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Jabesh-gilead

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Battles and sieges

  1. c. 1050 BCSaul relieves Jabesh-gilead 1 Sam 11:1–11
    Saul with the levy of Israel and Judah against Nahash the Ammonite besieging Jabesh. Three companies strike the camp in the morning watch; the Ammonites are scattered, no two left together.

History

Jabesh-gilead was a town of Gilead east of the Jordan. Its name is thought to survive in the Wadi el-Yabis, a stream that runs down to the Jordan Valley south of Pella. Many scholars place it at Tell el-Maqlub, higher up the wadi, where the map places it; others prefer Tell Abu al-Kharaz near the wadi's mouth, excavated by a Swedish expedition under Peter Fischer from 1989, which found fortified towns of the Bronze and Iron Ages. Both sites were inhabited in the Iron Age.

In the Book of Judges, after the war against Benjamin, Israel found that no one from Jabesh-gilead had come up to Mizpeh. The city was put to the sword, and four hundred virgins taken from it were given as wives to the surviving Benjamites. Later Nahash the Ammonite besieged Jabesh and offered a covenant only if he might "thrust out all your right eyes". Saul gathered the people at Bezek, came upon the Ammonites in the morning watch and scattered them. A longer form of the story in a Samuel scroll from Qumran, like Josephus, says that Nahash had already put out the right eyes of the Israelites beyond the Jordan.

The men of Jabesh repaid Saul. When the Philistines fastened the bodies of Saul and his sons to the wall of Beth-shan after the battle on Gilboa, all the valiant men of Jabesh went all night, took them down, burned them at Jabesh, buried their bones "under a tree at Jabesh", and fasted seven days. David, newly anointed king over Judah, blessed them for this kindness. Later he took the bones of Saul and Jonathan from them and buried them in Zelah, in the land of Benjamin, in the sepulchre of Kish.

Josephus calls Jabesh the chief city of the Gileadites and says that the bodies were buried in a place called Aroura. In the early fourth century Eusebius knew Jabesh as a village beyond the Jordan, on the hills six miles from Pella on the road to Gerasa. Nothing more is known of its later history.

Scripture: Judg 21:8–14; 1 Sam 11:1–11; 1 Sam 31:11–13; 1 Chr 10:11–12; 2 Sam 2:4–7; 2 Sam 21:12–14

Sources

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

Verses (20)

Judg 21:8
And they said, What one is there of the tribes of Israel that came not up to Mizpeh to the LORD? And, behold, there came none to the camp from Jabesh-gilead to the assembly.
Judg 21:9
For the people were numbered, and, behold, there were none of the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead there.
Judg 21:10
And the congregation sent thither twelve thousand men of the valiantest, and commanded them, saying, Go and smite the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead with the edge of the sword, with the women and the children.
Judg 21:12
And they found among the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead four hundred young virgins, that had known no man by lying with any male: and they brought them unto the camp to Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan.
Judg 21:14
And Benjamin came again at that time; and they gave them wives which they had saved alive of the women of Jabesh-gilead: and yet so they sufficed them not.
Judg 21:22
And it shall be, when their fathers or their brethren come unto us to complain, that we will say unto them, Be favourable unto them for our sakes: because we reserved not to each man his wife in the war: for ye did not give unto them at this time, that ye should be guilty.
1 Sam 10:27
But the children of Belial said, How shall this man save us? And they despised him, and brought him no presents. But he held his peace.
1 Sam 11:1
Then Nahash the Ammonite came up, and encamped against Jabesh-gilead: and all the men of Jabesh said unto Nahash, Make a covenant with us, and we will serve thee.
1 Sam 11:3
And the elders of Jabesh said unto him, Give us seven days’ respite, that we may send messengers unto all the coasts of Israel: and then, if there be no man to save us, we will come out to thee.
1 Sam 11:5
And, behold, Saul came after the herd out of the field; and Saul said, What aileth the people that they weep? And they told him the tidings of the men of Jabesh.
1 Sam 11:9
And they said unto the messengers that came, Thus shall ye say unto the men of Jabesh-gilead, To morrow, by that time the sun be hot, ye shall have help. And the messengers came and shewed it to the men of Jabesh; and they were glad.
1 Sam 11:10
Therefore the men of Jabesh said, To morrow we will come out unto you, and ye shall do with us all that seemeth good unto you.
1 Sam 31:11
And when the inhabitants of Jabesh-gilead heard of that which the Philistines had done to Saul;
1 Sam 31:12
All the valiant men arose, and went all night, and took the body of Saul and the bodies of his sons from the wall of Beth-shan, and came to Jabesh, and burnt them there.
1 Sam 31:13
And they took their bones, and buried them under a tree at Jabesh, and fasted seven days.
2 Sam 2:4
And the men of Judah came, and there they anointed David king over the house of Judah. And they told David, saying, That the men of Jabesh-gilead were they that buried Saul.
2 Sam 2:5
And David sent messengers unto the men of Jabesh-gilead, and said unto them, Blessed be ye of the LORD, that ye have shewed this kindness unto your lord, even unto Saul, and have buried him.
2 Sam 21:12
And David went and took the bones of Saul and the bones of Jonathan his son from the men of Jabesh-gilead, which had stolen them from the street of Beth-shan, where the Philistines had hanged them, when the Philistines had slain Saul in Gilboa:
1 Chr 10:11
And when all Jabesh-gilead heard all that the Philistines had done to Saul,
1 Chr 10:12
They arose, all the valiant men, and took away the body of Saul, and the bodies of his sons, and brought them to Jabesh, and buried their bones under the oak in Jabesh, and fasted seven days.

King James Version

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