First occurrence
In the beginning, God Elohiym created the heaven and the earth. Gen 1:1.
The primitive root
Strong’s H776 ארץ erets, a concrete noun meaning, “land, earth;” from an unused, unnamed primitive root. The pictographs are aleph + resh + tsadey.
aleph א = the ox head, thus strength, power, leader
resh ר = the head of man, thus head, first, top, beginning, man
tsadey צ, ץ = the trail, thus a man concealed, journey, chase, hunt
The related words will help us find the parable being told. One related word is “to crush;” another is “potsherd.” According to the Ancient Hebrew Lexicon,
Broken pieces of pottery were commonly used as writing tablets as they were inexpensive and durable. These potsherds were commonly used to send messages from one person to another, usually carried by runners.
The parable is of a strong (aleph) man (resh) on a trail (tsadey), i.e., the runner who is carrying a message from one place to another. It is from the sense of broken pottery that we get the meaning of land, for as pottery is broken up into potsherds, so land is broken up into its pieces by tribes or nations.
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