Atar, “To entreat,” Strong’s H6279

The first occurrence

Now Isaac pleaded with YHVH for his wife, because she was barren; and YHVH granted his plea, and Rebekah his wife conceived. Gen 25:21

(In the Scripture Picture: He answered them, that is, He was entreated by them, meaning He answered their prayer favorably.)

The primitive root

Strong’s H6279, עתר  atar,  a primitive verb meaning, “to entreat.” While the modern letters are ayin + tav + resh, according to the Ancient Hebrew Lexicon, the ancient pictographs were ghah + tav + resh. Ghah was a letter present in ancient Hebrew, but which was early on absorbed into the ayin.

ghah § = rope (twisted, goat, dark, negative)
tav ת =  crossed sticks (mark, sign, signal, monument)
resh ר =  head of man (head, first, top, beginning, man)

Our best clue to resolve this parable, was the fact that its cognate word is the Hebrew word for ‘incense.’

Let my prayer be set before You as incense, the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice. Psa 141:2

The parable being told, then, is of the curling, twisting (ghah) smoke of incense marking (tav, as a covenant sign) a request made to the greater (resh, as the chief or head), thus, an entreaty or supplication so lifted up,

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