The great river of Egypt; frequently referred to in the Bible.
The Authorized Version everywhere renders the word employed,
"ye'or," by "river." "Ye'or" has no Semitic etymology (as, e.g.,
Lagarde and Fr. Delitzsch have claimed), but is a
transliteration of late Egyptian "yoor," earlier "y(e?)tor" =
"river." The plural is used of the branches of the Nile in the
delta (seven large branches in antiquity, and many small
canals), to which especially Isa. vii. 18 and Ezek. xxix. 3
(alluding to their defensive value; comp. Isa. xxxiii. 21,
xxxvii. 25) refer. Only in Dan. xii. 5, 6, 7 the expression is
used of the Tigris. In Job xxviii. 10 it refers apparently in
some technical sense to mines. That Egypt's existence depended
exclusively on the Nile and its yearly inundations in summer
(caused by the spring rains in the mountains of Abyssinia) is
indicated in Gen. xli. 2; that it furnished even all the
drinking-water is shown by Ex. vii. 18, 21, 24, and Ps. lxxviii.
44. Therefore the Prophets used the symbolical thre