Negev Trip Day 1: Shephelah and Costal Plain

Impression Report 7

Shephelah and Coastal Plain

Andrew Sharp

10/12/2013
[Edits and additions in brackets by Alana.]

First we took a look near Zorah and Eshtaol, stopping and leaving the bus at the mouth of the Sorek wadi system, a major wadi system just to the west of Jerusalem. We had a good vantage point from atop a hill, looking out west towards the Philistine plain. [I hadn't been here before - it was a great place to note the transition from hill country to Shephelah, and you could see fairly clearly the cut of the chalk trough.]

Then we hopped back into the bus and drove a few minutes further west to Beth Shemesh, another ruin, rock walls, dirt dug out, the typical stuff. It was just to the west of our first outlook. I leaned on a destruction layer by accident. A destruction layer is a layer in the ground where there’s clearly broken stuff and ash and black and other obvious signs of the town being destroyed and burned. On the side of the pits dug out of the town you can see the layers of dirt removed and in that dirt you could clearly see bits of pottery and a black line. It was here that was a location where no pig bones were found. And the towns to the west did have pigs bones. This is an indication, based on the Jewish laws about what is and isn’t kosher, that the Israelites lived here, and more importantly, the Philistines didn’t live in this location either. Joshua 19:40 discusses the territory of Dan, something we could clearly see from here. I got a picture with Alana more or less holding the territory with her hand on the map.

Next, back to the bus again as we drove further south. Here we went to an unknown Iron Age city [Khirbet Qeiyafa]. It had two gates suggesting it was the town “two gates” (can’t remember the way it was said in Hebrew) [Sha'arayim or Shaaraim] but there were many towns that had two, so it’s rather speculative to call it that, and state that the location and title were tied together.

Some thought this area was the location of Israel’s encampment when going up against the Philistines in the story of David and Goliath, but that doesn’t seem to make sense with the topography [and geography]. If it was on this particular hill, the Philistines would have more or less been able to just walk past Saul and the Israelites, rather than needing to push through them [on their way into the hill country]. Not to mention it talks about the Israelites and Philistines being encamped on opposing heights with a valley between, but the valley at the location of this Iron Age City was quite wide, likely too wide for one camp to yell to the other, which kind of happens when the Philistines call out to the Israelites to send out their best man. Plus Goliath is decked out in bronze armor, not iron and the Iron Age City, is, you guessed it, from the Iron Age, when the account likely would have mentioned the use of iron, not bronze. 1 Sam 17 tells the story by the way.

Also, it might have been Goliath’s knee that was hit given David kills him twice in the story. Odd. But the term for forehead and the term for knee are very similar and the knee may have been one of the only places unprotected by Goliath’s armor. Not to mention he falls forward when he gets hit by David, which seems unlikely if he’s hit in the forehead, though one needs to account for the fact he may have been moving down hill, and the weight of his armor in motion may have been enough to cause this too. Though a baseball sized rock moving something similar to the speed of a pro MLB pitcher’s speed ball, maybe a bit faster? That’d knock most anyone over backwards if it hit your head. But Goliath had a helmet on, so the knee isn’t that unlikely. [To get an idea of how slings are used in similar ways even today, you can follow this link: http://www.timesofisrael.com/video-shows-idf-soldiers-outmatched-by-rock-slinging-palestinians/.]

Next we stopped atop Beth Guvrin. Saw an old church dome and had lunch.

Next we went to Lachish, saw a big siege mound and anti-siege mound. 2 Chor. 32 talks about Lachish and it’s being sieged in the time of King Hezekiah, the same king who built the “Hezekiah’s Tunnel” we walked through, the long underground tunnel that lead to/from a spring in Jerusalem. Also in 2 Kings 18.

Us on top of the seige ramp

We went to the beach and saw the Canaanite city gate. One of the oldest mud brick gate arches in existence I think. Then went to a hostel for the night, exhausted.