56 Sotah 10b (מדורי “habitations”, a play on the word מדורה “fire-place”); for the various descriptions of hell and paradise comp. Index, s.v. “Hell and Paradise”. The place where Moloch was worshipped (comp. the preceding note), according to the description in the older Midrashim, consisted of seven compartments (Ge ben Hinnom is thus modelled after Gehinnom). The allegoric interpretation of the seven compartments as symbolizing the sevenfold punishment is found not only in Ezra 7. 80–81, but also among the later Kabbalists; comp. Zohar II, 150b, and Azulai, Hesed le-Abraham, 51d. Rather strange is Mishle 7, 57, which speaks of fourteen compartments of hell (the text is not to be emended, as it is based on the interpretation of שבעתים as “two times seven”), whereas the rabbinic sources (in addition to those mentioned above, comp. also Tehillim 11, 100 and 101) and the Babylonian myth concerning the descent of Ishtar into hell know only of seven compartments.
57 The names vary in the different versions; comp. ‘Erubin 19a; Tehillim 11, 100 and 101; PRK, Grünhut’s edition, 77, and vol. I, p. 10.
58 Seder Rabba di-Bereshit 15; Konen 35 (bottom; read ע׳ אלפים פחות ת״ק); comp. further Alphabet R. Akiba 28; BHM V, 50; vol. I, p. 10. The numbers given in Konen concerning the dimensions of hell presuppose a “distance of 500 years” as a unit. Comp. vol. I, p. 11.
59 Seder Rabba di-Bereshit 19–20; BHM V, 49–50. Comp. further vol. II, pp. 311–312, as well as vol. III, p. 37. On serpents which have venom instead of blood, see King, Creation Tablets, 16 and 50.
60 Masseket Gehinnom 147. On the different kinds of fire comp. vol. II, p. 310; vol. III, p. 244; vol. IV, p. 199. See further Alphabet R. Akiba 81; PRK, 16a; Sefer Yezirah (not in our text) in Mahzor Vitry 319. On the Persian origin of this legend, comp. Darmesteter in R.E.J. I, 186, and Kohut, Angelologie, 32–33.
61 BR 1.3 and 3.8 (according to one opinion the angels were created as late as the fifth day, simultaneously with the other winged creatures), as well as 11.9; Tan. B. I, 1 and 12; ShR 15.22; PRE 4; Tehillim 24, 204; 76, 373–374; 104, 442; Konen 25. Reminiscences of the old view, according to which the angels were created on the first day (Jub. 2.2; 2 Enoch 29.3; Apocalypse of Baruch 21.6), have been preserved even in authoritative Midrashim, but particularly in the mystic literature. In the latter an attempt is made to har-
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