Meshech

AI summary: Meshech functions in Scripture as a far-off northern name that conveys distance and foreignness. In the Psalms it can stand almost as shorthand for alien surroundings, while Ezekiel places Meshech within the trading world and then within the threatening coalition gathered against God's people. That makes the name useful both for real ethnographic memory and for symbolic portrayal of hostile distance. The cross references present Meshech as a remote northern people whose name carries commercial, geographic, and apocalyptic overtones.¹

Drawing out, the sixth son of Japheth (Gen. 10:2), the founder of a tribe (1 Chr. 1:5; Ezek. 27:13; 38:2, 3). They were in all probability the Moschi, a people inhabiting the Moschian Mountains, between the Black and the Caspian Seas. In Ps. 120:5 the name occurs as simply a synonym for foreigners or barbarians. “During the ascendency of the Babylonians and Persians in Western Asia, the Moschi were subdued; but it seems probable that a large number of them crossed the Caucasus range and spread over the northern steppes, mingling with the Scythians. There they became known as Muscovs, and gave that name to the Russian nation and its ancient capital by which they are still generally known throughout the East” ³