PATRIARCHAL PALESTINE
BY
THE REV. A.H. SAYCE
PROFESSOR OF ASSYRIOLOGY, OXFORD
WITH A MAP
PUBLISHED UNDER THE DIRECTION OF THE TRACT COMMITTEE
LONDON:
SOCIETY FOR PROMOTING CHRISTIAN KNOWLEDGE,
NORTHUMBERLAND AVENUE, CHARING CROSS, W.C.;
43, QUEEN VICTORIA STREET, E.C.
BRIGHTON: 129, NORTH STREET.
NEW YORK: E. & J.B. YOUNG & CO.
RICHARD CLAY & SONS, LIMITED,
LONDON & BUNGAY.
[Illustration: THE CHIEF PLACES MENTIONED IN THE BOOKS OF GENESIS AND
EXODUS]
PREFACE
A few years ago the subject-matter of the present volume might have been
condensed into a few pages. Beyond what we would gather from the Old
Testament, we knew but little about the history and geography of Canaan
before the age of its conquest by the Israelites. Thanks, however, to
the discovery and decipherment of the ancient monuments of Babylonia and
Assyria, of Egypt and of Palestine, all this is now changed. A flood of
light has been poured upon the earlier history of the country and its
inhabitants, and though we are still only at the beginning of our
discoveries we can already sketch the outlines of Canaanitish history,
and even fill them in here and there.
Throughout I have assumed that in the narrative of the Pentateuch we
have history and not fiction. Indeed the archaeologist cannot do
otherwise. Monumental research is making it clearer every day that the
scepticism of the so-called "higher criticism" is not justified in fact.
Those who would examine the proofs of this must turn to my book on _The
Higher Criticism and the Verdict of the Monuments_. There I have written
purely as an archaeologist, who belongs to no theological school, and
consequently readers of the work must see in it merely the irreducible
minimum of confidence in the historical trustworthiness of the Old
Testament, with which oriental archaeology can be satisfied. But it is
obvious that this irreducible minimum is a good deal less than what a
fair-minded historian will admit. The archaeological facts support the
traditional rather than the so-called "critical" view of the age and
authority of the Pentateuch, and tend to show that we have in it not
only a historical monument whose statements can be trusted, but also
what is substantially a work of the great Hebrew legislator himself.
For those who "profess and call themselves Christians," however, there
is another side to the question besides the archaeological. The modern
"critical" views in regard to the Pentateuch are in violent
contradiction to the teaching and belief of the Jewish Church in the
time of our Lord, and this teaching and belief has been accepted by
Christ and His Apostles, and inherited by the Christian Church. It is a
teaching and belief which lies at the root of many of the dogmas of the
Church, and if we are to reject or revise it, we must at the same time
reject and revise historical Christianity. It is difficult to see how we
can call ourselves Christians in the sense which the term has borne for
the last eighteen hundred years, and at the same time repudiate or
modify, in accordance with our individual fancies, the articles of faith
which historical Christianity has maintained everywhere and at all
periods. For those who look beyond the covers of grammars and lexicons,
the great practical fact of historical Christianity must outweigh all
the speculations of individual scholars, however ingenious and elaborate
they may be. It is for the individual to harmonize his conclusions with
the immemorial doctrine of the Church, not for the Church to reconcile
its teaching with the theories of the individual. Christ promised that
the Spirit of God should guide His Apostles and their followers into
"all truth," and those who believe the promise cannot also believe that
the "Spirit of Truth" has been at any time a Spirit of illusion.
Oriental archaeology, at all events, is on the side of those who see in
the Hebrew patriarchs real men of flesh and blood, and who hold that in
the narratives of the Pentateuch we have historical records many of
which go back to the age of the events they describe. Each fresh
discovery made by the archaeologist yields fresh testimony to the truth
of the Old Testament stories. Since the manuscript of the present work
was ready for the press, two such discoveries have been made by Mr.
Pinches, to whom oriental archaeology and Biblical research are already
under such deep obligations, and it has been possible only to glance at
them in the text.
He has found a broken cuneiform tablet which once gave an account of the
reign of Khammurabi, the contemporary of Chedor-laomer and Arioch, of
the wars that he carried on, and of the steps by which he rose to the
supreme power in Babylonia, driving the Elamites out of it, overthrowing
his rival Arioch, and making Babylon for the first time the capital of a
united kingdom. Unfortunately the tablet is much broken, but what is
left alludes to his campaigns against Elam and Rabbatu--perhaps a city
of Palestine, of his reduction of Babylon, and of his successes against
Eri-Aku or Arioch of Larsa, Tudghulla or Tidal, the son of Gazza ... and
Kudur-Lagamar or Chedor-laomer himself. The Hebrew text of Genesis has
thus been verified even to the spelling of the proper names. The other
discovery of Mr. Pinches is still more interesting. The name of Ab-ramu
or Abram had already been found in Babylonian contracts of the age of
Khammurabi; Mr. Pinches has now found in them the specifically Hebrew
names of Ya'qub-ilu or Jacob-el and Yasup-ilu or Joseph-el. It will be
remembered that the names of Jacob-el and Joseph-el had already been
detected among the places in Palestine conquered by the Egyptian monarch
Thothmes III., and it had been accordingly inferred that the full names
of the Hebrew patriarchs must have been Jacob-el and Joseph-el. Jacob
and Joseph are abbreviations analogous to Jephthah by the side of
Jiphthah-el (Josh. xix. 14), of Jeshurun by the side of Isra-el, or of
the Egyptian Yurahma by the side of the Biblical Jerahme-el. As is
mentioned in a later page, a discovery recently made by Prof. Flinders
Petrie has shown that the name of Jacob-el was actually borne not only
in Babylonia, but also in the West. Scarabs exist, which he assigns to
the period when Egypt was ruled by invaders from Asia, and on which is
written the name of a Pharaoh Ya'aqub-hal or Jacob-el.
Besides the names of Jacob-el and Joseph-el, Mr. Pinches has met with
other distinctively Hebrew names, like Abdiel, in deeds drawn up in the
time of the dynasty to which Khammurabi belonged. There were therefore
Hebrews--or at least a Hebrew-speaking population--living in Babylonia
at the period to which the Old Testament assigns the lifetime of
Abraham. But this is not all. As I pointed out five years ago, the name
of Khammurabi himself, like those of the rest of the dynasty of which he
was a member, are not Babylonian but South Arabian. The words with which
they are compounded, and the divine names which they contain, do not
belong to the Assyrian and Babylonian language, and there is a cuneiform
tablet in which they are given with their Assyrian translations. The
dynasty must have had close relations with South Arabia. This, however,
is not the most interesting part of the matter. The names are not South
Arabian only, they are Hebrew as well. That of Khammu-rabi, for
instance, is compounded with the name of the god 'Am, which is written
'Ammi in the name of his descendant Ammi-zaduqa, and 'Am or 'Ammi
characterizes not only South Arabia, but the Hebrew-speaking lands as
well. We need only mention names like Ammi-nadab or Ben-Ammi in
illustration of the fact. Equally Hebrew and South Arabian is _zaduqa_
or _zadoq_; but it was a word unknown to the Assyrian language of
Babylonia.
When Abraham therefore was born in Ur of the Chaldees, a dynasty was
ruling there which was not of Babylonian origin, but belonged to a race
which was at once Hebrew and South Arabian. The contract tablets prove
that a population with similar characteristics was living under them in
the country. Could there be a more remarkable confirmation of the
statements which we find in the tenth chapter of Genesis? There we read
that "unto Eber were born two sons: the name of the one was Peleg," the
ancestor of the Hebrews, while the name of the other was Joktan, the
ancestor of the tribes of South Arabia. The parallelism between the
Biblical account and the latest discovery of archaeological science is
thus complete, and makes it impossible to believe that the Biblical
narrative would have been compiled in Palestine at the late date to
which our modern "critics" would assign it. All recollection of the
facts embodied in it would then have long passed away.
Even while I write Prof. Hommel is announcing fresh discoveries which
bear on the early history of the Book of Genesis. Cuneiform tablets have
turned up from which we gather that centuries before the age of Abraham,
a king of Ur, Ine-Sin by name, had not only overrun Elam, but had also
conquered Simurru, the Zemar of Gen. x. 18, in the land of Phoenicia. A
daughter of the same king or of one of his immediate successors, was
high-priestess both of Elam and of Markhas or Mer'ash in Northern Syria,
while Kimas or Northern Arabia was overrun by the Babylonian arms.
Proofs consequently are multiplying of the intimate relations that
existed between Babylonia and Western Asia long before the era of the
Patriarchs, and we need no longer feel any surprise that Abraham should
have experienced so little difficulty in migrating into Canaan, or that
he should have found there the same culture as that which he had left
behind in Ur. The language and script of Babylonia must have been almost
as well known to the educated Canaanite as to himself, and the records
of the Patriarchal Age would have been preserved in the libraries of
Canaan down to the time of its conquest by the Israelites.
Perhaps a word or two is needed in explanation of the repetitions which
will be found here and there in the following pages. They have been
necessitated by the form into which I have been obliged to cast the
book. A consecutive history of Patriarchal Palestine cannot be written
at present, if indeed it ever can be, and the subject therefore has to
be treated under a series of separate heads. This has sometimes made
repetitions unavoidable without a sacrifice of clearness.
In conclusion it will be noted, that the name of the people who were
associated with the Philistines in their wars against Egypt and
occupation of Palestine has been changed from Zakkur to Zakkal. This has
been in consequence of a keen-sighted observation of Prof. Hommel. He
has pointed out that in a Babylonian text of the Kassite period, the
people in question are mentioned under the name of Zaqqalu, which
settles the reading of the hieroglyphic word. (See the _Proceedings_ of
the Society of Biblical Archaeology for May 1895.)
A.H. SAYCE.
_September_ 30, 1895.
THE KINGS OF EGYPT AND BABYLONIA DURING THE PATRIARCHAL AGE.
EGYPT.
Dynasties XV., XVI., and XVII.--Hyksos or Shepherd-kings (from Manetho).
Dynasty XV.--
yrs. mths.
1. Salatis reigned 13 0
2. Beon, or Bnon reigned 44 0
3. Apakhnas, or Pakhnan reigned 36 7
4. Apôphis I reigned 61 0
5. Yanias or Annas reigned 50 1
6. Assis reigned 49 2
Of the Sixteenth Dynasty nothing is known. Of the Seventeenth the
monuments have given us the names of Apôphis II. (Aa-user-Ra) and
Apôphis III. (Aa-ab-tani-Ra), in whose reign the war of independence
began under the native prince of Thebes, and lasted for four
generations.
Dynasty XVIII.-- Manetho.
1. Neb-pehuti-Ra, Ahmes (more than 20 Amosis.
years).
2. Ser-ka-Ra, Amon-hotep I., his son (20 years Amenophis I.
7 months.)
3. Aa-kheper-ka-Ra, Thothmes I., his son, and Chebron.
queen Amen-sit.
4. Aa-kheper-n-Ra, Thothmes II., his son, and Amensis.
wife Hatshepsu I. (more than 9 years).
5. Khnum-Amon, Hatshepsu II., Mâ-ka-Ra ...
his sister (more than 16 years).
6. Ra-men-Kheper, Thothmes III., her brother Misaphris.
(57 years, 11 months, 1 day, from March
20, B.C. 1503 to Feb. 14, B.C. 1449).
7. Aa-khepru-Ra, Amon-hotep II., his son Misphragmuthosis.
(more than 5 years).
8. Men-khepru-Ra, Thothmes IV., his son Touthmosis.
(more than 7 years).
9. Neb-mâ-Ra, Amon-hotep III., his son (more Amenophis II.
than 35 years), and queen Teie.
10. Nefer-khepru-Ra, Amon-hotep IV., Khu-n-Aten Horos.
(also called Khuriya), his son
(more than 17 years).
11. Ankh-khepru-Ra and queen Meri-Aten. Akherres.
12. Tut-ânkh-Amon Khepru-neb-Ra, and queen Rathotis.
Ankh-nes-Amon.
13. Aten-Ra-nefer-nefru-mer-Aten. ...
14. Ai kheper-khepru-ar-mâ-Ra, and queen ...
Thi (more than 4 years).
15. Hor-m-hib Mi-Amon Ser-khepru-ka (more Armais.
than 3 years).
Dynasty XIX.--
1. Men-pehuti-Ra, Ramessu I. (more than 2 years). Ramesses.
2. Men-mâ-Ra, Seti I., Mer-n-Ptah I. (more than Sethos.
27 years), his son.
3. User-mâ-Ra, Sotep-n-Ra, Ramessu II., Mi-Amon ...
(B.C. 1348-1281), his son.
4. Mer-n-Ptah II., Hotep-hi-ma Ba-n-Ra, Mi-Amon, Ammenephthes.
his son.
5. User-khepru-Ra, Seti II., Mer-n-Ptah III., his Sethos Ramesses.
brother.
6. Amon-mesu Hik-An Mer-Khâ-Ra Sotep-n-Ra, usurper. Amenemes.
7. Khu-n-Ra Sotep-n-Ra, Mer-n-Ptah IV., Si-Ptah Thuoris.
(more than 6 years), and queen Ta-user.
Dynasty XX.--
1. Set-nekht, Merer-Mi-Amon (recovered the kingdom from the
Phoenician Arisu).
2. Ramessu III., Hik-An, his son (more than 32 years).
3. Ramessu IV., Hik-Mâ Mi-Amon (more than 11 years).
4. Ramessu V., User-Mâ-s-Kheper-n-Ra Mi-Amon (more than 4 years).
5. Ramessu VI., Neb-mâ-Ra Mi-Amon Amon-hir-khopesh-f (Ramessu
Meri-Tum, a rival king in Northern Egypt).
6. Ramessu VII., At-Amon User-mâ-Ra Mi-Amon.
7. Ramessu VIII., Set-hir-khopesh-f Mi-Amon User-mâ-Ra Khu-n-Amon.
8. Ramessu IX., Si-Ptah S-khâ-n-Ra Mi-Amon (19 years).
9. Ramessu X., Nefer-ka-Ra Mi-Amon Sotep-n-Ra (more than 10 years).
10. Ramessu XI, Amon-hir-khopesh-f Kheper-mâ-Ra Sotep-n-Ra.
11. Ramessu XII., Men-mâ-Ra Mi-Amon Sotep-n-Ptah Khâ-m-Uas
(more than 27 years).
* * * * *
Dynasty I. of Babylon--
1. Sumu-abi, 15 years, B.C. 2458.
2. Sumu-la-ilu, his son, 35 years.
3. Zabû, his son, 14 years.
4. Abil-Sin, his son, 18 years.
5. Sin-muballidh, his son, 30 years.
6. Khammu-rabi, his son, 55 years (at first under the sovereignty of
Chedor-laomer, the Elamite; by the conquest of Eri-Aku and the Elamites
he unites Babylonia, B.C. 2320).
7. Samsu-iluna, his son, 35 years.
8. Ebisum, or Abi-esukh, his son, 25 years.
9. Ammi-satana, his son, 25 years.
10. Ammi-zaduga, his son, 21 years.
11. Samsu-satana, his son, 31 years.
Dynasty II. of Uru-azagga, B.C. 2154--
1. Anman, 51 (or 60) years.
2. Ki-nigas, 55 years.
3. Damki-ili-su, 46 years.
4. Iskipal, 15 years.
5. Sussi, his brother, 27 years.
6. Gul-kisar, 55 years.
7. Kirgal-daramas, his son, 50 years.
8. A-dara-kalama, his son, 28 years.
9. A-kur-du-ana, 26 years.
10. Melamma-kurkura, 6 years.
11. Bel-ga[mil?], 9 years.
Dynasty III., of the Kassites, B.C. 1786--
1. Gandis, or Gaddas, 16 years.
2. Agum-Sipak, his son, 22 years.
3. Guya-Sipak, his son, 22 years.
4. Ussi, his son, 8 years.
5. Adu-medas, ... years.
6. Tazzi-gurumas, ... years.
7. Agum-kak-rimi, his son, ...
years.
* * * * *
(The following order of succession is taken from Dr. Hilprecht.)
14. Kallimma-Sin.
15. Kudur-Bel.
16. Sagarakti-buryas, his son.
17. Kuri-galzu I.
18. Kara-indas,
19. Burna-buryas, his nephew, B.C. 1400.
20. Kara-Khardas, son of Kara-indas.
21. Nazi-bugas, or Su-zigas, an usurper.
22. Kuri-galzu II., son of Burna-buryas, 2. years.
23. Nazi-Maruttas, his son, 26 years.
24. Kadasman-Turgu, his son, 17 years.
25. Kadasman-Burias, his son, 2 years.
26. Gis-amme ti, 6 years.
27. Saga-rakti-suryas 13 years.
28. Kasbat, or Bibe-yasu, his son, 8 years.
29. Bel-nadin-sumi, 1 year 6 months.
30. Kadasman-Kharbe, 1 year 6 months.
31. Rimmon-nadin-sumi, 6 years.
32. Rimmon-sum-utsur, 30 years (including 7 years of occupation of
Babylon by the Assyrian king, Tiglath-Ninip).
33. Mile-Sipak, 15 years.
34. Merodach-baladan I., his son, 13 years.
35. Zamania-nadin-sunii I., 1 year.
36. Bel-sum-iddin, 3 years.
CHAPTER I
THE LAND
Patriarchal Palestine! There are some who would tell us that the very
name is a misnomer. Have we not been assured by the German critics and
their English disciples that there were no patriarchs and no Patriarchal
Age? And yet, the critics notwithstanding, the Patriarchal Age has
actually existed. While criticism, so-called, has been busy in
demolishing the records of the Pentateuch, archaeology, by the spade of
the excavator and the patient skill of the decipherer, has been equally
busy in restoring their credit. And the monuments of the past are a more
solid argument than the guesses and prepossessions of the modern
theorist. The clay tablet and inscribed stone are better witnesses to
the truth than literary tact or critical scepticism. That Moses and his
contemporaries could neither read nor write may have been proved to
demonstration by the critic; yet nevertheless we now know, thanks to
archaeological discovery, that it would have been a miracle if the
critic were right. The Pentateuch is, after all, what it professes to
be, and the records it contains are history and not romance.
The question of its authenticity involves issues more serious and
important than those which have to do merely with history or
archaeology. We are sometimes told indeed, in all honesty of purpose,
that it is a question of purely literary interest, without influence on
our theological faith. But the whole fabric of the Jewish Church in the
time of our Lord was based upon the belief that the Law of Moses came
from God, and that this God "is not a man that He should lie." And the
belief of the Jewish Church was handed on to the Christian Church along
with all its consequences. To revise that belief is to revise the dogmas
of the Christian Church as they have been held for the last eighteen
centuries; to reject it utterly is to reject the primary document of the
faith into which we have been baptized.
It is not, however, with theological matters that we are now concerned.
Patriarchal Palestine is for us the Palestine of the Patriarchal Age, as
it has been disclosed by archaeological research, not the Palestine in
which the revelation of God's will to man was to be made. It is
sufficient for us that the Patriarchal Age has been shown by modern
discovery to be a fact, and that in the narratives of the Book of
Genesis we have authentic records of the past. There was indeed a
Patriarchal Palestine, and the glimpses of it that we get in the Old
Testament have been illustrated and supplemented by the ancient
monuments of the Oriental world.
Whether the name of Palestine can be applied to the country with strict
accuracy at this early period is a different question. Palestine is
Philistia, the land of the Philistines, and the introduction of the name
was subsequent to the settlement of the Philistines in Canaan and the
era of their victories over Israel. As we shall see later on, it is
probable that they did not reach the Canaanitish coast until the
Patriarchal Age was almost, if not entirely, past Their name does not
occur in the cuneiform correspondence which was carried on between
Canaan and Egypt in the century before the Exodus, and they are first
heard of as forming part of that great confederacy of northern tribes
which attacked Egypt and Canaan in the days of Moses. But, though the
term Canaan would doubtless be more correct than Palestine, the latter
has become so purely geographical in meaning that we can employ it
without reference to history or date. Its signification is too familiar
to cause mistakes, and it can therefore be used proleptically, just as
the name of the Philistines themselves is used proleptically in the
twenty-first chapter of Genesis. Abimelech was king of a people who
inhabited the same part of the country as the Philistines in later
times, and were thus their earlier representatives.
The term "Palestine" then is used geographically without any reference
to its historical origin. It denotes the country which is known as
Canaan in the Old Testament, which was promised to Abraham and conquered
by his descendants. It is the land in which David ruled and in which
Christ was born, where the prophets prepared the way for the Gospel and
the Christian Church was founded.
Shut in between the Desert of Arabia and the Mediterranean Sea on the
east and west, it is a narrow strip of territory, for the most part
mountainous, rugged, and barren. Northward the Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon
come to meet it from Syria, the Anti-Lebanon culminating in the lofty
peaks and precipitous ravines of Mount Hermon (9383 feet above the level
of the sea), while Lebanon runs southward till it juts out into the sea
in its sacred headland of Carmel. The fertile plain of Esdraelon or
Megiddo separates the mountains of the north from those of the south.
These last form a broken plateau between the Jordan and the Dead Sea on
the one side and the Plain of Sharon and the sea-coast of the
Philistines on the other, until they finally slope away into the arid
desert of the south. Here, on the borders of the wilderness, was
Beersheba the southern limit of the land in the days of the monarchy,
Dan, its northern limit, lying far away to the north at the foot of
Hermon, and not far from the sources of the Jordan.
Granite and gneiss, overlaid with hard dark sandstone and masses of
secondary limestone, form as it were the skeleton of the country. Here
and there, at Carmel and Gerizim, patches of the tertiary nummulite of
Egypt make their appearance, and in the plains of Megiddo and the coast,
as well as in the "Ghor" or valley of the Jordan, there is rich alluvial
soil. But elsewhere all is barren or nearly so, cultivation being
possible only by terracing the cliffs, and bringing the soil up to them
from the plains below with slow and painful labour. It has often been
said that Palestine was more widely cultivated in ancient times than it
is to-day. But if so, this was only because a larger area of the
cultivable ground was tilled. The plains of the coast, which are now
given over to malaria and Beduin thieves, were doubtless thickly
populated and well sown. But of ground actually fit for cultivation
there could not have been a larger amount than there is at present.
It was not in any way a well-wooded land. On the slopes of the Lebanon
and of Carmel, it is true, there were forests of cedar-trees, a few of
which still survive, and the Assyrian kings more than once speak of
cutting them down or using them in their buildings at Nineveh. But south
of the Lebanon forest trees were scarce; the terebinth was so unfamiliar
a sight in the landscape as to become an object of worship or a
road-side mark. Even the palm grew only on the sea-coast or in the
valley of the Jordan, and the tamarisk and sycamore were hardly more
than shrubs.
Nevertheless when the Israelites first entered Canaan, it was in truth a
land "flowing with milk and honey." Goats abounded on the hills, and the
bee of Palestine, though fierce, is still famous for its honey-producing
powers. The Perizzites or "fellahin" industriously tilled the fields,
and high-walled cities stood on the mountain as well as on the plain.
The highlands, however, were deficient in water. A few streams fall into
the sea south of Carmel, but except in the spring, when they have been
swollen by the rains, there is but little water in them. The Kishon,
which irrigates the plain of Megiddo, is a more important river, but it
too is little more than a mountain stream. In fact, the Jordan is the
only river in the true sense of the word which Palestine possesses.
Rising to the north of the waters of Merom, now called Lake Hûleh, it
flows first into the Lake of Tiberias, and then through a long deep
valley into the Dead Sea. Here at a depth of 1293 feet below the level
of the sea it is swallowed up and lost; the sea has no outlet, and parts
with its stagnant waters through evaporation alone. The evaporation has
made it intensely salt, and its shores are consequently for the most
part the picture of death.
In the valley of the Jordan, on the other hand, vegetation is as
luxuriant and tropical as in the forests of Brazil. Through a dense
undergrowth of canes and shrubs the river forces its way, rushing
forward towards its final gulf of extinction with a fall of 670 feet
since it left the Lake of Tiberias. But the distance thus travelled by
it is long in comparison with its earlier fall of 625 feet between Lake
Hûleh and the Sea of Galilee. Here it has cut its way through a deep
gorge, the cliffs of which rise up almost sheer on either side.
The Jordan has taken its name from its rapid fall. The word comes from a
root which signifies "to descend," and the name itself means "the
down-flowing." We can trace it back to the Egyptian monuments of the
nineteenth and twentieth dynasties. Ramses II., the Pharaoh of the
Oppression, has inscribed it on the walls of Karnak, and Ramses III.,
who must have reigned while the Israelites were still in the wilderness,
enumerates the "Yordan" at Medînet Habu among his conquests in
Palestine. In both cases it is associated with "the Lake of Rethpana,"
which must accordingly be the Egyptian name of the Dead Sea. Rethpana
might correspond with a Hebrew Reshphôn, a derivative from Resheph, the
god of fire. Canaanite mythology makes the sparks his "children" (Job v.
7) and it may be, therefore, that in this old name of the Dead Sea we
have a reference to the overthrow of the cities of the plain.
Eastward of the Dead Sea and the Jordan the country is again mountainous
and bare. Here were the territories of Reuben and Gad, and the
half-tribe of Manasseh; here also were the kingdoms of Moab and Ammon,
of Bashan and the Amorites. Here too was the land of Gilead, south of
the Lake of Tiberias and north of the Dead Sea.
We can read the name of Muab or Moab on the base of the second of the
six colossal statues which Ramses II. erected in front of the northern
pylon of the temple of Luxor. It is there included among his conquests.
The statue is the only Egyptian monument on which the name has hitherto
been found. But this single mention is sufficient to guarantee its
antiquity, and to prove that in the days before the Exodus it was
already well known in Egypt.
To the north of Moab came the kingdom of Ammon, or the children of Ammi.
The name of Ammon was a derivative from that of the god Ammi or Ammo,
who seems to have been regarded as the ancestor of the nation, and "the
father of the children of Ammon" was accordingly called Ben-Ammi, "the
son of Ammi" (Gen. xix. 38). Far away in the north, close to the
junction of the rivers Euphrates and Sajur, and but a few miles to the
south of the Hittite stronghold of Carchemish, the worship of the same
god seems to have been known to the Aramaean tribes. It was here that
Pethor stood, according to the Assyrian inscriptions, and it was from
Pethor that the seer Balaam came to Moab to curse the children of
Israel. Pethor, we are told, was "by the river (Euphrates) of the land
of the children of Ammo," where the word represents a proper name (Num.
xxii. 5). To translate it "his people," as is done by the Authorized
Version, makes no sense. On the Assyrian monuments Ammon is sometimes
spoken of as Beth-Ammon, "the house of Ammon," as if Ammon had been a
living man.
Like Moab, Ammon was a region of limestone mountains and barren cliffs.
But there were fertile fields on the banks of the Jabbok, the sources of
which rose not far from the capital Rabbath.
North of Gilead and the Yarmuk was the volcanic plateau of Bashan,
Ziri-Basana, or "the Plain of Bashan," as it is termed in the cuneiform
tablets of Tel el-Amarna. Its western slope towards the Lakes of Merom
and Tiberias was known as Golan (now Jolân); its eastern plateau of
metallic lava was Argob, "the stony" (now El Lejja). Bashan was included
in the Haurân, the name of which we first meet with on the monuments of
the Assyrian king Assur-bani-pal. To the north it was bounded by
Ituraea, so named from Jetur, the son of Ishmael (Gen. xxv. 15), the
road through Ituraea (the modern Jedur) leading to Damascus and its
well-watered plain.
The gardens of Damascus lie 2260 feet above the sea. In the summer the
air is cooled by the mountain breezes; in the winter the snow sometimes
lies upon the surface of the land. Westward the view is closed by the
white peaks of Anti-Lebanon and Hermon; eastward the eye wanders over a
green plain covered with the mounds of old towns and villages, and
intersected by the clear and rapid streams of the Abana and Pharphar.
But the Abana has now become the Barada, or "cold one," while the
Pharphar is the Nahr el-Awaj.
The Damascus of to-day stands on the site of the city from which St.
Paul escaped, and "the street which is called Straight" can still be
traced by its line of Roman columns. But it is doubtful whether the
Damascus of the New Testament and of to-day is the same as the Damascus
of the Old Testament. Where the walls of the city have been exposed to
view, we see that their Greek foundations rest on the virgin soil; no
remains of an earlier period lie beneath them. It may be, therefore,
that the Damascus of Ben-Hadad and Hazael is marked rather by one of the
mounds in the plain than by the modern town. In one of these the stone
statue of a man, in the Assyrian style, was discovered a few years ago.
An ancient road leads from the peach-orchards of Damascus, along the
banks of the Abana and over Anti-Lebanon, to the ruins of the temple of
the Sun-god at Baalbek. The temple as we see it is of the age of the
Antonines, but it occupies the place of one which stood in Heliopolis,
the city of the Sun-god, from immemorial antiquity. Relics of an older
epoch still exist in the blocks of stone of colossal size which serve as
the foundation of the western wall. Their bevelling reminds us of
Phoenician work.
Baalbek was the sacred city of the Bek'a, or "cleft" formed between
Lebanon and Anti-Lebanon by the gorge through which the river Litâny
rushes down to the sea. Once and once only is it referred to in the Old
Testament. Amos (i. 5) declares that the Lord "will break the bar of
Damascus and cut off the inhabitant from Bikath-On"--the Bek'a of On.
The name of On reminds us that the Heliopolis of Egypt, the city of the
Egyptian Sun-god, was also called On, and the question arises whether
the name and worship of the On of Syria were not derived from the On of
Egypt. For nearly two centuries Syria was an Egyptian province, and the
priests of On in Egypt may well have established themselves in the
"cleft" valley of Coele-Syria.
From Baalbek, the city of "Baal of the Bek'a," the traveller makes his
way across Lebanon, and under the snows of Jebel Sannîn--nearly 9000
feet in height--to the old Phoenician city of Beyrout. Beyrout is
already mentioned in the cuneiform tablets of Tel el-Amarna under the
name of Beruta or Beruna, "the cisterns." It was already a seaport of
Phoenicia, and a halting-place on the high road that ran along the
coast.
The coastland was known to the Greeks and Romans as Phoenicia, "the land
of the palm." But its own inhabitants called it Canaan, "the lowlands."
It included not only the fringe of cultivated land by the sea-shore, but
the western slopes of the Lebanon as well. Phoenician colonies and
outposts had been planted inland, far away from the coast, as at Laish,
the future Dan, where "the people dwelt careless," though "they were far
away from the Sidonians," or at Zemar (the modern Sumra) and Arka (still
called by the same name). The territory of the Phoenicians stretched
southward as far as Dor (now Tanturah), where it met the advance guard
of the Philistines.
Such was Palestine, the promised home of Israel. It was a land of rugged
and picturesque mountains, interspersed with a few tracts of fertile
country, shut in between the sea and the ravine of the Jordan, and
falling away into the waterless desert of the south. It was, too, a land
of small extent, hardly more than one hundred and sixty miles in length
and sixty miles in width. And even this amount of territory was
possessed by the Israelites only during the reigns of David and Solomon.
The sea-coast with its harbours was in the hands of the Phoenicians and
the Philistines, and though the Philistines at one time owned an
unwilling allegiance to the Jewish king, the Phoenicians preserved their
independence, and even Solomon had to find harbours for his merchantmen,
not on the coast of his own native kingdom, but in the distant Edomite
ports of Eloth and Ezion-geber, in the Gulf of Aqabah. With the loss of
Edom Judah ceased to have a foreign trade.
The Negeb, or desert of the south, was then, what it still is, the haunt
of robbers and marauders. The Beduin of to-day are the Amalekites of Old
Testament history; and then, as now, they infested the southern frontier
of Judah, wasting and robbing the fields of the husbandman, and allying
themselves with every invader who came from the south, Saul, indeed,
punished them, as Romans and Turks have punished them since; but the
lesson is remembered only for a short while: when the strong hand is
removed, the "sons of the desert" return again like the locusts to their
prey.
It is true that the Beduin now range over the loamy plains and encamp
among the marshes of Lake Hûleh, where in happier times their presence
was unknown. But this is the result of a weak and corrupt government,
added to the depopulation of the lowlands. There are traces even in the
Old Testament that in periods of anarchy and confusion the Amalekites
penetrated far into the country in a similar fashion. In the Song of
Deborah and Barak Ephraim is said to have contended against them, and
accordingly "Pirathon in the land of Ephraim" is described as being "in
the mount of the Amalekites" (Judges xii. 15). In the cuneiform tablets
of Tel el-Amarna, too, there is frequent mention of the "Plunderers" by
whom the Beduin, the Shasu of the Egyptian texts, must be meant, and who
seem to have been generally ready at hand to assist a rebellious vassal
or take part in a civil feud.
Lebanon, the "white" mountain, took its name from its cliffs of
glistening limestone. In the early days of Canaan it was believed to be
the habitation of the gods, and Phoenician inscriptions exist dedicated
to Baal-Lebanon, "the Baal of Lebanon." He was the special form of the
Sun-god whose seat was in the mountain-ranges that shut in Phoenicia on
the east, and whose spirit was supposed to dwell in some mysterious way
in the mountains themselves. But there were certain peaks which lifted
themselves up prominently to heaven, and in which consequently the
sanctity of the whole range was as it were concentrated. It was upon
their summits that the worshipper felt himself peculiarly near the God
of heaven, and where therefore the altar was built and the sacrifice
performed. One of these peaks was Hermon, "the consecrated," whose name
the Greeks changed into Harmonia, the wife of Agenor the Phoenician.
From its top we can see Palestine spread as it were before us, and
stretching southwards to the mountains of Judah. The walls of the
temple, which in Greek times took the place of the primitive altar, can
still be traced there, and on its slopes, or perched above its ravines,
are the ruins of other temples of Baal--at Dêr el-'Ashair, at Rakleh, at
Ain Hersha, at Rashêyat el-Fukhâr--all pointing towards the central
sanctuary on the summit of the mountain.
The name of Hermon, "the consecrated," was but an epithet, and the
mountain had other and more special names of its own. The Sidonians, we
are told (Deut. iii. 9), called it Sirion, and another of its titles was
Sion (Deut. iv. 48), unless indeed this is a corrupt reading for Sirion.
Its Amorite name was Shenir (Deut. iii. 9), which appears as Saniru in
an Assyrian inscription, and goes back to the earliest dawn of history.
When the Babylonians first began to make expeditions against the West,
long before the birth of Abraham, the name of Sanir was already known.
It was then used to denote the whole of Syria, so that its restriction
to Mount Hermon alone must have been of later date.
Another holy peak was Carmel, "the fruitful field," or perhaps
originally "the domain of the god." It was in Mount Carmel that the
mountain ranges of the north ended finally, and the altar on its summit
could be seen from afar by the Phoenician sailors. Here the priests of
Baal called in vain upon their god that he might send them rain, and
here was "the altar of the Lord" which Elijah repaired.
The mountains of the south present no striking peak or headland like
Hermon and Carmel. Even Tabor belongs to the north. Ebal and Gerizim
alone, above Shechem, stand out among their fellows, and were venerated
as the abodes of deity from the earliest times. The temple-hill at
Jerusalem owed its sanctity rather to the city within the boundaries of
which it stood than to its own character. In fact, the neighbouring
height of Zion towered above it. The mountains of the south were rather
highlands than lofty chains and isolated peaks.
But on this very account they played an important part in the history of
the world. They were not too high to be habitable; they were high enough
to protect their inhabitants against invasion and war. "Mount Ephraim,"
the block of mountainous land of which Shechem and Samaria formed the
centre, and at the southern extremity of which the sacred city of Shiloh
stood, was the natural nucleus of a kingdom, like the southern block of
which Hebron and Jerusalem were similarly the capitals. Here there were
valleys and uplands in which sufficient food could be grown for the
needs of the population, while the cities with their thick and lofty
walls were strongholds difficult to approach and still more difficult to
capture. The climate was bracing, though the winters were cold, and it
reared a race of hardy warriors and industrious agriculturists. The want
of water was the only difficulty; in most cases the people were
dependent on rain-water, which they preserved in cisterns cut out of the
rock.
This block of southern mountains was the first and latest stronghold of
Israel. It constituted, in fact, the kingdoms of Samaria and Judah. Out
of it, at Shechem, came the first attempt to found a monarchy in Israel,
and thus unite the Israelitish tribes; out of it also came the second
and more successful attempt under Saul the Benjamite and David the Jew.
The Israelites never succeeded in establishing themselves on the
sea-coast, and their possession of the plain of Megiddo and the southern
slopes of the Lebanon was a source of weakness and not of strength. It
led eventually to the overthrow of the kingdom of Samaria. The northern
tribes in Galilee were absorbed by the older population, and their
country became "Galilee of the Gentiles," rather than an integral part
of Israel. The plain of Megiddo was long held by the Canaanites, and up
to the last was exposed to invasion from the sea-coast. It was, in fact,
the battle-field of Palestine. The army of the invader or the conqueror
marched along the edge of the sea, not through the rugged paths and
dangerous defiles of the mountainous interior, and the plain of Megiddo
was the pass which led them into its midst. The possession of the plain
cut off the mountaineers of the north from their brethren in the south,
and opened the way into the heart of the mountains themselves.
But to possess the plain was also to possess chariots and horsemen, and
a large and disciplined force. The guerilla warfare of the mountaineer
was here of no avail. Success lay on the side of the more numerous
legions and the wealthier state, on the side of the assailant and not of
the assailed.
Herein lay the advantage of the kingdom of Judah. It was a compact
state, with no level plain to defend, no outlying territories to
protect. Its capital stood high upon the mountains, strongly fortified
by nature and difficult of access. While Samaria fell hopelessly and
easily before the armies of Assyria, Jerusalem witnessed the fall of
Nineveh itself.
What was true of the later days of Israelitish history was equally true
of the age of the patriarchs. The strength of Palestine lay in its
southern highlands; whoever gained possession of these was master of the
whole country, and the road lay open before him to Sinai and Egypt. But
to gain possession of them was the difficulty, and campaign after
campaign was needed before they could be reduced to quiet submission. In
the time of the eighteenth Egyptian dynasty Jerusalem was already the
key to Southern Palestine.
Geographically, Palestine was thus a country of twofold character, and
its population was necessarily twofold as well. It was a land of
mountain and plain, of broken highlands and rocky sea-coast. Its people
were partly mountaineers, active, patriotic, and poor, with a tendency
to asceticism; partly a nation of sailors and merchants, industrious,
wealthy, and luxurious, with no sense of country or unity, and
accounting riches the supreme end of life. On the one hand, it gave the
world its first lessons in maritime exploration and trade; on the other
it has been the religious teacher of mankind.
In both respects its geographical position has aided the work of its
people. Situated midway between the two great empires of the ancient
Oriental world, it was at once the high road and the meeting-place of
the civilizations of Egypt and Babylonia. Long before Abraham migrated
to Canaan it had been deeply interpenetrated by Babylonian culture and
religious ideas, and long before the Exodus it had become an Egyptian
province. It barred the way to Egypt for the invader from Asia; it
protected Asia from Egyptian assault. The trade of the world passed
through it and met in it; the merchants of Egypt and Ethiopia could
traffic in Palestine with the traders of Babylonia and the far East. It
was destined by nature to be a land of commerce and trade.
And yet while thus forming a highway from the civilization of the
Euphrates to that of the Nile, Palestine was too narrow a strip of
country to become itself a formidable kingdom. The empire of David
scarcely lasted for more than a single generation, and was due to the
weakness at the same time of both Egypt and Assyria. With the Arabian
desert on the one side and the Mediterranean on the other, it was
impossible for Canaan to develop into a great state. Its rocks and
mountains might produce a race of hardy warriors and energetic thinkers,
but they could not create a rich and populous community. The Phoenicians
on the coast were driven towards the sea, and had to seek in maritime
enterprise the food and wealth which their own land refused to grant.
Palestine was essentially formed to be the appropriator and carrier of
the ideas and culture of others, not to be itself their origin and
creator.
But when the ideas had once been brought to it they were modified and
combined, improved and generalized in a way that made them capable of
universal acceptance. Phoenician art is in no way original; its elements
have been drawn partly from Babylonia, partly from Egypt; but their
combination was the work of the Phoenicians, and it was just this
combination which became the heritage of civilized man. The religion of
Israel came from the wilderness, from the heights of Sinai, and the
palm-grove of Kadesh, but it was in Palestine that it took shape and
developed, until in the fullness of time the Messiah was born. Out of
Canaan have come the Prophets and the Gospel, but the Law which lay
behind them was brought from elsewhere.