Smith's Bible Dictionary.pdf - Online Christian Library

Smith's Bible Dictionary
•Son of Rehoboam by Maachah the granddaughter of Absalom. (2 Chronicles 11:20) (B.C. after
973.)
Zizah
a Gershonite Levite, second son of Shimei, (1 Chronicles 23:11) called Zina in ver. (1 Chronicles
23:10)
Zoan
(place of departure), an ancient city of lower Egypt, called Tanis by the Greeks. It stood on the
eastern bank of the Tanitic branch of the Nile. Its name indicates a place of departure from a country,
and hence it has been identified with Avaris (Tanis, the modern San), the capital of the Shepherd
dynasty in Egypt, built seven years after Hebron and existing before the time of Abraham. It was
taken by the Shepherd kings in their invasion of Egypt, and by them rebuilt, and garrisoned,
according to Manetho, with 240,000 men. This cite is mentioned in connection with the plagues in
such a manner as to leave no doubt that it is the city spoken of in the narrative in Exodus as that
where Pharaoh dwelt, (Psalms 78:42,43) and where Moses wrought his wonders on the field of
Zoan a rich plain extending thirty miles toward the east. Tanis gave its name to the twenty-first and
twenty-third dynasties and hence its mention in Isaiah. (Isaiah 19:13; 30:4) (The present “field of
Zoan” is a barren waste, very thinly inhabited. “One of the principal capitals of Pharaoh is now the
habitation of fishermen the resort of wild beasts, and infested with reptiles and malignant fevers.”
There have been discovered a great number of monuments here which throw light upon the Bible
history. Brugsch refers to two statues of colossal size of Mermesha of the thirteenth dynasty,
wonderfully perfect in the execution of the individual parts and says that memorials of Rameses
the Great lie scattered broadcast like the mouldering bones of generations slain long ago. The area
of the sacred enclosure of the temple is 1500 feet by 1250.-ED.)
Zoar
(smallness), one of the most ancient cities of the land of Canaan. Its original name was Bela.
(Genesis 14:2,8) It was in intimate connection with the cities of the “plain of Jordan”—Sodom,
Gomorrah, Admah and Zeboiim, See also (Genesis 13:10) but not Genesis10:19 In the general
destruction of the cities of the plain Zoar was spared to afford shelter to Lot. (Genesis 19:22,23,30)
It is mentioned in the account of the death of Moses as one (of the landmarks which bounded his
view from Pisgah, (34:3) and it appears to have been known in the time both of Isaiah, (Isaiah 15:5)
and Jeremiah. (Jeremiah 48:34) These are all the notices of Zoar contained in the Bible. It was
situated in the same district with the four cities already mentioned, viz. in the “plain” or “circle”
of the Jordan, and the narrative of (Genesis 19:1)... evidently implies that it was very near to Sodom.
vs. (Genesis 19:15; 23:27) The definite position of Sodom is, and probably will always be, a mystery;
but there can be little doubt that the plain of the Jordan was at the north side of the Dead Sea and
that the cities of the plain must therefore have been situated there instead of at the southern end of
the lake, as it is generally taken for granted they were. [Sodom] (But the great majority of scholars
from Josephus and Eusebius to the present of the Dead Sea.)
Zoba, Or Zobah
(station), the name of a portion of Syria which formed a separate kingdom in the time of the
Jewish monarchs Saul, David and Solomon. It probably was eastward of Coele-Syria, and extended
thence northeast and east toward, if not even to, the Euphrates. We first hear of Zobah in the time
of Saul, when we find it mentioned as a separate country, governed apparently by a number of
kings who owned no common head or chief. (1 Samuel 14:47) Some forty years later than this we
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William Smith