה cubit.
Line 6.—At the end of line 5 and beginning of line 6 is a broken word, which is read by Professor Sayce with the following word אמה and three-fourths of a cubit, היה was נבה the height, elevation, common in Old Testament. הצר the rock. על over, ראש head, beginning, a common word. החצב the excavation, tunnel.
It will be seen that most of the words in the inscription are common Bible terms, although some are used in an unusual sense.
The great value of the Siloam inscription can be rightly estimated only after consideration of what was known before its discovery with respect to the graphic art and literary culture of Palestine at the period when this inscription was cut on the wall of the famous subterranean aqueduct. Up to a very recent time all primitive Semitic writing was supposed to be Phœnician, the Phœnicians in turn being supposed to
