The borders of Israel will be basically rectangular. The east and west will be outlined by the Mediterranean and the Jordan river. The southern border will be a line from the bottom of the dead sea straight across to Egypt. The northern border will be a little higher than the Sea of Galilee and will run from Mt Hor, which was where Aaron died, through Libo Hamath to Zedad. It’s difficult to pin down where any of these places are, but when I put Libo Hamath into Google Maps it takes me to the ruins of Tyre, which seems like about where that border might be. Tyre is a really interesting city. Carthage was a colony of Tyre, but before that, Tyre was a colony of Sidon. That’s all after the time of the book of Numbers though. I wonder if Zedad might have later become Sidon. Of course I don’t have anything to base that one beyond the fact that they sound a little bit similar. Maybe on my next pass through the Bible I’ll have time to research it more thoroughly. Tune in next year.
I’m a little surprised at how small the boundaries laid out by God really are. I got the impression that Israel was supposed to take up the lion’s share of the Arabian Peninsula, but it sounds here like it’s only supposed to be about the same size and shape of the northern half of the current day nations of Israel, if you count all the U.N. contested Palestinian parts and the Golan Heights and all the stuff that Israel claims. This puts Be’er Sheba and a lot of the places important to the history of Abraham and the early heroes of the Bible outside of the promised land.
No comments:
Post a Comment