Cave-Dwelling Troglodytes: A Scholarly Perspective on חרי

[Jim Stinehart]

Isaac Fried wrote: “The name שוֹבל $OBAL may indeed be from the root שבל, 'raise, extend', of which we have the שׁוֹבֶל, 'flap', of Isaiah 47:2, and the שׁבִיל, 'path, trail', of Jer. 18:15; or it may be the theophoric איש-הוא-בעל or איש-הוא-אב-אל. Compare ישראל=איש-ר-אל.”

1. שבל does not work well as a west Semitic root of שובל, because שבל has no vav/ו.

2. שבל at Isaiah 47: 2 means “the train of a robe”, and it has no vav/ו.

3. שביל at Jeremiah 18: 15 has no vav/ו, and has a yod/י after the bet/ב. The alternative spelling replaces that yod/י with vav/ו, but it’s still after the bet/ב, not before the bet/ב as in the name here: שובל.

Note that no such west Semitic etymology works, as none can account for vav/ו as the second letter in this name. All 26 names at Genesis 36: 20-30 use defective spelling, in which vav/ו is an important Hebrew letter.

4. A better starting point is “or it may be the theophoric איש-הוא-בעל”, because בל does represent Baal, meaning “lord”. The reason why there’s no ayin/ע in the middle is because this is the Hebrew rendering of the Akkadian form of this word/name: bêlu.

But it’s way too big of a stretch to see ש as being איש, much less ו as somehow being הוא.

Instead, why not go with a letter-for-letter exact match?

“Shobal” : שובל : Še-wi-be-lu, meaning: “Great [is the] Lord”. Cf. the attested Hurrian names Še-e-wi, Še-wi-i-šarri (which has the same format and essentially the same meaning as this Biblical Hurrian name), and Bêlu at Nuzi (Nuzi Names, pp. 133, 114). šew- or šaw- means “great” in Hurrian.

At Genesis 36: 20-21 and 29-30, “Shobal” : שובל : Še-wi-be-lu is explicitly stated to be a אלוףחרי. The attested meaning of that phrase at Ugarit is “Hurrian princeling”. A אלוףחרי is n-o-t a cave-person, is not a troglodyte, is not a “Horite”, did not live south of the Dead Sea, and has nothing whatsoever to do with the 8th - 6th century BCE state of Edom. Not. University scholars tell us that a late 7th century BCE Jewish editor in Jerusalem was trying to fool his contemporaries into thinking this was an ancient text by studding his composition with Late Bronze Age terminology. Does that theory of the case make any sense? No. The reason why Genesis 36: 20-30 is replete with authentic Late Bronze Age terminology and proper names is because it was composed in the Late Bronze Age, and it was recorded in cuneiform writing in the Late Bronze Age. That is why Genesis 36: 20-30 can have letter-for-letter spelling accuracy as to both the terminology אלוףחרי and 26 vintage Hurrian names.

The scholarly theory of חרי in the Patriarchal narratives is untenable on all levels. In considering the meaning of חרי in the Patriarchal narratives, why can’t scholars give up on the absurdist notion of cave-dwelling troglodytes at the mid-1st millennium BCE state of Edom south of the Dead Sea (where there are few caves)? Why not instead be sensible and ask about the חרי and the אלוףחרי and the city of אדום that are attested in northwest Gilead in the Late Bronze Age? After all, isn’t northwest Gilead, just east of the Jordan River, the most logical place for Esau to settle, once he has to leave Canaan?

Northwest Gilead, just east of the Jordan River, has a climate and topography very similar to Canaan just west of the Jordan River. Esau had famously loved hunting big game as a young man (Genesis 25: 27), and there was plenty of good hunting in the well-wooded hill country of western Gilead. By contrast, Edom is located in a very arid area south of the Dead Sea, where there is little arable land, and the lack of trees means that hunting big game is largely out of the question there. The area south of the Dead Sea was known for copper mining and the caravan trade between Egypt and Mesopotamia, being occupations with which Esau had no familiarity at all. Indeed, prior to the 8th century BCE there was very little population living south of the Dead Sea. Why would Esau be thought to choose such a forbidding locale, instead of attractive northwest Gilead just across the Jordan River from Canaan? Note that Esau prospers after leaving Canaan. He can quickly muster 400 men as an impressive entourage (Genesis 32: 6), and Esau explicitly says to Jacob: “And Esau said, I have enough, my brother; keep that thou hast unto thyself.” Genesis 33: 9. Furthermore, it is strongly implied at Genesis 36: 6-7 that Esau’s lifestyle in Esau’s adopted homeland was the same as that of Jacob in Canaan. Finally, we know that Esau is approaching Jacob from the n-o-r-t-h (west), because at Genesis 32: 22-24 Jacob for the first time takes his family south across the Jabbok River (at night), then Jacob alone bravely stands watch on the north bank of the Jabbok River that fearful night, pending Esau’s arrival from the n-o-r-t-h (west).

Why isn’t there a single university scholar out there who is willing to question the traditional locale south of the Dead Sea for Esau, and a-s-k if Genesis 36: 20-30 -- including the חרי and the אלוףחרי and the Late Bronze Age city of אדום near the Sea of Galilee and 26 Hurrian names -- is, rather, an accurate reflection of historical northwest Gilead in the Late Bronze Age?

Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois

[Isaac Fried]

1. If one prefers to consider the letter vav of שובל as a fourth radical, one has the right to do so. I myself think it is a later scribal addition to mark the vowel O or U for הוּא, 'he'.
2. The writing of “Shobal” as: שובל : Še-wi-be-lu, meaning: “Great [is the] Lord”, introduces into the name the four extra English letters e-i-e-u.
3. Indeed, there is no denying the possibility that the initial letter ש of שובל is the essence of the root שאה or שׂיא, 'top, pinnacle', as in Job 20:6, referring to the loftiness of בעל or אב-אל.

Isaac Fried, Boston University

[Jim Stinehart]

Isaac Fried wrote:

“1. If one prefers to consider the letter vav of שובל as a fourth radical, one has the right to do so. I myself think it is a later scribal addition to mark the vowel O or U for הוּא, 'he'.”

For this Biblical name, I see the Hebrew letter vav/ו as being the consonant W.

True, in Hebrew common words, vav/ו seldom appears in initial position, though when it does, it is a consonant. An example would be וזר at Proverbs 21: 8.

Consider now if the early Hebrew author of the Patriarchal narratives wanted to refer to the Hurrians by the following colorful nickname: “Hewa [is] God people”. [Hewa, spelled various ways in English and in the ancient languages, was the Hurrians’ chief goddess.] The expected Hebrew defective spelling would be: חוי. The Hebrew vav/ו renders the consonant W there, for the Hurrian goddess name “Hewa”. KJV transliterates that full name of a people as “Hivite”. It appears at Genesis 34: 2; 36:
2. [Note that the final yod/י does double duty there: (i) it is the Hurrian theophoric suffix -ia, a-n-d (ii) it is also the standard Hebrew ending meaning “people”.]

To render the second syllable of the Hurrian word še-wi in the Biblical Hurrian name “Shobal” : שובל : Še-wi-be-lu, Hebrew vav/ו is the natural choice. Proper names in the Patriarchal narratives use defective spelling, so the Hurrian word še-wi is rendered in Hebrew defective spelling as: שו.

“2. The writing of “Shobal” as: שובל : Še-wi-be-lu, meaning: “Great [is the] Lord”, introduces into the name the four extra English letters e-i-e-u.”

Proper names in the Patriarchal narratives use defective Hebrew spelling. So with the exception of Akkadian long U, the vowel in a consonant-vowel syllable is never rendered by any Hebrew letter.

Although university scholars ignore defective spelling entirely in mis-analyzing the 26 names at Genesis 36: 20-30, they do recognize that in t-h-e-o-r-y , one should expect defective spelling for names in the Patriarchal narratives. To quote the leading expert on defective spelling vs. plene spelling in the Hebrew Bible:

“[S]ome really common names [of characters in early books of the Bible] like Moses, Aaron, Jacob, have plene spelling rarely or never…. The spelling of many names thus remained unchanged at a time when similar words which were not proper names [feature plene spelling].” James Barr, “The Variable Spellings of the Hebrew Bible, Vol. 73”, Oxford University Press, Oxford, U.K. (1989), p. 165.

If university scholars would at least a-s-k if defective spelling applies in analyzing proper names in the Patriarchal narratives, we could quickly prove the Late Bronze Age provenance of that truly ancient text.

“3. Indeed, there is no denying the possibility that the initial letter ש of שובל is the essence of the root שאה or שׂיא, 'top, pinnacle', as in Job 20:6, referring to the loftiness of בעל or אב-אל.”

Job 20: 5-7 is not conducive to words that are epithets fit for the divine:

“5 That the triumphing of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment? 6 Though his excellency [loftiness of pride : שיאו] mount up to the heavens, and his head reach unto the clouds; 7 Yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung: they which have seen him shall say, Where is he?”

It’s hard to get more negative than that!

It does not make sense to try to see שו in “Shobal” : שובל : Še-wi-be-lu as being short for שיאו: (i) the meaning is inappropriate; (ii) such a shortening is never attested; and (iii) “Shobal” : שובל : Še-wi-be-lu, being explicitly said at Genesis 36: 20-21, 29-30 to be a אלוףחרי, cannot possibly have a west Semitic name: he is not a cave-dwelling, west Semitic-speaking troglodyte “Horite” living at, or at the future site of, the mid-1st millennium BCE state of Edom south of the Dead Sea, as the scholarly community would have it. No, “Shobal” : שובל : Še-wi-be-lu, being a אלוףחרי, is a Hurrian princeling living in northwest Gilead in the Late Bronze Age, near the Late Bronze Age city of אדום : udūmu southeast of the Sea of Galilee.

The p-i-n-p-o-i-n-t linguistic and historical accuracy of Genesis 36: 20-30, in a Late Bronze Age historical context, is truly breathtaking. If only there were at least one university scholar out there somewhere who would be willing to question the traditional, age-old view that “Shobal” : שובל is allegedly a cave-dwelling, west Semitic-speaking troglodyte “Horite” living at, or at the future site of, the mid-1st millennium BCE state of Edom south of the Dead Sea. But alas, there is no such scholar. Why won’t anyone in the university community take Genesis 36: 20-30 seriously from an historical perspective?

Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois

[Jim Stinehart]

In this post we will ask the following question which, believe it or not, no university scholar has ever asked (at least in print). Is there any possibility that the age-old traditional religious geographical understanding of Seir in the Patriarchal narratives may be in error? That is to say, instead of Seir allegedly being (on the scholarly view) a locale south of the Dead Sea where fictional Horite [חרי] cave-dwelling troglodytes are fictionally portrayed in the Patriarchal narratives as living, does anything in the Biblical text (as opposed to the traditional religious interpretation thereof) suggest, or perhaps even mandate, that Biblical Seir in the Patriarchal narratives is instead northwest Gilead, where Hurrians [חרי] and Hurrian princelings [אלוףחרי] are, per Genesis 36: 20-30, historically attested as living in the Late Bronze Age?

1. When Jacob fears a sneak night-time attack from Esau (when Jacob is returning to Canaan after being in eastern Syria for 20 years), Jacob for the first time takes his family s-o-u-t-h across the Jabbok River to the s-o-u-t-h-e-r-n bank of the Jabbok River for safety. Genesis 32: 22-24. That would be clinically insane if Esau lived in any locale south of the Jabbok River, such as for example the area south of the Dead Sea (per the scholarly view). But it makes perfect sense if Seir in the Patriarchal narratives means northwest Gilead, located n-o-r-t-h of the Jabbok River.

2. Once Jacob’s older twin brother Esau proves not to be hostile, then per Genesis 33: 14, 16-17, within a few days or so after Esau has returned to Seir, Jacob himself, true to his word, arrives in Seir (until I [Jacob] come unto my lord [Esau] unto Seir -- Genesis 33: 14). That is impossible if Seir is south of the Dead Sea. But it makes perfect sense if Seir is northwest Gilead. Jacob stays in the southwest corner of Seir (i.e., the southwest corner of northwest Gilead) at Succoth (located just north of the Jabbok River and just east of the Jordan River) for some time, building booths for his exhausted livestock there. Jacob and Succoth are i-n S-e-i-r .

3. On two occasions, people are said to go “ahead” or “before” Jacob to Seir: לפניו at Genesis 32: 3; לפני at Genesis 33: 14. As with all of the foregoing examples, that nomenclature makes sense if and only if Jacob himself is on his way to Seir (namely the southern edge of northwest Gilead, on the north bank of the Jabbok River near the Jordan River). Such nomenclature makes no sense if Seir is, as unanimously assumed by Biblical scholars, located south of the Dead Sea -- 90 long miles out of the way, being a locale where Jacob never at any point goes.

4. Since before meeting with Esau Jacob obviously feared that Esau might have hostile intent, there would be no reason for Jacob to send messengers to tell Esau that Jacob was in Gilead if Seir, where Esau lived, was the land of fictional cave-dwelling troglodytes located south of the Dead Sea -- 90 long miles south of the Jabbok River. But if Seir is northwest Gilead, so that some of Esau’s חרו : ḫry : Hurrian in-laws lived just north of the Jabbok River near the Jordan River, then Jacob could not avoid being espied by such in-laws of Esau when Jacob crossed through the heart of Gilead in heading west along the north bank of the Jabbok River toward the Jordan River and Canaan. Hence all things considered, it was better tactics for Jacob to tell Esau that Jacob had arrived in, and was passing through, Gilead. Genesis 32: 3.

Please note that the geography of chapters 32 and 33 of Genesis is utterly senseless on the scholarly view that “Seir” in the Patriarchal narratives is a place south of the Dead Sea where fictional Horite [חרי] cave-dwelling troglodytes are fictionally portrayed in the Patriarchal narratives as living. Just as surely, e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g makes complete sense if Biblical Seir in the Patriarchal narratives is instead northwest Gilead, where Hurrians [חרי] and Hurrian princelings [אלוףחרי] are historically attested as living in the Late Bronze Age.

The scholarly view of the underlying geography of chapters 32 and 33 of Genesis is untenable. It merely parrots the millennia-old traditional religious geographical understanding of Seir in the Patriarchal narratives, which cannot be squared with what the Biblical text actually says. The Biblical text (other than a few later-added editorial additions that are substantively false) has p-i-n-p-o-i-n-t historical accuracy in the context of the Late Bronze Age. What is in error here is not the Biblical text, but rather the age-old traditional religious geographical understanding of Seir in the Patriarchal narratives, and the identical scholarly view of such geography.

Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois

[Jim Stinehart]

The Hebrew word חרי : ḫry appears in three different places in the Patriarchal narratives. In each place, let’s compare the current scholarly view with an historical view.

1. Genesis 14: 6: “and the חרי : ḫry in the hill country of Seir….” [NRSV]

Current scholarly view:

The חרי : ḫry are fictional hole-people, probably being cave-dwelling troglodytes, fictionally portrayed as living in Seir south of the Dead Sea.

Problems with scholarly view: (a) there are few caves south of the Dead Sea; (b) no hole-people are attested south of the Dead Sea; (c) no “Horites” are attested south of the Dead Sea; (d) no “Seir” is attested south of the Dead Sea.

Historical view:

The חרי : ḫry are the Hurrians in the hill country of northwest Gilead (east of the Jordan River, north of the Jabbok River and southeast of the Sea of Galilee).

Strengths of historical view: (a) Hurrians are attested in northwest Gilead in the Amarna Letters; (b) northwest Gilead is hill country; (c) Seir is attested in the Amarna Letters, and its likely location is northwest Gilead.

2. Genesis 36: 20-22. 29-30: “20 These are the sons of Seir the חרי : ḫry, who inhabited the land; Lotan, and Shobal, and Zibeon, and Anah, 21 And Dishon, and Ezer, and Dishan: these are the חריאלוף : ḫry.ulp, the children of Seir in the land of אדום. 22 And the children of Lotan were חרי and Hemam; and Lotan's sister was Timna. …29 These are the חריאלוף : ḫry.ulp; …, 30 ….: these are the חריאלוף : ḫry.ulp among their אלוף : ulp in the land of Seir.” [KJV]

Current scholarly view:

Certain of Esau’s in-laws are חרי : ḫry, fictional hole-people, probably being cave-dwelling troglodytes, some of whom are troglodyte princes : חריאלוף : ḫry.ulp, and all of whom are fictionally portrayed as living in Seir south of the Dead Sea.

Problems with scholarly view: (a) there are few caves south of the Dead Sea; (b) no hole-people are attested south of the Dead Sea; (c) no “Horites” are attested south of the Dead Sea; (d) no “Seir” is attested south of the Dead Sea; (e) in the context of the Patriarchal Age, one would logically expect אדום to reference Late Bronze Age Udūmu, not mid-1st millennium BCE Edom (except in three הוא later-added editorial additions) ; (f) the term חריאלוף : ḫry.ulp is only used non-biblically in the Late Bronze Age (at Ugarit), and applies to Hurrian princelings; (g) if scholars are right that Genesis 36: 9-30 was composed in post-exilic Jerusalem, such text could not contain so much bona fide Late Bronze Age nomenclature, such as חריאלוף : ḫry.ulp, “Seir” and Udūmu; (h) it would make no sense to give an extended genealogy like this for cave-dwelling troglodytes, or for any fictional hole-people; (i) Esau has a huge flock of sheep and goats like Jacob (Genesis 36: 7), which is impossible if Esau moved south of the Dead Sea and married into a cave-dwelling troglodyte people; (j) it would be senseless for Isaac to arrange to have his favorite son Esau marry two women whose relatives are cave-dwelling troglodytes south of the Dead Sea (or other hole-people south of the Dead Sea); (k) it would make no sense to list 26 names at Genesis 36: 20-30 that, on a west Semitic analysis, are either inscrutable or do not have a sensible underlying meaning.

Note that the scholarly view makes no sense whatsoever on any level: textually, logically, linguistically or historically.

Historical view:

The חרי : ḫry are the Hurrians in the hill country of northwest Gilead (east of the Jordan River, north of the Jabbok River and southeast of the Sea of Galilee). Some of Esau’s in-laws are Hurrian princelings: חריאלוף : ḫry.ulp. By marrying into the Hurrian princeling power structure just east of the Jordan River, Esau is able to land on his feet in leaving Canaan, becoming a wealthy man with a large flock of sheep and goats in northwest Gilead.

Strengths of historical view: (a) Hurrians are attested in northwest Gilead in the Amarna Letters; (b) northwest Gilead is hill country; (c) Seir is attested in the Amarna Letters, and its likely location is northwest Gilead; (d) Udūmu is attested in the Amarna Letters near the Sea of Galilee; in the Patriarchal Age, אדום is referencing Late Bronze Age Udūmu, not mid-1st millennium BCE Edom; (e) Isaac arranged for his favorite son Esau to marry into a people, the Hurrians, who were sophisticated, powerful, had many sheep and goats, and lived in a locale where Esau could prosper; (f) all 26 names at Genesis 36: 20-30 make perfect sense as Hurrian names.

Note that e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g makes perfect sense on the historical view.

3. Genesis 40: 16: “When the chief baker saw that the interpretation was good, he said unto Joseph, I also was in my dream, and, behold, I had three חרי : ḫry baskets on my head”.

Current scholarly view:

Since the chief baker would not dream of baskets made by cave-dwelling troglodytes, scholars have made up a meaning for חרי : ḫry here, either “white” or “wicker”, even though חרי : ḫry is never used elsewhere in the Bible, or outside of the Bible, with such meaning. Genesis gives us no hint as to why the chief baker was executed.

Problems with scholarly view: (a) no basis for made-up translations of חרי : ḫry; (b) dream should enable Joseph to determine that the chief baker was committing treason.

Historical view:

The chief baker’s pro-Hurrian dream of a Hurrian : חרי : ḫry basket was treasonous, in that Pharaoh had just recently taken the controversial action of cutting off relations with the Hurrian great power state of Mitanni in eastern Syria.

Strengths of historical view: (a) same definition of חרי : ḫry applied throughout Patriarchal narratives; (b) explains why the chief baker was executed for treason.

Conclusion:

No aspect of the current scholarly view of חרי : ḫry in the Patriarchal narratives makes any sense on any level.

Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois

[Isaac Fried]

Does the name of the Edomite King Herod contain the element הר or חר?

Isaac Fried, Boston University

[Jim Stinehart]

Isaac Fried wrote: “Does the name of the Edomite King Herod contain the element הר or חר?”

1. My understanding is that in Hebrew, the first three letters of the name “Herod” [please correct me if I’m wrong here] are הור, with a he, not a heth. As such, the name “Herod” should have no connection to חרי, which as everyone following this thread knows has the following two possible meanings in the Patriarchal narratives: (a) “Hurrian”, as its historical meaning in the Late Bronze Age; or (b) “cave-dwelling troglodyte south of the Dead Sea”, as its absurdist, scholarly meaning, despite the fact that caves are rare south of the Dead Sea, no cave-dwelling troglodytes are attested south of the Dead Sea, no hole-people are attested south of the Dead Sea, no “Horites” are attested south of the Dead Sea, no “Seir” is attested south of the Dead Sea, it would make no sense for Isaac to arrange for his favorite son Esau to marry two women whose people are cave-dwelling troglodytes south of the Dead Sea, and it would make no sense for Esau to prosper, having a flock of sheep and goats as large as that of Jacob, if Esau had married into a cave-dwelling troglodyte people south of the Dead Sea. Meanwhile, e-v-e-r-y-t-h-i-n-g makes perfect sense on all levels -- in terms of text, logic, linguistics and history -- if חרי : ḫry is given its historical meaning of “Hurrians”. In leaving Canaan, Esau moves just east of the Jordan River to northwest Gilead, near Seir and Udūmu [אדום], where he prospers, based in part on the key fact that, per Genesis 36: 20-30, one of the ancestors (“Zibeon”) of one of Esau’s Hurrian [חתי] wives is a אלוףחרי : ulp.ḫry. The attested Late Bronze Age term for “Hurrian princeling”, at Ugarit, is אלוףחרי : ulp.ḫry, which is exactly what we see at Genesis 36: 21, 29-30. Isn’t it odd that not a single university scholar today (to the best of my knowledge) advocates using the historical meaning of either חרי : ḫry or אלוףחרי : ulp.ḫry in interpreting the Patriarchal narratives?

2. Apparently, there is no academic agreement as to the etymology of “Herod”. See this site for various (Hebrew-based) speculations as to possible etymologies of the name “Herod”. http://www.abarim-publications.com/Mean ... ZvcQLvH8qQ

3. The text itself of the Patriarchal narratives, if zero weight is given to the 1% of the received text that is later-added editorial additions (especially when denoted by הוא), is historical in a Late Bronze Age historical context. It is university scholars who insist on giving this Late Bronze Age Biblical text (which was recorded in cuneiform in the Late Bronze Age) a non-historical, absurdist interpretation. Imagine if Trevor Bryce’s classic study of the Hittites were treated the same way. Every time Bryce says “Hurrians”, just substitute the phrase “cave-dwelling troglodytes south of the Dead Sea”. Then Bryce’s history of the Hittites (who frequently interacted with the Hurrians) would instantly turn into non-historical fantasy. Sadly, that’s exactly what university scholars have done to the Patriarchal narratives.

Jim Stinehart
Evanston, Illinois