Prof. Yigal Levin:
1. You wrote: “How on earth do you know that Adamah of Josh 19:36 was "a
fairly big city" while Adami Hanekeb was a "small town"?”
I agree that there were no big cities in the area yet [which indeed is one
essential part of my overall analysis, as will become apparent]. I see the
place whose name is in masculine construct plural as being a village with a
generic name, with such name being shared by another place in the general
neighborhood. As backdrop to my analysis, please take a look at the excellent
map of Lower Galilee here:
_http://truthandpurpose.com/2008/09/where-jesus-grew-up-a-study-of-lower-gal
ilee/_
(http://truthandpurpose.com/2008/09/where-jesus-grew-up-a-study-of-lower-galilee/)
I associate the Adamah of Joshua 19: 36 with Tel Adami on that map, and I
associate the Adami Nekeb of Joshua 19: 33 with the Kh. Ed Damiyeh on that
map. One basis for that is that I see )DMY H-NGB as being the same place as
)DMY H-NQB, with NGB referring to the fact that Ed Damiyeh is a few miles “
south” of Tel Adami. Also, you can see from that map the critical fact that
Ed Damiyeh has a strategic location at a “pipe”/socket/narrow passageway,
which would make sense for NQB. At Joshua 19 these two places are mentioned
in quick succession, which makes sense for them being close together. The
key is a village, having a generic proper name rendered here in masculine
construct plural, which has a strategic location at a “pipe”/socket/narrow
passageway, where there were no big cities in the area at the time.
2. You wrote: “For that matter, how do you know that Adami Hanekeb was a
town at all? The context in which it appears, that of border descriptions,
often mentions topographical object other than towns. That very same verse
mentions "the Jordan" - the river.”
That’s actually the single most important issue on this thread. Where
there were no big cities in the area at the time, but a locale had a strategic
location at a “pipe”/socket/narrow passageway, then the following is likely
and predictable. There will be a village at that strategic location. It’s
name likely will be a generic name, oftentimes based on the local
topography. As such, there will often be one or two other villages in the same
general area, though not having a strategic location, that will have the same
or
similar generic names based on the local topography. If the one village with
the strategic location is small enough, then scholars often mistakenly
think that the place name, which uses construct plural, is exclusively
referring
to the local topography itself, rather than referencing the following two
key facts: (i) there were several villages in the neighborhood with the same
or similar generic proper names, reflected by the plural aspect of the
plural construct form, but (ii) the Biblical author means to refer solely to
the
o-n-e village with a generic name that had a strategic location at a “pipe
”/socket/narrow passageway.
Per the map I referenced above, there were two places with generic names
that seem based on Adam in eastern Lower Galilee. In order to determine that
both were cities, towns or villages, we can go back in time to the mid-15th
century BCE Thutmose III list of places in Canaan. There we seem to see
both of these two places: )a-ta-m-m at #36, as to which Anson Rainey comments “
)DMY HNQB”; and $a-ma-$u )a-tu-ma at #51, as to which Anson Rainey,
focusing on )a-tu-ma, comments: “)DMH?”. This is a rare case of where a mere
village made it onto the T III list because of its strategic location.
[Speaking of places that were not big cities in the Bronze Age, which is a
critical part of my overall analysis, let me just note here that we don’t see
the
Beth-horon cities on the T III list or in the Amarna Letters or in the
Pentateuch, because they did not come into existence until about the 10th
century
BCE.]
Why would you think that these items at Joshua 19 or on the T III list are
a “topographical object other than towns”? The primary reference is not to
“red earths of the Nekeb”, which would not make sense, but rather is to
the proper name of a village that has a strategic location at a “pipe”
/socket/narrow passageway. No one is surprised that Joshua 19: 33 logically
ends
with a reference to the Jordan River, whereas all the previous references in
that verse are generally viewed as being cities.
3(a). You wrote: “Assuming that "neqeb" here refers to a "hole" or a
"breach", perhaps a pass of some kind, I would understand "Adami hanekeb" as
"the red (or "earth") of the breach".”
But you see, that would contradict normal Hebrew grammar. Don’t you see
)DMY as being masculine construct plural? Then where’s the plural element in
your analysis? Yes, the idea of a strategic locale near a “hole” or “breach
” or at a “pipe”/socket/narrow passageway is very good, but I see a
village there which is sensibly referenced in the Bible by using masculine
construct plural. If there were no big cities in the area at the time, then
this
situation is commonplace in ancient Canaan. A strategically located village
had a generic name, sharing that generic name with several other places in
the general neighborhood, which in turn leads to construct plural format in
referencing that village with a generic name. Though that one village might
have been tiny, nevertheless from a military standpoint, having effective
control of that village might have been of paramount importance in order to
control that “pipe”/socket/narrow passageway. So whenever we see construct
plural form, we should ask ourselves whether, instead of being a reference
exclusively to local topography, we are in fact seeing a reference to a
village with a generic name that had a strategic location at a “pipe”
/socket/narrow passageway, where there were no big cities in the area at the
time.
3(b). You further wrote: “Something like "Ma'aleh Adumim" in Josh 15 -
the red ascent.”
I have never seen anyone else take that interpretation. I believe the
mainstream scholarly view is that ma-aleh is a common word, meaning “ascent”,
whereas Adumim by contrast is a proper name. The Biblical reference to )DMY
H-NQB is to a village by using the village’s proper name in masculine
construct plural, where no big cities existed yet in the area, where that
village
had a generic name shared by another town in the general area [hence the
plural aspect of the construct plural form], and where that o-n-e village,
though it may have been quite small, nevertheless was important because it had
a strategic location at a “pipe”/socket/narrow passageway.
4. You wrote: “In general, analyzing place-names according to standard
biblical Hebrew grammar is very iffy. Unlike prose, in which the author at
least is able to carefully choose every phase, place-names are "facts on the
ground", and who knows what local dialect produced this or that form in what
period?”
That seems to be the point you’ve been driving at all along. You don’t
want to see a village with a generic proper name being referenced in masculine
construct plural, where such village had a strategic location at a “pipe”
/socket/narrow passageway, and where there were no big cities yet in the area
at the time. But to avoid that, it seems you have to deny the ordinary
rules of Hebrew grammar. By contrast, I am saying that construct plural when
applied to proper names in geographical place names in the Bible has a very
predictable meaning. I don’t see any rules of normal Hebrew grammar as being
broken here. I see no exceptionalism. If I get the gist of your argument,
an argument I often see in scholarly analyses, it is that you are in effect
saying that when one sees construct plural in a Biblical place name, you
are entitled to throw away the Hebrew grammar book in the name of “local
dialect”, because each such name allegedly embodies exceptionalism. I
respectfully disagree with that special pleading. The Biblical authors could
slightly
massage west Semitic geographical place names to put them in standard
Hebrew form. Let’s first ask what the geographical place name using construct
plural would mean if the n-o-r-m-a-l rules of Hebrew grammar applied. Isn’t
that a logical first step to take?
I would like to set forth a series of Biblical place names outside of the
Pentateuch on this thread which, in my opinion, all follow the normal rules
of Hebrew grammar, and all make perfect sense, with no exceptionalism being
claimed. If I can explain a series of place names of this type, then I think
that may undercut the view that most such place names are sui generis and
follow few if any recognizable rules. We shouldn’t rule out in advance,
should we, the possibility that there might be a village with a generic name
that is therefore referenced in masculine construct plural, and which had a
strategic location at a “pipe”/socket/narrow passageway, where there were no
big cities yet in the area at the time? I want to set forth a series of
Biblical place names which, in my opinion, (i) have a proper name in construct
plural form, and (ii) have a predictable meaning that fully accords with
normal Hebrew grammar, just like )DMY H-NQB. If I can show enough such
Biblical
geographical place names that follow all the normal rules of Hebrew grammar
that I see as being applicable in these situations, then I think I may be
able to overcome the scholarly view that most of these place names are sui
generis and follow no recognizable rules. Let’s see if the pattern I have
proposed for understanding )DMY H-NQB applies to a series of similar Biblical
place names.
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois
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