APPENDIX I. THE ISRAELITISH ORIGIN OF THE SANCTUARY AT MECCA. 1. PROF. DOZY of Leyden, in his work lately published, De Israelieten te Mekka, (Haarlem, 1864), has given to the world an exceedingly interesting account of his researches into the early history of the sanctuary at Mecca and of the religion which existed there before the time of Mohammed. His reasoning is very ingenious and original; and the conclusions to which he has arrived are of considerable importance, in their bearing upon the early history of Israel, and especially on the results arrived at in this volume. I shall here endeavour to set before the English reader an abstract of the chief points in these new discoveries, stating them generally in Prof. Dozy's own words, but not confining myself to these, nor following exactly the course of his argument. I shall rather treat the subject in my own way, and on some points of detail shall have occasion to express a difference of opinion from his. But the merit of having first made these investigations, and applied his intimate knowledge of Arabian writers, to throw light upon some obscure passages of Scripture, and reveal a hitherto unknown portion of Israelitish history, is entirely his own. 2. In the body of this Part (207) as well as in (III.817), I have drawn attention to the fact that the tribe of Simeon seems to have altogether disappeared at a very early age from the history of Israel. The sons of Simeon '-i.e. in Oriental phraseology, the divisions of the tribe-are summed-up four times in the Bible, G.xlvi.10, E.vi. 15, N.xxvi.12,13, 1Ch.iv.24; of which notices the second appears to have been merely copied from the first, and the last two differ from the former and from each other. In Ju.i.3, &c., we find Simeon helping his brother Judah against the Canaanites, but playing a subordinate part; and in v.17 we read'And Judah went with Simeon his brother, and they slew the Canaanites that inhabited Zephath, and made a kherem * of it. And they called the name of the *‘Under the name kherem is to be understood whatever was devoted to a Deity, and could not be taken back again. It might be a person, a head of cattle, a piece of land, or anything else: but whatever it might be, that was once dedicated to the Deity, became and for ever remained his property; it could never be redeemed; it became 'most holy.' [L.xxvii.21,28.] Also the enemies of the Deity were city (Khormah) Hormah.' We find, indeed, another notice of this very same transaction in N.xxi.2,3; but this is put too soon, during the lifetime of Moses, (when Israel had not yet entered Canaan), and the act is ascribed to 'Israel,' instead of merely to Judah and Simeon. Hormah, in fact, appears as a Simeonite town in Jo.xix.4, where it is named as one of the seventeen towns, with their villages, which were assigned to this tribe. Most of these towns lay in the SW. of Palestine, on the borders of Arabia and the Philistine territory. 3. But the facts-that Simeon went against the Canaanites only as a dependent of Judah,—that his seventeen towns are described as all lying within the inheritance of the children of Judah,' Jo.xix. 1,-that in the time of Saul and David sir of these are actually reckoned either to Judah or to the Philistines, while almost all of them are included in the list of the towns of Judah in Jo.xv,-show, as we have said (208), that the Simeonites had very little power, and had probably never been able to acquire an independent position. And, accordingly, in the Blessing of Jacob, written, as we have seen reason to conclude, in the earlier part of David's reign, they are spoken of as 'portioned-out in Jacob and scattered in Israel.' 4. Still the Simeonites are mentioned in Jacob's Blessing as actually existing, though in much the same forlorn condition as the tribe of Levi: whereas, even in Solomon's time, they seem to have disappeared altogether. They are not named after the separation of the Ten Tribes, as forming part of the kingdom of Judah, to which from their local position they would have necessarily belonged. We read of Judah and Benjamin supporting Rehoboam, 1K.xii.21; but Simeon is never mentioned again in the history of the Book of Kings. He is not named at all in the Song of Moses, D.xxxiii, written, as we believe, not long before Josiah's time; and, though occurring in Ez.xlviii.24, it is only in a prophetical vision, in which he appears as one of the restored tribes in the time of the Messiah. 5. Something peculiar, then, it would seem must have happened to the tribe of Simeon during the interval between the composition of G.xlvi and the death of Solomon. It has been said, indeed, that this tribe may have dwindled away, or become absorbed in the tribe of Judah. These explanations of the matter, how devoted to him, i.e. the persons or peoples, who worshipped another god: but these could be devoted to the Deity in no other way than by death, [L.xxvii.29], and in this case the kherem was a ban of the most fearful kind. Still there was even here . a distinction; there were different degrees of kherem; for they put to death (i) only the men, (ii) only the men and the women who had known man, (iii) all except the maids, (iv) all the human beings, men, women, and children, reserving the cattle and other property as booty, (v) all human beings and cattle, the gold, silver, &c. being dedicated to the Sanctuary, (vi) all human beings and cattle, the property and the place being also destroyed utterly. The locality, which before, or at, or after, the extermination of the enemies of the Deity, was devoted to him, was itself called kherem or khormah, and no stranger, no undevoted person, might enter it; if any did, they must be put to death.' Dozy, p.77. ever, are merely conjectures, though such as might be admitted as plausible if there were no better way of accounting for this phenomenon. And, indeed, these causes of their disappearance may very well have coexisted to some extent with the main reason of which we are about to speak; more especially as the numbers of armed men of Simeon, which are reckoned as 59,300 at the first census in the wilderness, N.i.23, ii.13, are reduced to 22,200 at the second, N.xxvi. 14. But there is a singular narrative in the Book of Chronicles, to which Prof. Dozy seems for the first time to have directed close attention, and which, as he observes, may give us a clue to lead us out of the maze of mere conjecture into the field of historical certainty.' 6. The Book of Chronicles,' he adds, p.49, ‘is, it is true, of a very late age: it contains for the most part modifications of accounts which we possess in other Books in a more trustworthy form, and it is not always deserving of credit. But this does not prevent its containing also some valuable passages, which are found nowhere else and such is that to which I now refer. It is an old account-dating, as the Chronicler says, out of the time of Hezekiah; and there is no reason to doubt the truth of this statement. . . . In fact, if the Chronicler himself had invented the narrative, he would afterwards, we may be sure, have made some use of it whereas he never refers to it, but on the contrary gives plain evidence afterwards that he has actually forgotten it. Nor is there here any trace to be found of the purpose, which in other instances has induced this writer to modify, or to invent, certain pieces of history.' 7. The passage in question is 1Ch.iv.24–43, which gives an account of the 'sons of Simeon,' with their towns and villages, and ends as follows, v.39-43: 3o And they went until they came to Gedor, unto the east of the valley, to seek pasture for their flocks. 40 And they found pasture, fat and good, and the land wide on both hands, and quiet and peaceable; for out of Ham were those dwelling there previously. "And there went these, written by names in the days of Hezekiah king of Judah, and smote their tents, and the Minæans* who were found there, and made a kherem of them unto this day, and dwelt in their place; for there was pasture for their flocks there. 42 And out of them, out of the sons of Simeon, there went to Mount Seir five hundred men, and Pelatiah, and Neariah, and Rephaiah, and Uzziel, sons of Ishi, at their head. 43 And they smote the remnant that escaped of Amalek, and dwelt there unto this day.' 8. It is plain that the above records a migration of the Simeonites, and upon a somewhat large scale. Two questions now arise, Whither? and When? * In v.41 we find 'they smote their tents and the Mehinim,' that is, Mincans, in accordance with the LXX, καὶ ἐπάταξαν τοὺς οἴκους αὐτῶν καὶ τοὺς Μιναίους : and this reading is, no doubt, correct, since, 'smite,' is used of lifeless objects, e.g. 'tents,' 2Ch.xiv. 14, as well as of men. But the Masorites have changed In .the dwellings הַמְעוּנִים into |