• Kir of Moab
    Aid to Bible Understanding

    • KIR OF MOAB

      An important city of Moab, probably a onetime capital. The Aramaic Targum consistently refers to Kir (of Moab), Kir-hareseth and Kir-heres as Kerak, indicating that these are but alternative names for the same place. “Kir of Moab” is therefore usually identified with modern Kerak. (Isa. 15:1) This city is situated on a small plateau over 3,000 feet (900 meters) above sea level and about eleven miles (18 kilometers) E of a point just below the Dead Sea peninsula El-Lisan. Steep valleys separate most of Kerak from the loftier neighboring mountains.

      Toward the close of the tenth century B.C.E. the allied forces of Israel, Judah and Edom attacked Kir-hareseth. If the site is correctly identified with Kerak, doubtless from the nearby mountains slingers bombarded the city with stones. Although Kir-hareseth evidently was not taken, the battle went hard against the king of Moab. For some unstated reason he, along with 700 warriors, sought to break through the battle lines in order to reach the king of Edom but was unsuccessful. As a last resort it appears that the king of Moab publicly sacrificed his own firstborn son, probably to appease the god Chemosh. (2 Ki. 3:5, 9, 25-27) The Hebrew text (2 Ki. 3:27) may also be understood to mean the firstborn son of the king of Edom, and some suggest that this is alluded to at Amos 2:1. But this is less likely.

      Isaiah’s prophecy indicated that the Moabites would mourn for Kir-hareseth’s raisin cakes, perhaps a principal product of the city’s trade. (Isa. 16:6, 7) Isaiah also spoke of his being boisterous like a harp over Moab and Kir-hareseth. As the strings of a harp vibrate with sound, so Isaiah’s inward parts were moved by the message of woe for Kir-hareseth.—Isa. 16:11; see also Jeremiah 48:31, 36.

  • Kish
    Aid to Bible Understanding

    • KISH

      [bow, power].

      l. A Merarite Levite who was the son of Mahli and brother of Eleazar. As Eleazar died without sons, having had only daughters, the sons of Kish took these heiresses as wives. One of the “sons of Kish” was Jerahmeel.—1 Chron. 23:21, 22; 24:29.

      2. A Benjamite; the son of Jeiel and his wife Maacah. (1 Chron. 8:29, 30) His brother Ner was the grandfather of Saul, Israel’s first king. (1 Chron. 9:35-39) Apparently Kish’s father Jeiel was also called Abiel.—See ABIEL No. 1.

      3. A Benjamite who was the father of King Saul. (1 Sam. 14:51; Acts 13:21) He was a wealthy member of the family of the Matrites. (1 Sam. 9:1; 10:21) This Kish was the son of Ner and grandson of Jeiel (Abiel), thus being the nephew of the Kish mentioned above. (1 Chron. 8:29-33; 9:35-39) However, 1 Samuel 9:1 calls him the son of Abiel, apparently using the term “son” to represent him not as the immediate son of Abiel (Jeiel), but rather as his grandson.

      The home of Kish was evidently at Gibeah, in Benjamin (1 Sam. 10:26), although his burial place was in Zela. (2 Sam. 21:14) The only event mentioned in the Bible regarding Kish concerns his sending his son Saul and an attendant out to search for some lost she-asses.—1 Sam. 9:3, 4.

      4. A Levite of King Hezekiah’s time; son of Abdi of the sons of Merari. Kish was one of the Levites who helped to cleanse the temple in the first year of Hezekiah’s reign.—2 Chron. 29:1-5, 12-17.

      5. A Benjamite ancestor of Esther’s cousin Mordecai.—Esther 2:5-7.

  • Kishon, Torrent Valley of
    Aid to Bible Understanding

    • KISHON, TORRENT VALLEY OF

      (Kiʹshon), [possibly, bending, curving].

      A stream identified as the Nahr el-Muqattaʽ. The Kishon winds its way in a northwesterly direction through the Plain of Esdraelon and, after flowing through a narrow gorge between Mount Carmel and a spur of the Galilean hills, enters the Plain of Acco (Acre) before finally emptying into the Mediterranean. The airline distance from the Kishon’s sources to its mouth at the Bay of Acco is about twenty-three miles (37 kilometers). Approximately twenty feet (6 meters) wide in the spring, the portion of the Kishon flowing through the Plain of Esdraelon increases in width by some ten feet (3 meters) in the western section of the plain. The Kishon’s greatest width of about sixty-five feet (20 meters) is reached in the Plain of Acco. With the exception of the last seven miles (11 kilometers) of its course, the Kishon is usually dry during the summer. But in the rainy season it becomes a rushing torrent, flooding its banks and sweeping everything in its path. The plain through which the Kishon flows then becomes a marshy region.

      In the time of Barak and Deborah the torrent valley of Kishon figured in the deliverance of the Israelites from Canaanite oppression. Barak and his troops took a position on Mount Tabor, this action drawing army chief Sisera, with his well-equipped forces and 900 chariots, to the Kishon. (Judg. 4:6, 7, 12, 13) The Israelites appeared to be at a military disadvantage. Yet, when directed to do so, Barak and his 10,000 men descended from Mount Tabor to engage the enemy. Jehovah God then intervened. “From heaven did the stars fight, from their orbits they fought against Sisera.”—Judg. 4:14, 15; 5:20.

      According to the traditional Jewish view expressed in the writings of Josephus, “there came down from heaven a great storm, with a vast quantity of rain and hail, and the wind blew the rain in the faces of the Canaanites, and so darkened their eyes, that their arrows and slings were of no advantage to them.” (Antiquities of the Jews, Book V, chap. V, par. 4) Such a downpour would have turned the ground to mud, immobilizing chariots and causing horses to sink into the mire and the enemy to flee in terror before Barak’s men. By whatever means, with Jehovah’s help, “all the camp of Sisera fell by the edge of the sword. Not as much as one remained.” (Judg. 4:15, 16; see also Psalm 83:9, 10.) Apparently the treacherous torrent of Kishon swept the corpses of the enemy away. (Judg. 5:21) Sisera himself escaped on foot, to suffer inglorious death by the hand of a woman, Jael the wife of Heber the Kenite.—Judg. 4:17-21.

      Later, during the reign of Israel’s King Ahab, the prophet Elijah slaughtered 450 prophets of Baal at the torrent valley of Kishon.—1 Ki. 18:22, 40.

      The “torrent valley that is in front of Jokneam” (Josh. 19:11) is considered to be the Kishon.