* The country of Padan-Aram is situated between the
Euphrates and the upper reaches of the Khabur, on both sides
of the Balikh, and is usually explained as the “plain” or
“table-land” of Aram, though the etymology is not certain;
the word seems to be preserved in that of Tell-Faddân, near
Harrân.
Their earliest chiefs bore the names of towns or of peoples,—N akhor, Peleg, and Serug:* all were descendants of Arphaxad,** and it was related that Terakh, the direct ancestor of the Israelites, had dwelt in Ur-Kashdîm, the Ur or Uru of the Chaldæans.*** He is said to have had three sons—Abraham, Nakhôr, and Harân. Harân begat Lot, but died before his father in Ur-Kashdîm, his own country; Abraham and Nakhor both took wives, but Abraham’s wife remained a long time barren. Then Terakh, with his son Abraham, his grandson Lot, the son of Harân, and his daughter-in-law Sarah,**** went forth from Ur-Kashdîm (Ur of the Chaldees) to go into the land of Canaan.
* Nakhôr has been associated with the ancient village of
Khaura, or with the ancient village of Hâditha-en-Naura, to
the south of Anah; Peleg probably corresponds with Phalga or
Phaliga, which was situated at the mouth of the Khabur;
Serug with the present Sarudj in the neighbourhood of
Edessa, and the other names in the genealogy were probably
borrowed from as many different localities.
** The site of Arphaxad is doubtful, as is also its meaning:
its second element is undoubtedly the name of the Chaldæans,
but the first is interpreted in several ways—“frontier of
the Chaldæans,” “domain of the Chaldæans.” The similarity of
sound was the cause of its being for a long time associated
with the Arrapakhitis of classical times; the tendency is
now to recognise in it the country nearest to the ancient
domain of the Chaldæans, i.e. Babylonia proper.
*** Ur-Kashdîm has long been sought for in the north, either
at Orfa, in accordance with the tradition of the Syrian
Churches still existing in the East, or in a certain Ur of
Mesopotamia, placed by Ammianus Marcellinus between Nisibis
and the Tigris; at the present day Halévy still looks for it
on the Syrian bank of the Euphrates, to the south-east of
Thapsacus. Rawlin-son’s proposal to identify it with the
town of Uru has been successively accepted by nearly all
Assyriologists. Sayce remarks that the worship of Sin, which
was common to both towns, established a natural link between
them, and that an inhabitant of Uru would have felt more at
home in Harrân than in any other town.
**** The names of Sarah and Abraham, or rather the earlier
form, Abram, have been found, the latter under the form
Abirâmu, in the contracts of the first Chaldæan empire.
And they came unto Kharân, and dwelt there, and Terakh died in Kharân.* It is a question whether Kharân is to be identified with Harrân in Mesopotamia, the city of the god Sin; or, which is more probable, with the Syrian town of Haurân, in the neighbourhood of Damascus. The tribes who crossed the Euphrates became subsequently a somewhat important people. They called themselves, or were known by others, as the ‘Ibrîm, or Hebrews, the people from beyond the river;** and this appellation, which we are accustomed to apply to the children of Israel only, embraced also, at the time when the term was most extended, the Ammonites, Moabites, Edomites, Ishmaelites, Midianites, and many other tribes settled on the borders of the desert to the east and south of the Dead Sea.
* Gen. xi. 27-32. In the opinion of most critics, verses 27,
31 32 form part of the document which was the basis of the
various narratives still traceable in the Bible; it is
thought that the remaining verses bear the marks of a later
redaction, or that they may be additions of a later date.
The most important part of the text, that relating the
migration from Ur-Kashdîm to Kharân, belongs, therefore, to
the very oldest part of the national tradition, and may be
regarded as expressing the knowledge which the Hebrews of
the times of the Kings possessed concerning the origin of
their race.
** The most ancient interpretation identified this nameless
river with the Euphrates; an identification still admitted
by most critics; others prefer to recognise it as being the
Jordan. Halévy prefers to identify it with one of the rivers
of Damascus, probably the Abana.
These peoples all traced their descent from Abraham, the son of Terakh, but the children of Israel claimed the privilege of being the only legitimate issue of his marriage with Sarah, giving naïve or derogatory accounts of the relations which connected the others with their common ancestor; Ammon and Moab were, for instance, the issue of the incestuous union of Lot and his daughters. Midian and his sons were descended from Keturah, who was merely a concubine, Ishmael was the son of an Egyptian slave, while the “hairy” Esau had sold his birthright and the primacy of the Edomites to his brother Jacob, and consequently to the Israelites, for a dish of lentils. Abraham left Kharân at the command of Jahveh, his God, receiving from Him a promise that his posterity should be blessed above all others. Abraham pursued his way into the heart of Canaan till he reached Shechem, and there, under the oaks of Moreh, Jahveh, appearing to him a second time, announced to him that He would give the whole land to his posterity as an inheritance. Abraham virtually took possession of it, and wandered over it with his flocks, building altars at Shechem, Bethel, and Mamre, the places where God had revealed Himself to him, treating as his equals the native chiefs, Abîmelech of Gerar and Melchizedek of Jerusalem,* and granting the valley of the Jordan as a place of pasturage to his nephew Lot, whose flocks had increased immensely.** His nomadic instinct having led him into Egypt, he was here robbed of his wife by Pharaoh.***
* Cf. the meeting with Melchizedek after the victory over
the Elamites (Gen. xiv. 18-20) and the agreement with
Abîmelech about the well (Gen. xxi. 22-34). The mention of
the covenant of Abraham with Abîmelech belongs to the oldest
part of the national tradition, and is given to us in the
Jehovistic narrative. Many critics have questioned the
historical existence of Melchizedek, and believed that the
passage in which he is mentioned is merely a kind of parable
intended to show the head of the race paying tithe of the
spoil to the priest of the supreme God residing at
Jerusalem; the information, however, furnished by the Tel-
el-Amarna tablets about the ancient city of Jerusalem and
the character of its early kings have determined Sayce to
pronounce Melchizedek to be an historical personage.
** Gen. xiii. 1-13. Lot has been sometimes connected of
late with the people called on the Egyptian monuments
Rotanu, or Lotanu, whom we shall have occasion to mention
frequently further on: he is supposed to have been their
eponymous hero. Lôtan, which is the name of an Edomite clan,
(Gen. xxxvi. 20, 29), is a racial adjective, derived from
Lot.
*** Gen. xii. 9-20, xiii. 1. Abraham’s visit to Egypt
reproduces the principal events of that of Jacob.
Drawn by Boudier, from a photograph brought home by Lortet.