cogn▪ DRS 9 (2010)#ḤLL-1: Akk ell ‘pur’, elēlu ‘être pur, libre’, mullil officiant du culte, ‘purificateur’, Ug ḥll ‘être désacralisé’, mḥll ‘officiant (?)’, Can ḥol, ḥālāl ‘profane, non sacré’, ḥillel ‘rendre profane, profaner; détacher, ouvrir, donner accès à; jeter bas, détruire’, Aram ḥallel ‘tenir pour permis, purifier’, Ar ḥalla ‘être permis, licite; être obligatoire’, ḥill, ḥalāl ‘chose permise, licite’; – ḥalla ‘dénouer, déplier, résoudre’, dial. ḥall ‘ouvrir’; Sab ḥll ‘être à la merci de, être sans protection contre’, Qat ḥll ‘annuler, mettre fin, perdre’, ḥtll ‘trouver du secours, être secouru’, mḥllt (pl.) ‘vannes d’écluse’; ? Sab mḥlt : paiement d’une taxe; Mhr ḥlūl ‘déclarer licite’, Jib aḥlél ‘rendre licite, pardonner’, Mhr ḥáttəl ‘être résolu; être purgé’, Jib ḥɔ́ttəl ‘disparaître’, Mhr ḥəláwl, Jib ḥálúl ‘purge’; – ? Mhr šəḥlūl, Jib s̃ḥɛlél ‘prendre le repas du soir en mois de ramadan’; Tña ḥalal ‘brave homme; profitable, avantageux; légitime (épouse, enfant)’, Amh halal ‘licite (pour les Musulmans)’.
▪ As is clear from the cognates given in DRS, the value ‘to be allowed, permissible’, etc., is assumed to be akin to that of ‘to untie, release, open, set free; to be pure, free (from a debt)’, treated under ↗ḥalla (ḥall); for the whole picture, cf. ↗ḤLː (ḤLL). To the same complex belongs, with all probability, also the idea of ‘to stop, rest, settle down; place’ (from *‘to untie the saddle, unload, alight’), cf. ↗ḥalla (ḥulūl). In this spirit, Zammit2002 puts together Akk elēlu ‘to be(come) pure; to be free [from a debt]’, Ug ḥl(l) ‘to free, releave (from a ban)’, Hbr ḥālal (Hif.) ‘to begin’ (lit. ‘untie, loosen, open’), Aram ḥᵃlal ‘to wash, rinse [i.e., to “dissolve” in water?]; to degrade, profane [i.e., make permissible against religious norms]’, Syr ḥalel ‘to purify’, Ar ḥalla ‘to untie (a knot); to be lawful; to alight, settle in a place’, SAr ḥll ‘to encamp; to be unprotected (against)’, Gz ḥalala ‘to be gathered, come in’.