Belial
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See also: Bélial
English
Alternative forms
Etymology
From Latin Bĕlĭal, from Hebrew בְלִיַּעַל. (This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium. Particularly: “What is etymological meaning?”) Of uncertain origin. It has been conventionally been interpreted as בְּלִי (“without”) + a word meaning "use" (hence "useless, worthless"), but it is unclear what the latter word is.
Pronunciation
Proper noun
Belial
- (mythology) A wicked demon in Christian and Jewish apocrypha.
- 2016 February 24, Nancy Rosenfeld, The Human Satan in Seventeenth-Century English Literature: From Milton to Rochester, Routledge, →ISBN, page 93:
- Here, too, the poet calls attention to Belial's role as one who blurs the borderline between essence and appearance: Belial himself seems fair (physically attractive), but is empty inside, and Milton was surely aware that in Hebrew the first syllable of the fallen angel's name means without.
Translations
a wicked demon in Christian and Jewish apocrypha