Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

If Abigail’s Carmel is located 7 miles southeast of Hebron, which is the 
traditional and scholarly view, chapter 25 of I Samuel makes no sense.  But 
if 
Abigail’s Carmel is located in the northeast corner of the Sorek Valley, at 
or 
near the traditional site of Zorah, then everything makes complete sense.
 
A.  Traditional Scenario:  Abigail’s Carmel Is 7 Miles Southeast of Hebron
 
1.  It is impossible that the 3,000 sheep and 1,000 goats referenced at I 
Samuel 25: 2 could graze 7 miles south of Hebron, in the Negev Desert.  The 
rugged, dry Negev Desert south of Hebron could not support a huge flock like 
that.  
When one looks at the first 300 Hebrew villages in the 12th century BCE, 
there is no Hebrew village southeast of Hebron, because the land and climate 
are 
so poor there.  If the land and climate were not good enough for a single 
Hebrew village in the 12th century BCE, it makes no sense to think that 3,000 
sheep 
and 1,000 goats would graze there in the 10th century BCE.
 
2.  If Abigail’s first husband, Nabal, was always south of Hebron, and had 
his 3,000 sheep south of Hebron, then Nabal certainly would have known that 
David was the rising young charismatic warlord in the area, and that Saul 
rarely 
ventured south of Hebron.  Accordingly, there is no way that Nabal, a rich 
man, 
would have publicly insulted David’s men so crudely.  With David’s 600 young 
men south of Hebron known to be the most powerful force in the Northern Negev 
Desert, no rich man pasturing 3,000 sheep in the Northern Negev Desert, south 
of Hebron, which was right in the very heartland of David’s territory, would 
have publicly insulted the rash young charismatic warlord David.
 
3.  If Nabal and Nabal’s 3,000 sheep were located within a few miles of the 
heartland of David’s territory, with David and his 600 young men being well 
known to everyone south of Hebron, there is no way that Nabal could have been 
surprised that his wife Abigail ran into David and 400 of David’s men when 
Abigail, on her own motion, took provisions south of Carmel to give to 
David’s men.  
Nabal, a surly man, would be expected to have been angry at Abigail for 
giving David’s men provisions without Nabal’s authorization, but Nabal is not 
reported in the text to be angry at Abigail in the slightest.  No, Nabal 
appears, 
rather, to be fatally shocked at the thought that David himself, together 
with 
400 of his men, was now operating just a few miles south of Carmel, right on 
Nabal’s doorstep, as it were.  Such a reaction is utterly senseless if Carmel 
and Nabal’s 3,000 sheep were 7 miles south of Hebron, which everyone in all 
of 
Canaan knew was the heartland of David’s territory.
 
4.  If Abigail’s Carmel was south of Hebron, then David would have gone to 
Carmel himself to propose marriage to Abigail after Nabal’s death.  Nabal’s 
numerous male heirs inherited those 3,000 sheep and 1,000 goats.  But David 
would 
have personally made those male heirs an offer they could not refuse.  Nabal’
s male heirs would have been forced to pledge loyalty to David.  Instead, 
David sends a few men (referred to as “messengers”), who take Abigail and a 
mere 
five servants away from Carmel down to David, with David making no contact 
whatsoever with Nabal’s male heirs, much less obtaining that huge flock.
 
We see that on the traditional, scholarly view that Carmel is located 7 miles 
southeast of Hebron (based on an Arabic village named Carmel being located 7 
miles southeast of Hebron in the common era), chapter 25 of I Samuel makes no 
sense on any level.
 
Surely we can do better than that!
 
B.  Proposed Scenario:  Abigail’s Carmel Is Located in the Northeast Corner 
of the Sorek Valley
 
The secular historical evidence from the Late Bronze Age strongly indicates 
that Carmel was located on the northeast corner of the Sorek Valley.  
Thutmosis 
III was there in the mid-15th century BCE, and item #96 on his list reports 
KRM + N, where N is the most common suffix on that list.  KRM + suffix 
matches 
KRM + L = Carmel, where the final L in KRML is viewed as being a suffix.  100 
years later, all the actions of the ruler of Ginti-Kirmil take place at 
Rubutu, just a few miles north of the Sorek Valley.  Many towns in the 
Shephelah had 
added “Ginti” or “Gath” to their town names, so Ginti-Kirmil certainly 
looks like KRML/Carmel.  Very importantly, the type of clay that the ruler of 
Ginti-Kirmil used to write three Amarna Letter tablets is found, in Canaan, 
primarily on the northern edge of the Sorek Valley.
 
Now we will see that the four above considerations concerning what is said in 
chapter 25 of I Samuel, which made no sense at all if Carmel is located 7 
miles southeast of Hebron, make perfect sense if historical Carmel is located 
on 
the northeast edge of the Sorek Valley, 18 miles northwest of Hebron.
 
1.  The Sorek Valley is an ideal place for 3,000 sheep and 1,000 goats.  
Nabal came from Maon, south of Hebron, but Nabal had acquired such a large 
flock 
that Nabal could no longer keep the flock south of Hebron, in the Negev 
Desert.
 
2.  The eastern edge of the Sorek Valley was in the heartland of Saul 
territory.  Nabal was confident that Saul would protect Nabal.  As one of the 
richest 
Hebrew men, Nabal was obviously on good terms with Saul, who was the logical 
person to protect Nabal’s huge flock in the northeast quadrant of the Sorek 
Valley.  (The Philistines did not operate quite that far east or north.  
David 
at that time was generally confined to the Northern Negev Desert south of 
Hebron.)  Indeed, it was awkward for Nabal when David’s men loudly and 
publicly 
proclaimed that David’s men had helped Nabal’s shepherds.  In order to avoid 
a 
charge of disloyalty to Saul, Nabal needed to insult David’s men publicly, 
which Nabal did.  Nabal was so confident that Saul would protect Nabal that 
Nabal 
had a big feast, and got drunk, presumably with several of his other wives, 
and apparently not missing the presence of Abigail, who likely was not his 
main 
wife #1.
 
3.  Nabal was fatally shocked the next morning at the news that his wife 
Abigail had met personally with David, and 400 of David’s young men.  That 
meant 
that reckless David, together with the bulk of his 600 men, could operate 
with 
impunity in the Sorek Valley!  Nabal had relied entirely on Saul’s repeated 
assurances that David was a mere bandit who was on the run in the wilderness 
south of Hebron, and that Saul would soon capture that nefarious bandit 
David.  
It was on that basis that Nabal had publicly insulted David’s men the 
previous 
day.  Now David himself, and 400 of David’s young men, had shown up just a 
few 
miles south of Carmel, in the southeast corner of the Sorek Valley.  The 
security of Nabal’s prized flock of 3,000 sheep and 1,000 goats was now 
hopelessly 
compromised.  Rather than being mad at his independent-minded wife, Nabal was 
shocked to death at the news that David could operate in Nabal’s beloved 
Sorek Valley.
 
4.  David’s impetuous action in taking 400 of his men up into the southeast 
corner of the Sorek Valley had been rash and dangerous, but he got away with 
it.  When Nabal died 10 days later, it was too dangerous for David himself to 
go 
up into the heartland of Saul’s territory in the eastern half of the Sorek 
Valley, as Saul by this time would doubtless have heard the story of 
Abigail’s 
odd dealings with David.  So David sends a few messengers up to Carmel in the 
northeast corner of the Sorek Valley, totally confident that widow Abigail 
will 
have no better options at this point than to run to a young bandit operating 
primarily in the wilderness south of Hebron.  Note that David and David’s men 
make no attempt whatsoever to establish an alliance with Nabal’s male heirs, 
who doubtless reaffirmed to Saul their commitment to Saul.
 
C.  The  m-a-i-n  point of chapter 25 of I Samuel is to show that David, 
rather than merely being a young warlord operating in the wilderness south of 
Hebron, was now beginning to operate much farther north, even in the Sorek 
Valley 
on occasion.  That foreshadows that soon David will be the ruler of all the 
Hebrews.
 
The scholarly view that chapter 25 of I Samuel is a pleasant folktale that 
recounts how David came to marry a rich widow south of Hebron is wrong on all 
counts.  Abigail was not a rich widow.  She only brought one donkey and five 
personal maidservants with her, nothing else.  And Carmel was not located 7 
miles 
south of Hebron, but rather was located on the northeast corner of the Sorek 
Valley.  David had made a statement of sorts up north in the Sorek Valley, 
but 
for the time being, the Sorek Valley was still Saul territory, and David was 
still for the most part limited to hanging out in the wilderness south of 
Hebron.
 
The Bible and the secular historical documentation of the Late Bronze Age 
tell the  s-a-m-e  story about Abigail’s Carmel.  Carmel was an historical 
city 
in the Late Bronze Age and the Iron Age that was located on the northeast 
corner of the Sorek Valley.  The fact that Arabic villagers in the common 
era, 7 
miles southeast of Hebron, misunderstood this Bible story and named their 
tiny 
village after Carmel in the common era should be given no weight.  The Bible 
and the secular history of the ancient world tell the same story about 
historical Carmel, which was located on the northeast corner of the Sorek 
Valley.
 
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois

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