In evaluating at which Beersheba Esau routinely bagged “savory” big game,
it is helpful to look at Late Bronze Age burials throughout Canaan. At
Gaza, the local aristocracy had taken up the Egyptian practice of hunting as a
high-class hobby:
“…the growing influence of Egypt following the campaigns of Thutmose III;
the many Egyptian and Egyptian-type objects [in Late Bronze Age burials
near Gaza] perhaps point to the desire of the local aristocracy to emulate Egypt
’s upper classes and their favorite pastimes such as fishing and hunting.”
Rivka Gonen, “Burial Patterns and Cultural Diversity in Late Bronze Age
Canaan” (1992), at p. 82.
Based on topography, we would expect hunting to have been better at
Lachish/Beer Laxi-Rai than at Gaza. Indeed, Late Bronze Age archaeological
finds
at Lachish have led to the conclusion that wild animals were hunted in the
Lachish Valley in the Late Bronze Age in part for use in sacrificial religious
cults: “The recent, massive final report for Lachish…tracks the animal
bones for the LB Level VI temple at Lachish as …evidence for hunted animals
used in sacrificial cult from the Late Bronze Age….” Mark S. Smith, “Recent
Study of Israelite Religion in Light of the Ugaritic Texts”, in “Ugarit at
Seventy-Five”, edited by K. Lawson Younger (2007), at p. 16. Yet based on
Iron Age burials at Lachish, we know that at least as of the Iron Age
[Lachish V], most meat eaten on a regular basis would have been from sheep and
goats or other domesticated animals, not wild animals. Yohanan Aharoni, “
Investigations at Lachish” (1975), at p. 92. In addition to being used for
religious sacrifices, hunting may likely have also been pursued as an
aristocratic
sport in the Lachish Valley in the Late Bronze Age, as was the case at Gaza
in the Late Bronze Age. In other words, hunting was doable and “special”
at Late Bronze Age Lachish, but not routine.
I see the “Lachi” element in Lachi-sha as being the “Laxi” element in
Beer Laxi-Rai, which I see as being the Lachish Valley, with the famous 144
foot well/Beer being at Lachish. In my view, that’s where Esau learned to
hunt, though it’s at a “Beersheba” where Esau routinely bags “savory” game for
his father Isaac.
The conventional view, by contrast, holds that Beer Laxi-Rai is in the
Sinai Desert. Isaac lives there from Genesis 24: 62 to Genesis 26: 1, a period
of time which I compute as being 30 years. Why would Isaac sojourn for 30
years in the Sinai Desert? How could Isaac be walking in a field at Genesis
24: 63 in the Sinai Desert, a place that has no fields? There is no place
in the Sinai that is remotely like the Biblical description of Beer Laxi-Rai,
or that has a name similar to Laxi. After Isaac has become the governing
Patriarch of Canaan upon Abraham’s death, Genesis 25: 11 explicitly tells us
that Isaac remained at Beer Laxi-Rai. Why would the governing Patriarch of
Canaan choose to live outside of Canaan, outside of the Promised Land, in
the Sinai Desert? Although the Sinai did have ibex and some other wild
animals, it is hard to envision Esau operating on his own as a hunter in the
Sinai
Desert. Moreover, Genesis 26: 1 makes no sense unless Beer Laxi-Rai is in “
the land”, that is, the land of Canaan.
As to hunting, we know from Iron Age burials that people at Beersheba of
the Negev in the Iron Age ate very little wild game, presumably because there
was little opportunity for hunting in that semi-arid clime. In fact, based
on archaeology, there appears to have been no permanent population at all at
Beersheba in the Negev in the Late Bronze Age: “Beersheba…No pottery of
Bronze Age date has been found at the site….” W.J. Martin and A.R. Millard,
at p. 63 of “Baker Encyclopedia of Bible Places”, ed. John J. Bimson
(1995). The wells were there, though, and so it was a good way-station on the
way to Egypt, which is how the Hebrews experience Beersheba in the Negev in
chapter 46 of Genesis. But if you want agriculture, hunting and a large flock
of sheep and goats in the Late Bronze Age, per chapters 21 and 26 and 28 of
Genesis, a great place for all of that would be Beersheba of Galilee, while
not being possible at Beersheba in the Negev.
Now compare the situation at Luz/Dan in Upper Galilee. There, gazelles
were hunted for food in the Late Bronze Age, and made up a substantial portion
of the people’s diet. Jonathan Michael Golden, “Ancient Canaan and Israel:
New Perspectives” (2004), at p. 95. The reason for that is that Dan was
close to Mt. Hermon, uninhabited by people, but with plenty of trees and a
natural place for a large population of wild animals. Beersheba of Galilee
was similarly situated, in that just southwest of Beersheba of Galilee was an
uninhabited huge, dense forest [MDBR P)RN] that was ideal for wild animals.
Thus Beersheba of Galilee is an ideal place for Isaac to say the following,
whereas such a statement could never have been made at Beersheba in the
Negev, due to the night and day differences in the prospects for hunting at
each locale:
“Isaac…called Esau his older son and said to him, ‘My son…take your
weapons, your quiver and your bow, and go out to the field and hunt game for
me,
and prepare for me delicious food, such as I love, and bring it to me so
that I may eat, that my soul may bless you before I die.’" Genesis 27: 1-4
All four members of the family knew that Esau would easily bag “savory”
big game that day. That wasn’t because Esau was a dwarf who was helped by the
devil. No, it was because Isaac, who unduly favored Esau, decided to have
the family sojourn for 10 long years at Beersheba of Galilee, precisely
because it was an ideal place for Esau to indulge his passion for hunting
“savory
” big game.
If we can get the geography right, this Biblical story tells itself.
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois
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