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Ziklag
[Bible]Ziklag was a town in the Negev region of southern Judah. Achish king of Gath gave it to David, who used it as his base while taking refuge in Philistine territory from Saul. It is known as the town raided by the Amalekites.
Sidon
[Bible]Sidon was a Phoenician port city on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean Sea, corresponding to present-day Saida in Lebanon. In the Old Testament it appears as a neighbor to the north of Israel, and in the New Testament it stands for Gentile territory.
Tyre
[Bible]Tyre was a Phoenician port city on the eastern coast of the Mediterranean. In the Old Testament it appears as a neighboring kingdom that dealt with David and Solomon and as a target of the prophets' oracles of judgment. In the New Testament it is a Gentile region visited by Jesus and Paul.
Mount Hermon
[Bible]Mount Hermon is a high mountain north of the upper Jordan River, at the southern end of the Anti-Lebanon range. In the Old Testament it appears as the northern boundary of the land Israel possessed, and it is well known from "the dew of Hermon" in Psalm 133.
Cornerstone
[Bible]A cornerstone is an important stone set at the corner of a building to align its walls and stabilize its structure. It appears in Psalm 118 and Isaiah 28, and the New Testament takes up the image as a reference to Jesus Christ.
Tablets of the Testimony
[Bible]The tablets of the testimony are the two stone tablets, inscribed with the Ten Commandments, that God gave to Moses on Mount Sinai. They were kept inside the Ark of the Covenant as a witness to the covenant between God and Israel.
Tarshish
[Bible]Tarshish is an Old Testament place name for a distant land across the sea. Scripture portrays it as a center of trade in metals such as silver and tin, and it is best known as the destination to which Jonah tried to flee from God.
Dead Sea
[Bible]The Dead Sea is a salt lake in eastern Palestine into which the Jordan River flows. The Old Testament calls it the "Salt Sea," the "Sea of the Arabah," and the "Eastern Sea." It is known as the lowest lake on the earth's surface.
Tophet
[Bible]Tophet was a site in the Valley of Hinnom south of Jerusalem. The Old Testament presents it as a place where children were burned as offerings in idolatrous worship, and the prophet Jeremiah made it a symbol of judgment.
Feast of Trumpets
[Bible]The Feast of Trumpets was an Old Testament festival observed on the first day of the seventh month of Israel's religious calendar. It was marked by the blowing of trumpets and a holy convocation, as prescribed in Leviticus 23 and Numbers 29.
Primeval History
[Bible]Primeval history is a scholarly term for Genesis 1–11, the part of Genesis that precedes Abraham and recounts the beginnings of the world and of humanity as a whole rather than of a particular people.
Joseph Barsabbas
[People]Joseph Barsabbas was a disciple in the early church who was put forward, together with Matthias, as a candidate to fill the apostolic office left vacant by Judas Iscariot. He was surnamed Justus, and when lots were cast, Matthias was chosen.
Gehenna
[Bible]Gehenna is a term derived from the "Valley of Hinnom" beside Jerusalem. In the New Testament it refers to the place where the wicked are punished after the final judgment. The New Korean Revised Version renders it as "hell."
Valley of Achor
[Bible]The Valley of Achor is a valley near Jericho where Achan was stoned to death in Joshua 7. Its name means "trouble," and the books of Hosea and Isaiah later mention it again as a place of restoration and hope.
Pharaoh Hophra
[People]Pharaoh Hophra was a king of Egypt during the final years of the kingdom of Judah. He is named only once in the Bible, in Jeremiah 44:30, and is known as the Egyptian king on whom Judah relied in its resistance to Babylon.
Maon
[Bible]Maon was a town in the southern hill country of Judah, and the name also applies to the surrounding wilderness (the Wilderness of Maon). In the Bible it appears as a place where David stayed while fleeing from Saul and as the home of Nabal and Abigail.
Basilides
[People]Basilides was a Christian Gnostic teacher who taught in Alexandria, Egypt, in the first half of the second century. The Church Fathers treated him as a leading representative of heresy and attributed to him the claim that Simon of Cyrene was crucified in place of Jesus.
Nain
[Bible]Nain was a small village in southern Galilee. It is mentioned only once in the Bible, in Luke 7:11, as the setting of the account in which Jesus raised a widow's only son.
Riblah
[Bible]Riblah was a town in the land of Hamath in Syria. The kings of Egypt and Babylon used it as a military base, and the Bible records it as the place where Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, interrogated and punished Zedekiah, king of Judah.
Cyrene
[Bible]Cyrene was a Greek city on the northeastern coast of present-day Libya in North Africa. In the New Testament it appears as the hometown of Simon, who carried the cross for Jesus, and as the place of origin of early Christian evangelists who preached the gospel to Gentiles in Antioch.