Biblical Hebrew Forum

[James Christian <jc.bhebrew AT googlemail.com>]

Jim,

may I invite you participate in any one of the many other interesting
discussions that take place here on b-hebrew? It would be nice to engage
with you on a level that doesn't involve your personal theories some time.
I'm sure that if you started to participate in other discussions it would
help people to understand and appreciate your talents and would strengthen
your relationship with the list members.

James Christian

2010/3/1 <JimStinehart AT aol.com>

>
> 1.  The word Bela as a proper name [of a town], BL(, only appears at
> Genesis 14: 2, in the following phrase:  “Bela (that is, Zoar)”.  No name
> of a
> ruler of Bela/Zoar is given.
>
> The name Bela/BL( may be a Hebrew nickname that is clever Hebrew wordplay
> on two different words.  BLL usually means “to mingle”, but it can mean “to
> feed provender (to livestock)” [Judges 19: 21].  BL( means “to devour”, or
> “
> to ravenously consume” [Genesis 41: 7, 24].  Note that feed can be
> ravenously devoured by livestock.
>
> On the positive side, this town is a “small”/Zoar/C(R agricultural town
> that produces grain used to feed livestock/BLL.  Yet the fear, both at
> Genesis
> 14: 1-11 and Genesis 19: 20-22, is that this “small”/Zoar/C(R town, which
> produces grain to feed livestock/BLL, may be “devoured”/BL(.
>
> 2.  By contrast to the foregoing, here is the standard scholarly
> explanation of the phrase “Bela (that is, Zoar)”:
>
> “[T]he explanatory phrase ‘that is, Zoar’ (vv 2, 8) is the first of
> several glosses in this chapter, indicating that this chapter is based on
> an old
> source that has been updated (cf. v. 4).”
>
> Gordon Wenham, “Genesis 1-15” (1987), at p. 310
>
> As is so often the case, the scholarly “explanation” makes no sense on any
> level.  Why would two different authors, in two different centuries, each
> of whom is making up an allegedly fictional story, (a) come up with two
> different names for the same town, yet (b) neither author comes up with any
> name
> at all for the ruler of this town?!
>
> 3.  As opposed to the foregoing scholarly “explanation”, consider the
> following historical explanation, which sees Genesis 14: 1-11 as having
> pinpoint
> historical accuracy.  In the approximately 350 Amarna Letters, the only
> place that does not have a ruler is Tunip, a “small” place that is one of
> the
> 5 losing rebellious parties that was historically “devoured” in a “valley
> of tilled fields”, that is the Orontes River Valley in west-central Syria,
> in
> Year 14.  Likewise, Bela/Zoar is the only one of 9 contending parties at
> Genesis 14: 1-2 that has no named ruler, and which is a “small”/Zoar/C(R
> place, and that is one of the 5 losing rebellious parties that was
> “devoured”
> /BL( in a Valley of Tilled Fields [Valley of Siddim/$DYM], in Year 14.
>
> The pinpoint historical accuracy of Genesis 14: 1-11 is astounding.  The
> Hebrew author even knows that one small [C(R] member of the league of 5
> rebellious parties, in a valley of tilled fields [$DYM] (where grain was
> grown to
> feed livestock [BLL]), had, very oddly, no ruler when the traumatic events
> of the fighting in Year 14 occurred, in which all five members of that
> league
> were devoured [BL(] by four attacking rulers, one of whom had a Hittite
> kingly name.  The key historical detail here is the peculiar lack of a
> ruler
> for that one member of that league.  Neat!
>
> Jim Stinehart
> Evanston, Illinois
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