The first occurrence.
And God said, “Let the earth bring forth the living creature after its kind: cattle, and creeping thing, and beast of the earth, each after its kind,” and it was so. Gen 1:24
The primitive root.
Strong’s H929, behemah; a concrete noun meaning “beast;” from an unnamed, unused primitive root of uncertain meaning. According to the Ancient Hebrew Lexicon, the 3-letter root of the noun is bet + hey + mem.
bet ב = house, thus house, household, family, in, within
hey ה = man w/ raised arms, thus look, reveal, wonder, worship, breath
mem מ ם = the water, thus chaos, mighty, blood
The cognate words will help us find the parable of the root. One is a height, another is the brother-in-law who marries his brother’s widow to raise up sons to his brother’s name. The story: A house and household is built up (bet); just so a high place is raised (hey, as the man’s arms are raised) above the surrounding area; above the inundation of the flood waters (mem). So a beast is a living creature of height, as opposed to creeping things which are of a low profile.
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