EMERODS printed with the vowels belonging to w-inn which is invariably the keri for it, perhaps euphemistically ; meaning Inheres, tuberationes), the word used in the E. V. to denote the disease with which God threatens to punish the disobedient Israelites (Deut. xxviii. 27), and which He inflicted on the Philistines for their profanation of the ark (I Sam. v. 6, 9, 12, 17 ; vi. 4, 5). I• According to Josephus it is dysentery. ` At length God sent a very destructive disease upon the city and country of Ashdod, for they died of the dysen tery or flux, that brought death upon them very suddenly ; for before the soul could, as is usual in easy deaths, be well loosed from the body, they brought up their entrails, and vomited up what they had eaten,' etc. (Antiq. i. I. I). 2. The bite of the Solpagos (So Jahn, Heb. Antiq. xii. 185, following Lichtenstein), a venomous kind of spiders, which bite men whenever they have an opportunity, especially in the fundament and verenda, and whose bite causes swellings fatal in their consequences.' It is these he supposes are meant by the achbarim (mice, E. V.), and which, being greatly multiplied, killed many per sons. But the apholim were not inflicted by the achbarim, whose devastations were confined to the land," which mar the land ;' and the achbar is no species of spider, but rather the field mouse, especially the short-tailed species, whose ravages in cultivated lands are so destructive. [ Acti BAR.] 3. Piles, bleeding piles, Ges. tumours, he morrhoids. Furst (Heb. Concord.) tumores, tu bera ani, nzariscae, Arab. Ghafalon.' A very pain ful disease, especially when inward, which often proves fatal. The Philistines, according to the custom of the heathen, presented to Jehovah golden images of the emerods and achbarim from which they suffered, as an expiation for their offence, that He might remove the plague.—I. J.
EMIM (mnyt-:, ; Sept. 'Oudot and 'Qui2e2p), the name of the aboriginal inhabitants of Shaveh-Kiria thaim, or the plateau of Moab (Gen. xiv. 5). The word is from V;•.t, to frighten,' and thus sig nifies terrors.' It has been questioned by some whether the names given to these primitive races, Anakim, Rephaim, Emim, etc., have refer
ence to their courage and warlike character, or to their physical strength and stature (A. Clarke, on Gen. vi. 4). But an honest interpretation of the sacred text requires us to give the words the latter meaning. That there were great num bers of giants in Canaan in a remote age, and that many of them still existed at, and long subse quent to, the conquest of the country by the Israel ites, does not admit of doubt. We read of Og, king of Bashan, `who remained of the remnant of the giants,' and whose huge bedstead was pre served in Rabbath-Ammon (Deut. iii. I 1) ; of the Anakim, a people great and tall' (Deut. ix. 2), of whom the spies said, ' we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight' (Num. xiii. 33) ; of Goliath, `whose height was six cubits and a span' (r Sam. xvii. 4) ; and so of these Emim, a people great and tall as the Anakim ; which also were accounted giants as the Anakim' (Dent. ii. to, II). Josephus also alludes to the race of giants who inhabited Canaan in early times, who had bodies so large, and coun tenances so entirely different from other men, that they were surprising to the sight, and terrible to the hearing. The bones of these men are shewn to this very day at Hebron (Antic. v. 2, 3). It is worthy of note, too, that the traditions of most ancient nations contain references to a primeval race of giants. Homer celebrates—' Great Poly pheme, of moreth an mortal might !"Odus and Ephialtio—' More fierce than giant, more than giants strong' (Odys. i. 91 ; xi. 375). In various parts of Syria the traditional tombs of the patriarchs are still shewn, and they are all of gigantic dimen sions (Porter's Damascus, i. 264; ii. 278. See Calmet's Dissertation on Giants).
The Anakim, Rephaim, Zuzim, and Emim were apparently different sections of one great tribe, or different names applied to the same peo ple in different districts where they had settled. They were gradually exterminated by foreign in vaders. The Emims were dispossessed by the Moabites (Deut. ii. 9-I I). [GIANTs.]—J. L. P.