The extent and boundaries of Canaan are given with tolerable exactness in the Bible. On the west, the sea was its border from Sidon to Gaza (Gen. x, 19). On the south it was bounded by a line running from Gaza to the southern end of the Dead Sea, in- cluding the Judnan hills, but excluding the country of the Amalekites (Gen. x, 19; Num. xiii, 29). The Jordan was the eastern boundary ; no part of Canaan lay beyond that river (Num. xxxiii, 51; Exod. xvi, 35, with Josh, v, 12; xxii, 11. See Reland, Palast, p. 8 sq.). On the north, Canaan extended as far as Hamath, which was also the utmost boundary of the "land of promise" (Gen. xvii, 8; Num. xxxiv, 8). The coast from Sidon northward to Arvad, and the ridge of Lebanon, were inhabited by Canaanitea, though they do not appear to have been included in Canaan proper (Gen. x, 15-19. See Bochart, Opp, i, 308 sq. ; Reland, PaHaut, p. 8 sq.). For geographical and other details, see Palestine.
The word "Canaan," in a few instances, such as Zeph. ii, 5, and Matt xv, 22, was applied to the low maritime plains of Philistia and Phoenicia (comp. Mark vii, 26 ; and see Gesenius on Isa. xxiii, 11). In the same manner, by the Greeks, the name Xva was used for Phoenicia, L e. the sea-side plain north of the " Tyr- ian ladder" (see the extract in Reland, Palmtt. p. 7, and Gesenius, Thesaur, p. 696), and by the later Phos* niciaus, both of Phoenicia proper and of the Punic col-
CANAAN 68
CANAAN
onitf in Africa (Kenrick, Phcemcia, p. 40, 42, 460). The name occurs in this sense on the Egyptian mon- ^nmHumimimisimi^
JC a n a n a , land Hieroglyph of Canaan.
nments as veil as on Phcenician coins (Eckhel, Docir. Num. iv, 409), and was not even unknown to the Car- thaginians (Gresenius, Gesch. d. Heb. Sprach. p. 16). The Sept in two cases, in like manner, renders the Hebrew by yytpa rutv ^oivucwv (Exod. xvi, 85 ; Josh. V, 12; comp. v, IX as they do ** Canaanites" by toiVucfc- Again, in Knm. xiii, 29, '*The Hittites, and the Jebosites, and the Amorites dwell in the moontains ; ctnd the Ccmaanitet dweU by the aea^ and by Ae eoatt of the Jordan." In 2 Sam. xxiv, 7, the Ca- naonites are distingoished from the Hiyites, though the latter were descended from Canaan ; and in sev- eral passages the Canaanites are mentioned with the ffittxtes, Amorites, Jebnsites, etc., as if they consti- tuted a special portion of the population (Exod. ill, 8 ; Dent vii, 1 ; Josh, iii, 10). The most probable ex- planation of these limited applications of the name is, that while some of the tribes which inhabited Syria retained for their territories the name of their common ancestor Canaan, others preferred taking, as a dis- tiactire appellation, the name of some subsequent head
Map of Canaan, with the Aboriginal Nations.
or chief of the tribe. The very same practice prevails to this day among the great tribes of Arabia. — Smith, Diet. s. V. ; Kitto, Cyclop, s. v. See Canaanite.
CANAAN, Lakguaoe of (1533 Hfito, Up of Co- naan\ occurs Isa. six, 18, where it undoubtedly des- ignates the language spoken by the Jews dweUing in Palestine. That the language spoken by the Canaan- ites was substantially identical with Hebrew appears, 1. From the £act that the proper names of Canaanitish persons and places are Hebrew, and can be accounted for et3nB[iologically from the Hebrew as readily as He- brew proper names themselves (thus we have Abim- elech, Kiijath-Sapher, ete.) ; 2. Close as was the in- tercourse of the Hebrews with the Canaanites, there is no hint of their needing any interpreter to mediate between them, which renders it probable that their respective languages were so nearly allied to each other as to be substantially the same ; 8. The remains of the Phoenician language, which was undoubtedly Canaanitish, bear the closest analogy to the Hebrew, and are best explained frtmi it, which proves them to be substantially the same language (Bochart, Geogr, Sacr. ii, col. 699 sq., ed. 1682).
To account for this, some have supposed that the Canaanites and the Hebrews were of the same original stock, and that the account in Genesis of their being descended from different branches of the Noachic fam- ily is a fiction to bo put to the account of national big- otry on the part of the writer. But this is a hypothesis utterly without foundation, and which carries its own confutation in itself; for, had national bigotry directed the writer, he would have excluded the Edomites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, from the Shemitic family, as well as the Canaanites ; nay, he would hardly have allowed the Canaanites to claim descent fW>m the right- eous Noah. The list of the nations in Gen. xi is ac- cepted by some of the most learned and unfettered scholars of Germany as a valuable and trustworthy document (Knobel, Vdlkertafel der Genew, 1860; Ber- theau, BeUrdffe, p. 174, 179). See Ethnoorapht. But if these were different races, how came they to have the same language? Knobel thiiiks that the country was first occupied by a Shemitic race, the de- scendante of Lud, and that the Hamites were immi- grante who adopted the language of the country into which they came (p. 204 sq.). On the other hand, Grotius, Le Clerc, and others, are of opinion that Abra- ham acquired the language of the country into which he came, and that Hebrew is consequently a Hamitic and not a Shemitic language (Grotius, Dissert, de Lmg, ffeb.j prefixed to his Commentary; Le Clerc, De Liny. Heb, ; Beke, Origines BibHoce, p. 230 ; Winning, Jfa»- uai of Compar. Phiiology^ p. 276) : by some later writ- ers Abraham's native tongue is supposed to have been Indo- Germanic or Arian. On the contrary, most maintain that Abraham reteined the use of the pri- meval language, and brought it with him to Canaan ; contending that, had he borrowed the language of the country into which he came, the result would have been a less pure language than the Hebrew, and we should have found in it traces of idolatrous notions and usages (Hftvemick, Einleit. 161, E. T. p. 188 ; Pa- reau, Inst. Inierp. p. 25, E. T. i, 27). This last is the oldest opinion, and .there is much to be urged in ite favor. It leaves, however, the close affinity of the language of Abraham and that of the Canaanites un- accounted for. The hypothesis that Abraham ac- quired the language of the Canaanites, and that this remained in his family, if admissible, would account not only for the affinity of the Hebrew and Phoenician tongues, but for the ease with which Abraham and his son made themselves understood in Egypt, and for the affinity of the ancient Egyptian and several modem African languages with the Hebrew. (See Bleek, Einleit. ins A, T. p. 61 sq. ; J. G. MOller, in Herzog*s ReaJUEncyUop. vii, 240.)— Kitto, s. v.