486
SHECHEM
SHEEP
erned from Ndblus, which is still the connecting link between the telegraph system east and west of Jordan. The modem town contains three churclies built by the Crusaders which are now mosques, the synagogue of the Samaritans, and a few fragments of the Roman city. Immediately outside the to\\Ti, on the S.W., there is a small mosque on the traditional site of Jacob's mouraing when Joseph's coat w;vs brought to him. In the minaret close by there is a stone with a Samaritan inscription containing the Ten Commandments.
Envirnns. — There are three spots in the neigh- bourhood of Shechem which require some notice : the Well of Jacob, the Tomb of Joseph, and the site of the ' oak ' of Moreh. A tradition that goes back to the early part of the 4th cent., and in which Jews, Samaritans, Christians, and Moslems agree, identihes Jacob's Well with Bir Y'akiib. This well, sometimes called Bir es- Hamai-ieh, ' well of the Samaritan ' (woman), is situated in the level plain of el-Mukhna, about H m. from Ndblus on the road to Jerus., and a little beyond the vUlage of BaU'ita. The well is sunk to a great depth, partly through alluvial soil and partly through limestone, so as to secure, even in exceptionally dry seasons, a supply of water. By its construction in his own ' parcel ' of ground, the patriarch, with great prudence and forethought, made himself in- dependent of the springs which probably belonged to the Shechemite villagers, and avoided those quarrels about water which are so common in a country where the population is partly sedentary and partly nomadic. Eusebius (Onom.) and the Bordeaux Pilgrim (A.D. 333) mention the well in connexion with Sychar, a place which they distin- guish from Sicliem and Neapolis. Jerome (Onmn.) adds that there was a church at the well which was visited by St. Paula (i?;j. Paul. xvi.). Antoninus Martyr (A.D. 570), Arculfus (A.D. 670), and Willi- bald (A.D. 754), mention the well and church, and Arculfus adds that the church was cruciform, the well being in the centre. The church was appar- ently destroyed before the arrival of the Crusaders and rebuilt in the 12th cent. It was again destroyed after tlie battle of Hattin, and remained a heap of rubbisli until a few years ago, when it became the property of the Greek Church, and its foundations were uncovered by excavation. The stone on which our Lord sat is said to have been taken to Con- stantinople in the reign of Justinian (see Sychar).
Jewish, Samaritan, and Christian tradition iden- tifies the Tomb of Joseph with a modem building, called Kabr YHsuf, situated in the plain about | m. north of Jacob's Well. Moslem traditions vary — one accepting the Kabr Ynsuf, another placing the tomb in the cemetery Eijal el- Amud aX, the foot of Gerizira. The latter place was apparently sho\vn to Maundrell (A.D. 1697). Eusebius, the Bordeaux Pilgrim, and Jerome {Onom.) place the tomb to the east of Neapolis and close to Sichem. Jerome elsewhere {Ep. Paul, xvi.) saj^s that St. Paula, after leaving Jacob's Well, visited the 'tombs of the twelve patriarchs.' The tradition that the twelve sons of Jacob were buried at Shechem rests on the words of St. Stephen (Ac 7"'- '"). Joseplius {Ant. II viii. 2) saj's they were buried at Hebron. Nearly all later writers refer to the tomb without distinctly indicating its position ; but all Jewish travellers place it in the immediate neighbourhood of tiie village of Baldta.
Two sites have been suggested for the • oak ' of Moreh. At the foot of Gerizim, in the recess which forms part of the natural amphitheatre already described, there is a small, well-kept cemetery, with a mosque, a courtyard, a well, and several tombs of which one is the tomb of Sheikh YHsuf. The place is called Rijal el-'AmUd, 'the men of the 3olumn,' or simply el- Amud, 'the column.'
Here, according to one tradition, Joseph and hia brethren were buried, or, according to another, several Jen-ish prophets. A tliird tradition finds in it the spot wnere Jacob buried the idols of his household, whilst the Samaritans believe it to be the place where Joshua set up a great stone under the ' oak ' that was in the sanctuary of the Lord (Jos 24^). The other site is Baldta, a small hamlet \vith a beautiful spring, not far from Jacob's \\'ell. The village is mentioned in the Samaritan Book of Joshua under its present name, which contains the radicals of the Aramaic word for 'oak.' The place is also, apparently, that mentioned by Eusebius and Jerome {Onom.) as Balanus (translated by them • oak ') near Joseph's Tomb, and identified by them with the oak of Shechem.
LiTKRATCRB. — Descriptions of Ndblus and ita environs, and of the importance of Shechem in the history of the Jews, will bo found in PEF Mem. ii. 172-178, 203, etc. ; Stanley, ^P p. 233, etc ; Smith, HGIIL 332, etc ; Gutirin, Saviarie, L p. 372, etc ; Robinson, BRP* iii p^ 96, etc. ; Wilson, PEF St. 1873, p. 06, etc.
C. W. Wilson. SHEDEUR (nisnc' ; the first part of the word is probably ns* Hhnddai, cf. Gray, BPN 169, 197). — The father of Elizur, the chief of Reuben, Nu 1' 2'° (B and Luc. in both Seoioi'p, A 'E5ioi)p) 7" (B 'E5i(7oup, B'^AF ZcSiaovp) 10'* (XfSioiJp).