NEBO
NEBO, MOUNT
Merodach of Babylon. influence in Western Asia (B.C. 3800-1400) the name and worship of Nebo were carried into Syria
In the period of Bab.
with those of other Babylonian deities. Hence we find a Mount Nebo in Moab (Dt 32, Is 153), and a town of Nebo in Reuben (Nu 32%) ; see the follow- ing two articles. In Is 46! Bel-Merodach and Nebo represent the city of Babylon, over which they presided. In the days of the later Chaldean empire, the kings’ names were for the most part compounds with Nebo (e.g. Nabopolassar, Nebuch- adrezzar, Nabonid). See, further, Schrader, KAT? 412f. (COT ii. 105f.]; Meyer, Gesch. i. 179; Tiele, Gesch. 207 ff., 6321. The name Abed-nego (Dn 17 etc.) is for Abed-nebo, t.e. ‘servant of Nebo.’
A. H. SAYCE.
NEBO.—1i. Town in Moab (133; Moabite Stone 733; LXX Ναβαύ, Naf; Vulg. Nabo, Nebo); men- tioned in Nu 323 between Sebam (=Sibmah) and Beon (=Baal-meon), and 32% between Kiriathaim and Baal-meon, as among the cities taken from Sihon and given by Moses to Reuben, and in 1 Ch 58 between Aroer and Baal-meon,in connexion with the Reubenite (clan) Bela, and in Is 15? with Medeba, Jer 48' with Kiriathaim, and Jer 48” between Dibon and Beth-diblathaim, as a Moabite city, which either had been or was to be laid waste. Nu 32 is from P on basis of JE; Is 15 and Jer 48 rest on an ancient oracle on Moab (cf. MOAB, p. 412). On the Moabite Stone, ll. 14-17, Mesha tells us: ‘Chemosh said to me, ‘Take Nebo against Israel,” and I went by night and fought against it from break of dawn till noon; and I took it, and put them (the inhabitants) all to death, 7000 men and boys(?), and women (?), and girls (?), and female slaves, for I had made it taboo to Ashtar-Chemosh. And I took thence the altar-hearths (?) of Jehovah and offered (?) them before Chemosh.’ Nebo is not mentioned in the catalogue of Reubenite towns in Jos 1313,
Eusebius (Onomasticon, 283, 93, 100) and Jerome (de Situ et Nom.) distinguish the town, Ναβώρ, Nabo, from the mountain, Nabau, Naban, and place the town 8 miles south of Heshbon, and identify it with Chanaath (Kenath), or Nobah. Buhl (Geogr. 266) holds that the site of Nebo is to be looked for amongst the ruins on Mt. Nebo (Jebel Neba). Either the mountain received the name Nebo as containing a sanctuary of Nebo (cf. NEBO {god]}), and the town was named after it; or the sanctuary was in the town, and the mountain was named after it; or the town and the mountain were so named nes: because each con- tained a sanctuary of Nebo.
Jerome, on Is 15%, states that there was at Nebo, ‘Belphegor,’ t.e. Baal-peor, the idol of Chemosh.
2. Town in Judah (3); NaBed, Ναβιά, Ναβού, Ναβώ; Vulg. Nebo); mentioned Ezr 2”, Neh 75 ‘the other Nebo,’ as giving name to the ‘children’ or ‘men of Nebo’ who returned with Zerubbabel. According to Ezr 10, in the time of Ezra and Nehemiah, seven ‘children of Nebo’ had foreign wives, whom they were compelled to discard.
As Nebo, in Ezr 2, Neh 7, follows Bethel and Ai, it should berepresented in the Greek (1 Es 5") by Νειφείς B, Φινείς A, which follows Betolion. But Lucian has Maxfels, and the number of the ‘children of Niphis,’ 156, is that given to Magbish in Ezr-Neh. Hence Νειφείς, etc., is held to represent Magbish (RVm, Meyer, Entstehung, 145). This Nebo is often identified with Nob, cf. Is 107, Neh 11", and the Nobai or Nebai of Neh 10”, which is probably the clan of Nob, corresponding to the ‘ children of Nob.’ The site of Nebo has beem fixed at Beit
Nubd, 12 miles N.W. of Jerusalem, and 8 from Lydda, or at Nuba, 4 miles south of Adullam (Armstrong, Names and Places, etc. ; Buhl, Geogr. p. 198; Meyer, Entstehung, etc. pp. 145, 149, 166 1.).
It follows from the
assages in Ezr-Neh that families from Nebo (
ob) had remained together in the Exile, and returned together, and thus be- came a post-exilic clan named after their original home. Beit Nubd is the Nobe or «ποῦ of Jerome’s Onomasticon, the Betenoble or Castellum Arnaldi of the Crusaders (Lane-Poole, Saladin, pp. 332-339).
The mention in 1 Ch 85 of Benjamite settlers in Moab suggests the possibility of a Benjamite colony in the Moabite Nebo, which when driven across the Jordan founded the western Nebo.
In 1S 30 Tisch. prints B as reading ἐν Νομβέ, Swete ἐν Nod; but the context excludes identifica- tion with our Nebo. W. H. BENNETT.
NEBO, MT. (\2;-19, NafSat).—The mountain from which Moses viewed the promised land before his death. The word Nebo occurs in connexion with Moses only in Dt 32” (the command to ascend) and Dt 34! (account of the ascent) [both P]. It is found in the itinerary, Nu 33 (P). Comparin, the command as given in Dt 3% and Nu 27 (closely parallel in substance but not in expres- sion with Dt 3”) with the ascent described Dt 34, and noting the ‘mountains of Abarim’ of Nu 33%, it follows that (1) Mt. Nebo forms part of the range of Abarim, and (2) the Top (head) of Pisgah (D) and Mt. Nebo (P) are alternative designations of the same spot (cf. Driver on Dt 34! in Internat. Crit. Comm.). Its situation may be determined within narrow limits. A ridge runs out west from the plateau of Moab (see note on Mishor in art. MEDEBA), sinking gradually ; at first a broad brown field of arable land, then a flat top crowned by a ruined cairn (to which the name Neba applies), then a narrower ridge ending in the summit called Sidghah, whence the slopes fall peenly on all sides (Conder, Heth and Moab, pi): eba is 5 miles S.W. of Heshbon and 9}