town or village

Aroer

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History

Aroer stood on the northern rim of the Arnon gorge, today's Wadi Mujib, beside the village of Ara'ir in Jordan, about 5 km south-east of Dhiban, the biblical Dibon. In the 1960s a Spanish expedition led by Emilio Olávarri made soundings and then excavations at the site. Below the site an ancient built road, in places 4 to 6 m wide, with kerbstones and retaining walls, climbs out of the gorge; it is dated to the Iron Age by its link with Aroer.

In Deuteronomy, Aroer, "which is by the brink of the river of Arnon", marks the southern end of the land that Israel took from Sihon, king of the Amorites. The children of Gad built Aroer, and Joshua makes it the border of Reuben. Jephthah, answering the king of Ammon, recalls that Israel had dwelt in Heshbon and Aroer and their towns for three hundred years. David's census began at Aroer, and in the days of Jehu, Hazael of Damascus smote the land of Israel east of the Jordan "from Aroer, which is by the river Arnon, even Gilead and Bashan".

About 840 BC, by the usual reckoning, Mesha, king of Moab, wrote on his stele from Dibon: "I built Aroer, and I made the highway at the Arnon". The road below the site has been identified with this highway. In Jeremiah's oracle against Moab, Aroer is a Moabite town again: "O inhabitant of Aroer, stand by the way, and espy; ask him that fleeth".

In AD 106 the land passed into the new Roman province of Arabia, and Trajan's new road, the Via Nova Traiana, crossed the Arnon by the ascent from Dhiban rather than at Aroer. Early in the fourth century Eusebius wrote that Aroer was still pointed out, perched on the brow of the mountain above the gorge where the torrent runs down to the Dead Sea.

Scripture: Deut 2:36; Deut 3:12; Num 32:34; Josh 13:15–16; Judg 11:26; 2 Sam 24:5; 2 Kgs 10:32–33; Jer 48:19

Checked against its sources; not yet read by a historian.

Verses (13)

Num 32:34

And the children of Gad built Dibon, and Ataroth, and Aroer,

Deut 2:36

From Aroer, which is by the brink of the river of Arnon, and from the city that is by the river, even unto Gilead, there was not one city too strong for us: the LORD our God delivered all unto us:

Deut 3:12

And this land, which we possessed at that time, from Aroer, which is by the river Arnon, and half mount Gilead, and the cities thereof, gave I unto the Reubenites and to the Gadites.

Deut 4:48

From Aroer, which is by the bank of the river Arnon, even unto mount Sion, which is Hermon,

Josh 12:2

Sihon king of the Amorites, who dwelt in Heshbon, and ruled from Aroer, which is upon the bank of the river Arnon, and from the middle of the river, and from half Gilead, even unto the river Jabbok, which is the border of the children of Ammon;

Josh 13:9

From Aroer, that is upon the bank of the river Arnon, and the city that is in the midst of the river, and all the plain of Medeba unto Dibon;

Josh 13:16

And their coast was from Aroer, that is on the bank of the river Arnon, and the city that is in the midst of the river, and all the plain by Medeba;

Judg 11:26

While Israel dwelt in Heshbon and her towns, and in Aroer and her towns, and in all the cities that be along by the coasts of Arnon, three hundred years? why therefore did ye not recover them within that time?

2 Sam 24:5

And they passed over Jordan, and pitched in Aroer, on the right side of the city that lieth in the midst of the river of Gad, and toward Jazer:

2 Kgs 10:33

From Jordan eastward, all the land of Gilead, the Gadites, and the Reubenites, and the Manassites, from Aroer, which is by the river Arnon, even Gilead and Bashan.

1 Chr 5:8

And Bela the son of Azaz, the son of Shema, the son of Joel, who dwelt in Aroer, even unto Nebo and Baal-meon:

Isa 17:2

The cities of Aroer are forsaken: they shall be for flocks, which shall lie down, and none shall make them afraid.

Jer 48:19

O inhabitant of Aroer, stand by the way, and espy; ask him that fleeth, and her that escapeth, and say, What is done?

King James Version