Bible Lexicons

ἅλας

(T, ἅλα ), -ατος , τό , late form of cl. ἅλς , -ος , ό (MM, VGT, s.v.),

[in LXX chiefly for H4416;]

salt, lit, and fig.: Matthew 5:13, Mark 9:50 Luke 14:34; like cl. ἅλες , wit, of wisdom and grace in speech: Colossians 4:6.†

As early as iii/B.C. the neuter form is proved to have been in existence, e.g. P Petr III. 140 (a)2 ἔλαιον ν ̄ ἅλας ν ̄ ξύλα , and may therefore be acknowledged in P Hib I. 152 (B.C. 250) ἐμβαλοῦ εἰς τὸ πλοῖον ἅλας καὶ λωτόν , though there the editors treat the word as accusative plural. A clear example seems to be quotable from P Par 55 bis i. 29 (ii/B.C.) καὶ ἄρτοι καὶ ἅλας . From later times we can quote P Leid X i. 8 (iii/iv A.D.) ἅλας Καππαδοκικόν , P Oxy IX. 12222 (iv/A.D.) τὸ ἅλας . The ambiguity of earlier exx. attaches itself even to P Leid C verso iv. 5 (p. 93 of part i.), where ἅλας may as well be acc. pl., since the items are acc. as well as nom. in this λόγος of provisions supplied to the Twins of the Serapeum (ii/B.C.). Mayser (Gr. p. 286) quotes a conjectural reading ἅλατος for ἄμτος in the same document; but the Petrie and the Paris papyri cited give us our only certain exx. from Ptolemaic times, to set beside 2 Esdras 7:22, Sirach 39:26. Cf. MGr ἁλάτι . Mr Thackeray (in a letter) would now regard ἅλας in LXX as probably neuter : ";the only indubitable cases of the plural are in the local plural phrases ἡ θάλασσα (etc.) τῶν ἁλῶν . This looks as if the plural was the regular form for salt-areas."; In the fourteen LXX instances of ἅλα and ἅλας the article is absent, and we are free to assume that a new neuter noun was already developing, perhaps under analogy of other food names like γάλα and κρέας . Ἁλός lived on in the papyri as late as A.D. 258–9, P Lond 1170 verso.124 ( = III. p. 196). By σταθμίον α ̣λ ̣ι ̣ς in P Tebt II. 331.14 (c. A.D. 131) we are apparently to understand ἁλός , ";a quantity of salt."; BGU III. 731 ii. 3 (A.D. 180) ἁλὸς πλεῖστον will serve as a further instance. Note ἁλική , ";salt tax,"; common in early papyri : see ἁλυκός below.

[Supplemental from 1930 edition]

See also N. D. Coleman in JTS xxiv. (1923), p. 387 ff., and W.S. Wood in ib. xxv. (1924), p. 167 ff.

 

 

 

αλα άλα ἅλα αλας άλας ἅλας αλατι άλατι ἅλατι αλγείν αλγηδών άλγημα άλγημά αλγημάτων αλγηρά αλγηρόν αλγήσω άλγος αλγώ αλγών άλειμμα ήλγησαν χάριτι ala alas alati chariti hala hála halas hálas halati hálati