Robinson’s identification of Kiriath-jearim with Kuriet el-Enab or Abu Ghésh does not meet the
requirements of Jg 18" and 1S 6.
LirerRatURE.—The whole question of the site is fully discussed in SWP vol. iii. sheet xvii.; see also Henderson, Palestine (Index); G. A. Smith, HGHLZ 225f.; Moore, Judges, $98 f. ; Dillmann on Jos 917; Buhl, GAP (Index); Robinson, BRP? ii. 11f. (Smith, Moore, Dillmann, Buhl, all speak with more or less suspicion of the correctness of Robinson's identification with Kuriet el--Enab, but decline to commit themselves to the "Erma site, which Buhl pronounces to be still more improb- able, and Smith remarks that it would place Kiriath-jearim very far away from the other members of the Gibeonite 5 Neither of these writers, however, gives due weight position near Chesalon). C.
R. CONDER.
KIRIATH-SANNAH (ajo nop, πόλις γραμμάτων) occurs once (Jos 15” P) as another and presumably an older name for Debir (wh. see), <A third name was Kiriath-sepher (which see for site); and this, not Kiriath-sannah, was the reading of the LXX here.
To those who retain the Massor. reading the
4 KIRIATH-SEPHER
KISHON
meaning is obscure. Gesenius(7/es.) takes Sannah for a contraction of Sansannah, and translates ‘palm-city’; but, besides that the contraction is unlikely, one hardly expects a palm city in ‘ the hill- country.’ Sayce (10 54), following a suggestion mentioned by Ewald (Gesch. i. 347 n.), translates ‘city of instruction,’ and uses the name to support his very precarious theory that Debir was a library and archive town of the Canaanites. He further suggests that the name may be present as Bit Sani in a fragmentary letter from Ebed-tob the vassal king of Jerusalem, in the Tel el-Amarna collection. A. C. WELCH.
KIRIATH-SEPHER (15D nap, πόλις γραμμάτων ; Καριασσώφαρ π΄ γ΄, Bin Jg 1") is twice mentioned in the parailel passages (Jos 15%, Jg 17, J) as the older name of a town which the victors called Debir. It is frequently identified with the present ed-Dhaheriyeh, a village which lies ‘4 or 5 hours 8.W. of Hebron,’ on a high road down Wady Khulil, and which is on the frontier of the hill-country towards the Negeb (see, however, DEBIR).
Many commentators from the earliest times, accepting the word as Heb., have translated with various shades of sense ‘book town’ (ef. LXX above, Vulg. civitas litterarum, Targ. ‘7x “). Sayce (HC 54) has based on this a theory about the condition of literary culture among the early Canaanites. The three town names yield him proof of the presence of an oracle, which gave rise to a library, and so attracted students to a university. It is utterly unwarranted to build so much on the uncertain etymology of a non-Heb. word. Smith (Hist. Geogr. 279 n.) suggests that the sense may be ‘toll-town,’ and he compares for the translation 2 Ch 9217, and for the toll the town’s position on a road into Syria. But the sense given to 755 is somewhat artificial. It is much more likely that traces of the same foreign root are to be found in Sephar of S. Arabia (Gn 1039) and Sepharvaim (2 Καὶ 17%). See the whole subject very fully and fairly discussed by Moore, Judges, 26 f.
A. C. WELCH.
KISEUS (Keicaios)—The form in Ad. Est 11? of Kish (Est 2°), the name of the great-grandfather of Mordecai. See Kisu, No. 4.
KISH (vp).—1. The father of Saul the first king of Israel (1 S 9! 10” 1451, Ac 13%). He was the son of Abiel of the tribe of Benjamin. In 1 Ch 888 939. Ner and not Abiel is said to have been the father of Kish,* but there seems to have been some confusion in the text, due perhaps to the very elliptical character of the record or to the frequent recurrence of the same family names. The home of Kish and of his family was at Gibeah (rendered ‘the hill of God’ and ‘the hill’ both in AV and RV of 1S 10° and 10"). He does not seem to have been in any way prominent, but to have been living the simple life ot a small farmer, when his son was called to be king. 2. The uncle of the foregoing, the son of Jeiel or Jehiel (1 Ch 8% 9%), 3. The eponym of a family of Merarite Levites (1 Ch 2322-2 3455... 2 Ch 9913), 4, A Benjamite ancestor of Mor- deeai, queen Esther’s cousin (Es 25). See ESTHER.
W. Muir.
KISHI (%7).—A Merarite Levite, ancestor of Ethan, 1 Ch 6“ [Heb.*]. In the parallel passage 1 Ch 15 the MT has πῦρ, Kushaiah. In all probability the latter is the correct form of the name. It is supported by Luc. Kovcel in the first of the above passages. Kittel (in SBOT) prefers myp, or rather Ἐπ’, pointing out that the LXX (B) in 1 Ch 6* has Kewwal= ‘yp, and in 1517 Κεισαῖος ξξ πον (2). J. A. SELBIE.
* Kittel (in Haupt’s SBOT) and Kautzsch read the first tlause of these verses, ‘And Ner begat Abner.’ See ABIEL.
KISHION (jp). —A town allotted to Issachar (Jos 19), given to the Levites (21%, where AV has Kishon). The parallel passage, 1 Ch 67 (Η 6.5], reads Kedesh, which is taken (perhaps wrongly) by Dillmann and others to be a textual error for Kishion. The latter name has not been recovered, while there is a large ruined mound called Tell Kedes near Taanach in Issachar. See ΘῊΡ vol. ii. sheet viii. C. R. CoNDER.