Shfela
The Shfela, or Shephelah, lit. "lowlands", is a transitional region of soft-sloping hills in south-central Israel stretching over 10–15 km between the Judaean Mountains and the Coastal Plain. The different use of the term "Judean Plain", as either defining just the Coastal Plain segment stretching along the Judaean Mountains, or including, or only referring to, the Shfela creates grave confusion. Today the Shfela is rural with many farms, but the cities of Ashdod, Rehovot, Beit Shemesh, Kiryat Gat surround it; the Bible assigned land in the Shfela to the tribes of Dan. The Shfela is mentioned many times in the Hebrew Bible; the Shfela was the site of many biblical battles. During the Bar Kokhba revolt, hollowed out hills were connected to form elaborate bunker systems for the combat with the Romans; the Shfela consists of fertile rolling hills. Topographically it represents the transition from the higher and more rugged Jerusalem and Hebron Mountains, whose foothills it forms, the Coastal Plain.
About 60 km long in north-south direction and only 13 km wide, it is subdivided into two parts: the western "Low Shephelah", which starts at an altitude of ca. 150 metres above sea level and rises to no more than ca. 200 metres above the Coastal Plain, the eastern "High Shephelah" rising to altitudes between 250-450 metres above sea level. In the upper part the valleys descending from the Judean Mountains are deeper, they broaden once they reach the lower part where the riverbeds create larger spaces between the hills. Where they reach the Shfela, the rivers can flow over substantial distances along the border between the mountains and the hills, forming longitudinal valleys. Passage between the east-west and north-south valleys has dictated the communication routes throughout history. In geological terms, the Shfela is a syncline, i.e. it formed as a basin whose rock layers were folded downwards, but is part of the wider south Judean anticlinorium-a regional formation characterised by upward folding.
Typical to the Shfela are the Senonian-Eocene chalky formations. The soft Eocene chalk is known locally as kirton, which tends to build a harder upper calcrete crust, so that in the past people quarried the kirton while leaving the nari layer in place as a ceiling. Apart from using the extracted rock, they utilised the generated underground hollows for different purposes. One of the major characteristics is hills formed of marl-covered soft chalk, as opposed to the Judean Hills which are made of hard chalk and dolomite; the valleys and lower areas contain soil with a high sand content, as well as large tracts of fertile areas. Seasonal swamps can develop during the rainy season; the southern part is made up of loess. The Shfela has a temperate Mediterranean to semi-arid climate. A series of east-west valleys cuts the Shfelah into districts. From north to south, they are: the Valley of Ayalon, Sorek Valley, Valley of Elah, Guvrin Valley, Valley of Lachish, Valley of Adorayim; the biblical towns established there guarded settlements of the interior and took advantage of trade passing along this route.
Ayalon was the primary access corridor to Jerusalem along the ascent of Horon. Caves are a major feature of the southern part of the Shfela, many of them bell-shaped such as those in Beit Guvrin. Archaeological surveys in the Shfela have found evidence of habitation during the Late Bronze period; the Shfela was a border region between the Iron Age Kingdom of Judah and the Philistines. During the decline and ultimate destruction of Judah by the Assyrians and Babylonians, the region was taken over by the Edomites and it became the core of what was known in Greek as Idumea; the Shfela flourished during the Hellenistic period, was affected by the First Jewish-Roman War and was depopulated of Jews as a result of the Bar Kochba revolt. It flourished again in the Byzantine period and was the scene of one of the major battles during the Muslim Arab conquest of the 7th century. Geography of Israel Adullam Azekah – biblical tell Beit Guvrin – multi-period archaeological site at Beit Guvrin National Park Beit Jimal – Silesian monastery connected to St. Stephen Beit Shemesh – biblical tell and modern Israeli town Emmaus Nicopolis – archaeological site, "Emmaus of the Byzantines" Gezer – biblical tell Hurvat Itri Imwas – pre-1967 Arab village and archaeological site Keilah Khirbet Qeiyafa – archaeological site of Iron Age II and Hellenistic occupations Kiryat Gat – modern Israeli town Lakhish – biblical tell Latrun – historical site and modern monastery in the Ayalon Valley Libnah – Canaanite city-state in the Shephelah Lod/Lydda, city on the border between Shephelah and Coastal Plain Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut – modern Israeli town Socoh / Sokho – biblical tell Tell es-Safi – Gath of the Philistines, biblical tell Tell Zayit – archaeological site, tentatively associated with biblical Libnah or Ziklag Timnah Soils of the Coastal Plain and the Shefela
Eusebius
Eusebius of Caesarea known as Eusebius Pamphili, was a historian of Christianity and Christian polemicist. He became the bishop of Caesarea Maritima about 314 AD. Together with Pamphilus, he was a scholar of the Biblical canon and is regarded as an learned Christian of his time, he wrote Demonstrations of the Gospel, Preparations for the Gospel, On Discrepancies between the Gospels, studies of the Biblical text. As "Father of Church History", he produced the Ecclesiastical History, On the Life of Pamphilus, the Chronicle and On the Martyrs. During the Council of Antiochia he was excommunicated for subscribing to the heresy of Arius, thus withdrawn during the First Council of Nicaea where he accepted that the Homoousion referred to the Logos. Never recognized as a saint, he became counselor of Constantine the Great, with the bishop of Nicomedia he continued to polemicize against Saint Athanasius of Alexandria, Church Fathers, since he was condemned in the First Council of Tyre in 335. Little is known about the life of Eusebius.
His successor at the See of Caesarea, wrote a Life of Eusebius, a work that has since been lost. Eusebius' own surviving works only represent a small portion of his total output. Beyond notices in his extant writings, the major sources are the 5th-century ecclesiastical historians Socrates and Theodoret, the 4th-century Christian author Jerome. There are assorted notices of his activities in the writings of his contemporaries Athanasius, Eusebius of Nicomedia, Alexander of Alexandria. Eusebius' pupil, Eusebius of Emesa, provides some incidental information. In his Ecclesiastical History, Eusebius writes of Dionysius of Alexandria as his contemporary. If this is true, Eusebius' birth must have been before Dionysius' death in autumn 264, he was born in the town in which he lived for most of his adult life, Caesarea Maritima. He was baptized and instructed in the city, lived in Syria Palaestina in 296, when Diocletian's army passed through the region. Eusebius was made presbyter by Agapius of Caesarea.
Some, like theologian and ecclesiastical historian John Henry Newman, understand Eusebius' statement that he had heard Dorotheus of Tyre "expound the Scriptures wisely in the Church" to indicate that Eusebius was Dorotheus' pupil while the priest was resident in Antioch. By the 3rd century, Caesarea had a population of about 100,000, it had been a pagan city since Pompey had given control of the city to the gentiles during his command of the eastern provinces in the 60s BC. The gentiles retained control of the city for the three centuries to follow, despite Jewish petitions for joint governorship. Gentile government was strengthened by the city's refoundation under Herod the Great, when it had taken on the name of Augustus Caesar. In addition to the gentile settlers, Caesarea had large Samaritan minorities. Eusebius was born into the Christian contingent of the city. Caesarea's Christian community had a history reaching back to apostolic times, but it is a common claim that no bishops are attested for the town before about 190 though the Apostolic Constitutions 7.46 states that Zacchaeus was the first bishop.
Through the activities of the theologian Origen and the school of his follower Pamphilus, Caesarea became a center of Christian learning. Origen was responsible for the collection of usage information, or which churches were using which gospels, regarding the texts which became the New Testament; the information used to create the late-fourth-century Easter Letter, which declared accepted Christian writings, was based on the Ecclesiastical History of Eusebius of Caesarea, wherein he uses the information passed on to him by Origen to create both his list at HE 3:25 and Origen's list at HE 6:25. Eusebius got his information about what texts were accepted by the third-century churches throughout the known world, a great deal of which Origen knew of firsthand from his extensive travels, from the library and writings of Origen. On his deathbed, Origen had made a bequest of his private library to the Christian community in the city. Together with the books of his patron Ambrosius, Origen's library formed the core of the collection that Pamphilus established.
Pamphilus managed a school, similar to that of Origen. Pamphilus was compared to Demetrius of Phalerum and Pisistratus, for he had gathered Bibles "from all parts of the world". Like his model Origen, Pamphilus maintained close contact with his students. Eusebius, in his history of the persecutions, alludes to the fact that many of the Caesarean martyrs lived together under Pamphilus. Soon after Pamphilus settled in Caesarea, he began teaching Eusebius, somewhere between twenty and twenty-five; because of his close relationship with his schoolmaster, Eusebius was sometimes called Eusebius Pamphili: "Eusebius, son of Pamphilus". The name may indicate that Eusebius was made Pamphilus' heir. Pamphilus gave Eusebius a strong admiration for the thought of Origen. Neither Pamphilus nor Eusebius knew Origen personally.
Beit Shemesh
Beit Shemesh is a city located 30 kilometres west of Jerusalem in Israel's Jerusalem District, with a population of 114,371 in 2017. The history of Beit Shemesh goes back to pre-biblical times; the modern city of Beit Shemesh was founded in 1950. The ancient city of Beit Shemesh was named after the Canaanite sun-goddess Shemesh, worshipped there in antiquity; the ruins of the ancient biblical city are located at a site called Tel Beit Shemesh, a tell located near the modern city. In the Amarna letters Shamash is mentioned several times, along with Addu, as one of the greatest gods: the Pharaoh is "like Addu and Shamash"; the name Beth-Shemesh was shared by two other places in Palestine and one more in Egypt. Beit Shemesh is first mentioned in the Hebrew Bible in the Book of Joshua, as a city in the territory of the tribe of Judah on the border between their territory and that of the tribe of Dan. In Joshua 21:16, this city was set aside as one of the 13 Kohanic cities for the priests of the tribe of Levi, the Kohanim.
Another city by the same name, Beit Shemesh, is mentioned in Joshua 19:38, being situated in the territory of the tribe of Naphtali. The city located in the territorial bounds of the tribe of Judah is mentioned in the 6th chapter of 1 Samuel as being the first city encountered by the Ark of the Covenant on its way back from Philistia after having been captured by the Philistines in battle; the stone on which the Ark was placed is recorded as still being located there at the time of writing the Books of Samuel. In the King James Version this stone is described as "the great stone of Abel". In 2 Kings 14, Beit Shemesh is again mentioned as being the site of the battle between Amaziah king of Judea and Jehoash king of Israel. After the destruction of much of Judah by Sennacherib in 701 BCE, the city was abandoned for a while, but there seems to have been an attempt by a group of Judahites at resettling Beth Shemesh, judging by the refurbishing of the water reservoir in the 7th century BCE. However, after the Babylonian conquest of Judah in the early 580s, either the new Babylonian rulers, or the nearby Philistine metropolis of Ekron favoured by them put an end to the initiative by sealing and covering over the vital water reservoir, not uncovered until 2004.
During the first Jewish return, at the beginning of the Second Temple period, there was no lasting revival of the city, as opposed to many other places in the vicinity such as Beit Guvrin and others. The small Arab towns of Dayr Raban and Dayr Rafat used rocks for building from this ancient source. A monastery and other remains from the Byzantine period have been found on the tell. In the late 19th century the area was known as'Ain Shems or Khirbet'Ain Shems and was used as a temporary harvest-time residence by local Arabs; the small mosque of Abu Mizar stood there. During the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, the Egyptian army invaded the area and set up a fortified post, called "Mishlat" in Hebrew, on a hill overlooking Beit Shemesh, within the Arab village Dayr Aban; the post changed hands several times during fighting. The Harel Brigade occupied part of the post for several months, giving rise to the name "the joint post" or the "Mishlat HaMeshutaf", with 60 meters dividing them and the enemy forces.
The Mishlat was taken by the Harel force in the Ha-Har offensive, during the night of 19–20 October 1948. Beit Shemesh is the point from which the so-called Convoy of 35 set out to bring provisions to besieged Gush Etzion. On 15 January 1948, a group of 38 Palmach volunteers left Hartuv near Beit Shemesh. After one member of the group sprained his ankle and returned, accompanied by two others, the group, now numbering 35, continued on its way, their presence was discovered by two Arab women who encountered two scouts of the group near Surif.. The Convoy of 35 was subsequently killed in fighting with Arab villagers and militiamen. On 6 December 1950, the Hartuv displaced persons camp "Ma'abarat Har-Tuv" was established on the site of the current-day Moshav Naham; the first inhabitants were Jewish Bulgarian immigrants. They were joined by more Jewish immigrants from Bulgaria, Iraq, Romania and Kurdistan. In 1952 the first permanent houses were built in Beit Shemesh. Prior to 1948 the Ramat Beit Shemesh neighborhood area was the site belonging to the Arab village Bayt Nattif.
This village was built on remnants of an ancient Judean town, with various remnants of Jewish settlement from the time, such as a mosaic floor and other remains from the period of the Hasmonean kings and earlier. This area is under dispute about preservation, having been the subject of a grassroots campaign. In its early years, Beit Shemesh came to typify the "Development Town" with a North African immigrant population. In 1977, following a writeup in Haaretz newspaper, Beit Shemesh was perceived as the main outpost for Menachem Begin's Likud party, he promised to rehabilitate neighborhoods and when Likud came to power that year, investment in the city increased. The Israel Police maintains a bomb disposal specialist training center in Beit Shemesh; when the city was built in the 1950s, it was settled by new immigrants from Iran, Romania, Bulgaria and Iraqi Kurdistan. In the 1990s, the city saw a large influx of new immigrants from the former Soviet Union, Ethiopia a
Maqam (shrine)
A Maqām is a shrine built on the site associated with a Muslim saint or religious figure his or her tomb. It is a funeral construction small, cubic-shaped and topped with a dome; the maqams of Palestine were considered significant to the field of biblical archaeology, as their names were used in the 18th and 19th centuries to identify much of biblical geography. According to Claude Reignier Conder's description in 1877, the Palestinian locals attached "more importance to the favour and protection of the village Mukam than to Allah himself, or to Mohammed his prophet". From Arabic "a place" or "station." It is used to denote a "sanctuary", such as an actual tomb. Its meaning can be restricted only to built structures; the literal meaning of maqam is "the place where one stands." Such name for a holy tomb is used in Syria and Palestine. There is a form Mukam in the essays of European travellers of the 19th century. Due to their cubic shape, these constructions were called Kubbeh, Qubba the same way as the major sacred site Kaaba in Mecca.
In Turkic-speaking Muslim countries similar tombs are known as Türbe, Dürbe, Aziz and in Iranian-speaking countries — Dargah. The most popular type of maqams is a single chamber square building topped with a dome, in the middle of which there is a stone cenotaph, though the bodies of holy men themselves were buried below the ground level. In the south wall of the maqam, facing Mecca, there is a small mihrab decorated with inscriptions and floral ornament; the entrance to the chamber is at the north wall. In the other arched walls there are small windows; the dome is situated by an ancient carob or oak tree or a spring or rock cut water cistern. The positioning of maqams on or near these nautral features is seen as indicative of ancient worship practices adapted by the local population and associated with Muslim saints. Ali Qleibo, a Palestinian anthropologist, states that this built evidence constitutes "an architectural testimony to Christian/Moslem Palestinian religious sensibility and its roots in ancient Semitic religions."
Maqams were dedicated to biblical and quranic, real or mythical and female figures from ancient times to the time of the Arab conquest or late Ottoman rule. The maqams are not always supposed to stand over the tombs of the saints. A cenotaph is indeed always to be found there, but they are regarded as "stations." There are bigger maqams, consisting of two, three or four chambers: prayer chamber, entrance hall, zawiya or a room for pilgrims to have a rest. Big maqams have three similar domes. In times of old, the dome was decorated by a metal spire with a crescent, but nowadays such decoration is rare. A sacred tree was planted near maqams — a palm tree, oak or sycomore. There was a well or spring. Candelabras and lamps are hanging in an active maqam, a cenotaph is covered by a quilt, praying rugs are spread on the floor in front of the mihrab; as a rule, maqams were built on the top of the hills or at the crossroads, besides their main function — shrine and prayer place, they served as a guard point and a guiding landmark for travelers and caravans.
Over the years, new burial places appeared near maqams. Big cemeteries formed around many Muslim sanctuaries; every village in Palestine has a wali, a patron saint, whom people, predominantly rural peasants, would call upon for help at his or her associated sanctuary. While wali can refer to both the saint and sanctuary, a sanctuary for a common saint is more known as a maqam. Early Islam disapproved worshipping of holy men and their burial places, considering it a sort of idolatry, but it was Shiites who started to build sumptuous tombs for their deceased leaders — imams and sheikhs, turned those tombs into religious objects. Soon Sunnis followed their example. Arab travellers and geographers ‘Ali al-Harawi, Yaqut al-Hamawi and others described in their essays many Christian and Muslim shrines in Syria and Egypt. During the times of Mamluk dynasty, monumental tombs were built for Muslim holy men and theologists, some of these tombs have come down to present times; the major part of them is located in Egypt, some parts are in Syria and Palestine.
These are namely the famous Rachel's Tomb in Bethlehem, the splendid mausoleum of Abu Hurairah in Yavne and the maqam of sheikh Abu ‘Atabi in Al-Manshiyya, Acre. In the Ottoman Empire times, maqams were constructed everywhere, old sanctuaries were taken under restoration. New buildings were not as monumental and pompous as before, looked quite unpretentious. In Turkish period, maqams had simple construction and no architectural décor. Mosques were uncommon in Palestinian villages until the late 19th century, but every village had at least one maqam which served as sites of worship in the Palestinian folk Islam popular in the countryside over the centuries. Christians and Jews held some of the maqams to be holy, such as that of Nabi Samwil. In the period of Ottoman rule over Palestine, most of these sites were visited collectively by members of all three faiths who travelled together with provisions for a multi-day journey; some maqams, like Nabi Rubin and Nabi Musa among others, were the focus of seasonal festivals that thousands would attend annually.
The period of Mandator
Shale oil extraction
Shale oil extraction is an industrial process for unconventional oil production. This process converts kerogen in oil shale into shale oil by pyrolysis, hydrogenation, or thermal dissolution; the resultant shale oil is used as fuel oil or upgraded to meet refinery feedstock specifications by adding hydrogen and removing sulfur and nitrogen impurities. Shale oil extraction is performed above ground by mining the oil shale and treating it in processing facilities. Other modern technologies perform the processing underground by applying heat and extracting the oil via oil wells; the earliest description of the process dates to the 10th century. In 1684, Great Britain granted the first formal extraction process patent. Extraction industries and innovations became widespread during the 19th century; the industry shrank in the mid-20th century following the discovery of large reserves of conventional oil, but high petroleum prices at the beginning of the 21st century have led to renewed interest, accompanied by the development and testing of newer technologies.
As of 2010, major long-standing extraction industries are operating in Estonia and China. Its economic viability requires a lack of locally available crude oil. National energy security issues have played a role in its development. Critics of shale oil extraction pose questions about environmental management issues, such as waste disposal, extensive water use, waste water management, air pollution. In the 10th century, the Arabian physician Masawaih al-Mardini wrote of his experiments in extracting oil from "some kind of bituminous shale"; the first shale oil extraction patent was granted by the British Crown in 1684 to three people who had "found a way to extract and make great quantities of pitch and oyle out of a sort of stone". Modern industrial extraction of shale oil originated in France with the implementation of a process invented by Alexander Selligue in 1838, improved upon a decade in Scotland using a process invented by James Young. During the late 19th century, plants were built in Australia, Brazil and the United States.
The 1894 invention of the Pumpherston retort, much less reliant on coal heat than its predecessors, marked the separation of the oil shale industry from the coal industry. China, New Zealand, South Africa, Spain and Switzerland began extracting shale oil in the early 20th century. However, crude oil discoveries in Texas during the 1920s and in the Middle East in the mid 20th century brought most oil shale industries to a halt. In 1944, the US recommenced shale oil extraction as part of its Synthetic Liquid Fuels Program; these industries continued until oil prices fell in the 1980s. The last oil shale retort in the US, operated by Unocal Corporation, closed in 1991; the US program was restarted in 2003, followed by a commercial leasing program in 2005 permitting the extraction of oil shale and oil sands on federal lands in accordance with the Energy Policy Act of 2005. As of 2010, shale oil extraction is in operation in Estonia and China. In 2008, their industries produced about 930,000 metric tonnes of shale oil.
Australia, the US, Canada have tested shale oil extraction techniques via demonstration projects and are planning commercial implementation. Only four processes are in commercial use: Kiviter, Galoter and Petrosix. Shale oil extraction process decomposes oil shale and converts its kerogen into shale oil—a petroleum-like synthetic crude oil; the process is conducted by hydrogenation, or thermal dissolution. The efficiencies of extraction processes are evaluated by comparing their yields to the results of a Fischer Assay performed on a sample of the shale; the oldest and the most common extraction method involves pyrolysis. In this process, oil shale is heated in the absence of oxygen until its kerogen decomposes into condensable shale oil vapors and non-condensable combustible oil shale gas. Oil vapors and oil shale gas are collected and cooled, causing the shale oil to condense. In addition, oil shale processing produces spent oil shale, a solid residue. Spent shale consists of inorganic compounds and char—a carbonaceous residue formed from kerogen.
Burning the char off the spent shale produces oil shale ash. Spent shale and shale ash can be used as ingredients in brick manufacture; the composition of the oil shale may lend added value to the extraction process through the recovery of by-products, including ammonia, aromatic compounds, pitch and waxes. Heating the oil shale to pyrolysis temperature and completing the endothermic kerogen decomposition reactions require a source of energy; some technologies burn other fossil fuels such as natural gas, oil, or coal to generate this heat and experimental methods have used electricity, radio waves, microwaves, or reactive fluids for this purpose. Two strategies are used to reduce, eliminate, external heat energy requirements: the oil shale gas and char by-products generated by pyrolysis may be burned as a source of energy, the heat contained in hot spent oil shale and oil shale ash may be used to pre-heat the raw oil shale. For ex situ processing, oil shale is crushed into smaller pieces, increasing surface area for better extraction.
The temperature at which decomposition of oil shale occurs depends on the time-scale of the process. In ex situ retorting processes, it begins at 300 °C and proceeds more and at higher temperatures; the amount of oil produced is the highest when the temperatu
David
David is described in the Hebrew Bible as the second king of the United Kingdom of Israel and Judah after Saul and Ish-bosheth. In the biblical narrative, David is a young shepherd who gains fame first as a musician and by killing the enemy champion Goliath, he becomes a close friend of Saul's son Jonathan. Worried that David is trying to take his throne, Saul turns on David. After Saul and Jonathan are killed in battle, David is anointed as King. David conquers Jerusalem, taking the Ark of the Covenant into the city, establishing the kingdom founded by Saul; as king, David commits adultery with Bathsheba, leading him to arrange the death of her husband Uriah the Hittite. Because of this sin, God denies David the opportunity to build the temple, his son Absalom tries to overthrow him. David flees Jerusalem during Absalom's rebellion, but after Absalom's death he returns to the city to rule Israel. Before his peaceful death, he chooses his son Solomon as successor, he is honored in the prophetic literature as an ideal king and an ancestor of a future Messiah, many psalms are ascribed to him.
Historians of the Ancient Near East agree that David existed around 1000 BCE, but that there is little that can be said about him as a historical figure. There is no direct evidence outside of the Bible concerning David, but the Tel Dan Stele, an inscribed stone erected by a king of Damascus in the late 9th/early 8th centuries BCE to commemorate his victory over two enemy kings, contains the phrase Hebrew: ביתדוד, consisting of the Hebrew words "house" and "David", which most scholars translate as "House of David". Ancient Near East historians doubt that the united monarchy as described in the Bible existed. David is richly represented in post-biblical Jewish written and oral tradition, is discussed in the New Testament. Early Christians interpreted the life of Jesus in light of the references to the Messiah and to David. David is written tradition as well; the biblical character of David has inspired many interpretations in art and literature over centuries. The first book of Samuel portrays David as the youngest of the eight sons of Jesse of Bethlehem.
His mother is not named in any book of the Bible, but the Talmud identifies her as Nitzevet daughter of Adael. When the story was retold in 1 Chronicles he was made the youngest of seven sons and given two sisters and Abigail; the Book of Ruth traces his ancestry back to Ruth the Moabite. David is described as cementing his relations with various political and national groups through marriage. King Saul offered David his oldest daughter Merab. David did not refuse the offer, but humbled himself in front of Saul to be considered among the King's family. Saul reneged and instead gave Merab in marriage to Adriel the Meholathite. Having been told that his younger daughter Michal was in love with David, Saul gave her in marriage to David upon David's payment in Philistine foreskins. Saul tried to have him killed. David escaped. Saul sent Michal to Galim to marry Palti, son of Laish. David took wives in Hebron, according to 2 Samuel 3. David wanted Michal back and Saul's son Ish-boshet delivered her to David, causing her husband great grief.
The Book of Chronicles lists his sons with his various concubines. In Hebron, David had six sons: Amnon, by Ahinoam. By Bathsheba, his sons were Shammua, Shobab and Solomon. David's sons born in Jerusalem of his other wives included Ibhar, Eliphelet, Nepheg, Japhia and Eliada. Jerimoth, not mentioned in any of the genealogies, is mentioned as another of his sons in 2 Chronicles 11:18, his daughter Tamar, by Maachah, is raped by her half-brother Amnon. God is angered when Saul, Israel's king, unlawfully offers a sacrifice and disobeys a divine command both to kill all of the Amalekites and to destroy their confiscated property. God sends the prophet Samuel to anoint a shepherd, the youngest son of Jesse of Bethlehem, to be king instead. After God sends an evil spirit to torment Saul, his courtiers recommend that he send for David, a man skilled in playing the lyre, wise in speech, brave in battle. David thus enters Saul's service as one of the royal armour-bearers and plays the lyre to soothe the king.
War comes between Israel and the Philistines, the giant Goliath challenges the Israelites to send out a champion to face him in single combat. David, sent by his father to bring provisions to his brothers serving in Saul's army, declares that he can defeat Goliath. Refusing the king's offer of the royal armour, he kills Goliath with his sling. Saul inquires the name of the young hero's father. Saul sets David over his army. All Israel loves David. Saul plots his death, but Saul's son Jonathan, one of those who loves David, warns him of his father's schemes and David flees, he goes first to Nob, where he is fed by the priest Ahimelech and given Goliath's sword, to Gath, the Philistine city of Goliath, intending to seek refuge with King Achish there. Achish's servants or officials question his loyalty, David sees that he is in danger there, he goes next to the cave of Adullam. From there he goes to seek refuge with the king of
Rehoboam
Rehoboam was the fourth king of Israel according to the Hebrew Bible. He was a son of and the successor to Solomon, a grandson of David. In the account of I Kings and II Chronicles, he was king of the United Monarchy of Israel, but after the ten northern tribes of Israel rebelled in 932/931 BC to form the independent Kingdom of Israel, under the rule of Jeroboam, Rehoboam remained as king only of the Kingdom of Judah, or southern kingdom. According to the Jewish Encyclopaedia, "Solomon's wisdom and power were not sufficient to prevent the rebellion of several of his border cities. Damascus under Rezon secured its independence Solomon, thus before the death of Solomon the unified kingdom of David began to disintegrate. With Damascus independent and a powerful man of Ephraim, the most prominent of the Ten Tribes, awaiting his opportunity, the future of Solomon's kingdom became dubious". According to 1 Kings 11:1-13, Solomon had broken the mandate of the Torah by marrying foreign wives and being influenced by them and building shrines to the Moabite and Ammonite gods.
So the Lord became angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned from the Lord God of Israel... Therefore the Lord said to Solomon, "Because you have done this, have not kept My covenant and My statutes, which I have commanded you, I will tear the kingdom away from you and give it to your servant. I will not do it in your days, for the sake of your father David. Rehoboam's mother, was an Ammonitess, thus one of the foreign wives whom Solomon married. In the Revised Version she is referred to as "the Ammonitess". Conventional biblical chronology dates the start of Rehoboam's reign to the mid-10th century BC, his reign is described in 2 Chronicles 10-12 in the Hebrew Bible. Rehoboam was 41 years old; the assembly for the coronation of Solomon's successor, was called at Shechem, the one sacredly historic city within the territory of the Ten Tribes. Before the coronation took place the assembly requested certain reforms in the policy followed by Rehoboam's father, Solomon; the reforms requested would materially reduce the royal exchequer and hence its power to continue the magnificence of Solomon's court.
The older men counseled Rehoboam at least to speak to the people in a civil manner. However, the new king sought the advice from the young men he had grown up with, who advised the king to show no weakness to the people, to tax them more, which Rehoboam did, he proclaimed to the people, Whereas my father laid upon you a heavy yoke, so shall I add tenfold thereto. Whereas my father chastised you with whips, so shall I chastise you with scorpions. For my littlest finger is thicker than my father's loins. Although the ostensible reason was the heavy burden laid upon Israel because of Solomon's great outlay for buildings and for luxury of all kinds, the other reasons include the historical opposition between the north and the south; the two sections had acted independently until David, by his victories, succeeded in uniting all the tribes, though the Ephraimitic jealousy was ready to develop into open revolt. Religious considerations were operative; the building of the Temple was a severe blow for the various sanctuaries scattered through the land, the priests of the high places supported the revolt.
Josephus has the rebels exclaim: "We leave to Rehoboam the Temple his father built."Jeroboam and the people rebelled, with the ten northern tribes breaking away and forming a separate kingdom. The new breakaway kingdom continued to be called Kingdom of Israel, was known as Samaria, or Ephraim or the northern Kingdom; the realm Rehoboam was left with was called Kingdom of Judah. During Rehoboam's 17-year reign, he retained Jerusalem as Judah's capital but Judah did what was evil in the sight of the Lord, they provoked him to jealousy with their sins which they committed, more than all that their fathers had done. For they built for themselves high places, pillars, Ashe′rim on every high hill and under every green tree, they did according to all the abominations of the nations which the Lord drove out before the people of Israel. Rehoboam went to war against the new Kingdom of Israel with a force of 180,000 soldiers. However, he was advised against fighting his brethren, so returned to Jerusalem.
The narrative reports that Judah were in a state of war throughout his 17-year reign. In the fifth year of Rehoboam's reign, king of Egypt, brought a huge army and took many cities. According to Joshua, son of Nadav, the mention in 2 Chronicles 11, 6 sqq. that Rehoboam built fifteen fortified cities, indicates that the attack was not unexpected. The account in Chronicles states that Shishaq marched with 1,200 chariots, 60,000 horsemen and troops who came with him from Egypt: Libyans and Kushites. Shishaq's armies captured all of the fortified towns leading to Jerusalem between Gibeon; when they laid siege to Jerusalem, Rehoboam gave Shishaq all of the treasures out of the temple as a tribute. The Egyptian campaign cut off trade with south Arabia via Elath and the Negev, established during Solomon's reign. Judah became a vassal state of Egypt. Rehoboam had 18 wiv
_-_29_Dec._2014.JPG)
