Javan

or ION, (for the Hebrew word, differently pointed, forms both names,) was the fourth son of Japheth, and the father of all those nations which were included under the name of Grecians, or Ionians, as they were invariably called in the east. Javan had four sons, by whom the different portions of Greece Proper were peopled: Elisha, Tharsis, Chittim, and Dodanim. Elisha, Eliza, or Ellas, as it is written in the Chaldee, and from whom the Greeks took the name of ‘Ελληνες, settled in the Peloponnesus; where, in the Elysian fields and the river Ilissus, his name is still preserved. Tharsis settled in Achai; Chittim, in Macedonia; and Dodanim, in Thessaly and Epirus; where the city of Dodona gave ample proof of the origin of its name. But the Greeks did not remain pure Javanim. It appears from history that, at a very early age, they were invaded and subjugated by the Pelasgi, a Cuthite race from the east, and by colonies of Phenicians and Egyptians from the south: so that the Greeks, so famous in history, were a compound of all these people. The aboriginal Greeks were called Jaones, or Jonim; from which similarity of sound, the Jonim and the Javanim, although belonging to two essentially different families, have been confounded together. Javan is the name used in the Old Testament for Greece and the Greeks. See DIVISION OF THE EARTH.

Ja´van, the fourth son of Japhet. The interest connected with his name arises from his being the supposed progenitor of the original settlers in Greece and its isles [NATIONS, DISPERSION OF].

The fourth son of Japheth, Gen 10:2,4 . This name is the same as the Greek Ion, whence comes Ionia, and it is understood that Javan was the ancestor of the Greeks. See GREECE.\par

Ja’van. (clay).

1. A son of Japheth. Gen 10:2; Gen 10:4. Javan was regarded as the representative of the Greek race. The name was, probably, introduced into Asia by the Phoenicians, to whom the Ionians were naturally better known than any other of the Hellenic races, on account of their commercial activity, and the high prosperity of their towns, on the western coast of Asia Minor.

2. A town in the southern part of Arabia (Yemen), whither the Phoenicians traded. Eze 27:19.

1. Son of Japheth, father of Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim (Gen 10:2; Gen 10:4). The same as Ionia, the branch of the Greek race best known in the East, so expressing the Greeks generally. Yavnan is the Assyrian designation in cuneiform inscriptions of Sargon’s time. Yuna is their Persian designation in Persepolitan inscriptions. In Isa 66:19 James is one representative of the Gentile world. Its commerce in "the persons of men (slaves) and vessels of brass" with Tyre is mentioned Eze 27:13. In Joe 3:3; Joe 3:6, God reproves the nations because "they have given a boy for (as price for prostitution of) an harlot, and sold a girl for wine," especially Tyre and Sidon; "the children of Judah and Jerusalem have ye sold unto the Grecians (sons of Javan), that ye might remove them far from their border." Others from the mention of "Sabeans" (Joe 3:8) think Javan in Arabia is meant. (See 2).

Some germs of civilization probably passed into Greece through Jewish slaves imported from Phoenicia. Greece, and her king Alexander, is prophetically mentioned (Dan 8:21; Dan 10:20; Dan 11:2). God in retribution for the enslaving of Judah’s children (Zec 9:13) declares He will fill His bow with Judah and Ephraim as His arrows, and "raise up thy sons, O Zion, against thy sons, O Greece"; fulfilled partly in His raising up the Jewish Maccabees against Antiochus Epiphanes the representative of Greece; hereafter to be exhaustively consummated in Israel being made victorious over the last antichrist, Antiochus’ antitype.

2. In Eze 27:19 Javan is a Greek settlement in Arabia. Then instead of "going to and fro" translated "from Uzal." the capital of Arabia Felix or Yemen, Sanaa. However KJV yields good sense: all peoples, whether near as the Israelite "Dan" on the sea coast, or far off as" Javan," or the Greeks who "go to and fro," frequented thy fairs with "iron, cassia," etc. brought from various quarters.

Javan (jâ’van), day. 1. A son of Japheth. Gen 10:2; Gen 10:4; Isa 66:19; Eze 27:13. Javan was regarded as the representative of the Greek race. The name was probably introduced into Asia by the Phœnicians, to whom the Ionians were naturally better known than any other of the Hellenic races, on account of their commercial activity and the high prosperity of their towns on the western coast of Asia Minor. 2. A town in the southern part of Arabia (Yemen), whither the Phœnicians traded. Eze 27:19.

[Ja’van]

Fourth son of Japheth, and father of Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim and Dodanim. "From these came the distribution of the isles of the nations." Gen 10:2; Gen 10:4; 1Ch 1:5; 1Ch 1:7. Corresponding to this is Isa 66:19, where God sends His messengers to Javan, to the isles afar off, where His glory shall be made known. In Dan 8:21, where the Hebrew is the same, Alexander the Great is king of Javan, agreeing with Dan 10:20; Dan 11:2; , Zec 9:13 that Javan refers to Greece. In Eze 27:13 the Javan that traded with Tyre doubtless also refers to Greece; but in Eze 27:19 it is supposed to point to southern Arabia, the verse being better translated "Vedan and Javan of Uzal traded in thy markets," etc.

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By: Emil G. Hirsch

Name of one of the seven sons of Japheth, given in the list of nations (Gen. x. 2, 4; comp. I Chron. i. 5, 7), and as such the progenitor of Elisha, Tarshish, the Hittim, and the Dodanim (Rodanim). The word corresponds to the Greek Ἰων, the plural of which is Ἰονες, with the digamma between the a and o (see Homer's "Iliad," xiii. 685). The Greek name denotes the Ionians, settled, when the list of Genesis was written, on the mainland of Greece and on the islands of the Ægean Sea as well as along the coast of Asia Minor. The Greeks were designated by this name in Assyrian ("Ya-wa-nu" [Greece], "Yawnai" [Greek]; Schrader, "K. A. T." 2d ed., pp. 87 et seq.) and in Old Persian, and the name was used in this sense by the Syrians, the Arabs, and the Egyptians. The question is still open whether in the Old Testament "Javan" connotes the Greeks, in keeping with this usage of other ancient peoples, or merely the Ionians proper. According to Stade ("De Populo Javan," Giessen, 1880), the term stands for the Ionians of Asia Minor in all pre-Persian passages of the Old Testament (e.g., Ezek. xxvii. 13; Isa. lxvi. 19, and therefore also in Gen. x. 2, 4). It has the wider significance in Joel iii. 6 (Persian age), Zech. ix. 13, and Dan. viii. 21.

In these passages the context shows merely that a distant country is meant (Isa. lxvi. 19) into which Israelites were sold as slaves (by the Phenicians and Philistines; Joel iii. 6). Something of this kind is certainly also referred to in Zech. ix. 13; in fact Ezekiel (xxvii. 13) speaks of "Ionian" (or Greek) slave-trading in the markets of Tyre. In Ezek. xxvii. 19 the word "Javan" is either a corruption of the text (in view of the circumstance that in verse 13 it is used in a clearly different meaning from that required here; see Cornill, "Ezekiel," pp. 351 et seq.), or it designates an Arabic people. Glaser ("Skizze der Gesch. und Geographie Arabiens," ii. 428) suggests that in this verse it is the name of the place called "Jain," not very far from Medina.

In Talmudic literature "Javan" stands unquestionably for Greece (e.g., in Yoma 10a); "lashon Yewanit" means the Greek language. In late Hebrew "Javan" denotes the Russians, because they belong to the Greek Catholic Church; therefore Nathan Nate Hanover calls his description of the Chmielnicki persecution "Yewen Meẓulah," punning on Ps. lxix. 3. In Yiddish literature and in the parlance of the Russian Jews "Javan" (pronounce "Yoven") denotes the soldier. So Perez in his sketch "Der Meshullaḥ": "Bei Yoven is a gut Cheder" = "Military service is a good training."

Bibliography:

Ed. Meyer, Die Heimat der Ionier, in Philologus, new series, iii. 479 et seq.;

Fr. Lénormant, Histoire Ancienne de l'Orient, i. 296, Paris, 1881;

idem, Les Origines de l'Histoire, etc., i., ii. 1-29, Paris, 1884;

Fr. Delitzsch, Wo Lag das Paradies? pp. 248-250, Leipsic, 1881;

W. Max Müller, Asien und Europa, p. 370, ib. 1893;

Stade, De Populo Javan, Giessen, 1880 (now incorporated in Reden und Abhandlungen, ib. 1899);

Ed. Meyer, Gesch. des Altertums, i. 490-494, ii. 433, 685 et seq., Stuttgart, 1883-84.

JAVAN, the Heb. rendering of the Gr. Iaôn, ‘Ionian, is a general term in the Bible for Ionians or Greeks; very similar forms of the name occur in the Assyrian and Egyptian inscriptions. In the genealogical table in Gn (Gen 10:2; Gen 10:4) and 1 Ch (1Ch 1:5; 1Ch 1:7) Javan is described as a son of Japheth and the father of Elishah, Tarshish, Kittim, and Dodanim (or better, Rodanim, i.e. Rhodes); from the reference to Kittim (Kition) as his son, it is possible that the passage refers particularly to Cyprus. In Isa 66:19 Javan is included among the distant countries that will hear of Jahweh’s glory; in Joe 3:6 the sons of the Javanites are referred to as trading in Jewish captives with the Phœnicians and Philistines; in Eze 27:13 Javan, with Tubal and Meshech, is described as trading with Tyre in slaves and vessels of brass. In all three passages the references are to the Ionian colonies on the coast of Asia Minor. In Eze 27:19 Javan appears a second time among the nations that traded with Tyre; clearly the Ionians are not intended, and, unless the text is corrupt (as is very probable), the reference may be to an Arab tribe, or perhaps to a Greek colony in Arabia. In Dan 8:21; Dan 10:20; Dan 11:2, where ‘the king,’ ‘the prince,’ and ‘the kingdom’ of Javan are mentioned, the passages have reference to the Græco-Macedonian empire.

L. W. King.

jā´van (יון, yāwān, meaning unknown):

(1) In Gen 10:2, Gen 10:4 = 1Ch 1:5, 1Ch 1:7 Septuagint Ἰωυάν, Iōuán; Isa 66:19; Eze 27:13 Septuagint Ἑλλάς, Hellás, Greece); Dan 8:21 m; Dan 10:20; Dan 11:2; Zec 9:13; Joe 3:6 (Hebrew 4:6) Septuagint ὁι Ἑλληνες, hoi Héllēnes, i.e. “Greeks”), “son” of Japheth, and “father” of Elisha, Tars, Kittim, and Rodarim, i.e. Rhodes (incorrectly “Dodanim” in Gen 10:4). Javan is the Greek Ἰάων, Iáōn or Ἰάων, Iá(v)ōn, and in Gen and 1 Ch = the Ionian Greeks of Asia Minor, probably here = Cyprus. The reference in Eze 27:13 (from which that in Isa 66:19 is copied) is the country personified. In Joel the plural יונים, y^ewānı̄m, is found. In Dan the name is extended to the Greeks generally. Corroboration of the name is found in Assyrian (Schrader, editor, Keilinschriftliche Bibliothek, II, 43). “The Persian Yauna occurs in the same double reference from the time of Darius; compare Aesch. Pers., 176, 562” (Skinner, Gen, 198). In Egyptian the word is said to be y^ev^an-‛n’a; in the Tell el-Amarna Letters Yivana is mentioned as being in the land of Tyre. See HDB, II, 552b.

(2) Place (Eze 27:19); the name is missing in Septuagint.