Eknoyan Garabed
Renal Section, Department of Medicine, Baylor College of Medicine, Houston, TX 77030, USA.
J Am Soc Nephrol. 2005 Dec;16(12):3464-71. doi: 10.1681/ASN.2005091007. Epub 2005 Nov 2.
The kidneys, always used in the plural (kelayot), are mentioned more than 30 times in the Bible. In the Pentateuch, the kidneys are cited 11 times in the detailed instructions given for the sacrificial offering of animals at the altar. Whereas those instructions were for purification ceremonies at the Temple, sacrificial offerings were made subsequently in seeking divine intervention for the relief of medical problems. In the books of the Bible that follow the Pentateuch, mostly in Jeremiah and Psalms, the human kidneys are cited figuratively as the site of temperament, emotions, prudence, vigor, and wisdom. In five instances, they are mentioned as the organs examined by God to judge an individual. They are cited either before or after but always in conjunction with the heart as mirrors of the psyche of the person examined. There is also reference to the kidneys as the site of divine punishment for misdemeanors, committed or perceived, particularly in the book of Job, whose suffering and ailments are legendary. In the first vernacular versions of the Bible in English, the translators elected to use the term "reins" instead of kidneys in differentiating the metaphoric uses of human kidneys from that of their mention as anatomic organs of sacrificial animals burned at the altar. This initial effort at linguistic purity or gentility has progressed further in recent versions of the Bible, in which the reins are now replaced by the soul or the mind. The erosion may have begun in the centuries that followed the writing of the Bible, when recognition of the kidneys as excretory organs deprived them of the ancient aura of mysterious organs hidden deep in the body but accessible to the look of God. At approximately the same time, Greek analytical philosophy argued that the brain, which is never mentioned in the Bible, was the most divine and sacred part of the body. This argument gained ground in the past century, when the functions of the brain were elucidated, and ultimately established in the 1960s, when salvaging the kidneys for transplantation necessitated a change in the definition of death as irreversible brain function. It is ironic that advances in understanding kidney function and in nephrology that made kidney transplantation feasible may have contributed, albeit indirectly, to the gradual elimination of the metaphoric mention of human kidneys in the Bible.
肾脏，在圣经中总是用复数形式（kelayot）提及，出现超过30次。在《摩西五经》中，在关于在祭坛上献祭动物的详细说明中，肾脏被提及11次。虽然这些说明是关于圣殿中的净化仪式，但随后进行献祭是为了寻求神的干预以缓解医疗问题。在《摩西五经》之后的圣经书卷中，主要是在《耶利米书》和《诗篇》中，人的肾脏被比喻为性格、情感、审慎、活力和智慧的所在之处。在五个例子中，它们被提及是上帝用以审判一个人的被检查器官。它们要么在提及心脏之前，要么在之后，但总是与心脏一起被提及，作为被检查者心理的镜子。也有提到肾脏是对实际犯下或被认为犯下的轻罪进行神圣惩罚的所在之处，特别是在《约伯记》中，约伯的苦难和疾病是传奇性的。在最初的英文圣经白话译本中，翻译者选择使用“腰部”一词而非肾脏，以区分人类肾脏在隐喻用法与作为在祭坛上焚烧的献祭动物的解剖器官的提及。这种在语言纯净或文雅方面的初步努力在圣经的最新版本中进一步发展，现在“腰部”已被灵魂或心智所取代。这种演变可能在圣经写成后的几个世纪就已开始，当时对肾脏作为排泄器官的认识使它们失去了隐藏在身体深处但能被上帝审视的神秘器官的古老光环。大约在同一时间，希腊分析哲学认为，圣经中从未提及的大脑是身体最神圣的部分。这一观点在过去一个世纪中得到认可，当时大脑的功能被阐明，并最终在20世纪60年代确立，当时为了肾脏移植而挽救肾脏需要改变死亡定义为不可逆转的脑功能。具有讽刺意味的是，理解肾脏功能和肾脏病学的进展使肾脏移植成为可能，这可能间接导致了圣经中对人类肾脏隐喻提及的逐渐消失。
