Bibliotheca Polyglotta

▪ Two, or even three, etymata? WehrCowan1979 treats [v1] and [v2] in one and the same entry, without explaining how ‘land or plants thriving on natural water supplyʼ and perh. the god Baʕl or ‘lord, master’ may be related etymologically.
▪ [v1] From protSem *baʕl‑ ‘lord’ – Huehnergard2011.
▪ Orel&Stolbova1994 reconstruct protSem *baʕl- ‘husband, masterʼ < AfrAs *baʕil- ‘manʼ.
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hist

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cogn

▪ Bergsträsser1928: Akk bēlu, Hbr baʕal, Aram baʕlā, Gz bāʕl.
▪ Orel&Stolbova1994#182: Akk bēlu, Ug bʕl, Phoen bʕl, Pun bʕl, Hbr baʕal, EpigrAram bʕl, SAr bʕl, Śḥr baʕl, Soq baʕl, Mhr bâl, Gz baʕal, Te baʕl, Amh bal, all ‘husband, masterʼ. – Outside Sem: CCh *b˅l- ‘man’, Sa *bal- ‘father-in-law’, LEC *Hobol- ‘relative’, as well as in HEC *beHil- ‘master’, ‘friend’.
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disc

▪ Jeffery1938, 81: »The word occurs in the Elijah story and as a proper name undoubtedly came to Muḥammad from the same source as his ʔIlyās. As this would seem to be from the Syr we may conclude that baʕl is from the Syr baʕlā.¹ On the question of the word in general the authorities differ. Robertson Smith² argued that the word was a loan-word in Arabia, but Nöldeke (ZDMG, xl: 174), and Wellhausen (Reste, 146), claim that it is indigenous. It is worthy of note that as-Suyūṭī, Itq, 310, states that baʕl meant rabb in the dialects of Yemen and of Azd, and as such we find it in the SAr inscriptions, e.g. Glaser, 1076, 2, bʕl trʕt ‘Lord of Teriʕat’ (see further Rossini, Glossarium, 116; RES, i, Nos. 184, 185). In any case from the Nab and NAr inscriptions³ we learn that the word was known in this sense in Arabia long before Muḥammad’s time.⁴ Horovitz, KU, 101, thinks it came from Eth [Gz] (cf. Ahrens, Christliches, 38).«
▪ [v1] ‘god Baalʼ: is Baal just ‘theʼ lord, ‘theʼ master? Or was the god Baal the model after which the family’s superior was called a ‘baʕlʼ? Is there a connection between the god and natural irrigation?
▪ [v1]‘lordʼ, ‘husbandʼ: which meaning was earlier, ‘lordʼ or ‘husbandʼ? If ‘lordʼ, then it may have been transferred both to the family domain (‘lordʼ > ‘lord of the household, a woman’s masterʼ > ‘husbandʼ) and to the religious field (‘lordʼ > ‘the Lord, Masterʼ).
▪ [v2] ‘land or plants thriving on natural water supplyʼ: any connection with the god Baʕl?

1. So Horovitz, KU, 101, and see Rudolph, Abhängigkeit, 47 n. 2. Religion of the Semites (2 ed.), 100 ff.; Kinship, 210. 3. See Cook, Glossary, 32; Lidzbarski, Handbuch, 240, 241; Ryckmans, Nom propres, i, 8, 54; Nielsen in HAA, i, 241. 4. In the Qurʔān itself (xi, 75) it occurs in the sense of ‘husband’.

west

▪ Not from Ar baʕl, but ultimately from the same source are Engl Baal, from Hbr baʕal ‘lord, Baal’; Beelzebub, from Hbr baʕal zᵊbûb ‘lord of the flies’, pejorative alteration of baʕal zᵊbûl ‘lord prince’ (name of a Philistine god; cf. Ar ↗ḎBB and ↗ZBL); Hannibal, from Phoen (Pun) *ḥannī-baʕl ‘my grace (is) Baal’, cf. Ar ↗ḤNN; Belshazzar, from Hbr bēlšaṣṣar, from Akk bēl-šar-uṣur ‘Bel (an Akk deity) protect the king’ (bēl ‘lord, Bel’, cf. Ar baʕl, and ↗naẓara ‘to see, look, watch’).

deriv

►baʕlaẗ, n., wife: f. of baʕl [v1].
►baʕlī, adj., unirrigated (land, plants): nisba formation of baʕl [v2].

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