Levi
Levi/Levy ( /ˈliːvaɪ/, Hebrew: לֵּוִי; Levy Lēwî ; "joining") was, according to the Book of Genesis, the third son of Jacob and Leah, and the founder of the Israelite Tribe of Levi (the levites). Certain religious and political functions were reserved for the Levites, and the early sources of the Torah—the Jahwist and Elohist—appear to treat the term Levi as just being a word meaning priest; scholars therefore suspect that "levi" was originally a general term for a priest, and had no connection to ancestry, and that it was only later, for example in the priestly source and Blessing of Moses, that the existence of a tribe named Levi became assumed, in order to explain the origin of the priestly caste.
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Famous quotes containing the word levi:
“Human memory is a marvelous but fallacious instrument.... The memories which lie within us are not carved in stone; not only do they tend to become erased as the years go by, but often they change, or even increase by incorporating extraneous features.”
—Primo Levi (1919–1987)
“Christ never came this far, nor did time, nor the individual soul, nor hope, nor the relation of cause to effect, nor reason nor history.”
—Carlo Levi (1902–1975)
“The bond between a man and his profession is similar to that which ties him to his country; it is just as complex, often ambivalent, and in general it is understood completely only when it is broken: by exile or emigration in the case of one’s country, by retirement in the case of a trade or profession.”
—Primo Levi (1919–1987)