The remaining passages of Scripture respecting Sod- om relate merely to the event of its destruction (Gen. xix), and to its perpetual desolation: "Brimstone, and salt, and burning . . , not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass groweth therein" (Deut. xxix, 22); " Never to be inhabited, nor dwelt in from generation to generation ; where neither Arab should pitch tent nor shepherd make fold" (Isa. xiii, 19); "No man abiding there, nor son of man dwelling in it" (Jer. xlix, 18 ; 1, 40) ; " A fruitful land turned into saltncss" (Psa. cvii, 34) ; " Over- thrown and burned" (Amos iv, 11); "The breeding of nettles and salt-pits, and a perpetual desolation" (Zeph. ii, 9); "A waste land that smoketh, and plants bearing fruit which never cometh to ripeness" (Wisd, ix, 7); "Land lying in clods of pitch and heaps of ashes" (2 Esdr. ii, 9) ; " The cities turned into ashes" (2 Pet. ii, 6), where their destruction by fire is contrasted with the deluge. The miserable fate of Sodom and Gomorrah is held up as a warning in these and other passages of the Old and New Tests. By Peter and Jude it is made •"an ensample to those that after should live ungodly,"
and to those " denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ" (2 Pet. ii, 6 ; Jude 4-7). Our Lord him- self, when describing the fearful punishment that will befall those that reject his disciples, says that "it shall be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city" (Mark vi, 11; comp. Matt. X, 15).
In agreement with the above Scripture accounts is the statement of Josephus (War, iv, 8, 4). After de- scribing the lake, he proceeds: "Adjoining it is Sodo- mitis, once a blessed region abounding in produce and in cities, but now entirely burned up. They say that it was destroyed by lightning for the impiety of its inhabitants. And even to this day the relics of the divine fire and the traces of five cities are to be seen there, and, moreover, the ashes reappear even in the fruit." Josephus regarded this passage as his main statement of the event (see A71I. i, 11, 4). In another passage ( War, v, 13, 6) he alludes incidentally to the destruction of Sodom, contrasting it, like Peter, with a destruction by water. By comparing these passages with A nt. i, 9, it appears that Josephus believed the vale of Siddim to have been submerged, and to have been a district adjoining Sodom. Similar are the accounts of heathen writers, as Strabo and Tacitus; who, however vague their statements, are evidently under the belief that the remains of the towns were still to be seen. These passages are given at length by De Saulcy {Narr. i, 448). There is a slight variation in the account of the Koran (xi, 84): " VVe turned those cities upside down, and we rained upon them stones of baked clay."
The name of the bishop of Sodom, " Severus Sodo- morum," appears among the Arabian prelates who signed the acts of the first Council of Nice. Eeland remon- strates against the idea of the Sodom of the Bible being intended, and suggests that it is a mistake for Zuzuma- on or Zoraima, a see under the metropolitan of Bostra (Palcpst. p. 1020). This De Saulcy {Narr. i, 454) re- fuses to admit. He explains it by the fact that many sees still bear the names of places which have vanished, and exist only in name and memory, such as Troy. The Coptic version to which he refers, in the edition of M. Lenormant, does not throw any light on the point.
III. Phydcal Means of the Catastrophe to the City. — The destruction of Sodom claims attention from the so- lemnity with which it is introduced (Gen. xviii, 20-22) ; from the circumstances which preceded and followed — the intercession of Abraham, the preservation of Lot, and the judgment which overtook his lingering wife (ver. 25-33; xix) ; and from the nature of the physical agencies through which tlie overthrow was effected. Most of these particidars are easily understood ; but the last has awakened much discussion, and may therefore require a larger measure of attention. The circum- stances are these. In the first place, we learn that the vale of Siddim, in which Sodom lay, was very fertile, and everywhere well watered — " like the garden of the Lord;" and these circumstances induced Lot to fix his abode there, notwithstanding the wickedness of the in- habitants (xiii, 10, 11). Next it appears that this vale was full of " slime-pits." This means sources of bitu- men, for the word is the same as that which is applied to the cement used In^ the builders of Babylon, and we know that this was bitumen or asphaltum (xiv, 10; comp. xi, 3). These pits appear to have been of con- siderable extent; and, indeed, it was from them doubt- less that the whole valley derived its name of Siddim (D'^TC). At length, when the day of destruction ar- rived, " the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon (iomor- rah tire and brimstone from the Lord out of heaven ; and he overthrew those cities, and all the plain, and all the inhabitants of those cities, and that which grew upon the ground" (xix, 24, 25). In the escape from this overthrow, the wife of Lot " looked back, and became a pillar of salt" (ver. 26). When Abraham, early that same morning, from the neighborhood of his distant