KITTIM
KNEE, KNEEL
trafficking in their wares far and near, they estab- lished colonies in several of the islands, and at poe along the coast convenient as depdts for
neir foreign carrying trade. From its natural situation Cyprus must have early attracted their attention, and must soon have become their prin- cipal station in the conducting and extending of their trade with the West. Herodotus (Hist. vii. 90) distinctly states that most of the Cypriote cities had originally been Pheenician colonies. The Phenician origin of Kition, a city in the south-east of the island, now Larnaka, 15 plainly witnessed to by Cicero (de Finibus, iv. 20), and naturally enough the Pheenician settlers in other parts of the island would carry with them the name of their oldest and principal foundation. These Pheenician settlements in Cyprus date from a very early age—it may be even before the days of Moses (Diodor. v. 55. 77; Herodot. i. 105; Pausan. i. 14. 6). After a time it would seem that these Phenicians in Cyprus were joined by certain Canaanitish refugees, who had been driven out by the Philistines, and that they brought with them their moon goddess Atergatis (Derceto), whose temple was built at Old Paphos, while that of the Pheenician Baal was at Kition (see ASH- TORETH). The existence of such Phenician colonies in Cyprus is witnessed to also by the occasional references in history to the Kittim as subject to, or at least as claimed as subjects of, Tyre. It would seem that even as early as the days of kin Solomon the K. were subject to the Tyrians, an compelled by Hiram to pay tribute (Jos. Ant. VIII. v. 3, c. Apion. 1. 18). foetus also tells how Eluleus, king of Tyre, sailed against the revolted K., and reduced them again to submission (Ant. Ix. xiv. 2). In the annals of Sargon the Cypriote kings are referred to as put under tribute in B.c. 709 (Schrader, COT? ii. 96).
It is not, however, to these Phoenician colonists that the name is given in Gn 10%. The Pheenician K. may rather be set alongside of the Caph- torim (Gn 10), who are represented as Cushites, and of the sons of Ham, and as inhabiting some island or coastland near to Cyprus, in all proba- bility Crete. The Japhethite K., as sons of Javan, belonged to the Greek family of nations— whether to the ancient pre-Hellenic Carian popula- tion of the island, or to some Hellenic tribe which had in early times settled there, can scarcely now be determined. Interesting inscriptions have been discovered near Larnaka, the ancient Kition, which, although figured in Phoenician letters, are yet composed in a Greek dialect. This seems to indicate that the epeaple from whom these inscrip- tions have come down to us were a Greek people, ethnographically belonging to the family of Javan, retaining their language and modes of thought, | but largely influenced by the presence of a Pheenician immigration. That they adopted the Pheenician letters and mode of writing is just the sort of result we should have expected, seeing | that the Pheenician colonists were enterprising | merchants, who would naturally lead in matters of | commerce and correspondence with those around.
The last recorded words of Balaam are a pro- phecy of the destruction of Asshur and Eber by some conquering power coming in ships from ‘the coast of Kittim’(Nu 24"), It is quite evident that here the term on? 1 is used, not to describe the island of Cyprus, or any other exactly defined territory, but as indicating quite generally some great Western people which had made themselves a name, and become a terror among the nations. No doubt Asshur and Eber stand for the great | powers of the East collectively, and the prophecy | 1s a foretelling of the utter overthrow of the sove- reienty of the Eastern monarchies by the advanc- |
| receive me?’
ing power of the great empires of the West. The Degtaning of the fulfilment was seen in the cam- paigns of Alexander the Great, but it was much more truly and permanently realized in the de- velopment and growth of the empire of the Romans. The phrase ‘coast of Kittim,’ therefore, does not mean Macedonia, _nor Rome, but simply the Western power which, for the time being, is to the front, or gives promise of prominence and perman- ence in the immediate future. See Cyprus.
LiTERATURE.—Besides works mentioned in the text, see Kurtz, History of the Old Covenant, vol. iii. Edin. 1859, p. 450ff.; Orelli, The OT Prophecy of the Consummation of God's Kingdom, Edin. 1885, pp. 143-147 ; Bevan, Short Commentary on Daniel, Camb. 1892, p. 190f. ; Ewald, History of Israel, London, 1880, vol. v. pp. 245, 297. See also ‘Chittim’ by Kautzsch in Riehm, Hand- worterbuch, p. 234 ; and by Kneucker in Schenkel, Bibellexicon, 1515 f. ; and the literature under Cvrrvs.
J. MACPHERSON.
KNEAD, KNEADING - TROUGH.—See Breap, vol. i. p. 317%
KNEE, KNEEL (73 [Assyr. birku], in Dn 6° Aram. 723, once Dn 5° Aram. 73298; ‘kneel’ is expressed by vb. 723 in Qal,* 2 Ch 65, Ps 95° [all], ef. Aram. ptep. 723 in Dn 6” and Hiph. 3220 used in Gn 24" of causing camels to kneel. The LXX and NT terms are γόνυ, ‘knee,’ and γονυπετεῖν, ‘kneel’).—The knees appear repeatedly in Scrip- ture as a seat of strength, and hence as weakened through terror, Job 4) (‘thou hast confirmed the feeble knees’; ef. Is 358, He 1913), Ezk 77 (‘all knees shall be weak as water’; ef. 217 [Heb.?*]) ; Dn 5° (the appearing of the handwriting upon the wall so terrified Belshazzar that ‘his knees smote one against another’; cf. Nah 2). <A psalmist complains that his knees are weak through fast- ing, Ps 109%. Amongst the plagues denounced upon disobedience to the Deuteronomie law is this, ‘The LorpD shall smite thee in the knees. . . with a sore boil,’ ete., where the reference appears to be to some form of elephantiasis (see Driver, ad loc.).