Princes are hanged
up (תלה/κρεμάννυμι) by their hand: the faces fo the elders were not honoured. (Lam
5:12)
1. תָּלָה (in 2 S 21:12 (Ḳerê), Dt 28:66; Hos 11:7 (?) תָּלָא), ‘to hang up’ anything, e.g. the earth Job 26:7, the shields on
the tower of David Ca 4:4, the harps of the exiles in Babylon Ps 137:2;
especially of the hanging up of a dead
body, in Gn 40:19, 22; 41:13 of the chief baker, who was probably first
beheaded and then had his body impaled as an aggravation of the punishment, see
Dillm. ad loc.; in 2 S 4:12 of the
murderers of Ishbosheth, whose bodies, after their hands and feet had been cut
off, were hung up by David beside the pool in Hebron; in 2 S 21:12 of the
bodies of Saul and Jonathan, which were hung up by the Philistines at
Beth-shan. The fuller expression ‘(hang) upon a tree’ (עַל־עֵץ) occurs in Gn 40:19; Dt 21:22; Jos 8:29;
10:26 bis, Est 2:23 (in which last
passage it is possible that impaling of the dead
bodies is meant; cf. Herod. iii. 125, ix. 78; Plutarch, Artax. 17, Timol. 22;
Justin, xxi. 4). The Deuteronomic code regulated the Jewish practice (cf.
Philo, de Spec. Leg. § 28) as
follows:—‘If a man have committed a sin worthy of death and he be put to death,
and [after his death] thou hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all
night upon the tree, but thou shalt surely bury him the same day, for he that
is hanged is accursed of God (קִלְלַת אֱלהִים, LXX κεκατηραμένος ὑπὸ θεοῦ, Aq. Theod. κατάρα θεοῦ, not
‘a curse, i.e. reproach, insult to God,’ as one school of Jewish
interpreters understood it), that thou defile not thy land which the Lord thy
God giveth thee for an inheritance’ (Dt 21:22f., where see Driver’s note). This
prescription is noted as having been carried out in the case even of the kings
executed by Joshua (Jos 8:29; 10:27). The requisite publicity has been attained
by sunset and the land has been cleansed from the defilement affecting it. (On
‘exposure’ of this kind and its religious meaning see W. R. Smith, RS1 351 n.). The exposure of
the bodies of Saul’s sons (2 S 21:9ff.) day after day was either exceptional,
or reflects the practice of an age that was a stranger to the mildness of the
Deuteronomic code (cf. Benzinger, Heb.
Arch. 333).
The LXX equivalent of תָּלָה is κρεμάννυμι, which appears also in the NT in Lk
23:39; Ac 5:30; 10:39; Gal 3:13, the only difference from OT usage being that
it is used in all these passages of the hanging of a living body upon a cross. The language of Dt 21:23, although it had of course no direct
reference to crucifixion, could readily be transferred to it, and evidently was
so transferred by the Jews, as we can gather from Gal 3:13. It was the hanging
up, not the death, that brought disgrace upon the sufferer, and the epithet Tālûi (תָּלוּי ‘the hung’), derived from Dt 21:23, is
frequently applied in contempt to Jesus by the later Jews. See the very
instructive note of Lightfoot, Galatians6,
152ff. (John A. Selbie, “HANGING,” in A Dictionary of the Bible: Dealing with Its Language, Literature, and
Contents Including the Biblical Theology, ed. James Hastings et al., 2
vols. [New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1912], 2:298, emphasis in bold added)
Jeremiah’s mention of princes being “hung up by their hands” (Lam.
5:12) by the Babylonians may refer to the use of a crossbeam. But there is no
way of knowing whether the prophet speaks of a method of execution or the
dishonoring of bodies killed in battle. The classical Greek historians
Herodotus and Thucydides refer to the stake or cross as a method of execution
during the time of the Persians. But it is not clear whether the victim was
tied or nailed to the wood or impaled. (“Cross” in Nelson’s New Illustrated Bible Dictionary, ed. Ronald F. Youngblood, F. F. Bruce, and
R. K. Harrison [Nashville, Tenn.: Thomas Nelson, Inc., 1995], Logos
Bible Software edition)
κρεμάννυμι, κρεμάω (formed from the
aor. ἐκέμασα), κρεμάζω and the popular κρεμνάω, are not common in the Gk. Bible.1
The Heb. original is usually תלה
or תלא. The range of meaning is the same in both
Gk. and Heb. κρεμάννυμι,
from the Indo-Germ. root qer, is
commonly linked with the Gothic hramjan,
“to crucify” (OHG rama, “frame”), though this is more likely connected with the
Germanic qrom, “lattice-frame.” The
word means “to hang (on or from)” (compounds with ἐπι-, ἐκ-),
“to hang on the gallows,” “to be suspended.” The dep. κρέμαμαι is used intr. In the Gr. OT the ref. in
Ez. 15:3 is to the hanging of all kinds of vessels, and in Cant. 4:4; Ez.
27:10, 11 to that of shields, helmets and quivers, cf. musical instruments in ψ 136:2 and amulets in Ez. 13:18 (Heb.
Hexapla, not the Mas.). At Ez. 17:22 the verb is used for “to plant” in the
Mas. In 1 Macc. 1:61 and 2 Macc. 6:10 the children of Jewish women who are to
be executed are hung on their breasts or around their necks. Acc. to Job 26:7
the earth hangs on nothing, and 2 S. 18:9, 10 tells how Absalom was hanging in
the branches (תזק) and swung between heaven and earth (נתן). The κρεμάμενος of 18:10 led to the use of κρέμαμαι for תזק
and נתן in 18:9. In Ac. 28:4 the snake hangs from
the hand of Paul (κρεμάμενον
… ἐκ τῆς χειρός).
. . .
2. Gl. 3:13.
The verb is most commonly used in the Bible to denote judicial
hanging.
In the OT Law this punishment is in general only a supplement to
stoning. The reference is thus to the hanging of corpses. This is
so in the basic law of Dt. 21:22, 23, which even after the loss of national
independence still controls inner Jewish relationships. This may be seen from
the exposition of the Law in Joseph., in which the ordinance of Dt. 21:22, 23
is given in the following form (Ant., 4, 202): ἁ δὲ βλασφημήσας θεὸν καταλευσθεὶς (stoned) κρεμάσθω διʼ ἠμέρας καὶ ἀτίμως καὶ ἀφανῶς θαπτέσθω. It is also shown by individual OT
instances of the hanging of the dead acc. to the law of Israel, cf. Jos. 8:29;
10:26; 2 S. 4:12 (תלה);
Jdt. 14:1, 11; 2 Macc. 15:33. To be sure, Jos. 8:29 does not say explicitly
that the king of Ai was put to death first, but this is most likely in view of
the usual practice and the original context. The LXX no longer makes a sharp
distinction, however, between the OT law of hanging corpses and the more
general practice of putting to death by hanging, impaling or crucifixion. In
Jos. 8:29: τὸν βασιλέα τῆς Γαι ἐκρέμασεν ἐπὶ ξύλου διδύμου, it seems to have had crucifixion in
view; this is why the διδύμου
is independently added. In the translation traced back to Σ two other instances deserve mention. In
Nu. 25:4 and 2 S. 21:6, 9, 13, the Mos. has the rare and difficult verb יקע. For this the LXX uses παραδειγματίζειν in Nu. but in Βας. it has ἐξηλιάζειν, “to abandon or expose to the sun.” Σ uses the present word, Ἀ has ἀναπήγνυμι in both instances. Perhaps they are
confusing יקע with תקע,
which means “to fasten to,” “to affix,” and which the LXX occasionally renders πήγνυμι. It thus follows that κρεμάννυμι and ἀναπήγνυμι are used as equivalents of תקע, “to affix with nails,” and both in the
sense “to hang or affix on the cross,” “to impale.” Naturally, the translators
could well be selecting the term which to them seemed best to fit the sense. In
Nu. 25 and 2 Βασ.
21 neither the original nor the translations refer to the ancient Israelite
punishment of exposing corpses, but to impaling as the main punishment. Σ uses the present verb for this even
though it really has a different sense in the sphere of OT law. Ἀ seems to link ἀναπήγνυμι with the same conception. On Nu. 25 in Σ Thdrt. (MPG, 80, p. 396b) observes: τοῦ μέντοι λαοῦ ἡμαρτηκότος οἱ ἄρχοντες ἐκρεμάσθησαν, ὡς ὁ Σύμμαχος ἔφη, ὡς μὴ ἐξάραντες τὸ πονηρὸν ἐξ αὐτῶν. A use fixed by the astral cult seems to
underlie 2 Βασ. 21:6; the later Gk.
translators then interpret this in the light of familiar penal practice. In many OT passages the Heb. תלה
does not refer to the supplementary Heb. punishment but to the customs of
hanging, impaling and crucifixion customary elsewhere. Thus Egyptian practice
underlies Gn. 40:19, 22; 41:13, and Mesopotamian practice underlies Lam. 5:12; 1
Εσδρ. 6:31 and the
relevant verses in Est. In 1 Εσδρ. the translator is responsible for κρεμασθῆναι ἐπὶ ξύλου. The Mas. is זְקִיף יִתְמְחֵא, which in 2 Εσδρ. 6:11 (the later transl. of the same
book) is rendered ὠρθωμένος παγήσεται. In both
translations ξύλον
is used for “beam,” but in this context it must be given the sense of “stake.”
Thus the distinction between the Israelite and the non-Israelite practice of
hanging, which is linguistically not very emphatic in the Mas., is completely
obliterated in the Greek versions.
In this light one may see why it is that in the NT at Lk. 23:39 (Mt.,
Mk. συσταυροῦσθαι); Ac. 5:30;
10:39 (cf. 2:23 προσπήγνυμι;
2:36; 4:10 σταυρόω) the present verb
is used for crucifixion (→ σταυρός), and why it is that both on the Christian and also on the Jewish
side OT passages, esp. Dt. 21:23, can be adduced as material parallels in the
polemical and apologetical discussion of the fact of the crucifixion.
The LXX rendering of Dt. 21:23 (κεκατηραμένος ὑπὸ θεοῦ πᾶς κρεμάμενος ἐπὶ ξύλου) is not wholly literal. Πᾶς and ἐπὶ ξύλου are not found in the Mas. and are thus
marked with asterisks in the Hexapla tradition. The typologically significant
addition ἐπὶ ξύλου (→ ξύλον) derives from the many passages in which it is found in the original
Heb. A literal translation of the Mas. כּי קִלְלַת אֱלֹהִים תָּלוּי is given by ἈΘ:
κατάρα θεοῦ κρεμάμενος. Similarly, in Gl. 3:13a Paul first uses
the noun κατάρα; the ἐπικατάρατος in 13b comes from Dt. 27:26, which has
been quoted just before in Gl. 3:10. Σ
takes a different line: διὰ
τὴν βλασφημίαν τοῦ θεοῦ ἐκρεμάσθη. This presupposes an obj. gen. and ὕβρις (mockery) θεοῦ or λοιδορία θεοῦ for קִלְלַת אֱלֹהִים, for which there are par. elsewhere. On the other hand Ἀ, Pl.
and the Rabb. tradition (Sanh., 6, 4) take κατάρα θεοῦ as a subj. gen. The Rabb. tradition
regularly applies the word תלה
to Jesus. This is obviously intentional. It places Jesus under the curse of Dt.
21:23, and groups him with Haman, who was hanged, and with
Absalom, whose fate was equivalent to hanging. It was the κρεμάννυμι of the LXX which made this understanding
possible. Perhaps Gl. 3:13 shows that Paul had to meet this kind of objection
from the very first. The significance of Paul’s answer is stated by Justin as
follows: ἡμῶν τονοῖ τήν ἐλπίδα ἐκκρεμαμένην ἀπό τοῦ σταυρωθέντος Χριστοῦ. For Paul, and therewith for early
Christianity, the curse was made a blessing, and the OT passages which refer to
Christ point forward to this. Worth noting in this connection is the typology
of a free rendering of נֶאֱחָז
in Gn. 22:13, the story of the offering of Isaac; this refers to the ram which
was caught in a thicket. Hebr. and Syr. have κρεμάμενος for it, and Melito of Sardis notes that
this rendering is to be introduced: ώς σαφέστερον τυποῦν τὸν σταυρόν. (Georg Bertram, “Κρεμάννυμι
(κρεμάω), Κρέμαμαι, Ἐκκρέμαμαι,” TDNT 3:915-16, 917-19)
