III. /Jistori/. — The allusions to Shechem in the Bible are numerous, and show how important the place was in Jewish history. Abraham, on his first migration to the land of promise, pitched his tent and built an altar under the oak (or Terebinth) of Moreh at Shechem. '• The Canaanite was then in the land ;" and it is evi- dent that the region, if not the city, was already in pos- session of the aboriginal race (see (ien. xii, 0). Some have inferred from the expression "place of Shechem" (03'^ mpp) that it was not inhabited as a city in the time of Abraham. But we have the same expression used of cities or towns in other instances (xviii, '24 ; xix. 12 ; xxix, 22 ) ; and it may have been interchanged here, without any difference of meaning, with the phrase, "city of Shechem," which occurs in xxxiii, 18. A |)o- sition affording such natural advantages would hardly fail to be occupied as soon as any population existed in the coinitry. The narrative shows incontestably that at the time of Jacoli's arrival here, after his sojourn in Mesopotamia (ver. IM; ch. xxxiv), Shechem was a Hi- vite city, of which Hamor, the father of Shechem, was the head man. It was at this time that the patriarch purchased from that chieftain " the parcel of the field," which he 8ubse(|uontly beijueathod, as a S|)ecial patri- mony, to his son Joseph (xliii, 22; Josh, xxiv, 32; .lohn iv, 5). The field lay undoubtedly on the rich plain of
the Muhhna, and its value was the greater on account of the well which Jacob had dug there, so as not to be dependent on his neighbors for a supply of water. The defilement of Dinah, Jacob's daughter, and the capture of Shechem and massacre of all the male inhabitants by Simeon and Levi, are events that belong to this period (Gen. xxxiv, 1 sq.). As this bloody act, which Jacob so entirely condemned (ver. 30) and reprobated with his dying breath (xlix, 5-7), is ascribed to two persons, some urge that as evidence of the very insignificant charac- ter of the town at the time of that transaction. But the argument is by no means decisive. Those sons of Ja- cob were already at the head of households of their own, and may have had the support, in that achievement, of their numerous slaves and retainers. We speak in like manner of a commander as taking this or that city when we mean that it was done under his leadership. The oak under which Abraham had worshipped survived to Jacob's time ; and the latter, as he was about to remove to Beth-el, collected the images and amulets which some of his family had brought with them from Padan-arara and buried them " under the oak which was by She- chem" (xxxv, 1-4). The "oak of the monument" (if we adopt .that rendering of 3Sp "p'SX in Judg. ix, 6), where the Shechemitcs made Abimelech king, marked, perhaps, the veneration with which the Hebrews looked back to these earliest footsteps (the incunabula gentis) of the patriarchs in the Holy Land. See MiiONENiM. During Jacob's sojourn at Hebron his sons, in the course of their pastoral wanderings, drove their flocks to She- chem, and at Dothan, in that neighborhood, Joseph, who had been sent to look after their welfare, was seized ami sold to the Ishmaelites (Gen. xxxvii, 12, 28). In the distribution of the land after its conquest by the He- brews, Shechem fell to the lot of Ephraim (Josh, xx, 7), but was assigned to the Lcvites, and became a city of refuge (xxi, 20, 21). It acquired new importance as the scene of the renewed promulgation of the law, when its blessings were heard from (ierizim and its curses from Ebal, and the people bowed their heails and acknowl- edged Jehovah as their king and ruler (Dent, xxvii, 11; Josh, ix, 32-35). It was here Joshua assembled the jieo- ple, shortly before his death, and delivered to them his last counsels (xxiv, 1,25). After the death of (iideon, Abimelech, his bastard son, induced the Shechemites to revolt from the Hebrew commonwealth and elect him as king (Judg. ix). It was to denounce this act of usur- pation anil treason that Jotham delivered his parable of the trees to the men of Shechem from the top of (ieri- zim, as recorded at length in Judg. ix, 22 sq. The pict- uresque traits of the allegory, as Prof. Stanley suggests {iSinai and Palestine, j). 286 ; Jewish Church, p. 348 ), are strikingl}' appropriate to the diversified foliage of the region. In revenge for his expulsion, after a reign of three years, Abimelech destroyed the city, and, as an emblem of the fale t<i which he would consign it, sowed the groinul with salt (Jutlg. ix, 34-45). It was soon re- stored, however, for we are told in 1 Kings xii that all Israel assembled at Shechem, and Rehoboam, Solomon's successor, went thither to be inaugurated as king. Its central position made it convenient for such assemblies; its history was fraught with recollections which would give the sanctions of religion as well as of |iatricilism to the vows of sovereign and people. The new king's ob- stinacy made him insensible to such influences. Here, at this same place, the ten tribes renounced the house of David and transferred their allegiance to Jeroboam (ver. It)), under whom Shechem became for a time the capital of his kingdom. We come next to the epoch of the exile. The people of Shechem. doubtless shared the fate of the other inhabitants, and were, most of I hem at least, carried into captivity (2 Kings xvii, 5, 6; xviii, 9 sq.). liui Shalmanescr, the conipuTor, sent colonies from Babylonia to occupy the place of the exiles (xvii, 24). It would seem that there was another influx of stran- gers, at a later period, under Esar-haddon (Ezra iv, 2).