Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

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