Ps. cvii. 16, not excepting even the brazen gates | purpose of robbing them, and that it is to this of Babylon (Is. xlv. 2), and also of the iron danger that Solomon's proverb refers; but it gates of the prison in Jerusalem (Acts xii. 10). can scarcely be imagined that the Israelites The gates of cities were also secured with bars, were liable to have their houses entered by of which there is frequent mention in the Scrip- Arab plunderers in the reign of that powerful tures (Deut. iii. 5; 1 Sam. xxiii. 7; 2 Chron. monarch (Nar. of Miss. of Enquiry, 249). viii. 5). These were sometimes of brass (1 Kings iv. 13) and sometimes of iron (Ps. cvii. 16). The gates of cities were the seat of judgment. Here the judges or elders sat and administered the laws and settled disputed points (Deut. xxi. 19; xxv. 7; Ruth iv. 1, 2, 11; Prov. xxii. 22; xxxi. 23; Lam. v. 14; Amos v. 12; Zech. viii. 16). The Turkish court, it is well known, derived its appellation of the Porte from the administration of justice and the transaction of public business at its gates. During the Arabian rule in Spain the same practice obtained; and the magnificent gate of entrance to the Moorish palace of the Alhambra at Granada retains to this day the name of the Gate of Judgment or Justice. The gates of cities were also a place where business, particularly public business, was transacted (Gen. xxxiv. 20; 2 Sam. xix. 8; 1 Kings xxii. 10; Dan. ii. 49). Elisha prophesied that a measure of fine flour should be sold for a shekel, and two measures of barley for a shekel, in the gate of Samaria,' which accordingly came to pass (2 Kings vii. 1, 18). In Persia, in the present day, there are frequently recesses in the gates of cities, as at Mosul, which are used as shops for the sale of wheat and barley, bread and groceries (Layard, Nin. and Bab. 57). From these circumstances, and also from the gates being the place of going out of and of entering into cities, they appear to have been chief places of concourse,' and hence they were convenient for addressing the people (Prov. i. 21; viii. 3; Jer. xvii. 19, 20). Criminals, or such as were deemed criminals, were stoned without the gates (1 Kings xxi. 13; Acts vii. 58). It is also said of our Lord that he suffered without the gate' (Heb. xiii. 12). 6 To possess the gates of enemies is to conquer and have dominion over them (Gen. xxii. 17). Gates mourn when there are few or no people to pass out and in by them (Is. iii. 26; Lam. i. 4). The gates of hell that cannot prevail against the church are the whole power and policy of hell-the whole legions of evil angels, and their unnumbered agents of erroneous and wicked men (Matt. xvi. 18). He that exalteth his gate seeketh destruction (Prov. xvii. 19). Speaking of Tabreez in Persia, Mr. Perkins, an American missionary, says, 'The streets, which are narrow, crooked, irregular, and only roughly and partially paved, present nothing to the eye but dead mud walls, from eight to fifteen feet high. These are entered by gates or doors, small and low in proportion to the prudence as well as the standing of the owner; for high, large gates are a token of wealth which excites the envy of equals who will not be slow to find accusations against him, or the cupidity of superiors,' perhaps of the government, who can readily find pretexts for relieving the owner of his surplus wealth, if to strip him of nothing more' (Perkins, Resid. in Persia, 153). It is also said that the gates of houses are made low as a protection from the Arabs, who would otherwise ride into them on horseback for the . GATH, one of the cities of the five lords of the Philistines. It was very ancient, for while Ephraim, Jacob's son, yet lived, the men of Gath' slew several of his sons (1 Chron. vii. 21, 22). Goliath, who was of the race of the giants, and was slain by David in single combat, is called Goliath of Gath' (1 Sam. xvii. 4-10, 40-51). Achish, to whom David twice fled for protection when seeking to elude the pursuit of Saul, is called 'the king of Gath' (xxi. 10-15; xxvii. 1-7). The inhabitants of Gath were called Gittites (Josh. xiii. 3); and it is a singular circumstance that, on occasion of Absalom's rebellion, there were in David's army a body of Philistines, and that they remained faithful to him when so many of his own subjects joined his rebellious son: All the Cherothites and all the Pelethites, and all the Gittites, six hundred men of Gath, who came after him from Gath, passed on before the king; and it further ap pears that they were under the command of one of their own countrymen, 'Ittai the Gittite' (2) Sam. xv. 18-22). Gath appears to have been early destroyed, or at least to have lost its im portance. Amos alludes to some such event (vi. 2); and Gath is not enumerated by the later prophets along with the other four cities of the Philistines (Amos i. 6-8; Jer. xxv. 20; Zeph. ii. 4, 5; Zech. ix. 5, 6). No traces are now known of Gath, and its particular locality is not ascertained (Robinson, Res. ii. 420). GATH-HE'PHER, or GITTAH-HE'PHER, a city of Galilee, noted as the birth-place of the prophet Jonah (Josh. xix. 13; 2 Kings xiv. 25). Jerome says it was two miles from Sephoris or Diocæsarea. GATH-RIM'MON. There were two places of this name, one in the lot of Dan, and westward from Jerusalem, and another in the lot of the western half-tribe of Manasseh. Both were given to the Levites of Kohath's family (Josh. xxi. 24, 25). In a country so full of vineyards as Canaan was we need not wonder to find a variety of cities named Gath, or wine-press.' GA'ZA, a city near the south-west point of Canaan, distant about an hour from the Mediterranean Sea. It is among the earliest of the Canaanitish cities mentioned in the O. T. (Gen. x. 19), and it afterwards became noted as one of the five cities of the lords of the Philistines. Joshua extended his conquests to Gaza, but does not appear to have taken it (Josh. x. 41; xi. 22; xiii. 3). After his death, however, Judah took it, and also Askelon and Ekron, 'with the coasts thereof' (Judg. i. 18). But the Philistines were not driven out of the country (Judg. iii. 1-3), and the children of Israel, as a punishment for their sins, were delivered into the hand of the Philistines forty years' (Judg. x. 6, 7; xiii. 1). Samson at length appeared as the champion and avenger of his people, and Gaza became renowned as the scene of his later exploits, of his imprisonment, and his death. GAZA 257 | GEBAL The from the opportunity it gave of furnishing sup- This city was the western boundary of Solomon's kingdom (1 Kings iv. 24). The prophets denounced heavy judgments on it (Jer. xxv. 20; xlvii. 5; Amos i. 6, 7; Zeph. ii. 4; Zech. ix. 5). Pharaoh, king of Egypt, in the time of Jeremiah, smote it (Jer. vii. 1); and Cambyses, king of Persia, in his expedition against Egypt, is said to have deposited his treasures in it. Alexander the Great took Gaza after a lengthened siege; and, provoked by the resistance he had met with, he treated the Persian governor and its other brave defenders in a most barbarous manner. During the wars of the Maccabees Gaza was still a place of great strength: it was fortified by the Syrian Bacchides; its suburbs were burned by Jonathan, and the city itself was captured by Simon (1 Maccab. xi. 61; xiii. 43). Alexander Jannæus, king of the Jews, about 96 B.C., took it, and utterly overthrew it, after a siege of a year (Joseph. Antiq. xiii. 13. 3), but it was afterwards rebuilt by the Roman general Gabinius (Ibid. xiv. 5. 3). Augustus gave it to Herod the Great (Ibid. xv. 7. 3); and after his death it was added to the province of Syria (Ibid. xvii.) are only the masculine and feminine have sometimes been supposed to refer to one 11. 4). About A.D. 65, during the government forms of the same word, signifying hill, they and the same place. But that they were disof the procurator Gessius Florus, Gaza, with tinet places is evident from Josh. xviii. 24, 28; other cities, was again laid in ruins by the reYet this destruction was pro1 Sam. xiii. 2, 3; Is. x. 29; Robinson, ii. 114). bellious Jews. bably only partial, or was but temporary, for the two words. 'Thus Geba,' says Dr. Robinthere exist coins of Gaza struck in honour of There is, however, some confusion in the use of Titus, Adrian, and the following emperors, which shew at least that the city was still a place of son, is certainly read for Gibeah in Judg. xx. I am unable to doubt that, vice versa, Gibeah importance very soon after the destruction of 10, 33, comp. ver. 9, 36; so in 1 Sam. xiv. 16 is put for Geba by an error in transcribing' Jerusalem. In 1 Sam. xiv. the scene of (Bib. Sac. i. 602). Jonathan's romantic adventure with the Philistines is laid in Gibeah; but, according to this view, Robinson thinks it to have been in Geba. ancient Geba. The present village of Jeba he considers as the It was on the way which goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza' that Philip met and bap; tized the Ethiopian eunuch (Acts viii. 26); and though it is called 'Gaza, which is desert,' this is probably to be referred not to the city itself, but to the country around, which, in the language of the N. T., might be called desert, as being without villages, and having but few inhabitants, which is still the case at the present day. During the first six centuries of the Christian era there appears to have been a Christian church in Gaza, and mention is made of its bishops at several of the ancient councils. Here Constantine built a stately church, and called the city Constantia, from the name of his son, and made it a free city; but Julian deprived it of all its privileges about thirty or forty years afterwards. In A.D. 634 it was taken by the Some generals of the first caliph Abu Bekr. of the most important campaigns of the Crusaders took place in the neighbourhood. In the 12th century we find the place garrisoned by the Knights Templars. It finally fell into the hands of Saladin A.D. 1170. Gaza, it would appear, must have greatly revived since the beginning of the 18th century. In 1707, when Sir Paul Lucas saw it, it was little better than a heap of ruins, with about 400 poor people nestling among them. In 1838 Dr. Robinson estimated the inhabitants of Gaza as not less than 15,000 or perhaps 16,000. situation, on the route of the great caravans which in all ages have passed between Egypt and Syria, is favourable to its trade and prosperity, both as affording a means of constant communication with these countries, and also 8 Its GE'BA, a city of Benjamin, lying to the north-east of Jerusalem (Josh. xviii. 24), which, As Geba () and Gibeah however, with its suburbs, was given to the priests (xxi. 17). GEBAL, a city of the Phoenicians, on the coast of Syria, between Tripoli and Berytus. It was called Búẞlos (Byblos) by the Greeks, and was famous for the birth and temple of Adonis. The land of the Giblites was included in the grant to the children of Israel, but it was not conquered by them in the days of Joshua (xiii. 2, 5). Giblites (marg. not 'stope-squarers,' as in E. T.) were employed as workmen about Solomon's temple (1 Kings v. 18); and in Ezek. xxvii. 9, 'the ancients of Gebal, and the wise men thereof,' are mentioned as caulkers in the ships of Tyre. It may be questioned whether the Israelites ever came into possession of Gebal. Like many other places, it has now resumed nearly its ancient name, being called by the Arabs Jibeil. The walls of the town inclose an irregular quadrangle of no great extent, but even this is filled more with ruins than with dwellings. Among these is a large khan without the walls, surmounted by a corridor, whose roof is supported by handsome granite columns. Such is the profusion of elegant and costly remains of ancient grandeur that they are crammed into old walls, planted in the terraces of their fields, thrown into the small harbour, or left at random in the streets and gardens. Some stones lying on the ground are twenty feet long. There is only one gate, and that is not guarded; and the lofty old castle, the first and last object seen as the traveller comes and | goes, is without an inhabitant. Within it is a Maronite church. The population appears to be estimated at about 600. (Maundrell, 33; Rosen. Geog. iii. 79; Amer. Miss. Her. 1841, p. 33; Bib. Sac. v. 7). GENERATION properly signifies the natural production of animals. In the Scriptures it signities-1. The creation or formation of things: 'These are the generations of the heavens and of the earth when they were created' (Gen. ii. 4; see also v. 1). 2. A genealogy; a genealo gical table: The book of the generation of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham,' &c. (Matt. i. 1-16. 3. An order or succession of descent: In the fourth generation they shall come hither again' (Gen. xv. 16); 'An Ammonite or a Moabite shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord, even to their tenth generation' (Deut. xxiii. 3); Job saw his sons, and his sons' sons, even four generations' (Job xlii. 16); Remember the days of old; consider the years of many generations' (xxxii. 7); "They shall fear thee, as long as the sun and moon endure, throughout all generations' (Ps. lxxii. 5). 4. A race or class of persons living at the same time; persons of the same age or period; contemporaries: Joseph died, and all his brethren, and all that generation' (Exod. i. 6); 'One generation passeth away, and another generation cometh' (Eccles. i. 4); Verily, I say unto you, all these things shall come upon this generation' (Matt. xxiii. 36). 5. A class of persons of a particular character, good or bad: God is in the generation of the righteous' (Ps. xiv. 5); 'The generation of the upright shall be blessed' (cxii. 2); 'There is a generation that are pure in their own eyes, and yet is not washed from their filthiness' (Prov. xxx. 11-14); Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a peculiar people' (1 Pet. ii. 9). 6. Way of acting: The children of this world are wiser in their generation than the children of light' (Luke xvi. 8). 7. Offspring, brood: Ye serpents, ye generation' (yevvηuara, offspring or brood) of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of hell?' (Matt. xxiii. 33; see also iii. 7; xii. 34). Tevvhua is in like manner used of the offspring or fruit of trees (Matt. xxvi. 29), and so also in Mark and Luke in the corresponding passages. GENESIS. [PENTATEUCH.] GENNES'ARET, a district of country on the west side of the Sea of Tiberias, hence called also the Lake of Gennesaret (Matt. xiv. 34; Luke v. 1). According to Josephus it was 30 stadia long and 20 broad, or 3 Roman miles in length by 24 in breadth; a statement which Dr. Wilson considers as tolerably correct. He further describes it as of wonderful beauty and fertility (Wars, iii. 10. 8); and though there is probably some exaggeration in his description, yet Dr. Wilson does not question its general truth. 'The valley,' he says, has every appearance of the greatest fertility, and if kept in order, and properly laid out, would be truly beautiful and delightful. At present it has some rich pasturage and cultivated fields, bearing luxuriant crops of corn and rice and vegetables. Wild figs and quantities of the nekl tree are still found growing in it in several places. Various lines of oleanders, particularly along the streams which run through it, add to its beauty. The soil is much of a dark alluvial loam, and contains the debris of the basaltic rock in the neighbourhood' (Wilson, 137). GERAH, the twentieth part of a shekel. It was the least of the Jewish moneys (Exod. xxx. 13). GERAR, an ancient city of the Philistines, in the south-west of Canaan, of which Abimelech was king, and where both Abraham and Isaac dwelt for a time. Afterwards Isaac departed thence.e., from the town of Gerar, and pitched his tent in the valley of Gerar, and dwelt there.' Probably Abraham had previously done the same (Gen. x. 19; xx. xxi. 2232; xxvi.) Gerar has been generally supposed to have been situated between Gaza and Beersheba. Now, there is a Wade-Gerur in the Arabian desert, on the south-west confines of Palestine. It lies considerably to the south-west of Beersheba. It is a valley of great breadth, and in some places is under cultivation. Taken in connection with the other wadys or valleys which lie near to it, it may be described as an immense plain, well worthy to give a name to a kingdom or principality such as Abimelech may be sup posed to have possessed. We see no reason to doubt that this was the Gerar spoken of in the book of Genesis (Stewart, 190, 193, 207). GER'IZIM, MOUNT, and MOUNT EBAL, were two hills of Samaria, which rose immediately from the valley in which the ancient Shechem was situated, and in which lies the present Nabulus. They rise at the distance of between two and three hundred paces from each other: Mount Ebal on the north, its top extremely bare and barren; Mount Gerizim on the south, even its summit bearing marks of cultivation. They are both steep, rocky, and precipitous, and apparently about 800 feet in height (Robinson, iii. 96). Upon Mount Ebal, according to the Hebrew text, and upon Mount Gerizim, according to the Samaritans, the Israelites were commanded to set up great stones,' and to 'write upon them all the words of the law,' and to build an altar unto the Lord,' and to offer burnt-offerings thereon, and peace-offerings,' and to eat there, and rejoice before the Lord.' They were also commanded to station six of the tribes on Mount Gerizim-Simeon and Levi, and Judah and Issachar, and Joseph and Benjamin, to bless the people; and six on Mount Ebal to curse them-Reuben, Gad, and Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali; and the Levites were to speak unto all the men of Israel with a loud voice,' and pronounce on them the blessings and the curses, and as each blessing and curse was pronounced all the people were to say, Amen' (Deut. xxvii. xxviii.) It must have been a very interesting and solemn service, well calculated to make a deep and lasting impression on their minds. According to the commandment of Moses, this sublime service was gone through by the nation of Israel soon after they entered Canaan under the leadership of Joshua, a circumstance which must have On Mount Gerizim a temple was erected for the Samaritans, permission for this end having been obtained from Alexander of Macedon when he was on his way to invade the Persian empire. [SAMARITANS.] greatly added to its significance (Josh. viii. 30- | behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron; is 35). It does not appear it was designed ever it not in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? to be repeated. nine cubits was the length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it, after the cubit of a man' (Deut. iii. 11, 13). These measurements shew that he was a man of gigantic stature, but they do not enable us to form any idea of his exact height; any calculation founded thereon would be very uncertain. In the days of Joshua we find Rephaims on the west of the Jordan, or at least we read of the land of the Rephaims (Josh. xvii. 15); and there was a valley near Jerusalem called the valley of Rephaim' (2 Sam. v. 18), which would seem to indicate that It was to Mount Gerizim that the woman of Samaria referred in her conversation with our Lord when she said our fathers worshipped in this mountain, and ye say that in Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship' (John iv. 20). GESH'UR, a district of Aram or Syria (2 Sam. xv. 8) which adjoined, on the east side of the Jordan, the north border of the territory of Israel, and lay between Mount Hermon and Bashan (Deut. iii. 13, 15; Josh. xii. 5; xiii. 11). According to the boundaries of the promised land as laid down by Moses, Geshur would have formed part of it; but in Josh. xiii. 2, 13, it is stated that the Israelites did not expel the Geshurites nor the Maachathites, but that the Geshurites and the Maachathites dwell among them unto this day;' and that they did not afterwards permanently subdue Geshur appears from the circumstance, that in David's time this district had a king of its own called Talmai, whose daughter Maachah was one of David's wives (2 Sam. iii. 3). She was the mother of Absalom and his sister Tamar, both of them distinguished for their beauty; and when he slew his brother Amnon because he had defiled his sister, he fled to his grandfather Talmai, in Geshur, and remained with him for the space of three years (2 Sam. xiii. 1, 28, 29, 37, 38; Rosen. Geog. ii. 227). GESH'URITES, a people who dwelt on the south-west of Canaan or in the neighbouring wilderness of Shur, not far from the country of the Philistines. David when dwelling at Ziklag' invaded the Geshurites, and the Gezrites, and the Amalekites, and left neither man nor woman alive' (Josh. xiii. 2; 1 Sam. xxvii. 8, 9). GETHSEMANE. [JERUSALEM.] GIANTS, men whose stature greatly exceeds the ordinary height of the human race. Of such persons we have frequent examples in the Scriptures. Even before the flood giants are spoken of, perhaps the progeny of the mixed marriages of the posterity of Seth and Cain: 'There were giants in the earth in those days; and also after that, when the sons of God came in unto the daughters of men, and they bare children to them; the same became mighty men, which were of old men of renown' (Gen. vi. 4). On the east of the Jordan there appears to have been more than one race of giants: Chedorlaomer, and the kings that were with him, came and smote the Rephaims in AshterothKarnaim, and the Zuzims in Ham, and the Emims in Shaveh-Kiriathaim' (Gen. xiv. 5). The Rephaims are again mentioned xv. 20. Bashan was called the land of the Rephaims (E. T. giants), but on its conquest by Moses, it is said Only Og, king of Bashan, remained of the remnant of the Rephaims (E. T. giants): ་ these parts had at one time been inhabited by the Rephaims. Emims dwelt therein in times past, a people Of the country of Moab we read: The great and many, and tall as the Anakims; which also were accounted giants as the Anakims, but the Moabites call them Emims' (Deut. ii. 10, 11). Of the country of Ammon it is in like manner said: That also was accounted a land of giants; giants dwelt therein in old time, and the Ammonites call them Zamzummims, a people great and many, and tall as the Anakims; but the Lord destroyed them before them, and they succeeded them, and dwelt in their stead' (ii. 19-21). These Zamzummims are commonly supposed to be the same as the Zuzims. There were also giants in Canaan west of the Jordan. The spies who were sent by Moses to search out the land ascended by the south and and Talmai, the children of Anak, were;' and came unto Hebron, where Ahiman, Sheshai, on their return to Kadesh they made the following report: The land through which we have gone, to search it, is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof; and all the people that we saw in it are men of great stature: and there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants; and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight' (Num. xiii. 22, 32, 33). But notwithstanding this discouraging report, Joshua, after conquering the rest of Canaan, came and cut off the Anakims from the mountains, from Hebron, from Debir, from Anab, and from all the mountains of Judah, and from all the mountains of Israel: Joshua destroyed them utterly with their cities; there was none of the Anakims left in the land of the children of Israel, only in Gaza, in Gath, and in Ashdod there remained' (Josh. xi. 21, 22). Whether any of the Anakims had previous to this time settled in the land of the Philistines, or whether some only now fled thither, does not appear; nor indeed do we ever afterwards read of Anakims in Philistia, but we read of giants, and it is not unlikely they might be descendants of Anak. Goliath of Gath is described as a man of great stature (in height 'six cubits and a span'), but he was slain by David in single combat (1 Sam. xvii. 4, 49-51). There were also four sons of the giant in Gath, who were afterwards slain in battle by David's servants when he himself was king (2 Sam. xxi. 15-22); but the word in this passage translated 'the giant' is 7, which may be merely the name of their father. After this we read no more of giants in Canaan. The only other mention of a giant in the Scriptures is of an Egyptian, a | 8-10); and here that miscreant was himself put man of great stature, five cubits high,' who was to death as a punishment of his foul murders (1 slain with his own spear' by Benaiah, another Kings ii. 28-34). Here the tabernacle was set of David's valiant men (1 Chron. xi. 22, 23). up for many years under David and Solomon, GIB'EAH, a city of Benjamin, a few miles the ark being at the time at Jerusalem, and burnt sacrifices and peace-offerings being there offered before God. Gibeon, however, was now the great high-place where the daily and other sacrifices were offered up, and it continued to be so until the dedication of the temple (1 Chron. xvi. 1, 2, 39; xxi. 29; 2 Chron. i. 3, 4). Here on one occasion Solomon offered a thousand burnt-offerings, and the same night he had that remarkable dream in which he asked for himself a wise and understanding heart in preference to riches and honour (1 Kings iii. 4-15; 2 Chron. i. 5-13). There is little room to doubt that El Jib is north-east of Jerusalem, and from its name it appears to have been situated on a hill (Josh. xviii. 28). Not many years after Joshua's death it was the scene of a most outrageous act of wickedness, which led to a civil war in which the tribe of Benjamin was almost entirely extirpated (Judg. xix. 21). It is probably in reference to this gross outrage that Hosea, speaking of Israel in his own times, says: They have deeply corrupted themselves, as in the days of Gibeah; therefore he will remember their iniquity, he will visit their sins' (ix. 9). And again: 0 Israel, thou hast sinned from the days of Gibeah: there they stood: the battle the ancient Gibeon of the Scriptures. It is a in Gibeah against the children of iniquity did village of a moderate size, situated on the not overtake them' (x. 9). Gibeah was probably summit of a hill. The houses stand very irrethe birth-place of Saul; it was at least his homegularly and unevenly, sometimes almost one at the time he was anointed and chosen as king in old massive ruins, which have fallen down in above another. They seem to be chiefly rooms of Israel (1 Sam. x. 26), and he continued to reside there after he was made king (xi. 4; xv. every direction (Robinson, Res. ii. 136). 34); hence it was called Gibeah of Saul as well GIB'LITES. [GEBAL.] as Gibeah of Benjamin. It was here the Gibeonites hanged seven of Saul's descendants, whom David had given up to them, for the purpose no doubt of rendering their death the more ignominious (2 Sam. xxi. 1-9). east. Dr. Robinson supposes that the site of Gibeah was a conical hill now called Tuleil-el-Ful, which is seen at a great distance, especially from the On it there was once a square tower, which has now fallen into ruins, and has the appearance of a pyramidal mound. There are no other remains around the hill itself, but a few rods further west there are a number of substructions, consisting of large unhewn stones in low massive walls. He supposes that the ancient city may have extended down from the hill on that side, and have included this spot (Bib. Sac. i. 601). ་ GIB'EON, a city of the Hivites, one of the tribes of Canaan, five or six miles north-west of Jerusalem. It is called a great city as one of the royal cities' (Josh. x. 2; xi. 19). It is first mentioned in the O. T. in connection with the deceit practised by its inhabitants upon Joshua, by which, although Canaanites, Joshua was led not only to make a league with them and to spare their lives, but also in their defence to give battle to the five Canaanitish kings who, in revenge for their having made peace with the Israelites, came up and made war upon them. It was on this occasion that 'the sun stood still upon Gibeon, and the moon in the valley of Ajalon.' But yet, to punish them for having beguiled him, Joshua appointed them to be 'bondmen, and hewers of wood and drawers of water for the congregation and for the altar of the Lord, in the place which he should choose' (ix. x. 1-14). This place afterwards fell to the lot of Benjamin (xviii. 25), and was one of the cities assigned to the priests (xxi. 17). Here it was that Abner's challenge to Joab terminated in his own defeat and in the death of Asahel (2 Sam. ii. 12-32); here also at a later period Amasa was treacherously slain by Joab (xx. GIER-EAGLE. [RACHAM.] GI'HON. 1. One of the four heads or branches of the river which watered the garden of Eden, and compassed or ran along the whole The Arabs called that river land of Cush. As which runs north-westward into the Caspian |