02_eichler_nuovoImpaginato+eliminata_nota24)_DEF_copiaaaaa_26_38 28/04/15 11:32 Pagina 34 34 RAANAN EICHLER excavated in the mid-nineteenth century, such as one found in Nim- rud by Austen Henry Layard between 1845 and 1851 and now housed in the British Museum 29, along with the mistaken belief that the Akkadian words kirûbu 30 or kāribu 31 designated these beings, boosted the view that cherubim shared the form of these colossi 32. V. Griffin Doubting the association of the cherub with the human-headed winged bull, the nineteenth-century biblicist August Dillmann pre- ferred to connect the cherub with the griffin, or raptor-headed winged lion. In support of his view, he noted the aforementioned Akkadian word kurūbu, along with the fact that the function of guarding unapproachable places is attributed in Greek legend to the griffins, just as the cherubim possess this function in the Hebrew Bible (Gen 3,24; Ezek 28,14-19) 33. The phonetic similarity between bwrk and the Greek word γρύψ (stem γρυπ-), from which English “griffin” is derived, has been noted by scholars both before and after Dillmann 34. The griffin ap- plates (not enumerated) “Ark of the Covenant”, “Cherubim” 1-4; C. DE BRUYN, Travels into Muscovy, Persia, and Part of the East-Indies (London 1737) II, 11-12. 29 British Museum ME 118872; online: http://www.britishmuseum.org/ explore/highlights/highlight_objects/me/c/colossal_statue_winged_bull.aspx [cited 15 June 2014]. 30 LENORMANT, History, 125-126; F. DELITZSCH, Wo lag das Paradies? (Leipzig 1881) 153. Refuted by, e.g., T.C. FOOTE, “The Cherubim and the Ark”, JAOS 25 (1904) 279-286 at 279. CAD does not list kirûbu as a word. 31 DHORME – VINCENT, “Chérubins”, 335-336. According to CAD, kāribu is an adjective that can describe “a deity represented as making a gesture of adoration”. 32 Layard himself made this connection cautiously. See A.H. LAYARD, Nineveh and Its Remains (London 1849) II, 464-465; ID., Discoveries in the Ruins of Nineveh and Babylon (New York 1853) 549. See also DELITZSCH, Paradies, 150-155 and bibl. 33 A. DILLMANN, Genesis: Critically and Exegetically Expounded (Eugene, OR 2005 [1897]) 170 (83). WOOD, Wings, 200-207, identifies the cherub with the eagle-headed winged lion and the human-headed winged lion (winged sphinx); see below. 34 J.G. EICHHORN, Einleitung in das Alte Testament (Göttingen 41823) III, 80, 160-161; W. VATKE, Die biblische Theologie (Berlin 1835) I, 325-326. Early bibliography in LENORMANT, History, 119, n. 1; DELITZSCH, Paradies, 151; J. WELLHAUSEN, Prolegomena to the History of Israel (Edinburgh 1885)