[130] Cornill: _Der Israelitische Prophetismus. Five Lectures for the Educated Laity._ 1894.
[131] Amos vii. 14. See further pp. 76 f.
[132] Khurbet Taḳûa', Hebrew Teḳôa', תְּקֹוע, from תקע, _to blow a trumpet_ (cf. Jer. vi. 1, _Blow the trumpet in Tekoa_) or _to pitch a tent_. The latter seems the more probable derivation of the name, and suggests a nomadic origin, which agrees with the position of Tekoa on the borders of the desert. Tekoa does not occur in the list of the towns taken by Joshua. There are really no reasons for supposing that some other Tekoa is meant. The two that have been alleged are (1) that Amos exclusively refers to the Northern Kingdom, (2) that sycomores do not grow at such levels as Tekoa. These are dealt with on pp. 79 and 77 respectively.
[133] 2 Chron. xx. 20.
[134] נֹקֵד, nôḳêd, is doubtless the same as the Arabic "naḳḳâd," or keeper of the "naḳad," defined by Freytag as a short-legged and deformed race of sheep in the Bahrein province of Arabia, from which comes the proverb "viler than a naḳad"; yet the wool is very fine. The king of Moab is called נוֹקֵד in 2 Kings iii. 4 (A.V. _sheep-master_). In vii. 14 Amos calls himself בּוֹקֵר, _cattleman_, which there is no reason to alter, as some do, to נֹוקֵד.
[135] בֹּולֵס, bôlês, probably from a root (found in Æthiopic) balas, _a fig_; hence one who _had to do with figs, handled them, ripened them_.
[136] The Egyptian sycomore, _Ficus sycomorus_, is not found in Syria above one thousand feet above the sea, while Tekoa is more than twice as high as that. Cf. 1 Kings x. 27, _the sycomores that are in the vale_ or _valley land_, עֵמֶק; 1 Chron. xxvii. 28, _the sycomores that are in the low plains_. "The sycamore grows in sand on the edge of the desert as vigorously as in the midst of a well-watered country. Its roots go deep in search of water, which infiltrates as far as the gorges of the hills, and they absorb it freely even where drought seems to reign supreme" (Maspero on the Egyptian sycomore; _The Dawn of Civilization_, translated by McClure, p. 26). "Everywhere on the confines of cultivated ground, and even at some distance from the valley, are fine single sycamores flourishing as though by miracle amid the sand.... They drink from water, which has infiltrated from the Nile, and whose existence is nowise betrayed upon the surface of the soil" (_ib._, 121). Always and still reverenced by Moslem and Christian.
[137] So practically Oort (_Th. Tjidsch._, 1891, 121 ff.), when compelled to abandon his previous conclusion (_ib._, 1880, 122 ff.) that the Tekoa of Amos lay in Northern Israel.
[138] In 1891 we met the Rushaideh, who cultivate Engedi, encamped just below Tekoa. But at other parts of the borders between the hill-country of Judæa and the desert, and between Moab and the desert, we found round most of the herdsmen's central wells a few fig-trees or pomegranates, or even apricots occasionally.
[139] Luke i. 80.
[140] Mark i. 18.
[141] v. 5; viii. 14.
[142] See p. 36.
[143] Prov. xxxi. 24.
[144] vi. 10.
[145] i. 9.
[146] v. 16.
[147] v. 21 ff.
[148] li. 7, 8.
[149] viii. 4 ff.
[150] vi. 1, 4-7.
[151] See pp. 136 f.
[152] i. 2.
[153] שׁופר, as has been pointed out, means in early Israel always the trumpet blown as a summons to war; only in later Israel was the name given to the temple trumpet.
[154] See further on this important passage pp. 89 ff.
[155] _Shall a little bird fall on the snare earthwards and there be no noose about her? Shall a snare rise from the ground and not be taking something?_ On this see p. 82. Its meaning seems to be equivalent to the Scottish proverb: "There's aye some water whan the stirkie droons."