[b-hebrew] Qadesh of Genesis 20:1

JimStinehart at aol.com JimStinehart at aol.com
Mon May 10 10:40:11 EDT 2010


James Christian:
 
Isaac is portrayed in chapter 21 of Genesis as being born in Upper Galilee, 
near Hurrian country.  What seems inexplicable in west Semitic makes 
perfect sense in Hurrian, regarding the name rendered in west Semitic as “Qadesh”
/QD$.
 
Both Qadesh on the Orontes and Qadesh of Upper Galilee are in Hurrian 
country, and have rulers with Hurrian-type names in the Amarna Letters.  So it 
makes sense that the original name of each place was a Hurrian name, which was 
later taken over into west Semitic as QD$.  The fact that the Qadesh that 
is in the Orontes River Valley has three completely different spellings in 
the Amarna Letters suggests that it was originally a Hurrian name, since 
Hurrian names notoriously have many different alternative spellings in west 
Semitic.  Finally, Karl’s point that there are many places in greater Canaan 
called Qadesh is consistent with the view that desert oases south of Canaan were 
originally called QD$/“sanctuary” in west Semitic, which makes sense for a 
desert oasis, but that up north, the name was originally a Hurrian name, 
with a completely different meaning, but it sounded quite a bit like QD$, so 
eventually it came to be called QD$ by west Semitic-speaking people.  QD$ on 
the Orontes and QD$ of Upper Galilee were not “sanctuaries” at all, but 
rather were important market cities, as such being involved in “grain” 
distribution. 
 
For the two famous cities up north that eventually became known as QD$ 
(both the one on the Orontes, and also the one in eastern Upper Galilee), it is 
likely that in each case, the city’s original name had been “Great Grain” 
in Hurrian.  “Grain” in Hurrian is kadi, or KD, per p. 92 of the 
Fournet/Bomhard Hurrian website.  “Great” in Hurrian is $a-wu, or $W, at p. 99.  “
Great Grain” in Hurrian would be KD$W.  [In Hurrian, adjectives usually 
functioned as suffixes, so the adjective would be stuck onto the end of the noun, 
being one word in the agglutinative language of Hurrian.  It’s literally “
Graingreat”, being one word, with the noun coming first, in Hurrian.]   Hurrian 
had no Q [see p. 9], so Hurrian K could have sounded as much like west 
Semitic Q as west Semitic K [with those two letters having similar, though not 
identical, sounds in west Semitic].  The point is that Hurrian K could come 
out as either K or Q on the mid-15th century BCE Thutmose III list, since the 
Hurrians themselves made no distinction between these two slightly 
different west Semitic sounds.  
 
Now, for the first time, item #1 on the Thutmose III list from the mid-15th 
century BCE makes perfect sense:  QD$W.  [Google “Paul James Cowie 
Archaeowiki” for the website that, after you make three selections referencing the T 
III list, sets forth the entire T III list.  Although Cowie does a fairly 
good job of showing the names on the T III list, many of his proposed 
identifications are suspect or wrong.  Also check p. 72 of Anson Rainey’s “The 
Sacred Bridge”, which often has a more detailed analysis.]  With Egyptian Q 
being equivalent to Hurrian K, QD$W at item #1 on the T III list is KD$W, 
meaning “Great Grain” in Hurrian.  It’s a  p-e-r-f-e-c-t  match in Hurrian.  
Today we see that as being QD$, but that’s the west Semitic, later version, 
with the original having been KD$W/QD$W in Hurrian, meaning “Great Grain”, for 
Qadesh on the Orontes in the heart of Hurrian country.
 
Now look at item #4 on the T III list.  It’s KT$WN, and as we will now see, 
it’s actually the same Hurrian name, which likewise later came out in west 
Semitic as QD$.  Egyptian T and D are interchangeable on the T III list [so 
that MKT at item #2 is Megiddo, with Egyptian T being a D].  The final N is 
a common suffix on the T III list, and is optional.  KT$W -N is KD$W, where 
the Egyptian T is interchangeable with D, and an optional, standard [west 
Semitic] suffix N has been added.  Once again, the match in Hurrian is  
p-e-r-f-e-c-t.  Both of these city names were originally the same, and were 
Hurrian KD$W.  But when the Hurrians died out, their language died with them.  So 
KD$W later came to be the similar-sounding QD$ in west Semitic.  The 
spellings vary ever so slightly on the T III list.  What would ideally have been 
KD$W comes out at item #1 as QD$W, and at item #4 as KT$W-N.  It’s all the 
same name, being “Great Grain” in Hurrian, but later becoming similar-sounding 
QD$ in west Semitic.  See how everything makes perfect sense if one applies 
a Hurrian analysis to these names of cities located in Hurrian country?  
 
But now comes the most exciting part of all.  Item #4 on the T III list, 
namely KT$W-N, is Qadesh of Upper Galilee.  From basic geography, we know that 
such city is an “eye” on the “great” Mt. Hermon.  That’s precisely the 
alternative name of Qadesh of Upper Galilee that is set forth at item #5 on 
the T III list!  (YN $W = “Eye on Great”, that is, “eye” on the “great” 
mountain of nearby towering Mt. Hermon.  Yes, (YN is west Semitic and $W is 
Hurrian, but that’s just the same as in the name of Jerusalem’s ruler at the 
time, Abdi-Heba.  Abdi is virgin pure west Semitic, while just as surely, 
Heba is virgin pure Hurrian for the name of the Hurrian goddess Heba.  [One 
alternative spelling, as is typical for Hurrian words being rendered in the 
western alphabet, for this Hurrian goddess is Khipa.  Note how dramatically 
these alternative spellings vary.]  (YN $W is not a “scribal error”, as Anson 
Rainey asserts in “The Sacred Bridge”.  No way!  At Genesis 14: 7, the 
Hebrew author uses an all-west Semitic version of the west Semitic-Hurrian 
combination that appears on the T III list.  $W meaning “great” in Hurrian is 
replaced by M$P+, meaning “seat of justice” in Hebrew.  So both at items #4 
and #5 on the T III list, and at Genesis 14: 7, this city in eastern Upper 
Galilee has two names:  (1) QD$, being the west Semitic version of the 
original Hurrian KD$W, which originally meant “Great Grain” in Hurrian, but whose 
west Semitic virtual sound equivalent is QD$, meaning “sanctuary”;  and (2) 
(YN M$P+, being the all-west Semitic version of the original west 
Semitic-Hurrian combination (YN $W, meaning “Eye on Great” in the part-Hurrian 
version, and “Eye on Seat of Justice” in the all-west Semitic version, in both 
cases referring to nearby towering Mt. Hermon.  Originally, there was a 
clever play on words here in Hurrian, where $W in Hurrian meant both that the 
grain was “great” in the city name KD$W, while that same word $W in Hurrian 
also meant that nearby Mt. Hermon was “great” in the alternative name for the 
same city:  (YN $W.
 
The QD$ at both Genesis 14: 7 and Genesis 20: 1 is Qadesh of Upper Galilee, 
attested by that name (in the older Hurrian version) at item #4 on the T 
III list, and whose alternate name of En Mishpat is attested by that name 
(with the second half being in Hurrian on the T III list) at item #5 on the T 
III list.  [In Ugaritic literature, this name of the city in Upper Galilee, 
not surprisingly, came out as qd$.  QD$ is the west Semitic version of the 
Hurrian name KD$W.  The sounds are very similar, though the underlying meanings 
are completely different.]
 
Moving on now to the other three geographical place names at Genesis 20: 1, 
GRR/Gerar is attested as KRR at item #80 on the T III list.  [Egyptian K is 
routinely used to render west Semitic G, as in Megiddo being MKT at item #2 
on the T III list.]  GRR is GLL [or, in full spelling, GLYL], that is, 
Galilee.  The Egyptians used the same letter, R, for either west Semitic R or 
west Semitic L.  Confusion between R and L, or R softening to L over the 
course of time, is why the older version is R, in GRR and KRR, whereas the later 
version is L, in GLL/GLYL.
 
Shur is not attested on the T III list, because that impregnable, arrogant 
island city-state just off the northwest corner of Upper Galilee did not 
have to kowtow to Thutmose III.  But it’s all over the Amarna Letters [though a 
different letter is used for the sibilant at the beginning of the name;  
the Hebrew author of the Patriarchal narratives refused to call that arrogant 
island city-state “divine rock”, which was its arrogant proper name, so he 
changed the sibilant at the beginning of the name].  Note that the name of 
the ruler of Shur [who dominated Gerar/GRR/northern Galilee, and hence is “
king of GRR” at Genesis 20: 2, that is, King of Galilee] is identical in 
chapters 20, 21 and 26 of Genesis as in the Amarna Letters:  Abimelek.  Abimelek’
s influence extended throughout much of Galilee, as in Amarna Letter EA 148 
he complains about what Hazor is doing.  Note that he does not complain 
about his junior partner, Qadesh of Upper Galilee.  That’s why in going to see 
Abimelek, Abraham wisely goes by way of Qadesh of Upper Galilee, rather than 
going by way of Hazor.  The pinpoint historical accuracy of the Patriarchal 
narratives is truly breathtaking.
 
Both in the Amarna Letters and in chapters 21 and 26 of Genesis, Abimelek 
is the only ruler in the book who ever complains, and who indeed constantly 
complains, about not having needed access to well water.  It’s the same 
Abimelek, with the same, very peculiar, major league water problem.
 
The original concept of Galilee/GLYL/GLL/GRR was the land between QD$ in 
eastern Upper Galilee and Shur on the northwest corner of Upper Galilee.  
[Later Galilee came to have a somewhat broader meaning, including Lower 
Galilee.]  After Abraham left the Patriarchs’ Hebron, per Genesis 20: 1 he lived 
between QD$ and $WR, and he sojourned in GRR.  Historically, that’s Upper 
Galilee, and the wording of Genesis 20: 1 reads very naturally.  That’s where 
Isaac was born, being a locale nowhere close to the future state of Judah.
 
NGB is also on the T III list at item #57, and refers to 
Adamah-Negev/Adamah-Nekev in eastern Galilee.  [Cowie errs in seeing it as referring to the 
Negev Desert.  The Thutmose III campaign against the forces of Qadesh on the 
Orontes never went into the Negev Desert.  The cities near item #57 are 
nowhere near the Negev Desert.  Other scholars properly see NGB at item #57 as 
being in northern Canaan.]  That reference clarifies that Abraham went north 
by way of the Jordan River, being the long way around that avoided the many 
Hurrian princelings in western Lower Galilee.
 
Thus both (i) (YN M$P+ and QD$ at Genesis 14: 7, and (ii) all four 
geographical place names at Genesis 20: 1 -- NGB, QD$, $WR and GRR -- are attested 
on the T III list and/or in the Amarna Letters.  But on several occasions, we 
need to use a Hurrian analysis to understand these names.  The equivalent 
to (YN M$P+, using the original Hurrian word for the second name, was (YN $W 
[per item #5 on the T III list].  The Hurrian forerunner of QD$ was KD$W 
[which on the T III list is both item #1, as QD$W, regarding Orontes, and item 
#4, as KT$W + N, regarding Upper Galilee].
 
Now that there’s finally, at long last, a Hurrian language website, it’s 
quite easy to track these names down and understand them.  Instead of relying 
on scholars, who so often fail to do any Hurrian analysis at all, we can 
figure these things out for ourselves.  Scholar Aharoni says that it’s 
shocking that Qadesh of Upper Galilee was allegedly, and unaccountably, left off of 
the T III list, and scholar Anson Rainey says that item #5 on the T III 
list is allegedly a “scribal error”.  No way!  They’re both wrong.  Item #5 is 
perfect as is, and is the part-Hurrian equivalent of En Mishpat, being an 
alternative name of Qadesh of Upper Galilee, whose modern Israeli kibbutz 
theme song similarly starts out:  “Facing the radiance of Mt. Hermon”.  Item 
#4 on the T III list is also perfect, and is the Hurrian version of west 
Semitic QD$, being the supposedly missing Qadesh of Upper Galilee.  Heavens, 
these scholars know that these places were located in Hurrian country.  So why 
not apply a Hurrian analysis and resolve these otherwise inexplicable 
matters?
 
If you want pinpoint historical accuracy in a Late Bronze Age historical 
context in northern Canaan, chapter 14 of Genesis is the best place to start.  
But to understand what’s going on there, a focus on Hurrian is needed for 
place names in Hurrian country.  If one fully understands Genesis 14: 7, then 
it’s relatively easy to understand Genesis 20: 1.  In telling us again and 
again that Genesis 14: 7 and Genesis 20: 1 are fictional, university 
scholars rely very heavily on the false scholarly claim that allegedly, (YN M$P+, 
QD$ and GRR are unattested in the secular history of the ancient world.  
Not!!!  Just look at items #4 and #5 on the T III list and think Hurrian, and 
look at item #80 on the T III list and forget the overwhelming scholarly bias 
against Genesis talking about Galilee.  These names are fully historical in 
a Late Bronze Age historical context, if we, unlike university scholars, are 
willing to look  n-o-r-t-h  of Jerusalem and the Dead Sea to identify these 
historical names from the Late Bronze Age.  It matters not how many times 
university scholars solemnly vow that they will  n-e-v-e-r  look north of the 
Dead Sea in evaluating the historicity of those 3 names.  Those 3 names are 
fully historical (as is all of Genesis 14: 1-11, for that matter), for 
anyone willing to look at Late Bronze Age inscriptions from north of the Dead 
Sea.
 
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois



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