Shiloh in the Bible Encyclopedia - ISBE
shi'-lo (shiloh): The prophecy in Gen 49:10, "The scepter
shall not depart from Judah, .... until Shiloh come," etc.,
has been the subject of very diverse interpretations. the
Revised Version margin gives as alternative renderings, "
`Till he come to Shiloh having the obedience of the peoples'
Or, according to the Syriac, `Till he come whose it is,'
etc." (1) From the earliest times the passage has been
regarded as Messianic, but the rendering in the text, which
takes "Shiloh" as a proper name, bearing a meaning such as
"peaceful" (compare Isa 9:6, "Prince of Peace"), labors
under the difficulty that Shiloh is not found elsewhere as a
personal name in the Old Testament, nor is it easy to
extract from it the meaning desired. Further, the word was
not personally applied to the Messiah in any of the ancient
VSS, which rather assume a different reading (see below).
Apart from a purely fanciful passage in the Talmud (compare
Driver, Gen, 413), this application does not appear earlier
than the version of Seb. Munster in the 16th century (1534).
(2) The rendering, "till he come to Shiloh," where Shiloh is
taken as the name of a place, not a person, is plausible,
but is felt to yield no suitable sense in the context. It
is, therefore, now also set aside by most recent scholars.
(3) The 3rd rendering, which regards Shiloh as representing
the Hebrew shelloh = shiloh for 'asher low, "whose (it is),"
has in its favor the fact that this is evidently the reading
presupposed in the Septuagint, the Peshitta, and the this is
evidently the reading presupposed in the Septuagint, the
Peshitta, and the Jewish Targums, and seems to be alluded to
in Ezek 21:27, "until he come whose right it is." In this
view the passage has still a Messianic reference, though
critics argue that it must then be regarded as late in
origin. Other interpretations need not detain us. See for
details the full discussions in Hengstenberg's Christology,
I, 54 ff, English translation, the commentaries of
Delitzsch, Driver, and Skinner, on Genesis (especially
Excursus II in Driver), and the articles in the various
Bible dictionaries.
See also PROPHECY.
James Orr
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