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not expressly named. But perhaps it is meant by הזּהב. The gullah above the candlestick which Zechariah saw was, according to Zec 4:12, provided with two golden pipes, in which were two olive trees standing on either side, which sunk therein the tuft-like end of their branches, of which it is said that they emptied out of themselves hazzahav into the oil vessels. Here it is manifest that hazzahav means, in the one instance, the precious metal of which the pipes are formed; and in the other, the fluid gold of the oil contained in the olive branches. Accordingly, Hitzig understands gullath hazzahav here also; for he takes gullah as a figure of the body, the golden oil as a figure of the soul, and the silver cord as a figure of vital energy.
Thus, with Hitz., understanding gullath hazzahav after the passage in Zechariah, I have correctly represented the meaning of the figures in my Psychol. p. 228, as follows: - “The silver cord = the soul directing and bearing the body as living; the lamp hanging by this silver cord = the body animated by the soul, and dependent on it; the golden oil = the spirit, of which it is said, Pro 20:27, that it is a lamp of God.” I think that this interpretation of the golden oil commends itself in preference to Zöckler's interpretation, which is adopted by Dächsel, of the precious fluidum of the blood; for if hazzahav is a metaphorical designation of oil, we have to think of it as the material for burning and light; but the principle of bright life in man is the spirit (ruahh hhayim or nishmath hhayim); and in the passage in Zechariah also, oil, which makes the candlestick give light, is a figure of the spirit (Ecc 12:6, ki im-beruhhi). But, as one may also suppose, it is not probable that here, with the same genit. connection, הכסף is to be understood of the material and the quality; and hazzqahav, on the contrary, of the contents. A golden vessel is, according to its most natural meaning, a vessel which is made of gold, thus a vessel of a precious kind. A golden vessel cannot certainly be broken in pieces, but we need not therefore understand an earthenware vessel only gilded, as by a silver cord is to be understood only that which has a silver line running through it (Gesen. in the Thes.); רצוּץ may also denote that which is violently crushed or broken, Isa 42:3; cf. Jdg 9:53. If gullath hazzahav, however, designates a golden vessel, the reference of the figure to the body, and at the same time of the silver cord to the vital energy or the soul, is then excluded, - for that which animates stands yet above that which is animated, - the two metallic figures in this their distribution cannot be comprehended in this reference. We have thus to ask, since gullath hazzahav is not the body itself: What in the human