Biblical Hebrew Forum

[K Randolph <kwrandolph AT gmail.com>]

Jim:

On Sat, Mar 26, 2011 at 2:25 PM, <jimstinehart AT aol.com> wrote:

> Karl:
>
> You wrote:  “Please don’t parade your ignorance. The effects of the
> Mediterranean climate are not limited to within a few miles of the coast,
> yet Hebron is within a few miles of the coast.”
>
> In fact, the city of Hebron is 38 miles east of the Mediterranean Sea, up
> high in the mountains.  The city of Hebron is only 18 miles west of the
> desolate Dead Sea.
>

In California, the effects of the Mediterranean climate stretch all the way
over to the Sierras, the eastern side of the state. That’s a lot longer
distance than from the Mediterranean Sea to Hebron.


>   The issues you raise about the climate at the city of Hebron are of
> critical importance.  Both the traditional view and the view of today’s
> university scholars are along the following lines:
> “In the Negev, in Beersheba, and beyond Mount Hebron, rainfall is slight,
> pasture-land is poor, springs are meagre, and the population is sparse. Yet
> here, alone with his tents, Abraham would build his home, remote from tribe
> and nation….  The northern-born sheep and cattle had grown up in a cool
> climate, with an abundance of water and soft grass, and found it hard to
> adapt to the parched and arid south.”  Moshe Dayan, “Living with the
> Bible” (1978), at p. 15.
>

Do you think quoting Moshe Dayan concerning modern climate is going to be
convincing when this discussion is talking about early bronze age climate?

>
> But does that standard view of the Patriarchs’ Hebron make any logical
> sense, and does it comport with what the text in fact says?
>
> 1.  Genesis 13: 9, 11 says that Abraham went the opposite direction from
> Bethel as Lot, and that Lot went east.  Thus the text indicates that
> Abraham went west of Bethel, which would bring Abraham to one of the best
> places in all of Canaan for a huge flock of sheep and goats:  the Aijalon
> Valley, in the northern Shephelah.
>

Historic Bethel is to the west of Jericho, almost straight north of Hebron.
With Hebron closer to the lush grazing lands of the Negev, why would he stay
to the north?

>
> 2.  Genesis 37: 14 says that the Patriarchs’ Hebron is a “valley”.  That
> fits the low-lying Aijalon Valley perfectly, but does not fit the towering
> mountains that surround the city of Hebron.
>

Hebron is on a height, surrounded by valleys. Genesis 37:14 says that Jacob
was encamped in the “Valley of Hebron”, i.e. a valley next to Hebron, not
that Hebron is a valley. Simple Hebrew grammar tells you that.

>
> 3.  The Bronze Age name of the city of Hebron was “Qiltu”, or some variant
> thereof.  Moses would not have known “Hebron” as the name of the city just
> northwest of the Judean Desert.  [Valleys in Bronze Age Canaan had no
> formal names.  The name “Aijalon Valley” was unknown in the ancient world.
> The Patriarchs would have to come up with a nickname for a valley, unlike
> reporting the historical name of a city.]
>

Where do you get that one from?

>
> 4.  In World War I, the camels at the city of Hebron died, because it was
> too cold and damp.  In the Early and Middle Bronze Ages, the climate was
> even cooler and wetter, so that Abraham’s camels could not have survived the
> winters at the city of Hebron.
>

What makes you think Abraham stayed there year round? As an nomadic
shepherd, isn’t it more likely that he would go down to the lush grasslands
around Beersheba for the winters?

>
> 5.  The city of Hebron receives almost no rainfall at all during the long,
> hot summer.  Though conditions in the Early and Middle Bronze Age would
> admittedly have been better than they are today, still there is not enough
> water for a huge flock of sheep and goats in the summer at the city of
> Hebron.  Yet look how Abraham fared at the Patriarchs’ Hebron, as
> described by his faithful servant:  “The LORD has greatly blessed my
> master, and he has become great.  He has given him flocks and herds,
> silver and gold, male servants and female servants, camels and donkeys.”  
> Genesis
> 24: 35.  That is simply not possible in the rugged mountains that surround
> the city of Hebron.  There’s not enough water in the long, hot summer for
> goats and sheep or other livestock, and it’s too cold and damp in the winter
> for camels.
>

Again, as we have repeatedly pointed out to you, you cannot point to the
modern climate and say that it is the same as early bronze age climate.

>
> 6.  Genesis 14: 14 tells us that Abraham had 318 armed retainers.  Why
> would a powerful man like that choose to sojourn way up in the rugged
> mountains that surround the city of Hebron, instead of in the lovely Aijalon
> Valley west of Bethel?
>

Why not? It was relatively cool compared to the lowlands, there was plenty
of feed for his sheep.

>
> 7.  In the Early and Middle Bronze Age, the city of Hebron was a true
> fortress with massive walls.  Why is that never mentioned in the Biblical
> text?
>

Was that relevant to the history? If not, why mention it?

However, middle bronze age Hebron was mentioned as a city-state with a king,
implying that it had walls as well.

>
> 8.  In the entirety of Genesis, no one is ever said to go “up” to the
> Patriarchs’ Hebron.  That makes sense if X-BR-W-N is a Patriarchal
> nickname for the low-lying verdant Aijalon Valley, but is not possible if
> the Patriarchs routinely sojourned in the rugged mountains that surround the
> city of Hebron.
>

Again irrelevant, as that was never part of a story line in Genesis.

>
> 9.  Genesis 24: 62 says that Isaac chose to live south of Abraham.  If
> Abraham was living at the city of Hebron, that means that Isaac chose to
> live either in the heart of the Negev Desert, or in the eastern Sinai
> Desert.  What sense does that make?  Why would Isaac choose to sojourn in
> a desert, and even after Abraham’s death, stay there?
>

What time of year was this? Was it permanent? Isaac was a nomad, too, so
there is nothing about him staying there.

Secondly, there is nothing in this verse that says that he was living
separate from Abraham his father, rather the context indicates that the two
were living together, in the same complex of tents. The lush grasslands of
the Negev could support a whole town of tents, not like today.

Remember that in the early bronze age, the Negev was a grassland with
patches of forest, not the desert that we find today.

>
> 10.  The Biblical text confirms what logic dictates:  the Patriarchs chose
> to sojourn in the best parts of Canaan for tending a huge flock of sheep and
> goats:  the Shephelah and Upper Galilee [GRR/“Gerar”].
>

Almost every one of your points is faulty, and as computer programmers say,
GIGO.


>   The Patriarchs sensibly never went anywhere near the mountainous city of
> Hebron, which was a terrible place for sheep and goats in the long, hot
> summers.  The reason why the city name Qiltu does not appear in Genesis is
> because the Patriarchs never went anywhere in the vicinity of that
> mountainous place.  Rather, the Patriarchs’ X-BR-W-N is the lovely Aijalon
> Valley in the northern Shephelah.  That conforms with both logic and what
> the Biblical texts says and does not say.
>

GIGO. Don’t you think you would be more convincing if you limited your
claims to what the Biblical text says, and does not say, than when you bring
in your “experts” and “scholars”? And limited yourself to early bronze age
when was the patriarchal age, than when you try to claim that the modern
conditions are the same as the early bronze age?

>
> Jim Stinehart
> Evanston, Illinois
>
>
Oh boy, I let myself get sucked into these long and fruitless discussions,
where only one point dealt with the Hebrew language. The rest merely
clarifies the text as it is written.

Karl W. Randolph.