3. There is still one branch of the Semites to be considered whichreceives prominent mention among the races of the OT —the PHanicrans. If we were to be guided by the testimony of language alone, the settlers along the northern Mediter- ranean coast certainly belong to the same branch as Hebrews, Moabites, Ammonites, and Edomites ; but the totally different social conditions prevailing in Phenicia, and the unique réle played by the Phenicians in history as merchants and seamen, suggest that another factor is at work here. The theory has been advanced and met with consider- able favour, that the Phcenicians were not the original settlers of the coastland of Syria, but came there from their homes, which were originally on the southern coast of Asia Minor, or, as some are inclined to believe, at the mouth of the Persian Gulf. There is, however, not sufficient material to settle so delicate a problem. There is no indi- cation that the population along the Syrian coast represents a mixture of Semites with other races, and our knowledge of Pheenician antiquities is too meagre —and what there is does not reach far enough back—to enable us to specify the historical relationship existing between the Pheenicians and other subdivisions of the Aramzan branch. As long as no evidence to the contrary is forthcoming, we must continue to place the Phoenicians in the same category with Hebrews, Moabites, etc. ; and, assuming that they formed part of the general movement of ‘ Aramzan’ groups from Arabia, they became differentiated after settling along the coast- land, where they may already have found a seafar- ing population, whom they gradually dispossessed, just as the Hebrews upon entering Palestine found the country settled by a population whom they in turn drove out.
The relationship between Hebrews and Pho- nicians was, again, chiefly commercial, just as between Hebrews and Yemenites. Commercial intercourse led to political alliances; and at one time, in consequence of such an alliance,—in the days of Ahab,—there was danger of the Pheenician cult becoming a serious rival to the national Jahweh worship.
The Pheenicians lead us to consider another group, which entered into far closer relations with the Hebrews than almost any other, and which,
RACES OF THE OLD TESTAMENT
among the races of the OT, occupies a peculiarly prominent and significant place—the CANAANITES. The OT usage of ‘Canaan’ is not consistent, being sometimes employed to include all of Palestine proper, Phoenicia, and even lands to the east of the Jordan, and at times restricted to Palestine. It is therefore not easy to determine the precise ex- tent of Canaanitish settlements. From the fact that ‘Canaanite’ comes to be synonymous with the merchant of Pheenicia (Is 23°, Ezk 174, Pr 314), we may certainly conclude that the Phcenicians were regarded as Canaanites, and the further use of the term as a designation of the pre- Israelitish inhabitants of Palestine is an indication of a close relationship between some sections at least of those peoples whom the Hebrews dis- possessed and the Pheenicians. But at this point certainty ends. The Canaanite is frequently in- troduced in the OT in connexion with a number. of other groups—the Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites, Hivvites, and Jebusites (¢.g. Ex 34"), to which elsewhere the Girgashites are added (e.g. Gn 1570-21*), It is quite clear from the way in which these peoples are grouped,—sometimes five being mentioned, sometimes seven, at times only two— Canaanite and Perizzite (e.g. Gn 13’ 34%),—that they were no longer sharply differentiated in the minds of the writers. Taken together, they con- stitute the inhabitants of Palestine whom the Hebrews encountered when they attempted to conquer the country ; but the survival of the term ‘Canaan’ asthe name for the district, and ‘ Canaan- ite’ as a general designation for the earlier inhabit- ants, points to Canaanites as forming the most powerful, and probably also the most prominent, part of the population. It may well be that some of those mentioned in the above conglomeration —notably the Perizzites and Girgashites — were merely subdivisions of the Canaanites that for a time acquired an independent position, but after- wards were again absorbed into the general body of Canaanites. At all events, it is plausible to assume that the interior of Palestine was occupied for an indefinite period, prior to the advent of the Hebrews, by groups of Semites more or less closely related to one another of which the Canaanites became the most prominent.
These Canaanites belonging to the same branches as the Semitic settlers in Pheenicia, the question of their origin is involved in the problem as to the origin of the Pheenicians. Adopting again the general theory above advanced, we may assume a movement similar to that which brought the Hebrews to Palestine to have taken place at a much earlier date. What Hebrew tradition assigns to the days of Abraham appears, then, to have been only a repetition of much earlier events. The Phcenicians and the Palestinian Canaanites would thus represent a subdivision of the Aramzan branch that moved along the Euphrates, and finally passed over by the northern route towards western lands, some settling along the coast and others pushing into the interior.
In the course of time these groups took a step forwards in culture, and became agriculturists. Their villages developed into towns, while those groups living on the coast were lured to seafaring careers.