Difference between revisions of "Shechem" - New World Encyclopedia
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===Classical and modern history=== | ===Classical and modern history=== | ||
| − | In Classical times, Shechem | + | In Classical times, Shechem remained the main settlement of the [[Samaritan]]s, whose cultic center was reestablished on nearby [[Mount Gerizim]], just outside of the town. Like all of Samaria, it was annexed, at the time of the deposition of [[Archelaus]] in 6 C.E., to the Roman province of [[Syria]]. In [[Acts_of_the_Apostles|Acts]] 7:16 the place is called '''Sychem''', and in the [[Gospel of John]] 4:5 it is called '''Sychar'''. |
| − | Shechem | + | Shechem is also the location of '''Jacob's Well''', where, according to the |
| + | Gospel of John 4:5–6 [[Jesus]]' famously met with the woman of [[Samaria]], and proved to her that he was both a prophet and the Messiah. The [[Ancient Rome|Ancient Roman]] and [[Arab]] city of [[Nablus]] lies 2 km to the west of the site. [[Josephus]], writing in about 90 CE, placed the city between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal (''[[Jewish Antiquities]]'' 4.8.44), and other ancient writers knew that it was on the outskirts of "Neapolis" (Nablus). Its [[archaeology|archaeological]] site was only stumbled upon in 1903 by a [[German people|German]] party of archaeologists led by Dr. [[Hermann Thiersch]] at a site known as Tel Balatah, beside the traditional site associated with the [[tomb]] of [[Joseph (dreamer)|Joseph]] ([[Book of Joshua|Joshua]] 24:32). | ||
| − | + | Some of its inhabitants may have been of the number of the "Samaritans" who believed in Jesus when He tarried two days in the neighborhood (John 4), and the city must have been visited by the Apostles on their way from Samaria to Jerusalem (Acts 8:25). Of the Samaritans of Sichem not a few rose up in arms on Mt. Garizim at the time of a Galilean rebellion in (67 CE). The city was very likely destroyed on that occasion by Cerealis ("Bell. Jud.," III, vii, 32). A few years after this a new city, Flavia Neapolis, was built by Vespasian a short distance to the west of the old one. Some 50 years later [[Hadrian]] restored the temple of Yahweh on Mount Gerezim and dedicated it to Jupiter (''Dion Cass''., xv, 12). | |
| − | Since the Mohammedan conquest (636, first under the Arab Caliphates, ultimately under the Ottoman Turks) Christianity | + | Neapolis, like Sichem, had very early a Christian community. It was from here that the first Christian [[apologist]], [[Justin Martyr]] hailed. Sources also speak of of bishops of Neapolis (Labbe, "Conc.," I, 1475, 1488; II, 325). On several occasions the Christians persecuted by the Samaritans. Later, the tables were turned, and in 474 the Christian emperor—reportedly to avenge an unjust attack on Christians by the Samatarians—deprived the Samaritans of Mt. Gerezim and gave it to the Christians who built on it a church dedicated to the Blessed Virgin (Procop., "De edif," v, 7). |
| + | |||
| + | Since the Mohammedan conquest (636, first under the Arab Caliphates, ultimately under the Ottoman Turks) Christianity had practically disappeared from [[Nablús]], which, however, remained the headquarters of the Samaritan sect and of its high priest. | ||
==Homonym== | ==Homonym== | ||
Revision as of 01:40, 13 July 2008
- For Shechem, the antagonist in the Biblical story of the rape of Dinah, see Dinah.
- For Jacobs Well, the village to the north of Guildford, Surrey, see Jacobs Well.
Shechem Hebrew toponym.
Biblical original
Shechem, Sichem, or Shkhem (Hebrew: שְׁכֶם / שְׁכָם, Standard Šəḫem Tiberian Šəḵem; "Shoulder") was an Israelite city in the tribe of Ephraim, situated at Tell Balatah {{#invoke:Coordinates|coord}}{{#coordinates:32|12|11|N|35|18|40|E| | |name= }}, 2 km east of present-day Nablus) was the first capital of the Kingdom of Israel.
Archaeological evidence indicates that the city was razed and reconstructed up to 22 times before its final demise in 200 C.E. Within the remains of the city can still be found a number of walls and gates built for defense, a government house, a residential quarter and the ruins of a temple raised to Zeus by the Roman Emperor Hadrian, the latter dating to the second century CE.
Its position is clearly indicated in the Bible: it lay north of Bethal and Shiloh, on the high road going from Jerusalem to the northern districts (Judges xxi, 19), at a short distance from Machmethath (Joshua 17:7) and of Dothain (Genesis 37:12-17); it was in the hill-country of Ephraim (Joshua 20:7; 21:21; 1 Kings 12:25; 1 Chronicles 6:67; 7:28), immediately below Mount Garizim (Judges 9:6-7). These indications are completed by Josephus, who says that the city lay between Mt. Ebal and Mt. Garizim, and by the Medaba map, which places Sychem, also called Sikima between the Tour Gobel (Ebal) and the Tour Garizin (Garizim). We may therefore admit unhesitatingly that Sichem stood on (St. Jerome, St. Epiphanius), or very close to (Eusebius, "Onomast.," Euchem; Medaba map), the site occupied by the town of Nablus, the Neapolis, or Flavia Neapolis of early Christian ages.
Pre-Roman History and Biblical tradition
The old city of Shechem dates back an estimated four thousand years.
At Shechem, Abram "built an altar to the Lord who had appeared to him... and had given that land to his descendants" (Gen 12:6-7). This biblical account is considered by some to describe the first place Abram stopped when he, Sarah, Lot and their party entered Canaan. The Bible states that on this occasion, God confirmed the covenant He had first made with Abram in Ur, regarding the possession of the land of Canaan. On a later sojourn, the sons of Jacob avenged their sister's rape (or by another interpretation, seduction) by massacring the city's inhabitants. Joshua assembled the Israelites in Shechem and encouraged them to reaffirm their adherence to the Torah. During the Judges period, Abimelech was crowned king in Shechem.
Shechem was a commercial center due to its position in the middle of vital trade routes through the region. It traded in local grapes, olives, wheat, livestock and pottery between the middle Bronze Age and the late Hellenic Period (1900-100 B.C.E.).
Shechem had been a Canaanite settlement, mentioned on an Egyptian stele of a noble at the court of Senusret III (c. 1880–1840 B.C.E.).
In the Amarna Letters of about 1350 B.C.E., Shachmu (i.e. Shechem) was the center of a kingdom carved out by Labaya, a Canaanite warlord who recruited mercenaries from among the Habiru. Labaya was the author of three Amarna letters. His name appears in 11 of the other 382 letters, referred to 28 times. SAY MORE ABOUT THIS
Shechem first appears in the Hebrew Bible in Genesis 12:6–8, which records how Abraham reached the "great tree of Moreh" at Shechem and offered sacrifice nearby. Later Joseph's bones were brought out of Egypt and reburied at Shechem. That the city of Sichem, the name of which (Hebrew shékém—'shoulder, saddle') appears to have been suggested by the configuration of the place, existed in the time of Abraham is doubted by a few who think it is referred to in Genesis, xii, 6, by anticipation; but there can be no question touching its existence in Jacob's time (Genesis 33:18, 19); it is certainly mentioned in the El-Amarna letters (letter 289), and is probably the Sakama of the old Egyptian traveler Mohar (fourteenth century B.C.E.; Muller, "Asien u. Europ.," p. 394, Leipzig, 1893).
Owing to its central position, no less than to the presence in the neighborhood of places hallowed by the memory of Abraham (Genesis 12:6, 7; 34:5), Jacob (Genesis 33:18-19; 34:2, etc.), and Joseph (Joshua 24:32), the city was destined to play an important part in the history of Israel. The city, including its Bronze Age temple, fell to the Israelites sometime before 1000 B.C.E.
There it was that, after Gideon's death, Abimelech, his son by a Sichemite concubine, was made king (Judges 9:1-6). Yotam, the youngest son of Gideon, made a famous speech on Mount Gerizim known as Yotam's allegory, where he warned the people of Shechem about Abimelech's future tyranny (Judges 9:7-20). When the city had, three years later, risen in rebellion, Abimelech took it, utterly destroyed it, and burnt the temple of Baal-berith, where the people had fled for safety. From the excavations, it was later learned that the city was indeed destroyed around 1100 B.C.E.
It was rebuilt in the tenth century B.C.E. and was probably the capital of Har Efraim (1 Kings 4). Shechem was the place appointed, after Solomon's death, for the meeting of the people of Israel and the investiture of Solomon's son Rehoboam. The meeting ended in the secession of the ten northern tribes, and Shechem, fortified by Jeroboam, became for a while the capital of the new kingdom (1 Kings 12:1; 14:17; 2 Chronicles 10:1).
When the kings of Israel moved first to Tirzah, and later on to Samaria, Shechem lost its importance, and we do not hear of it again until after the fall of Jerusalem (587 B.C.E.; Jeremiah 12:5).
However, the events connected with the restoration of Temple of Jerusalem were to bring it again into prominence. According to Josephus, on his second visit to Jerusalem, Nehemiah expelled the grandson of the high priest Eliashib, who refused to separate from his alien wife. Many Jews, both priests and laymen, sided with Eliashib's grandson and settled in Shechem. They also built a rival temple on Mount Gerizim. Thus Shechem became the holy city of the Samaritans. Shechem thus became the center of the Samaritan kingdom until it fell about 128 B.C.E. before the military invasion of the Jewish king John Hyrcanus, and their temple was destroyed ("Antiq.," XIII, ix, 1).
Classical and modern history
In Classical times, Shechem remained the main settlement of the Samaritans, whose cultic center was reestablished on nearby Mount Gerizim, just outside of the town. Like all of Samaria, it was annexed, at the time of the deposition of Archelaus in 6 C.E., to the Roman province of Syria. In Acts 7:16 the place is called Sychem, and in the Gospel of John 4:5 it is called Sychar.
Shechem is also the location of Jacob's Well, where, according to the Gospel of John 4:5–6 Jesus' famously met with the woman of Samaria, and proved to her that he was both a prophet and the Messiah. The Ancient Roman and Arab city of Nablus lies 2 km to the west of the site. Josephus, writing in about 90 C.E., placed the city between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal (Jewish Antiquities 4.8.44), and other ancient writers knew that it was on the outskirts of "Neapolis" (Nablus). Its archaeological site was only stumbled upon in 1903 by a German party of archaeologists led by Dr. Hermann Thiersch at a site known as Tel Balatah, beside the traditional site associated with the tomb of Joseph (Joshua 24:32).
Some of its inhabitants may have been of the number of the "Samaritans" who believed in Jesus when He tarried two days in the neighborhood (John 4), and the city must have been visited by the Apostles on their way from Samaria to Jerusalem (Acts 8:25). Of the Samaritans of Sichem not a few rose up in arms on Mt. Garizim at the time of a Galilean rebellion in (67 C.E.). The city was very likely destroyed on that occasion by Cerealis ("Bell. Jud.," III, vii, 32). A few years after this a new city, Flavia Neapolis, was built by Vespasian a short distance to the west of the old one. Some 50 years later Hadrian restored the temple of Yahweh on Mount Gerezim and dedicated it to Jupiter (Dion Cass., xv, 12).
Neapolis, like Sichem, had very early a Christian community. It was from here that the first Christian apologist, Justin Martyr hailed. Sources also speak of of bishops of Neapolis (Labbe, "Conc.," I, 1475, 1488; II, 325). On several occasions the Christians persecuted by the Samaritans. Later, the tables were turned, and in 474 the Christian emperor—reportedly to avenge an unjust attack on Christians by the Samatarians—deprived the Samaritans of Mt. Gerezim and gave it to the Christians who built on it a church dedicated to the Blessed Virgin (Procop., "De edif," v, 7).
Since the Mohammedan conquest (636, first under the Arab Caliphates, ultimately under the Ottoman Turks) Christianity had practically disappeared from Nablús, which, however, remained the headquarters of the Samaritan sect and of its high priest.
Homonym
Sichem is also the old spelling for Zichem, a Flemish municipality which is named after the biblical Sichem; it is now merged into Scherpenheuvel-Zichem.
See also
- Biblical archaeology
- Kingdom of Israel
- Nablus
ReferencesISBN links support NWE through referral fees
- Stager, Lawrence (2003). The Shechem Temple Where Abimelech Massacred a Thousand. Biblical Archaeology Review 29:4 (July/August): 26-35, 66, 68-69.
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