This page was originally written in July 2017.
This post is about the terms No and No Amon, as they appear in the Bible. First, an overview of how the terms are used in the Bible itself, with every mention of either term surveyed. Then, a look at how etymology has been used by modern scholars to identify No (Amon) as Thebes, Egypt. Finally, a note on the rabbinical interpretation of the term as referring to Alexandria.
Usage
First, a note for readers who might be following along in a King James Bible. The KJV reads “populous No” for the Hebrew No-Amon in Nehum 3:8 and “the multitude of No” for Amon from No. This is unfortunate, because while Amon does get used for crowd or multitude in one passage, No-Amon seems to be a proper name, with Amon referring to the Egyptian god Amun, but I’m getting ahead of myself. We’ll get to that.
First for the biblical data. This place appears in three passages.
Jeremiah 46:25-26 reads, Yahweh of Armies, God of Israel, says, Behold, I will punish Amon from No, and Pharaoh, and Egypt , and their gods, and their kings, and Pharaoh, and all who trust in him. And I will hand them over to those who seek to kill them, to Nebuchadrezzar king of Babylon, and to his servants, and afterward it will be inhabited as in ancient times — a decree of Yahweh.
Ezekiel 30:14-16 reads, I will desolate Pathros, and set a fire in Zoan, and carry out judgment in No. I will pour out my fury upon Sin, the stronghold of Egypt, and cut off the multitude (hamon) of No. I will set a fire in Egypt: Sin will writhe in pain, and No will be torn apart, and Noph will be in distress every day.
Finally, Nahum 3:8-9 reads, Are you [Nineveh] better than No Amon, sitting on the rivers, the sea surrounding her, whose fortification was the sea, whose wall was from the sea? Kush was her strength, and Egypt, and it was unbounded; Put and Lubim were her helpers.
The texts by themselves make a few things clear. Most obviously, No is a significant place in Egypt around the time of Nebuchadnezzar and the seventh century. Secondly, while only Nahum uses the longer name “No-Amon,” which can be interpreted as No of Amon, this is clearly the same place as the No of the other two passages, because Jeremiah speaks of Amon from No, and Ezekiel uses wordplay to associate No with the word hamon “multitude.”
Etymology
While in Hebrew the name goes back and forth between being No and the longer form No-Amon, Egyptians called Thebes Niwt and Niwt-‘lmn.[1] That last bit, ‘lmn, is the Egyptian name for the god Amun. So the alternating Hebrew names match the alternating Egyptian names about as well as to be expected (non-Hebrew names tend to change a bit when moving into biblical Hebrew).
The only problem is with the mention of the sea (Hebrew yam). In the modern sense of the term, Thebes is nowhere close to “the sea.” It is far inland in Egypt. However, Palmer Robertson cites a number of biblical passages which use the term yam to refer to the Nile (Isaiah 18:2; 19:5; Job 42:23) and to the Euphrates (Isaiah 27:1; Jeremiah 51:36).[1-1] Without necessarily endorsing Robertson’s interpretation of each of these verses (I’d have to spend some more time thinking about a couple of them, which on their face seem like they might not necessarily refer to the Nile or Euphrates), this seems possible.
Another argument is that the mention of the sea should be taken primarily as reflecting Nahum’s preoccupation with Nineveh, and that Nahum was not all that concerned with discussing the actual historical geography of Thebes.[2]
While there is almost unanimous agreement that No was Thebes, there is a 1949 journal article by J. Van Doorslaer arguing that the modern consensus is incorrect.[3] Doorslaer, relying on the “sea” mention, wishes to place No in the Nile Delta.
A variety of rabbinical sources read No (Amon) as Alexandria, but this is anachronistic because Alexandria was not founded until well after the biblical references were written. Nevertheless, in medieval documents, references to Jews living in No-Amon mean they were Alexandrians.
References