Rob Acosta wrote:
“Dr. Nili Liphschitz concludes a certain species of oak forests dominated
the ancient Levant to points south of both sides of the Dead Sea...”
On the b-hebrew list, the best way to check out claims of the prominence of
oak trees in Biblical times is to examine Biblical toponyms.
The Aijalon Valley has three villages whose names refer to “oak trees”: I
Samuel 10: 3, Joshua 19: 43, and I Kings 4: 9. [It is less clear whether
the name of the famous Aijalon refers to oak trees.] A little ways south of
there in the Shephelah is the Elah Valley, meaning “Oak Tree Valley”.
Shechem seems to have two nearby villages whose names refer to “oak trees”: at
Genesis 12: 6/Deuteronomy 11: 30 and Judges 9: 37. Galilee has two cities
whose names reference “oak trees”: Joshua 19: 33 and Judges 12: 12.
By stark contrast, to the best of my knowledge there is no village, city or
valley named for “oak trees” in southern hill country or near the Dead Sea.
Per Genesis 13: 9, 11, the logical place to look for the Patriarchs’ XBRWN
is west of Bethel, not south of Bethel. Per Genesis 13: 18, 14: 13 and 18:
1, we are told three times over that “oak trees” are prominent at the
Patriarchs’ XBRWN, and )LNY may also mean that there were several villages
whose
names referred to “oak trees” at or near the Patriarchs’ XBRWN. We see
that everything effortlessly fits the eastern Aijalon Valley perfectly. Two of
the problems with the traditional assertion that southern hill country is
the locale of the Patriarchs’ XBRWN are that (i) southern hill country is not
the opposite of “east” of Bethel, and (ii) there are no toponyms in
southern hill country that reference “oak trees”.
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois
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