The noun πτερυξ (pterux) means wing, but a wing in Biblical times was not the same thing as a wing now. Our noun derives from the unused noun πτερον (pteron), meaning feather or plumage, and shares its Proto-Indo-European root "pet-", meaning to rush or fly, with the verb ποταομαι (potaomai), to fly about, and ultimately the familiar noun ποταμος (potamos), meaning stream or river. That means that to the ancient Greek, a wing was not the proverbial instrument of flight but rather the proverbial instrument of flow and ultimately that of protection. Early humans, after all, began to seek each other in order to find protection from the wilderness and its forces and predators.

As we overly discuss in our article on the name Tigris, ancient civilizations commonly arose in association with great rivers. Since any culture is kept together by the knowledge (i.e. skills, artistry, traditions, stories) shared by its participants, and knowledge is associated with light, there is a strong narrative correlation between shining light and flowing water — hence the Hebrew verb that means to flow (what a river does) is the same as the verb that means to shine (what a lamp does), namely נהר (nahar), which in turn demonstrates that the ancients were familiar with Relativity Theory.

The Hebrew word for feather, namely אבר (abir), also means to be strong, hence the name Abir, which is an epithet of YHWH, which in turn is both the "personal name" of God as well as that of the alphabet (for a variety of reasons but also since, obviously, the Alphabet is the father of the Word). And that means that the Lord has wings (Psalm 91:4).

The first active deed of the Word in the Bible comes with his introduction to Abraham, when he says: "Abraham, don't fear, I am a shield to you" (Genesis 15:1). Hence the verb עוף ('up) means both to fly and to cover. The noun כנף (kanap), in turn, denotes either a wing or a winged creature, which is a creature that proverbially shields rather than one that proverbially flies.

As we discuss at length in our article on the noun αγγελος (aggelos), meaning messenger or angel, in antiquity wings were things that protected, which is why being winged was associated with the accumulation of knowledge, and thus with writing, and thus with a flow of light and thus with rivers.

Our noun is used 5 times in the New Testament, see full concordance, and from it derives:

Obviously related to the above, the verb πετομαι (petomai) means to use wings. A modern reader may immediately associate the term "use of wings" with a taking off into flight, but to the ancients, the "use of wings" much rather had to do with the gathering together of vulnerable young and shielding them against predators, the rays of the sun, and their own foolish desire to wander off. This magnificent and often misinterpreted verb is used 5 times in the New Testament, see full concordance, and from it derives:

The noun πτερνα (pterna) means heel; the aft end of one's foot opposite one's toes. The Greek word for foot is πους (pous) and the Hebrew is רגל (regel), and both may refer to one's physical and figurative foundation. How the Greek word for heel came to look like the words for feathers and flight isn't immediately clear, but a living language evolves just like the living biosphere, and words, just like animals, may evolve a convergent similarity in form that does not demonstrate an actual kinship. Still, Greek mythology obviously played with this link, both in the pedila, or winged sandals, of Hermes (which in Rome became the talaria of Mercury), and the vulnerable tendon of the otherwise uncompromisable Achilles.

In Hebrew canon the heel is featured prominently in both inculpation and redemption: from the promise that the serpent would bruise the man's heel (Genesis 3:15), to the story of Jacob, who would be Israel, who was born by holding onto the heel of his twin brother Esau (Genesis 25:26). A skeleton found at Giv'at ha-Mivtar (in Jerusalem) shows that Romans crucified at least some of their victims by driving nails though their heels (Psalm 22:16).

We humans are plantigrade, which means that our entire foot, from toes to heel, is flat on the ground while standing or periodically while walking. All primates are plantigrade, and so are bears, rodents, rabbits and kangaroos (and hyraxes), but that's where the list ends. All other animals are digitigrade and walk on their toes (and fingers, if you will). Curious enough, plantigrade locomotion appears to be the evolutionary original, from which digitigrade locomotion derived. Walking on toes allows for much greater speeds, but when a predator's advantage of a faster attack is met by the prey's advantage of a faster retreat, neither has gained much, and digitigrade gives no real advantage.

Humans are old-school flat-footers, who kept their heels on the ground and sought advantage over their enemies in other areas than speed. Their bipedal posture required plantigrade to retain stability, and their ability to stand upright greatly helped them to retain their social network, even when the individuals were relatively far apart. Above we briefly discuss Jesus' temptation to "fall to earth", which clearly describes a similar devolution or counter-evolution as digitigrade: a novelty that initially seems very advantageous, but which can't be contained and which spreads through the entire arena until no actual net advantage remains and the opportunity costs account for a negative return on investment.

Note, for instance, that Hebrew vowel notation retains considerable ambiguity, since the symbols for vowels may also be used for consonants: the written word דוד, for instance, may be the noun dod, meaning beloved, and also the name David, and the two are told apart solely by the reader's discretion. The Greek language dropped several of the Hebrew consonants (most notably the glottal plosives) or used their symbol to mark vowels. That is how the Hebrew letter א (aleph), which is a glottal plosive consonant, shouldn't be confused with the Greek letter α (alpha), which is a vowel, even though they share their name and their place in the alphabet. The Greek alphabet and the Latin one that followed it, don't have the interpretive freedom of the Hebrew one. The precision that modern alphabets command is, of course, more than welcome in our scientific age, but it appears that verbal ambiguity requires a kind of alertness from its reader that greatly benefits the reader, or at least in the long run (pun intended). As we discuss in our article on the name YHWH, this name consists entirely of symbols that may both convey a vowel or a consonant, and its power derives wholly from this duality.

Our noun πτερνα (pterna) occurs in the New Testament in John 13:18 only, which quotes Psalm 41:9, where the Psalmist speaks of his close friend who once ate his bread but now has lifted his heel against him. This is commonly (and rather liberally) interpreted to indicate some unspecified sort of deceit, but the ancients were pastorals and obviously realized that fast-movers walked on their toes, with lifted heels. The phrase "lifting the heels" is not a colloquium but rather speaks of the adoption of digitigrade locomotion, in favor of speed and at the price of stability, bipedalism and ultimately mankind's celebrated social network and thus his ratio and reason.

The noun καταπετασμα (katapetasma) describes the temple's inner veil, which separated the Holy Place from the Holy of Holies, and which ripped top to bottom on the moment that Jesus died on the cross. It occurs 6 times in the New Testament; see full concordance.

Our noun καταπετασμα (katapetasma) appears to be formed from the common prefix κατα (kata), meaning down from, down upon, and the verb πεταννυμι (petanummi), to fly or rather to spread out or spread wide. This verb later morphed into the more common forms πεταω (petao), πετω (peto) and πετομαι (petomai), to fly, flutter or be on the wing. These words obviously all derive from the same Proto-Indo-European root "pet-", meaning to rush or fly (of both birds and rivers) as the above.

But that means that our word described a hanging, broadly spread curtain. The author of the letter to the Hebrews equates this veil with the flesh of Christ (Hebrews 10:20), and that may take some mental gymnastics to square.

The Bible, like any piece of literature of a certain quality, tells stories that are true on multiple levels of complexity, not in the sense of allegory or metaphor but of self-similarity. It's clear that the temple was an earthly manifestation of heavenly patterns (Exodus 26:30, Hebrews 8:5) but what is not often emphasized that the heavenly and earthly patterns themselves consist of multiple self-similar layers (1 Thessalonians 1:7, Hebrews 9:23). Subsequently, the story of the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ too has a very broad range of manifestations in observable reality, and is true quite literally from the atomic level up to biology and psychology and the most complex structures of human society.

Here at Abarim Publications we are particularly fond of the way the story of Jesus' death and resurrection applies to the mammalian reproductive cycle. In our article on the name Stephen we explore this version of affairs in more detail, but the gist of it is that the whole of humanity is self-similar to a single human female, and Jesus her first ripe ovum. His preaching (i.e. hormonal secretion) sets the maternal body into conniptions, until he is unanimously expelled and enters the tomb that is the Fallopian tube. There the ovum is wholly severed from the maternal economy and literally outside the mother's body (it doesn't have to cross a membrane and is thus as "outside" as any object held in one's hand). But the Father's Spirit "resurrects" the ovum from the dead, and gives him a soul independent from the mother's. The mother's body receives the ovum back, but the ovum is now no longer just another cell of her larger body but a zygote, that will grow into a fetus, and eventually is born: as a whole other humanity beside the original one.

In this particular application of the story, the ripping veil corresponds to the rupture of the ovarian follicle, which becomes the corpus luteum.