or MESRAIM, son of Ham, and father of Ludim, Anamim, Lehabim,
Naphtuhim, Pathrusim, and Casluhim, Gen. x, 6. Meser or Misor was father
of the Mizraim, the Egyptians; and he himself is commonly called
Mizraim, although there is very strong probability that Mizraim, being
of the plural number, signifies rather the Egyptians themselves, than
the father of that people. Mizraim is also put for the country of Egypt:
thus it has three significations, which are perpetually confounded and
used promiscuously, sometimes denoting the land of Egypt, sometimes him
who first peopled Egypt, and sometimes the inhabitants themselves.
Cairo, the capital of Egypt, and even Egypt itself, are to this day
called Mezer by the Arabians. But the natives call Egypt Chemi, that is,
the land of Cham, or Ham, as it is also sometimes called in Scripture,
Psalm lxxviii, 12; cv, 23; cvi, 22. The Prophet Micah, vii, 15, gives to
Egypt the name of Mezor, or Matzor; and rabbi Kimchi, followed in this
by several learned commentators, explains by Egypt what is said of the
rivers of Mezor, 2 Kings xix, 24; Isaiah xix, 6; xxxvii, 25.
MOAB was the son of Lot, and of his eldest daughter, Gen. xix, 31, &c.
He was born about the same time as Isaac, A. M. 2108, and was father of
the Moabites, whose habitation lay beyond Jordan and the Dead Sea, on
both sides of the river Arnon. Their capital city was situated on that
river, and was called Ar or Areopolis, or Ariol of Moab, or Rabbah Moab,
that is, the capital of Moab, or Kir-haresh, that is, a city with brick
walls. This country was originally possessed by a race of giants called
Emim, Deut. ii, 11, 12. The Moabites conquered them, and afterward the
Amorites took a part from the Moabites, Judges xi, 13. Moses conquered
that part which belonged to the Amorites, and gave it to the tribe of
Reuben. The Moabites were spared by Moses, for God had restricted him,
Deut. ii, 9. But there always was a great antipathy between the Moabites
and the Israelites, which occasioned many wars between them. Balaam
seduced the Hebrews to idolatry and uncleanness, by means of the
daughters of Moab, Num. xxv, 1, 2; and Balak, king of this people,
endeavoured to prevail on Balaam to curse Israel. God ordained that the
Moabites should not enter into the congregation of his people, because
they had the inhumanity to refuse the Israelites a passage through their
country, nor would they supply them with bread and water in their
necessity. Eglon, king of the Moabites, was one of the first that
oppressed Israel after the death of Joshua. Ehud killed Eglon, and
Israel expelled the Moabites, Judges iii, 12, &c. Hanun king of the
Ammonites having insulted David’s ambassadors, David made war against
him, and subdued Moab and Ammon; under which subjection they continued
till the separation of the ten tribes. The Ammonites and the Moabites
continued in subjection to the kings of Israel to the death of Ahab.
Presently after the death of Ahab the Moabites began to revolt, 2 Kings
iii, 4, 5. Mesha, king of Moab, refused the tribute of a hundred
thousand lambs, and as many rams, which till then had been customarily
paid, either yearly, or at the beginning of every reign; which of these
two is not clearly expressed in Scripture. The reign of Ahaziah was too
short to make war with them; but Jehoram, son of Ahab, and brother to
Ahaziah, having ascended the throne, thought of reducing them to
obedience. He invited Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, who, with the king of
Edom, then his vassal, entered Moab, where they were near perishing with
thirst, but were miraculously relieved, 2 Kings iii, 16, &c.
It is not easy to ascertain what were the circumstances of the Moabites
from this time; but Isaiah, at the beginning of the reign of King
Hezekiah, threatens them with a calamity, which was to happen three
years after his prediction, and which probably referred to the war that
Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, made with the ten tribes and the other
people beyond Jordan. Amos, i, 13, &c, also foretold great miseries to
them, which, probably, they suffered under Uzziah and Jothan, kings of
Judah, or under Shalmaneser, 2 Chron. xxvi, 7, 8; xxvii, 5; or, lastly,
in the war of Nebuchadnezzar, five years after the destruction of
Jerusalem. This prince carried them captive beyond the Euphrates, as the
prophets had threatened, Jer. ix, 26; xii, 14, 15; xxv, 11, 12; xlviii,
47, &c; xlix, 3, 6, 39; l, 16; and Cyrus sent them home again, as he did
the rest of the captives. After their return from captivity they
multiplied, and fortified themselves, as the Jews did, and other
neighbouring people, still in subjection to the kings of Persia. They
were afterward conquered by Alexander the Great, and were in obedience
to the kings of Syria and Egypt successively, and finally to the Romans.
There is a probability, also, that in the later times of the Jewish
republic they obeyed the Asmonean kings, and afterward Herod the Great.
The principal deities of the Moabites were Chemosh and Baal-peor.
The prophecies concerning Moab are numerous and remarkable. There are,
says Keith, abundant predictions which refer so clearly to its modern
state, that there is scarcely a single feature peculiar to the land of
Moab, as it now exists, which was not marked by the prophets in their
delineation of the low condition to which, from the height of its
wickedness and haughtiness, it was finally to be brought down.
The land of Moab lay to the east and south-east of Judea, and bordered
on the east, north-east, and partly on the south of the Dead Sea. Its
early history is nearly analogous to that of Ammon; and the soil, though
perhaps more diversified, is, in many places where the desert and plains
of salt have not encroached on its borders, of equal fertility. There
are manifest and abundant vestiges of its ancient greatness: the whole
of the plains are covered with the sites of towns, on every eminence or
spot convenient for the construction of one; and as the land is capable
of rich cultivation, there can be no doubt that the country now so
deserted once presented a continued picture of plenty and fertility. The
form of fields is still visible; and there are the remains of Roman
highways, which in some places are completely paved, and on which there
are mile stones of the times of Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, and Severus,
with the number of the miles legible upon them. Wherever any spot is
cultivated the corn is luxuriant; and the riches of the soil cannot
perhaps be more clearly illustrated than by the fact, that one grain of
Heshbon wheat exceeds in dimensions two of the ordinary sort, and more
than double the number of grains grow on the stalk. The frequency, and
almost, in many instances, the close vicinity of the sites of the
ancient towns, prove that the population of the country was formerly
proportioned to its natural fertility. Such evidence may surely suffice
to prove that the country was well cultivated and peopled at a period so
long posterior to the date of the predictions, that no cause less than
supernatural could have existed at the time when they were delivered,
which could have authorized the assertion with the least probability or
apparent possibility of its truth, that Moab would ever have been
reduced to that state of great and permanent desolation in which it has
continued for so many ages, and which vindicates and ratifies to this
hour the truth of the Scriptural prophecies. The cities of Moab were to
be desolate without any to dwell therein;” no city was to escape: Moab
was to flee away.” And the cities of Moab have all disappeared. Their
place, together with the adjoining part of Idumea, is characterized, in
the map of Volney’s Travels, by the ruins of towns. His information
respecting these ruins was derived from some of the wandering Arabs; and
its accuracy has been fully corroborated by the testimony of different
European travellers of high respectability and undoubted veracity, who
have since visited this devastated region. The whole country abounds
with ruins; and Burckhardt, who encountered many difficulties in so
desolate and dangerous a land, thus records the brief history of a few
of them: The ruins of Eleale, Heshbon, Meon, Medaba, Dibon, Aroer, still
subsist to illustrate the history of the Beni Israel.” And it might with
equal truth have been added, that they still subsist to confirm the
inspiration of the Jewish Scriptures, or to prove that the seers of
Israel were the prophets of God; for the desolation of each of these
very cities was a theme of a prediction. Every thing worthy of
observation respecting them has been detailed, not only in Burckhardt’s
Travels in Syria,” but also by Seetzen, and, more recently, by Captains
Irby and Mangles, who, along with Mr. Bankes and Mr. Leigh, visited this
deserted district. The predicted judgment has fallen with such truth
upon these cities, and upon all the cities of the land of Moab far and
near, and they are so utterly broken down,” that even the prying
curiosity of such indefatigable travellers could discover among a
multiplicity of ruins only a few remains so entire as to be worthy of
particular notice. The subjoined description is drawn from their united
testimony: Among the ruins of El Aal (Eleale) are a number of large
cisterns, fragments of buildings, and foundations of houses. At Heshban,
(Heshbon,) are the ruins of a large ancient town, together with the
remains of a temple, and some edifices. A few broken shafts of columns
are still standing; and there are a number of deep wells cut in the
rock. The ruins of Medeba are about two miles in circumference. There
are many remains of the walls of private houses constructed with blocks
of silex, but not a single edifice is standing. The chief object of
interest is an immense tank or cistern of hewn stones, which, as there
is no stream at Medeba,” Burckhardt remarks, might still be of use to
the Bedouins, were the surrounding ground cleared of the rubbish to
allow the water to flow into it; but such an undertaking is far beyond
the views of the wandering Arabs.” There is also the foundation of a
temple built with large stones, and apparently of great antiquity, with
two columns near it. The ruins of Diban, (Dibon,) situated in the midst
of a fine plain, are of considerable extent, but present nothing of
interest. The neighbouring hot wells, and the similarity of the name,
identify the ruins of Myoun with Meon, or Beth Meon of Scripture. Of
this ancient city, as well as of Araayr, (Areor,) nothing is now
remarkable but what is common to them with all the cities of Moab, their
entire desolation. The extent of the ruins of Rabba, (Rabbath Moab,)
formerly the residence of the kings of Moab, sufficiently proves its
ancient importance; though no other object can be particularized among
the ruins, than the remains of a palace or temple, some of the walls of
which are still standing, a gate belonging to another building, and an
insulated altar. There are many remains of private buildings, but none
of them is entire. There being no springs on the spot, the town had two
birkets, the largest of which is cut entirely out of the rocky ground,
together with many cisterns. Mount Nebo was completely barren when
Burckhardt passed over it, and the site of the ancient city had not been
ascertained. Nebo is spoiled.”
While the ruins of all these cities still retain their ancient names,
and are the most conspicuous amidst the wide scene of general
desolation, and while each of them was in like manner particularized in
the visions of the prophet, they yet formed but a small number of the
cities of Moab; and the rest are also, in similar verification of the
prophecies, desolate, without any to dwell therein.” None of the ancient
cities of Moab now remain as tenanted by men. Kerek, which neither bears
any resemblance in name to any of the cities of Moab which are mentioned
as existing in the time of the Israelites, nor possesses any monuments
which denote a very remote antiquity, is the only nominal town in the
whole country, and, in the words of Seetzen, who visited it, in its
present ruined state it can only be called a hamlet; and the houses have
only one floor.” But the most populous and fertile province in Europe,
especially any situated in the interior of a country like Moab, is not
covered so thickly with towns as Moab is plentiful in ruins, deserted
and desolate though now it be. Burckhardt enumerates about fifty ruined
sites within its boundaries, many of them extensive. In general they are
a broken down and undistinguishable mass of ruins; and many of them have
not been closely inspected. But, in some instances, there are the
remains of temples, sepulchral monuments; the ruins of edifices
constructed of very large stones, in one of which buildings some of the
stones are twenty feet in length, and so broad that one constitutes the
thickness of the wall; traces of hanging gardens; entire columns lying
on the ground, three feet in diameter, and fragments of smaller columns;
and many cisterns out of the rock. When the towns of Moab existed in
their prime, and were at ease; when arrogance, and haughtiness, and
pride prevailed among them; the desolation, and total desertion and
abandonment of them all, must have utterly surpassed all human
conception. And that such numerous cities which subsisted for many ages,
some of them being built on eminences, and naturally strong; others on
plains, and surrounded by the richest soil; some situated in valleys by
the side of a plentiful stream; and others where art supplied the
deficiencies of nature, and where immense cisterns were excavated out of
the rock, and which exhibit in their ruins many monuments of ancient
prosperity, and many remains easily convertible into present utility;
should have all fled away, all met the same indiscriminate fate, and be
all desolate, without any to dwell therein,” notwithstanding all these
ancient indications of permanent durability, and their existing
facilities and inducements for becoming the habitations of men, is a
matter of just wonder in the present day. They shall cry of Moab, How is
it broken down!”
The strong contrast between the ancient and the actual state of Moab is
exemplified in the condition of the inhabitants as well as of the land;
and the coincidence between the prediction and the fact is as striking
in the one case as in the other. The days come, saith the Lord, that I
will send unto him (Moab) wanderers that shall cause him to wander, and
shall empty his vessels.” The Bedouin (wandering) Arabs are now the
chief and almost the only inhabitants of a country once studded with
cities. Traversing the country, and fixing their tents for a short time
in one place, and then decamping to another, depasturing every part
successively, and despoiling the whole land of its natural produce, they
are wanderers who have come up against it, and who keep it in a state of
perpetual desolation. They lead a wandering life; and the only
regularity they know or practise, is to act upon a systematic scheme of
spoliation. They prevent any from forming a fixed settlement who are
inclined to attempt it; for although the fruitfulness of the soil would
abundantly repay the labour of settlers, and render migration wholly
unnecessary, even if the population were increased more than tenfold;
yet the Bedouins forcibly deprive them of the means of subsistence,
compel them to search for it elsewhere, and, in the words of the
prediction, literally cause them to wander.” It may be remarked
generally of the Bedouins,” says Burckhardt, in describing their
extortions in this very country, that wherever they are the masters of
the cultivators, the latter are soon reduced to beggary by their
unceasing demands.” “O ye that dwell in Moab, leave the cities and dwell
in the rock, and be like the dove that maketh her nest in the sides of
the hole’s mouth.” In a general description of the condition of the
inhabitants of that extensive desert which now occupies the place of
these ancient flourishing states, Volney in plain but unmeant
illustration of this prediction, remarks, that the wretched peasants
live in perpetual dread of losing the fruit of their labours; and no
sooner have they gathered in their harvest, than they hasten to secrete
it in private places, and retire among the rocks which border on the
Dead Sea.” Toward the opposite extremity of the land of Moab, and at a
little distance from its borders, Seetzen relates, that there are many
families living in caverns;” and he actually designates them the
inhabitants of the rocks.” And at the distance of a few miles from the
ruined site of Heshbon, according to Captains Irby and Mangles, there
are many artificial caves in a large range of perpendicular cliffs, in
some of which are chambers and small sleeping apartments.” While the
cities are desolate, without any to dwell therein, the rocks are
tenanted. But whether flocks lie down in the city without any to make
them afraid, or whether men are to be found dwelling in the rocks, and
are “like the dove that maketh her nest in the sides of the hole’s
mouth,” the wonderful transition, in either case, and the close
accordance, in both, of the fact to the prediction, assuredly mark it in
characters that may be visible to the purblind mind, as the word of that
God before whom the darkness of futurity is as light, and without whom a
sparrow cannot fall unto the ground.
Naphtuhim, Pathrusim, and Casluhim, Gen. x, 6. Meser or Misor was father
of the Mizraim, the Egyptians; and he himself is commonly called
Mizraim, although there is very strong probability that Mizraim, being
of the plural number, signifies rather the Egyptians themselves, than
the father of that people. Mizraim is also put for the country of Egypt:
thus it has three significations, which are perpetually confounded and
used promiscuously, sometimes denoting the land of Egypt, sometimes him
who first peopled Egypt, and sometimes the inhabitants themselves.
Cairo, the capital of Egypt, and even Egypt itself, are to this day
called Mezer by the Arabians. But the natives call Egypt Chemi, that is,
the land of Cham, or Ham, as it is also sometimes called in Scripture,
Psalm lxxviii, 12; cv, 23; cvi, 22. The Prophet Micah, vii, 15, gives to
Egypt the name of Mezor, or Matzor; and rabbi Kimchi, followed in this
by several learned commentators, explains by Egypt what is said of the
rivers of Mezor, 2 Kings xix, 24; Isaiah xix, 6; xxxvii, 25.
MOAB was the son of Lot, and of his eldest daughter, Gen. xix, 31, &c.
He was born about the same time as Isaac, A. M. 2108, and was father of
the Moabites, whose habitation lay beyond Jordan and the Dead Sea, on
both sides of the river Arnon. Their capital city was situated on that
river, and was called Ar or Areopolis, or Ariol of Moab, or Rabbah Moab,
that is, the capital of Moab, or Kir-haresh, that is, a city with brick
walls. This country was originally possessed by a race of giants called
Emim, Deut. ii, 11, 12. The Moabites conquered them, and afterward the
Amorites took a part from the Moabites, Judges xi, 13. Moses conquered
that part which belonged to the Amorites, and gave it to the tribe of
Reuben. The Moabites were spared by Moses, for God had restricted him,
Deut. ii, 9. But there always was a great antipathy between the Moabites
and the Israelites, which occasioned many wars between them. Balaam
seduced the Hebrews to idolatry and uncleanness, by means of the
daughters of Moab, Num. xxv, 1, 2; and Balak, king of this people,
endeavoured to prevail on Balaam to curse Israel. God ordained that the
Moabites should not enter into the congregation of his people, because
they had the inhumanity to refuse the Israelites a passage through their
country, nor would they supply them with bread and water in their
necessity. Eglon, king of the Moabites, was one of the first that
oppressed Israel after the death of Joshua. Ehud killed Eglon, and
Israel expelled the Moabites, Judges iii, 12, &c. Hanun king of the
Ammonites having insulted David’s ambassadors, David made war against
him, and subdued Moab and Ammon; under which subjection they continued
till the separation of the ten tribes. The Ammonites and the Moabites
continued in subjection to the kings of Israel to the death of Ahab.
Presently after the death of Ahab the Moabites began to revolt, 2 Kings
iii, 4, 5. Mesha, king of Moab, refused the tribute of a hundred
thousand lambs, and as many rams, which till then had been customarily
paid, either yearly, or at the beginning of every reign; which of these
two is not clearly expressed in Scripture. The reign of Ahaziah was too
short to make war with them; but Jehoram, son of Ahab, and brother to
Ahaziah, having ascended the throne, thought of reducing them to
obedience. He invited Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, who, with the king of
Edom, then his vassal, entered Moab, where they were near perishing with
thirst, but were miraculously relieved, 2 Kings iii, 16, &c.
It is not easy to ascertain what were the circumstances of the Moabites
from this time; but Isaiah, at the beginning of the reign of King
Hezekiah, threatens them with a calamity, which was to happen three
years after his prediction, and which probably referred to the war that
Shalmaneser, king of Assyria, made with the ten tribes and the other
people beyond Jordan. Amos, i, 13, &c, also foretold great miseries to
them, which, probably, they suffered under Uzziah and Jothan, kings of
Judah, or under Shalmaneser, 2 Chron. xxvi, 7, 8; xxvii, 5; or, lastly,
in the war of Nebuchadnezzar, five years after the destruction of
Jerusalem. This prince carried them captive beyond the Euphrates, as the
prophets had threatened, Jer. ix, 26; xii, 14, 15; xxv, 11, 12; xlviii,
47, &c; xlix, 3, 6, 39; l, 16; and Cyrus sent them home again, as he did
the rest of the captives. After their return from captivity they
multiplied, and fortified themselves, as the Jews did, and other
neighbouring people, still in subjection to the kings of Persia. They
were afterward conquered by Alexander the Great, and were in obedience
to the kings of Syria and Egypt successively, and finally to the Romans.
There is a probability, also, that in the later times of the Jewish
republic they obeyed the Asmonean kings, and afterward Herod the Great.
The principal deities of the Moabites were Chemosh and Baal-peor.
The prophecies concerning Moab are numerous and remarkable. There are,
says Keith, abundant predictions which refer so clearly to its modern
state, that there is scarcely a single feature peculiar to the land of
Moab, as it now exists, which was not marked by the prophets in their
delineation of the low condition to which, from the height of its
wickedness and haughtiness, it was finally to be brought down.
The land of Moab lay to the east and south-east of Judea, and bordered
on the east, north-east, and partly on the south of the Dead Sea. Its
early history is nearly analogous to that of Ammon; and the soil, though
perhaps more diversified, is, in many places where the desert and plains
of salt have not encroached on its borders, of equal fertility. There
are manifest and abundant vestiges of its ancient greatness: the whole
of the plains are covered with the sites of towns, on every eminence or
spot convenient for the construction of one; and as the land is capable
of rich cultivation, there can be no doubt that the country now so
deserted once presented a continued picture of plenty and fertility. The
form of fields is still visible; and there are the remains of Roman
highways, which in some places are completely paved, and on which there
are mile stones of the times of Trajan, Marcus Aurelius, and Severus,
with the number of the miles legible upon them. Wherever any spot is
cultivated the corn is luxuriant; and the riches of the soil cannot
perhaps be more clearly illustrated than by the fact, that one grain of
Heshbon wheat exceeds in dimensions two of the ordinary sort, and more
than double the number of grains grow on the stalk. The frequency, and
almost, in many instances, the close vicinity of the sites of the
ancient towns, prove that the population of the country was formerly
proportioned to its natural fertility. Such evidence may surely suffice
to prove that the country was well cultivated and peopled at a period so
long posterior to the date of the predictions, that no cause less than
supernatural could have existed at the time when they were delivered,
which could have authorized the assertion with the least probability or
apparent possibility of its truth, that Moab would ever have been
reduced to that state of great and permanent desolation in which it has
continued for so many ages, and which vindicates and ratifies to this
hour the truth of the Scriptural prophecies. The cities of Moab were to
be desolate without any to dwell therein;” no city was to escape: Moab
was to flee away.” And the cities of Moab have all disappeared. Their
place, together with the adjoining part of Idumea, is characterized, in
the map of Volney’s Travels, by the ruins of towns. His information
respecting these ruins was derived from some of the wandering Arabs; and
its accuracy has been fully corroborated by the testimony of different
European travellers of high respectability and undoubted veracity, who
have since visited this devastated region. The whole country abounds
with ruins; and Burckhardt, who encountered many difficulties in so
desolate and dangerous a land, thus records the brief history of a few
of them: The ruins of Eleale, Heshbon, Meon, Medaba, Dibon, Aroer, still
subsist to illustrate the history of the Beni Israel.” And it might with
equal truth have been added, that they still subsist to confirm the
inspiration of the Jewish Scriptures, or to prove that the seers of
Israel were the prophets of God; for the desolation of each of these
very cities was a theme of a prediction. Every thing worthy of
observation respecting them has been detailed, not only in Burckhardt’s
Travels in Syria,” but also by Seetzen, and, more recently, by Captains
Irby and Mangles, who, along with Mr. Bankes and Mr. Leigh, visited this
deserted district. The predicted judgment has fallen with such truth
upon these cities, and upon all the cities of the land of Moab far and
near, and they are so utterly broken down,” that even the prying
curiosity of such indefatigable travellers could discover among a
multiplicity of ruins only a few remains so entire as to be worthy of
particular notice. The subjoined description is drawn from their united
testimony: Among the ruins of El Aal (Eleale) are a number of large
cisterns, fragments of buildings, and foundations of houses. At Heshban,
(Heshbon,) are the ruins of a large ancient town, together with the
remains of a temple, and some edifices. A few broken shafts of columns
are still standing; and there are a number of deep wells cut in the
rock. The ruins of Medeba are about two miles in circumference. There
are many remains of the walls of private houses constructed with blocks
of silex, but not a single edifice is standing. The chief object of
interest is an immense tank or cistern of hewn stones, which, as there
is no stream at Medeba,” Burckhardt remarks, might still be of use to
the Bedouins, were the surrounding ground cleared of the rubbish to
allow the water to flow into it; but such an undertaking is far beyond
the views of the wandering Arabs.” There is also the foundation of a
temple built with large stones, and apparently of great antiquity, with
two columns near it. The ruins of Diban, (Dibon,) situated in the midst
of a fine plain, are of considerable extent, but present nothing of
interest. The neighbouring hot wells, and the similarity of the name,
identify the ruins of Myoun with Meon, or Beth Meon of Scripture. Of
this ancient city, as well as of Araayr, (Areor,) nothing is now
remarkable but what is common to them with all the cities of Moab, their
entire desolation. The extent of the ruins of Rabba, (Rabbath Moab,)
formerly the residence of the kings of Moab, sufficiently proves its
ancient importance; though no other object can be particularized among
the ruins, than the remains of a palace or temple, some of the walls of
which are still standing, a gate belonging to another building, and an
insulated altar. There are many remains of private buildings, but none
of them is entire. There being no springs on the spot, the town had two
birkets, the largest of which is cut entirely out of the rocky ground,
together with many cisterns. Mount Nebo was completely barren when
Burckhardt passed over it, and the site of the ancient city had not been
ascertained. Nebo is spoiled.”
While the ruins of all these cities still retain their ancient names,
and are the most conspicuous amidst the wide scene of general
desolation, and while each of them was in like manner particularized in
the visions of the prophet, they yet formed but a small number of the
cities of Moab; and the rest are also, in similar verification of the
prophecies, desolate, without any to dwell therein.” None of the ancient
cities of Moab now remain as tenanted by men. Kerek, which neither bears
any resemblance in name to any of the cities of Moab which are mentioned
as existing in the time of the Israelites, nor possesses any monuments
which denote a very remote antiquity, is the only nominal town in the
whole country, and, in the words of Seetzen, who visited it, in its
present ruined state it can only be called a hamlet; and the houses have
only one floor.” But the most populous and fertile province in Europe,
especially any situated in the interior of a country like Moab, is not
covered so thickly with towns as Moab is plentiful in ruins, deserted
and desolate though now it be. Burckhardt enumerates about fifty ruined
sites within its boundaries, many of them extensive. In general they are
a broken down and undistinguishable mass of ruins; and many of them have
not been closely inspected. But, in some instances, there are the
remains of temples, sepulchral monuments; the ruins of edifices
constructed of very large stones, in one of which buildings some of the
stones are twenty feet in length, and so broad that one constitutes the
thickness of the wall; traces of hanging gardens; entire columns lying
on the ground, three feet in diameter, and fragments of smaller columns;
and many cisterns out of the rock. When the towns of Moab existed in
their prime, and were at ease; when arrogance, and haughtiness, and
pride prevailed among them; the desolation, and total desertion and
abandonment of them all, must have utterly surpassed all human
conception. And that such numerous cities which subsisted for many ages,
some of them being built on eminences, and naturally strong; others on
plains, and surrounded by the richest soil; some situated in valleys by
the side of a plentiful stream; and others where art supplied the
deficiencies of nature, and where immense cisterns were excavated out of
the rock, and which exhibit in their ruins many monuments of ancient
prosperity, and many remains easily convertible into present utility;
should have all fled away, all met the same indiscriminate fate, and be
all desolate, without any to dwell therein,” notwithstanding all these
ancient indications of permanent durability, and their existing
facilities and inducements for becoming the habitations of men, is a
matter of just wonder in the present day. They shall cry of Moab, How is
it broken down!”
The strong contrast between the ancient and the actual state of Moab is
exemplified in the condition of the inhabitants as well as of the land;
and the coincidence between the prediction and the fact is as striking
in the one case as in the other. The days come, saith the Lord, that I
will send unto him (Moab) wanderers that shall cause him to wander, and
shall empty his vessels.” The Bedouin (wandering) Arabs are now the
chief and almost the only inhabitants of a country once studded with
cities. Traversing the country, and fixing their tents for a short time
in one place, and then decamping to another, depasturing every part
successively, and despoiling the whole land of its natural produce, they
are wanderers who have come up against it, and who keep it in a state of
perpetual desolation. They lead a wandering life; and the only
regularity they know or practise, is to act upon a systematic scheme of
spoliation. They prevent any from forming a fixed settlement who are
inclined to attempt it; for although the fruitfulness of the soil would
abundantly repay the labour of settlers, and render migration wholly
unnecessary, even if the population were increased more than tenfold;
yet the Bedouins forcibly deprive them of the means of subsistence,
compel them to search for it elsewhere, and, in the words of the
prediction, literally cause them to wander.” It may be remarked
generally of the Bedouins,” says Burckhardt, in describing their
extortions in this very country, that wherever they are the masters of
the cultivators, the latter are soon reduced to beggary by their
unceasing demands.” “O ye that dwell in Moab, leave the cities and dwell
in the rock, and be like the dove that maketh her nest in the sides of
the hole’s mouth.” In a general description of the condition of the
inhabitants of that extensive desert which now occupies the place of
these ancient flourishing states, Volney in plain but unmeant
illustration of this prediction, remarks, that the wretched peasants
live in perpetual dread of losing the fruit of their labours; and no
sooner have they gathered in their harvest, than they hasten to secrete
it in private places, and retire among the rocks which border on the
Dead Sea.” Toward the opposite extremity of the land of Moab, and at a
little distance from its borders, Seetzen relates, that there are many
families living in caverns;” and he actually designates them the
inhabitants of the rocks.” And at the distance of a few miles from the
ruined site of Heshbon, according to Captains Irby and Mangles, there
are many artificial caves in a large range of perpendicular cliffs, in
some of which are chambers and small sleeping apartments.” While the
cities are desolate, without any to dwell therein, the rocks are
tenanted. But whether flocks lie down in the city without any to make
them afraid, or whether men are to be found dwelling in the rocks, and
are “like the dove that maketh her nest in the sides of the hole’s
mouth,” the wonderful transition, in either case, and the close
accordance, in both, of the fact to the prediction, assuredly mark it in
characters that may be visible to the purblind mind, as the word of that
God before whom the darkness of futurity is as light, and without whom a
sparrow cannot fall unto the ground.