Blog , Abnormal Interests, August 29, 2008, Friday Loanword: māḫāzu
Akkadian māḫāzu ranges in meaning from a small enclosure, often with a well or pond, serving a cultic purpose to a town with such a enclosure, to simply a town, to a quay or harbor. While not the most common word for "harbor" in Akkadian, it is that meaning of māḫāzu that will most concern us here.
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I hinted that מָחֹוז in Psalm 107:30 might not really be a hapax legomenon word in Biblical Hebrew. Let me be clear, it is hapax legomenon in the Hebrew of the MT. But how about Isaiah 23:10:
עִבְרִי אַרְצֵךְ כַּיְאֹר בַּת־תַּרְשִׁישׁ אֵין מֵזַח עֹוד
in the MT. This is a notoriously difficult verse. It more or less begs for emendation if only to make rudimentary sense of it. Slightly modifying Flint's, 48, n. 57, reconstruction, Barré, 18, arrives at the following proposed Vorlage for Isaiah 23:10:
עברי ארצך כי אבדת תרשיש אין מחז עוד
Cross (back) to your own land, for Tarshish has perished, (for) the harbor/port city is no more. (Barré's translation)