well of which he was allowed by Abimelech's herd- men to take peaceable possession. This was after two previous wells dug by Isaac's servants had led to strife, and tlie name of the tliird was called Rehoboth (norn 'wide spaces,' LXX Ei'pi/xwpio) because, said Isaac, ' now tlie Lord hath made room (hirhibh) for us,' Gn 26-- (J). Palmer (Desert of the Exodus, 383) describes a very ancient well on the north-east side of the Wadu es-Sddi (eight hours south of Beersheba), which he is inclined to identify with the Kehobotli of this passage. The name liuhaihch still lingers in the neighbourhood, being applied to a wady close by. The objections of Robinson (BRF' i. 197) to this identification are strangely pointless. It is not improbalile (cf. Konig and Sayce in Expos. Times, xi. [1900] pp. 239, 377) that the Rehoboth of Gn 26- is also the Ruhuti or Rubute of the Tel el-Amarna letters (Winckler, Nos. 183 and 239 ; Petrie, 256 and 260), although Sayce (in Early Israel, 289) and Petrie (Sijria and Egypt from the Tell el-Amarna Letters, 180) prefer to make Rubuti=\ia.hha,\\ of Jos 15™, and Hommel(.4//r234f.) identifies it with Kiriath- arba (Hebron), which he supposes to have been called RohdCt, ' the four quarters.'
2. In the list of kings of Edom contained in Gn Se^'*' one of the names is Shaul ' from Reho- both of the River' (-in;.i nuh-ia v." ; LXX [A ; 15 is defective here] (k "?oui^w9 rrjs xapa ttoto^iSi', and so A in the parallel passage 1 Ch 1^', 15 om.). The situation of this Rehoboth is quite uncertain. It is not even clear whether it sliould be sought in Edom or elsewhere. The Notitia Dignitatum (c. 29) makes it Edomite, and Eusebius and Jerome (in the Onomastieon) locate it in Gebalene, i.e. Idum;ea ; but the analogy of other OT passages where 'the River' (-^:-) is sjioken of absolutely, would lead us to think of the Euphrates, in which event Rehoboth might be Rnhnhn on the western bank of that stream, somewhat to the south of the Chabora.s. Winckler (Gcsch. i. 192) would (doubt- fully) place it between Palestine and Egypt, under- staiuling the "in; here to be the Wady cl-Arish, the ' River (Snj wady) of Egypt ' of Nu 34" etc.
The name RiVLoboth, owing lo its meaning, would be likol}' to be very widely dilVuscd (see Knobel on Gn 36", and cf. W. Max iliiller, Asien u. Eicropa, 134). J. A. Selbie.
FEHOBOTH-IR (ry nSh-i, AV Mhe city Roho- botli,' A\'rn ' t lur streets of the city'; LXX A t) 'Pow^us ttAXis, />" 'I'ou^bO ir., E 'Pou^d'9 r. ; Vulg. platen; ciritatis). — One of the four cities built by A.sshur (RV by Nimrod) in Assyria, the others being Nineveh (regarded as the later capital), Resen (ReJ-(5ni, Sayce), and Calah, now Nimrouci (Gn 10"). There has been much discussion as to the identity of this site, and As.s5-rian literature has not furnished us with any geographical city name ^vitll which it could be identified. Indeed it is hardly likely that we should come across it there, except umfer a different form, for neither of the component parts of the name is really As-
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Syrian, EShdhdth, as Delitzach has sliown, being rt-hitu, 'broad, open spaces,' whilst 'ir would lie represented by the common word /llu, 'city.' It has lieen objected tliat the Heb. scribe would not have translated ribitu, but would have transcribed it, just as he has transcribed Jiesen, without the guttural ; for the Assyrians as a rule pronounced neither the soft guttural ^, nor the v. This, liowever, cannot be regarded as conchisive, for the Heb. scribe has, to all appearance, translated, and ricit transcribed, the Assyrian dlii in the word 'ir, 'city.' It would therefore seem that we must not transcribe, but translate, the Heb. Rchobiith-'ir, .'ind this, in As.syrian, would be rebct dli, ' the broad .spaces (squares) of the city,' and regard the ex- pression, with Deliizsch, as referring to the name of Nineveh, which immediately precedes. Uelitzsch compares the Heb. expression with the rcbit Ninua, ' broad place of Nineveh,' in Esarhaddon 1. 23, and the probability is that he is right in his identifica- tion. Through this part of the city, probably a suburb, Esarhaddon caused the heads of the kings of Kundi and Sidon to be carried in procession with singing, etc. ; and, as he thus specially mentions it, it must have been a sufficiently important place. It is ai>iiarently this same place of which Sargon, Esarliaddon's grandfather, speaks in his Cylinder In.scriiitiun, 1. 44, in connexion with the peojiling of JIagganuljba : ' The city Magganubba, which lay like a pillar at the foot of the mountain Musri, above the springs and the broad place of Nineveh' (rcbit Kind). This text would therefore seem to make Magganubba the old name of Dfirsargina or Kborsabad, and the rrbit Nind must have lain be- tween that city and Nineveh, but much nearer to the latter. If the places referred to are named in the order in which they actually occurred, their relative positions would be (I) the mountain Musri, (2) the city Magganubba, (3) the springs, (4) the rebit Nind, (5) Ninft or Nineveh itself.
Ltteraturk.— Delitzsch, Paradies, p. 261 ; Schrader, COT i. p. 101 ; Uielim, Hatulworlerbuch ; and the Cahoer Bihdlexikon,