Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

b-hebrew - Re: [b-hebrew] Seir

b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Biblical Hebrew Forum

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: JimStinehart AT aol.com
  • To: yitzhaksapir AT gmail.com, b-hebrew AT lists.ibiblio.org
  • Subject: Re: [b-hebrew] Seir
  • Date: Wed, 19 May 2010 15:23:27 EDT


Yitzhak Sapir:

You wrote: “Penuel is east of the Jordan river. However, Jim is wrong
about Seir being in the Gil(ad. Seir is Edom.”

1. When Jacob is at Penuel in northern Gilead, he has basically two
alternate routes into his beloved homeland of Canaan. The northern route
would be
to go straight west to Shechem (or perhaps split his time between Succoth
east of the Jordan River, and Shechem west of the Jordan River). The
southern route would be to go south to Seir/Shar/Jazer in central Gilead, and
then
straight west from there to Jerusalem, and from thence perhaps to the
Patriarchs’ Hebron (whether that be the traditional city of Hebron south of
Jerusalem, or my view that the Patriarchs’ Hebron is the Aijalon Valley).

Laban, Esau, Jacob, and everyone else know that Jacob is certainly going
into Canaan. There’s no way that Jacob would lead his flock 100 miles south
to the southern end of the Dead Sea! Jacob would not fib to Esau about that,
because Esau would never be fooled by such a ridiculous fib. Rather, Jacob
makes a credible statement to Esau that Jacob will go to Seir, though much
more slowly than Esau, and that Jacob will see Esau at Seir, before Jacob
then goes on into Canaan. What in fact Jacob does, however, is to take the
northern route, and (somewhat surprisingly, both to the reader and to Esau)
splits his time between Succoth on the east bank of the Jordan River, and
Shechem to the west of the Jordan River.

The following text makes sense if and only if Seir is historical
Seir/Shar/Jazer in central Gilead:

“[Jacob speaking to Esau when they are at Penuel on the Jabbok River, in
northern Gilead:] ‘Let my lord [Esau] pass on ahead of his servant [Jacob],
and I [Jacob] will lead on slowly, at the pace of the livestock that are
ahead of me and at the pace of the children, until I come to my lord [Esau]
in
Seir.’" Genesis 33: 14 (ESV)

In chapters 31, 32, 33 and 14 of Genesis, the Seir being referenced must be
in central Gilead.

2. Your statement that “Seir is Edom” is coming out of the 1st millennium
BCE addendum to the truly ancient Patriarchal narratives at Genesis 36:
8-43. That late addition is talking about, and focused incessantly on, the
1st
millennium BCE state of Edom south of the Dead Sea. Though the state of
Edom was important to the state of Judah in the 1st millennium BCE, the area
south of the Dead Sea was a part of the world where the Patriarchs never go,
and in which the Patriarchs had zero interest. There was no Edom south of
the Dead Sea in the Patriarchal Age.

Virtually all scholars recognize that Genesis 36: 8-43 is a very late
addition to the Patriarchal narratives:

“[I]t does look as though [Genesis] 36: 9-43 is an insertion into a
discrete section (36: 1-8; 37: 1), for 37: 1, ‘Jacob settled in the land to
which
his father had migrated in the land of Canaan’, matches and echoes 36: 7-8 so
clearly. Thus almost all commentators conclude that at an earlier stage in
the history of the book, 37: 1 followed immediately after 36: 8. That 36:
9-43 is a secondary insertion into the book seems to be confirmed by the
second title, ‘This is the family history of Esau’, which is without analogy
in the rest of the book. Each of the other nine formulae, ‘This is the
family history of’, occurs but once, suggesting that the reduplication here
represents an addition to the book, which once had only ten such titles. In
this
case, 36: 9-43 would represent the last part of Genesis to be written.”
Gordon J. Wenham, “World Biblical Commentary: Genesis 16-50” (1994), p. 335.

Unlike chapter 14 of Genesis, which is redolent of the mid-14th century
BCE, the bulk of chapter 36 of Genesis could not possibly pre-date the 10th
century BCE: “36: 31 (‘these are the kings who reigned in the land of Edom
before a king reigned over the Israelites’) suggests that the list originates
from the period of the early monarchy [10th century BCE]. If it were from
an earlier period, such a statement would be impossible.” Gary A. Rendsburg,
“The Redaction of Genesis” (1986), at p. 110.

3. With the sole exception of Genesis 36: 8-43, which is a 1st millennium
BCE addendum to the truly ancient Patriarchal narratives, Seir in the
Patriarchal narratives is historical Seir/Shar/Jazer, in Gilead, in the
well-wooded hill country of the western Transjordan. We see Seir/Shar in the
Amarna
Letters, in the mid-15th century BCE Thutmose III list, and in the admittedly
ancient chapter 14 of Genesis (where Seir is paired with the
Horites/Hurrians, and hence must be north of the Dead Sea), all three of
which are vintage
Late Bronze Age sources. The ruins of Jazer are called Sar or Shar. The
name Seir likely derives from the Hurrian word for “orchard”, and the name
Shar likely derives from the basically similar Urartian word [though without
an ayin or ghayin] for “orchard”, in both cases referencing the fact that
the hill country of central Gilead was indeed “well-wooded”. Both Gesenius
and BDB, along with Arabic cognate words, support that linguistic etymology
of Seir.

We will never recover the historicity of the truly ancient Patriarchal
narratives until and unless we can get the underlying geography right.

Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page