Biblical Hebrew Forum

[JimStinehart AT aol.com]

Where is the “Valley of the King” -- (MQ H-MLK -- that is referenced at 
Genesis 14: 17, which is also called the Valley Shaveh/(MQ $WH?  [As 
discussed 
below, if the enigmatic word $WH is a Hurrian word meaning “great”, then 
that latter phrase means “Great Valley”.]  It sure sounds like an awfully 
important valley.  Per Gesenius, (MQ means “a low tract of land of wide 
extent…
, fit for corn land (Job 39: 10; Psal. 65: 14; Cant. 2: 1), and suited for 
battlefields (Job 39: 21)”.  Here this broad, true valley/(MQ is given two 
proper names, so it should be a prominent, real valley.
 
Most long books on Genesis say nothing whatsoever about the identity or 
location of (MQ H-MLK.  [E.g., Gerhard von Rad, “Genesis”;  E.A. Speiser, “
Anchor Bible Genesis”;  Robert Alter, “Genesis”.]  If a comment is made, it 
is 
usually similar to what Bruce K. Waltke says in “Genesis” at p. 233:  “
Shaveh.  Apart from the narrator’s explanation, the meaning would be 
uncertain. 
 The King’s Valley is probably close to Jerusalem (2 Sam. 18: 18).”  
However, in my opinion, the “king”/MLK in Absalom’s day at II Samuel would 
have 
been his father, King David.  (MQ H-MLK there is probably a Hebrew nickname 
for the Rephaim Valley southwest of Jerusalem, where King David is reported 
to have won two tremendous military victories over the Philistines, hence 
the 1st millennium century BCE Hebrew nickname “Valley of the King [David]”.  
If so, then that reference at II Samuel 18: 18 obviously has nothing 
whatsoever to do with “Valley Shaveh, that is, Valley of the King” in Abram’s 
day. 
 
Gordon J. Wenham is somewhat more helpful in “Genesis 1-15”, when he 
states at p. 315:  “‘The vale of Shaveh’:  the meaning of Shaveh is 
uncertain.  
It may be simply ‘valley’ (cf. v 5), or it may be ‘ruler’ (cf. A.A. 
Wieder, JBL 84 (1965) 161), as the root apparently means ‘to rule’ in 
Ugaritic.  
If the latter is correct, then the gloss ‘the King’s Vale’ is an apt Hebrew 
translation of an earlier Hebrew term.  ‘A king’s vale’ is mentioned in 2 
Sam 18: 18….  Whether the same King’s Vale is meant here is unclear….”
 
I don’t know if anyone cares to know what Targum Onkelos has to say in 
mistranslating Genesis 14: 17 into Aramaic, but here it is:  “the cleared out 
plain, that is the Hippodrome of the King.”
 
In a word, university scholars do not have any idea whatsoever where the “
Valley of the King” at Genesis 14: 17 is located.
 
Prof. Wenham’s comment is helpful, however, in suggesting that $WH may be a 
foreign word that means “ruler”, with “Valley Shaveh” thus being another 
way of saying “Valley of the King”.  There’s no west Semitic word like that 
that I know of, but it’s right there in Hurrian:  $aw- means “great” in 
Hurrian.  So the reference likely is to “Great Valley, that is, Valley of the 
King”.
 
Oddly, no university scholar has ever  a-s-k-e-d  if, historically, there 
actually was a Valley of the King in Canaan in the Bronze Age.  There was 
one, and only one, and it was in the Late Bronze Age:  the Beth Shean Valley. 
 
Genesis 41: 46 explicitly says that “Pharaoh”/PR(H is a “king”/MLK, and 
the only valley/(MQ in Canaan directly controlled by a true king in the 
Bronze 
Age, that is, by the king/MLK of Egypt -- hence being (MQ H-MLK/“Valley of 
the King” -- was the Beth Shean Valley, per the rare Egyptian garrison that, 
uniquely in Canaan, functioned for 300 years at Beth Shean:
 
“The mound of Tel Beth-Shean…towers steeply above the Beth-Shean Valley….  
The tell's location is strategically incomparable: the northern and 
southern sides are defended by deep ravines, through which the Harod (Wadi 
Jalud) 
and Asi Rivers flow, until they converge to the east of the mound.  The site 
commands the main road descending from the Jezreel and Harod Valleys to the 
Beth-Shean Valley, which was a segment of the international highway that, 
even today, connects Israel's northern coastal plain with Transjordan. To the 
east of the mound, in the Beth-Shean Valley, this latitudinal road 
intersects with the important longitudinal thoroughfare which traverses the 
Jordan 
Valley. From here, it continues north to the Huleh Valley and the Lebanese 
Bek'a.  These strategic advantages, as well as the abundant water and fertile 
lands nearby, made Beth-Shean an attractive site for settlement from earliest 
times.  …One of the major questions which we faced [in doing archaeological 
digs at Beth Shean] was why did the Egyptians of the New Kingdom chose 
Beth-Shean as a garrison town? It appears that the answer is related to the 
status of the town in the previous period. For during the Middle Bronze Age 
II, 
occupation on the mound was not extensive, and apparently the town was not 
fortified by the typical massive ramparts or glacis. Thus, it appears that 
during the New Kingdom, the Egyptians chose to establish their administrative 
and military center in the north of the country at a site of strategic 
importance, but nevertheless played only a secondary role in the pattern of 
Canaanite settlement in the region. …During a period of over 300 years of the 
Egyptian New Kingdom, Beth-Shean served as the center of Egyptian Pharaonic 
rule in northern Land of Israel.”  
_http://www.rehov.org/project/tel_beth_shean.htm_ 
(http://www.rehov.org/project/tel_beth_shean.htm) 
 
The one and only “Valley of the King” in Bronze Age Canaan [that is, a “
valley”/(MQ tightly controlled by Pharaoh as Egypt’s “king”/MLK, the only 
true king who operated in Canaan in the Bronze Age] historically was the Beth 
Shean Valley.  Note how that locale fits Genesis 14: 17 perfectly, as Abram 
is coming back to Canaan from the Damascus area, and so he would go right by 
Beth Shean.  Moreover, presumably one meaning of “Sodom” is a play on the 
word “Siddim”, meaning “good fields”, thus referencing the finest fields 
in all of Canaan:  the magnificent fields of the Jezreel Valley, including at 
Beth Shean. 
 
Note that the Beth Shean Valley, referred to by the Patriarchs as (MQ $WH, 
HW) (MQ H-MLK, is a broad, true valley par excellence.  (MQ [which is used 
twice in the above phrase] in Biblical Hebrew means “a broad, true valley”, 
such as (MQ )YLWN at Joshua 10: 12:  the Ayalon Valley.  Or to say the very 
same thing the Patriarchal way:  (MQ XBRWN at Genesis 37: 14.
 
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois