▪ Jeffery1938: »This sole occurrence of the word is in a passage descriptive of John the Baptist. Sprenger,
Leben, i, 125,
1
noted that the word was probably of foreign origin, and Mingana,
Syr Influence, 88, claims that it is the Syr
ḥnānā. / The primitive verb [Ar]
ḥanna does not occur in the Qurʔān. It may be compared with Sab
ḥn used in proper names,
2
Hbr
ḥānan ‘to be gracious’, and Syr
ḥnan, Aram
ḥᵃnan with the same meaning. It is to be noted, however, that the sense of ‘grace’ is the one that has been most highly developed in NSem, e.g. Akk
annu ‘grace, favour’, Hbr and Phoen
ḥēn, Aram
ḥnā and
ḥynā, Syr
ḥnānā, and this
ḥnānā is used in the Peshitta text of Lk. i, 58, in the account of the birth of John the Baptist. / Halévy,
JA, viiᵉ ser., x, 356, finds
ḥn-ʔl ‘grace de Dieu’ in a Safaite inscription, which if correct would be evidence of the early use of the word in NArabia.«