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The Hebrews
by Brian Gottesman
Scholars have long debated the exact
scope of the term “Hebrew” (Ivri in West Semitic) as found in the
Bible and other ancient writings. Some have postulated that the term comes
from the ancient West Semitic verb “to cross over”, as Abraham and his
family crossed over the Euphrates River on their way into Canaan. Others
believe the term derives from Ever (Heber), a biblical figure from the
book of Genesis and the ancestor of the biblical patriarchs. Recent discoveries
in Egyptology suggest that the term may be connected to “Habiru”
or “Apiru”, an Egyptian phrase used to describe nomadic tribes of
landless, primarily Semitic marauders. These Habiru bands could sometimes
be co-opted to serve the rulers of more settled peoples- many of the Amarna
letters refer to Canaanite kings such as Labayu of Shechem hiring mercenaries
from among them, and the Bible reports that the patriarch Abraham could
field over 300 soldiers- a formidable size for a Bronze Age army- and forming
alliances with the kings of Gerar, Hebron, the Segor, and even Egypt.
What is readily observable is that
from around 1400-1100 BCE, the Dark Ages of the eastern Mediterranean,
the settled Canaanite city-states fell to groups of interrelated, less
“civilized” tribes. The area now called Syria was conquered by the Aramaeans,
Trans-Jordan fell to the Moabites, and Ammonites, Amorite conquerors
seized Bashan, Amurru and Heshbon, and much of what is now Israel was taken
by Israelites (and unrelated Philistine invaders from the Aegean). Only
in the coastal portions of Lebanon and northern Israel did independent
Canaanite strongholds remain; we know these people as the Phoenicians. |