TY baker
never hit bottom
7 mins to collision
I want $1 for every time they say excited
the asteroid did not kill itsealf
they used to clap only after a successful mission
well, did it fucking move, or not?
she's cute
2 major missions
targeting computer
and studying the kinetic results
I just don't want to wait
every telescope that can, watched the trajectory change
we shouldn't have to wait too long
SERAPHIM שׂרפים
I. The word ‘Seraphim’ is the name given to the beings singing the trishagion to →Yahweh as king in Isa 6:2–3 and carrying out an act of purification in vv 6–7. The Seraphim are now generally conceived as winged →serpents with certain human attributes. The word śārāp has three occurrences in the Pentateuch (Num 21:6, 8; Deut 8:15) and four in Isa (6:2, 6; 14:29; 30:6). It is generally taken as a derivative of the verb śārap, to “burn”, “incinerate”, “destroy”. Since the verb is transitive, śārāp probably denotes an entity that annihilates by burning. While the etymological sense is thus “the one who burns (the enemies etc.)”, the term refers several times to some serpentine being. According to some scholars the connection with the Heb verb śārap is only a secondary association, the original etymon being Eg sfr / *srf (cf. srrf), “griffin” (JOINES 1974: 8 and 55 n. 15; GÖRG 1978).
II. The study of the ancient Near Eastern evidence, esp. iconographic representations, has been instrumental in the attempts to clarify the meaning and background of the seraphim. While some scholars have hinted that the seven thunders of →Baal and his lightning bolts or their iconography might provide illuminating parallels (cf. ANEP no. 655), there is now an emerging consensus that the Egyptian uraeus serpent is the original source of the seraphim motif (JOINES 1974; DE SAVIGNAC 1972). This interpretation was worked out by KEEL (1977:70–124) who was able to adduce iconographic evidence showing that the uraeus motif was well known in Palestine from the Hyksos period through the end of the Iron Age (on scarabs and seals). During the 8th century BCE the two-winged and, in Judah especially the four-winged, uraeus is a well attested motif on seals, while six-winged uraei do not seem to occur. Friezes with uraei (without wings) are found in Egyptian and Phoenician chapels. The English term “uraeus” is a loan-word from Greek which was in turn taken from the Egyptian word for the cobra figure worn on the forehead of Egyptian gods and kings, whom the cobra protects by means of her “fire” (poison). Among the Egyptian designations for the uraeus one finds the word ʒḫt, “flame”. The pre-eminent cobra deity in Egypt was the crown god Uto.
III. Previous attempts to take the two occurrences in Isa 6:2, 8 as more or less distinguished from the rest of the attestations (BDB 977) have now been generally abandoned. In the Pentateuch we find Yahweh sending hannĕḥāšîm haśśĕrāpîm, “the fiery serpents” (RSV), among the people (Num 21:6), commanding →Moses to make →Nehushtan, “fiery serpent” (Num 21:8). The desert is the place of “fiery serpents” (Deut 8:15), the abode of “the flying serpent” (śārāp mĕʿôpēp, Isa 30:6). In Isa 14:29 “the flying serpent” is used as a political metaphor for a new leader: “… for from the serpent’s root will come forth an adder, and its fruit will be a flying serpent.” That all five of the passages apart from Isa 6, understand śārāp to be a serpentine being is clear from the terminology used in the contexts in question, and two passages explicitly mention a winged serpent.
In Isa 6, the seraphim appear in connection with the enthroned heavenly king, →Yahweh Zebaoth. The following may be said about their position, form, number and function. Their position, ʿōmĕdîm mimmaʿal lô, “standing above” Yahweh (v 2), lends itself to comparison with the raised uraei on the chapel friezes, where the uraei are however without wings. Whether their shape is serpentine or more humanoid is a matter of dispute. As for number, there are probably two seraphim in Isa 6 (cf. v 3a). Concerning their function Isa 6 displays a noteworthy mutation of the uraeus motif (KEEL 1977: 113): instead of protecting Yahweh the seraphim need their wings to cover themselves from head to feet from Yahweh’s consuming holiness; Yahweh does not need their protection. Isaiah thus uses the seraphim to underscore the supreme holiness of the God on the throne.
IV. The seraphim occur a number of times in the pseudepigrapha and later Jewish literature (see OTP 2, index sub seraphim and J. MICHEL, RAC 5, 60–97). The seraphim, →cherubim and ophanim are described as “the sleepless ones who guard the throne of his glory” (1 Enoch 71:7).
Mettinger, T. N. D. (1999). Seraphim. In K. van der Toorn, B. Becking, & P. W. van der Horst (Eds.), Dictionary of deities and demons in the Bible (2nd extensively rev. ed., pp. 742–743). Brill; Eerdmans.