Biblical Hebrew Forum

["Jonathan D. Safren" <yonsaf AT beitberl.beitberl.ac.il>]

Dear Ian,
You wrote:

The Hittites were an Indo-European group, not Semitic as the connection
with the Canaanite groups would suggest. While there is nothing to
*directly* contradict the notion of the Hittites having been a Canaanite

population at some stage, it is so unlikely that it must be discounted
--
given what we know of them -- until something from the period can
sustain a
Hittite population in Palestine. As things stand there is nothing we can

show to make the biblical references to the Hittites have any historical

sense.

If the Tanakh mentions Hittites in Hebron and elsewhere in Biblical
Israel; if , in 2 Sam. 24 (paralleled in 1 Chr), David buys the Temple
Mount from the Jebusite arawnah/awarnah = Hurrian ewir;  and the Tell El
Amarna Tablets are full of Canaanite kinglets with Indo-European and
Hurrian names, with the ruler of Jerusalem, Puti-Heba, having a Hurrian
name (Hebat was a Hurrian goddess), then don't the biblical and the
extra biblical evidence intermesh? Isn't the Bible preserving early
traditions about the autochtonous inhabitants of Palestine? And isn't it
strange that a Hasmonean or Herodian author still fad access to such
ancient traditions, whether oral or written?
Sincerely,
Jonathan D. Safren
Dept. of Biblical Studies
Beit Berl College
Beit Berl Post Office 44905
Israel