Dabria
1:
DABRIA (PERSON) [Lat Dabria]. One of the five scribes whom Ezra was instructed to take with him in restoring the Scriptures (2 Esdr 14:24). In the 14th chap. of 2 Esdras God speaks to Ezra out of a bush, bidding him to reprove the living generation. Ezra accepts the responsibility but is apprehensive of those who are yet to come. The holy Scriptures had been burnt (2 Esdr 14:21; cf. 2 Kgs 25:8–9), and those who wish to live in the end time may be left in darkness without the light of Torah. Ezra prays for inspiration to restore the Scriptures. God directs Ezra to prepare many writing tablets and to employ the five scribes, Sarea, Dabria, Selemia, Ethanus, and Asiel, whose expertise was to write rapidly. At Ezra’s dictation they take turns writing for 40 days in characters which they do not know (2 Esdr 14:42), probably in the square Hebrew characters.
Bibliography
Ararat, N. 1972. Ezra and His Activity in the Biblical and Post-Biblical Sources. Beth Mikra 17: 451–92.
Jin Hee Han
Freedman, D. N. (1996, c1992). The Anchor Bible Dictionary (1:1232). New York: Doubleday.
