Massa
Mas'sa (Heb. Massa', מִשָּׂא, a liftiing up, as often; Sept. Μασσῆ), one of the sons of Ishmael (B.C. post 2061), who became the progenitor of an Arabian clan (Ge 25:14; 1Ch 1:30). The tribe is usually, and not improbably, compared with the Masani (Macavol, Ptol. v. 19, 2), inhabiting the Arabian desert towards Babylonia, doubtless the same as the lascei, a nomad tribe of Mesopotamia (Pliny, H. N. 6:30). This would confirm Forster's theory that the twelve sons of Ishmael peopled the whole of the Arabian peninsula (Geogr. of Arabia, 1:284). As Dumah is named in connection with Seir (Isa 21:11), there is some foundation for the opinion that Massa was a kingdom of considerable size, possibly reigned over by king Lemuel (Pr 30:1, הִמִּשָּׂא, "the prophecy"). SEE LEMUEL. Hitzig arbitrarily locates Dumah in wady el-Kora, about fifty miles south-east of Akabah, and then places Massa between it and Mount Seir (Zeller's Johrbuch, 1844, p. 288). SEE DUMAH.
