Elihu:

By: Emil G. Hirsch , Eduard König

Name of several Biblical personages. It has two forms— and —and its meaning is "He is my God," i.e. , "He remains my God and does not change," not as G. Hoffmann ("Hiob," 1891, p. 23) renders it: "He is my God," i.e. , "My God is the only true God." The most famous bearer of this name is found in the Book of Job (xxxii. 2-6, xxxiv. 1, xxxv. 1, xxxvi. 1), where he is described as the son of Barachel ( ), and a descendant of Buz ( ). Since the latter, according to Gen. xxii. 21, was a son of Abraham's brother Nachor and a brother of Huz ( ), the ancestor of Job, it follows that Elihu, the Buzite, was a distant relative of Job. The Assyrian equivalent of the land of Buz is "Bazu," designating a region probably east of Damascus (Friedrich Delitzsch, "Assyrische Lesestücke," 4th ed., 1901, p. 192). Elihu is therefore described asa non-Israelite living during the patriarchal period, like Job and other personages of the book named after him. Elihu is the speaker in ch. xxxii.-xxxvii., and his argument is as follows: God is the educator of mankind, who punishes only until the sinner has atoned for his sin and recognizes his wrong-doing. Then God has attained His object, to "bring back his soul from the pit, to be enlightened with the light of the living" (xxxiii. 17-30). Elihu, therefore, holds a middle ground, maintaining that God neither "takes away judgment," nor sends suffering merely as a punishment, but acts as the educator and teacher of mankind (xxxiv. 5; xxxv. 1, 14; xxxvi. 10, 22). As regards the relation of Elihu's speeches to the Book of Job, see Job, Book of .

Among the Israelites the following bore the name of Elihu: (1) Samuel's great-grandfather (I Sam. i. 1); (2) a brother of David (I Chron. xxvii. 18); (3) a chief of the tribe of Manasseh, who joined David when the latter fled to Ziklag (I Chron. xii. 20); (4) one of the Korhites (I Chron. xxvi. 7).