Belial

Belial (also known as Beliar) is a term occurring in the Hebrew Bible which later became personified as the devil in Jewish and Christian texts.

The term belial (בְלִיַּעַל bĕli-yaal) is a Hebrew adjective meaning "worthless." The etymology of the word is traditionally understood as "lacking worth", from two common words: beli- (בְּלִי "without-") and ya'al ( יָעַל "value").

Some scholars translate it from Hebrew as "worthless" (Beli yo'il), while others translate it as "yokeless" (Beli ol), "may have no rising" (Belial) or "never to rise" (Beli ya'al). Only a few etymologists have assumed it to be an invented name from the start.

It occurs twenty-seven times in the Masoretic Text, in verses such as Proverbs 6:12, where the KJV translates the Hebrew phrase adam beli-yaal as "a naughty person.

In the Hebrew text the phrase is either "sons of Belial" or simply "sons of worthlessness." Phrases beginning with "sons of" are a common semitic idiom such as "sons of destruction" "sons of lawlessness".

Of these 27 occurrences, the idiom "sons of Belial" (בְּנֵֽי־בְלִיַּעַל beni beliyaal) appears 15 times to indicate worthless people, including idolaters (Deuteronomy 13:13), the men of Gibeah (Judges 19:22, 20:13), the sons of Eli (1 Samuel 2:12), Nabal, and Shimei. In the King James Version of the Christian Bible, these occurrences are rendered with "Belial" capitalised:

In modern versions these are usually read as a phrase:

"Belial" is applied to ideas, words, and counsel, to calamitous circumstances, and most frequently, to worthless men of the lowest sort—for example, men who would induce worship of other gods; those of Benjamin who committed the sex crime at Gibeah; the wicked sons of Eli; insolent Nabal; opposers of God’s anointed, David; Rehoboam's unsteady associates; Jezebel's conspirators against Naboth; and men in general who stir up contention. Indicating that the enemy power would no longer interfere with the carrying out of true worship by his people in their land, YHWH declared through his prophet: "No more will any worthless person pass again through you. In his entirety he will certainly be cut off."

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