That the city of Jerusalem is called by various names, Lyranus shows on Genesis chapter 28, in these two verses:
Solyma, Luza, Bethel, Hierosolyma, Jebus, Aelia — the holy city is called “Jerusalem,” and “Salem.”
But in these [names] not so much the art [of the verse] as the matter is to be regarded. And first we must treat of the most usual and most celebrated of the ancient names — namely, Salem [and] Jerusalem.
Concerning Salem, then, it must be known, first, that by this name “peace” (which is more usually called shalom) is signified — as the Apostle is author (Hebrews 7, verse [2]), and our Interpreter [Vulgate] (Psalm 75 [76]), when he renders: “In peace is His place made.” Secondly: by St. Jerome (in the book On Hebrew Places) Salem seems to be reckoned threefold. One, which is Shechem — and this [is] beyond doubt among all; although Villalpandus (on Ezekiel) would have Salem [to be] an epithet of Shechem itself, not [its] proper name (in which way, at Genesis 33, verse 18, for “Jacob passed over into Salem, the city of the Sichemites,” the Innovators [Protestants] Junius and Tremellius translate, “Jacob came safe to the city of Shechem”). The second, which was near the western side of Aelia, or Jerusalem, in the time of Eusebius, or of St. Jerome himself. The third, at the eighth milestone from Scythopolis, in the plain — a village which is called Salumias. And thus some understand the words of St. Jerome. But to me it truly seems that St. Jerome there acknowledges only two: one, which is not Shechem itself, but [a place] of Shechem, or which belonged to Shechem as to [its] metropolis. For so he speaks in the cited little book On Places: “Salem, a city of the Sichemites, which (namely, Sichem) is Shechem.” And in the Epistle to Evagrius, Salim is called a town of the metropolis Shechem. And Salem is situated in the plain, and is distant from Scythopolis (or Beisan) 8
miles. For in the same little book, near the end of the letter “A,” [Jerome] says thus: “Aenon near Salim, where John baptizes, as it is written in the Gospel according to John; and the place is shown even now, at the eighth milestone from Scythopolis, toward the south, near Salim and the Jordan.” Whence it appears that those words of his, in the same [book] — “Also at the eighth milestone from Scythopolis, in the plain, a village is called Salamias” — are to be referred to the former Salem, from which he had taken the beginning of [his] discourse. But the other Salem [is] near to Jerusalem, set opposite it toward the west.
Thirdly. Yet it seems a third Salem must be added, which is Jerusalem itself. For [in] Psalm 75 [76], where our [Vulgate], as I said a little before, renders “peace,” the Chaldaean [Targum] said, “in Jerusalem His place is made”; and therefore there is added, “And His habitation in Sion.” And it is the common opinion of nearly all that Jerusalem was also called Salem — to which Josephus adheres, and in this place also Masius, and R. P. Salmerón (Prolegomenon 42), [and] Arias (in the book On Jerusalem); nay, even St. Jerome himself (in the Epitaph of Paula): “she entered,” he says, “the three-named city, Jebus, Salem, Jerusalem”; and [in] the Epistle to Dardanus: “Thy metropolis, O Judaea — first Jebus, then Salem, thirdly Jerusalem.”
Fourthly. The Salem whose King Melchizedek is written to have been (Genesis 14, verse 18) is thought by Josephus to be the third Salem, that is, Jerusalem; and very many agree with him. But by St. Jerome [it is thought to be] the first, which is also Salim. His words, in the Epistle about Melchizedek to Evagrius, are these: “A town near Scythopolis, which to this day is called Salem; and there is shown the palace of Melchizedek, which, by the magnitude of [its] ruins, shows the magnificence of the ancient work — concerning which, in the latter part of Genesis also, it is written: ‘Jacob came to Socoth’ (that is, ‘to tents’), ‘and built himself houses there, and tents, and passed over into Salem, a city of the region of Shechem, which is in the land of Chanaan.’ It must also be considered that Abraham, returning from the slaughter of the enemies — whom he pursued as far as Dan (which today is called Paneas) — was on the road not from Jerusalem, but from the town of the metropolis Shechem. Of which we also read in the Gospel: ‘Now John was baptizing in Aenon near Salim, because there were many waters there.’ Nor does it matter whether they name it Salem or Salim, since the Hebrews very rarely use vowel-letters in the middle [of words], and the same words are pronounced with different sounds and accents according to the will of readers and the variety of regions.” Yet these reasons of St. Jerome do not carry me away from the common opinion. First: because Abraham then dwelt not in Shechem, but in Hebron (Genesis 13, verse 18; chapter 14, verse 13), and therefore the road for him returning thither was not far from Jerusalem. Then: because the valley — which is also called “the King’s valley” (Genesis 14, verse 17) — is not far from Jerusalem (2 Kings [2 Samuel] 18, verse 18).
Fifthly. The village which, near Jerusalem, in Eusebius’s time was called by the name of Salem itself: either, after [Jerusalem] was built up (of which a little later) and the word “Jerusalem” began to flourish, [the village] retained that simpler name, as it were certain deserted remnants; or [the name] was once transferred from that place to the city of Jerusalem itself — [being] common to both on account of [their] nearness. But let us now treat of the compound [name].
I. Today, in the Hebrew text, it is written Ierushalaim; and so it is frequently called by the Innovators [Protestants] of religion and of speech, from whom [they] have also coined an entirely new word in their [own language]…
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…in the version of Junius and Tremellius, Ierusalaim and Ierusalayma, as in the notes on chapter 14 of Genesis. To me, however — since the present-day points [vowel-points] did not exist of old, as I have often said, and as St. Jerome too indicated a little before — the ancients seem to have read Ierusalem. For so the most ancient Seventy read [it], and so the Chaldaeans read [it] even today; and, as to the last syllable, [so do] the Syrians, when they call [it] Urischlem, as may be seen throughout the whole New Testament.
II. But from what the name is derived, [there are] various opinions. For, first, Josephus — and our [authors], says St. Jerome (Epistle to Evagrius) — all think that the name Hierusalem is compounded of Greek and Hebrew: namely, from the Greek ἱερόν [hieron, “sacred thing / temple”] and the Hebrew Salem. But this, says the same St. Jerome, the very mixture of a foreign tongue shows to be absurd. I add that Josephus says it consistently neither with himself nor with others. Not with himself: because in book 7 of the Antiquities, chapter 3, he says that τὸ ἱερόν is called by the Greeks “walls,” and that, because David surrounded the old Salem with walls, it was therefore so called; but in book 7 of the [Jewish] War, chapter 18, he gives [as] the cause, that Melchizedek built τὸ ἱερόν — that is, the temple — in the same Salem (which [view] Hegesippus embraced, book 7, chapter 3, as [he did] almost all the other [opinions] of Josephus). Not with others: because neither David, nor Melchizedek, nor any others at all from [that] region then commonly used the Greek tongue.
Secondly. It seems to Lyranus (chapter 1) and to Adrichomius (book On Jerusalem, no. 1) that it is called Hierusalem as if Iebusalem, one letter being changed into another for the sake of euphony. Thirdly. From the holy possessors after David, as if ioresch; for iarasch is “to enter upon an inheritance,” “to possess something by inheritance.” So Postellus, in his Cosmography, folio 8. Fourthly. Others derive [it] from ruum, which is “to be high,” and salem, with Iod prefixed — which [letter is] otherwise often formative of proper names, as in Israel, Ismael, Jacob, Isaac, and the like — so that Ierusalem is “high Salem,” because the city was steep in [its] site (as Tacitus says, book 5 of the Histories; and as our Prophet [says], Psalm 86 [87]: “founded on the holy mountains”; and likewise Jeremiah, chapter 30, verse 18: “the city shall be built upon its own height”) — and so that it may thus be distinguished from the other Salem, which is Shechem, concerning which St. Jerome [speaks] in the cited place. Fifthly, from raah, which is “to see,” and Salem, which is “peace” — so that, as was said above from the Apostle, Ierusalem [is] “the vision of peace,” or “the city in which peace is seen.” And this derivation, before the others, pleases me. First, because when Abraham, about to sacrifice his son, was asked by him — since otherwise the fire and the sword were at hand there — where then the victim was, he answers (verse 7): “God will see for Himself,” or “will provide.” And afterward, when God had supplied a ram in Isaac’s stead, and had provided for Himself concerning the victim, Abraham called the name of that place “God will see” (verse 14); and from that time afterward that mountain was called “The Lord will see,” as is added in the same place. But that name is there today written in Hebrew in two ways: once, Iehovah ireh; then, Iehovah ierae — of which the former properly means “The Lord will see,” but the latter, “The Lord will be seen,” or “will appear.” But afterward that ineffable name of the Lord was dropped, and the latter word was aptly joined with the ancient name of that place, and [the name] was made [and] called Ierusalem (Baruch 4, verse 30): “Be of better courage, O Jerusalem; for He who named thee will exhort thee” — that is, “will exhort [thee] by leading [thee] to comfort and peace,” or “will console thee.” For
in Greek it is παρακαλέσει σε ὁ ὀνομάσας σε [“He who named thee will console thee”]. The allusion, namely, is to God Himself, from whom it received the name (as was said above), and to the “peace” which [the city], by its own name, conveys. And some say that, according to the Hebrew letter, it is read: “Be of better courage, O Jerusalem; for He who named thee will console thee.” And although this is altogether the same as what has already been said according to the Latin and Greek letter, yet I wonder where they read that Hebrew text, since it is not [found] at all in the Hebrew Bibles. Thirdly. This formation of its name agrees nicely with a similar one. For [in] Judges 6, verse [32], Gideon was called Jerubbaal, because his father had said, Iareb [bo] habbaal — that is, “let Baal avenge himself on him,” or “let him contend against that Baal.” Fourthly. This is the common opinion — even of more recent [writers], such as Masius, Arias, and the like — which seems to be approved by the Church, since in the dedication of a church she sings:
Blessed city Jerusalem, called the vision of peace.
Hence also [in] Psalm 83 [84]: “The God of gods shall be seen in Sion.” And [in] Luke 2, when that most blessed old man Simeon saw Christ the Lord in the temple of Jerusalem itself: “Now,” he says, “Thou dost dismiss Thy servant, O Lord, for my eyes have seen Thy salvation.” But Arias seems to join this [interpretation] with the former, which regarded “height,” below (chapter 15, page 437), when he says: “The name Ierusalem signifies the same as ‘high,’ or ‘conspicuous,’ ‘peace to be beheld,’ and ‘perfection’; because, in order that it might be distinguished from the other Salem in the same region, it received the prefix Ieru, [a thing] to be of great mystery of amplitude.”
III. But why it is read today in Hebrew as Ierusalem in the dual number — mystical reasons are wont to be brought forward by some: for example, that by it might be signified the figure of that other, twofold Jerusalem — namely, of the Church militant and triumphant; that there might be shown to us a twofold peace to be sought — spiritual and bodily, eternal and temporal, with us and with others — through Him who is our peace (Ephesians 2), who appeared there, and was seen in the temple, the dwelling of peace — seen, I say, with [His] twin nature; and to whom, when born, the heavenly ones sang: “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men of good will.” And these and other similar reasons are not disapproved by me, provided they be held [as] secondary, and some primary [reason] be found. This [primary one] some say to be, that Jerusalem was as it were twofold — upper and lower — as Arias Montanus explains (in the Apparatus, in the book On the Site of Ancient Jerusalem): built, namely, upon two chief mountains, as Tacitus relates (book 5 of the Histories): “Two hills,” he says, “of immense height, walls enclosed — [walls] slanted by art, or curved inward.” But at the time at which Joshua came into Chanaan, not yet was each [part of the] city raised up, but only one of them; and therefore it appears that in the Hebrew was read only Ierusalem [in the singular]. But the later Rabbis, in order to show the amplitude of this city now [so] named, and to amplify [it] by the very sound, put a little chirik point beneath, and so begot the dual number from the singular. And from these two Hebrew names are derived those two [forms] used by the Greeks, Solyma and Hierosolyma. For Stephanus Byzantinus [is] ridiculous, when he fetches Solyma from the Solyman mountains — since those are in Pisidia, and the Solymi, in Homer, are a Southern people, like the Aethiopians…
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…[like the Aethiopians], as Strabo explains (book 1), and the insipid Tacitus — when [he derives it] “from Hierosolymus [as] leader” [these] foolish [men, follow him] in the same [author], book 5 of the Histories; who, as he himself says, “have handed down that the Solymi, a nation celebrated in the poems of Homer, gave to the city [they] founded the name Hierosolyma, from their own [name].” But the wicked Lysimachus — who, in Josephus (book 1 Against Apion), at the end, [derives it] ἀπὸ τῆς ἱεροσυλίας, that is, “from sacrilege” — says that at first, indeed, the city was called by [its] founders ἱεροσύλα [“temple-robbery”], because the Jews, coming into Chanaan, plundered and burned all the shrines of the gods, and out of those spoils raised up this city; but afterward, by [their] posterity, on account of its infamy, [it was] called ἱεροσόλυμα. For, as Josephus rightly objects against him, it is certain that the Hebrews imposed Hebrew, not Greek, names on things; and the Hebrew Ierusalem signifies something far other than the Greeks’ τὸ ἱεροσύλαν, as [was] expounded above.
Now, as to the other names which Lyranus recited before in his Distich — Luza and Bethel — these are not names of Jerusalem itself, as is clear from those things which are said [at] Genesis 28, verse [19], and from St. Jerome (book On Hebrew Places), where [he says] that Bethel is distant from Jerusalem 12 miles toward Neapolis (or Shechem); and again, that Luza — which is the same as Bethel — is distant from the same Shechem 3 miles. But Iebus (or Iebusi) was named from its inhabitant, the Jebusite (below, chapter 18, verse 28; Judges 9, verses 10, 11, 14; 1 Paralipomenon [Chronicles] 11, verses 4 & 5). And Aelia was so called for this reason: that the Emperor Aelius Hadrian had utterly overthrown the former Jerusalem, not leaving a stone upon a stone, and in its place — not, indeed, in the very same spot, yet a near one — built, as it were, a new city out of its ruins, to which he gave a name from himself. For so St. Jerome [says] often, as in the Epitaph of Paula: “Jerusalem was afterward raised up by Aelius Hadrian, out of the ruins and ashes of the city, into Aelia.” On chapter 1 of Joel: “We read of Aelius Hadrian’s expedition against the Jews, who so burned Jerusalem and its suburbs, that out of the remnants and embers of the city he founded a city of his own name, Aelia.” On Jeremiah, chapter 19: “The name of the city of Jerusalem itself is today void [disused], and by Aelius Hadrian it is called Aelia; and, together with [its] former habitation, it lost also [its] former name, to shake off the pride of its inhabitants.” And this name [Aelia] is very frequent in Eusebius’s little book On Places; but by some it is called, not precisely Aelia, but Aelia Capitolina — as [it is] used by Ptolemy (book 5 of the Geography): “ἱεροσόλυμα,” he says, “or [as it is] now called Aelia Capitolina.” And in [the life of] Hadrian, Dio — or Xiphilinus from him: “When he had led a colony into the city of Jerusalem, which had been overthrown, and which he called Aelia Capitolina, and had caused another [temple], of Jupiter, to be built in the place where the temple of God had been, a great and long-lasting war began to be stirred up.” And it is called Capitolina on account of this Jupiter, who [is] Capitolinus — [from his] temple — as Scaliger shows (Animadversions on Eusebius, page 199).
But other names too are gathered by others. First: Eusebius (book On Hebrew Places): “Area Ornea [the threshing-floor of Araunah] is Jerusalem” — nay rather, a place in Jerusalem, where afterward the temple was built (3 Kings [1 Kings], last [chapter]). Secondly: Ariel — Eusebius in the same place, and St. Jerome on Isaiah. Thirdly: Mello [Millo], according to Postellus in [his] Cosmography; but it was only a place in Jerusalem, concerning which [see] 3 Kings [1 Kings]. Fourthly: Libanus [Lebanon], according to the Chaldaean Paraphrast [Targum], chapter 4 of the Canticle [Song of Songs], verse 15 — or
on account of [its] beauty and height, or on account of the whiteness of the temple — concerning which [see] Josephus ([Jewish War], book 6, chapter 14). Fifthly: Tsedek, [so named] by Masius in this place, because [its king] is called Adoni-zedek, like Melchizedek. But if Jerusalem had been Tsedek, there would have been no need to add “King of Salem,” as is added [in] Genesis 14, and to the Hebrews 7 — especially since, according to Masius, Salem is Jerusalem. (Another account of the royal name will be given later, in Question 5.) Sixthly: today it is called by the Turks Quds Mubarak, that is, “the blessed sanctuary,” as Scaliger — cited before — says (Animadversions on Eusebius, page 212).
That its founder is sometimes said by Josephus to be Melchizedek, and sometimes David, I said above; [and that] Moses and the Jews [are made its founders], coming into Chanaan out of Egypt, by Lysimachus; [while] Tacitus (book 5 of the Histories) makes Hierosolymus the leader [its] author. But only that part of the building is to be attributed to David which on Mount Sion was called the “city of David” — since Jerusalem already existed, and he had occupied it only by great force and labor (2 Kings [2 Samuel] 5). And that Jerusalem already existed before the coming of the children of Israel out of Egypt, [their king] Adoni-zedek is a witness. But [the story of] Hierosolymus the leader [is] a mere fable — as also [are] the Solyman mountains and peoples, as regards the beginning of this city. About Melchizedek [it is] probable indeed, yet not certain.
But concerning its site, construction, extent, and exploits, things to be admired could truly be written, no less aptly than what was written about the city of Rome by Lipsius and Stapleton; but these [things lie] now outside the dance-floor [the scope] of this place. Let Arias, Adrichomius, Abulensis, Salmerón, [and] Villalpandus be consulted, in the places indicated. By the Prophets it is certainly called “the holy city,” or “holy” (Isaiah 52; Daniel 9; Nehemiah 2); and by the Evangelists (Matthew 4 & 27; Apocalypse 21); by David, “the city of God” (Psalm 86 [87]), “the city of the Lord of hosts, and of the great King” (Psalms 45, 47 [48]), “the fortified city” (Psalm 107 [108]); by Jeremiah (Lamentations 2), “a city of perfect beauty, the joy of the whole earth”; by Tacitus, near the beginning of book 5 of the Histories, “a famous city, and steep in [its] site”; by Pliny (book 5, chapter 14), “by far the most illustrious of the cities of the East.”