MOTHER. The Hebrew word for mother is nt3, am, and is regarded by the lexicographers as a primitive, imitating the earliest lisping of an infant : they compare it with the Greek Acduna, nct,thp.th pea; Sanscrit, md, ambd ; Copt., man ; English and French, mama ; German, amaze, (nurse), etc.
The ordinary applications of the word require no illustration ; but the following points of He brew usage may be noticed. When the father had more than one wife, the son seems to have con fined the title of mother' to his real mother, by which he distinguished her from the other wives of his father. Hence the source of Joseph's pecu liar interest in Benjamin is indicated in Gen. xliii. 29, by his being his mother's son.' The other brethren were the sons of his father by other wives. Nevertheless, when this precision was not necessary, the step-mother was sometimes styled mother. Thus Jacob (Gen. xxxvii. to) speaks of Leah as Joseph's mother, for his real mother had long been dead. The step-mother was, however, more properly distinguished from the womb-mother by the name of father's wife' (01.; ;ON). The word mother' was also, like father, brother, sister, employed by the Hebrews in a somewhat wider sense than is usual with us. It is used of
a grandmother (1 Kings xv. zo), and even of any female ancestor (Gen. iii. 20) ; of a benefactress (Judg. v. 7), and as expressing intimate relation ship (Job xvii. 14). In Hebrew, as in English, a' nation is considered as a mother, and indivi duals as her children (Is. 1. 1 ; Jer. 1. 12 ; Ezek. xix. 2 ; Hos. ii. 4 ; iv. 5) ; so our ' mother-coun try,' which is quite as good as father-land,' which we seem beginning to copy from the Ger mans. Large and important cities are also called. mothers, i. e., mother-cities,' with reference to the dependent towns and villages (2 Sam. xx. 19), or even to the inhabitants, who are called her chil dren (Is. iii. 12 ; xlix. 231. c The parting of the way, at the head of two ways' (Ezek. xxi. 21) is in the Hebrew the mother of the way,' because out of it the two ways arise as daughters. In Job i. 21, the earth is indicated as the common mother to whose bosom all mankind must return.' The particulars relating to the position which a mother occupied among the Jews, are involved in other relations, which are referred to the general head WOMAN. —J. K.