It is my opinion that a combination of Hebrew grammar, the ordinary
meaning of Hebrew common words, and an historical approach to Biblical proper
names will enable us to resolve one of the oldest and most perplexing Bible
mysteries of all time. Why on earth did Moses order the Israelites to attack
King Og and take over Bashan [Gilead, east of the Jordan River and east of
the Sea of Galilee, being the northern Transjordan, just south of Syria],
at Numbers 21: 33?
1. Bashan was not on the route of the Conquest. [It’s too far north and
east.]
2. And Bashan was not part of the originally Promised Land, either, which
in the Patriarchal narratives is confined to Canaan, whose eastern border
is the Jordan River. The Promised Land is “Canaan”, per Genesis 17: 8,
Exodus 6: 4, and Leviticus 14: 34. YHWH clarifies at Numbers 34: 11-12
that the eastern border of the Promised Land is the Jordan River. Moreover,
Moses is not allowed to enter the Promised Land, yet Moses sure as heck
rampages all over King Og’s Bashan!
How then to explain Numbers 12: 33, 35? “And they [Moses and the
Israelites] turned and went up by the way of Bashan: and Og the king of
Bashan
went out against them, he, and all his people, to the battle at Edrei. … So
they smote him, and his sons, and all his people, until there was none left
him alive: and they possessed his land.”
The keys to unraveling this longstanding Biblical mystery are: (i)
recognizing per Hebrew grammar that XRB-H at Exodus 3: 1 is a common word
meaning
“desert”, which could potentially apply to any awesome mountain “in the
desert”, including a desert mountain in the northern Transjordan, with XRB-H
not being a proper name meaning “Mt. Horeb” or “Mt. Sinai” that mandates
a locale of southern inland Sinai; (ii) giving MDYN [at Exodus 3: 1 and
elsewhere in Exodus and Genesis] its historical meaning in a Late Bronze Age
historical context, namely “Mitanni”, located just northeast of the
northern Transjordan; and (iii) understanding that “serv[ing] God” at “this
mountain” at Exodus 3: 12 means, given the ordinary meaning of the Hebrew
common word (BD, that the Israelites are to honor YHWH continuously in that
location, with “this mountain” being part of the land that the Israelites are
divinely fated to inhabit, rather than “this mountain” being [as
traditionally thought] Mt. Sinai, far south of the land that the Israelites are
divinely fated to possess.
Jabal al-Druze, being a magnificent mountain in the desert just north of
the eastern Transjordan, meets all of the above criteria perfectly. It’s an
awesome divine-like mountain “in the desert”/XRB-H, as required by Exodus
3: 1. Also fully in accordance with Exodus 3: 1, Jabal al-Druze is
located just a little southwest of historical MDYN [the homeland of Moses’
in-laws], that is, historical Mitanni in the Late Bronze Age, with Greater
Mitanni having included much of Syria [but not the Transjordan]. And it’s
within
King Og’s Bashan, so that by conquering Bashan “this mountain” became a
permanent part of the land that the Israelites were divinely fated to
inhabit, where the Israelites were to “serve [(BD] God” forevermore, per
Exodus
3: 12.
The reason w-h-y Moses insisted on attacking King Og and taking his land
of Bashan at Numbers 21: 33, even though Bashan was not on the Exodus
route and was not part of the originally Promised Land, is this. Jabal
al-Druze
is a “desert”/XRB mountain located in Bashan, where Moses had
encountered the burning bush at Exodus 3: 1 after leading his father-in-law’s
flock
there [near MDYN/Mitanni, where Moses’ in-laws lived]. And Jabal al-Druze is
“this mountain”, per Exodus 3: 12, at which Moses was divinely commanded
to “serve God” forevermore. In order to honor that divine commandment
given at Exodus 3: 12, Moses h-a-d to attack and take over King Og’s
Bashan, whose northeast border was the “desert”/XRB mountain near MDYN/Mitanni
where Moses’ in-laws lived: Jabal al-Druze.
The text of Exodus is accurately telling us what happened in the northern
Transjordan in the Late Bronze Age and why, if we don’t fight the text too
much, and if we are willing to apply an historical understanding to the
name MDYN in the text. Biblical “Midian”/MDYN = historical Mitanni.
Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois
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