Jericho in the Bible Encyclopedia - ISBE

jer'-i-ko (the word occurs in two forms. In the Pentateuch, in 2 Ki 25:5 and in Ezra, Nehemiah, Chronicles it is written yerecho; yericho, elsewhere): In 1 Ki 16:34 the final Hebrew letter is he (h), instead of waw (w). The termination waw (w) thought to preserve the peculiarities of the old Canaanite. dialect. In the Septuagint we have the indeclinable form, Iericho (Swete has the form Iereicho as well), both with and without the feminine article; in the New Testament Iereicho, once with the feminine article The Arabic is er-Riha. According to Dt 32:49 it stood opposite Nebo, while in 34:3 it is called a city grove of palm trees. It was surrounded with a wall (Josh 2:15), and provided with a gate which was closed at night (Josh 2:5), an d was ruled over by a king. When captured, vessels of brass and iron, large quantities of silver and gold, and "a goodly Babylonish garment" were found in it (Josh 7:21). It was on the western side of the Jordan, not far from the camp of Israel at Shittim, before crossing the river (Josh 2:1). The city was on the "plains" (Josh 4:13), but so close to "the mountain" on the West (probably the cliffs of Quarantania, the traditional scene of Christ's temptation) that it was within easy reach of the spies, protected by Rahab. It was in the lot of Benjamin (Josh 18:21), the border of which ascended to the "slope (English versions of the Bible "side") of Jeremiah on the North" (Josh 18:12). Authorities are generally agreed in locating the ancient city at Tel es- Sultan, a mile and a half Northwest of modern Jericho. Here there is a mound 1,200 ft. long and 50 ft. in height supporting 4 smaller mounds, the highest of which is 90 ft. above the base of the main mound. The geological situation (see JORDAN VALLEY) sheds great light upon the capture of the city by Joshua (Josh 6). If the city was built as we suppose it to have been, upon the unconsolidated sedimentary deposits which accumulated to a great depth in the Jordan valley during the enlargement of the Dead Sea, which took place in Pleistocene (or glacial) times, the sudden falling of the walls becomes easily credible to anyone who believes in the personality of God and in His power either to foreknow the future or to direct at His will the secondary causes with which man has to deal in Nature. The narrative does not state that the blowing of the rams' horns of themselves effected the falling of the walls. It was simply said that at a specified juncture on the 7th day the walls would fall, and that they actually fell at that juncture. The miracle may, therefore, be regarded as either that of prophecy, in which the Creator by foretelling the course of things to Joshua, secured the junction of Divine and human activities which constitutes a true miracle, or we may regard the movements which brought down the walls to be the result of direct Divine action, such as is exerted by man when be produces an explosion of dynamite at a particular time and place. The phenomena are just such as occurred in the earthquake of San Francisco in 1906, where, according to the report of the scientific commission appointed by the state, "the most violent destruction of buildings was on the made ground. This ground seems to have behaved during the earthquake very much in the same way as jelly in a bowl, or as a semi-liquid in a tank." Santa Rosa, situated on the valley floor, "underlain to a considerable depth by loose or slightly coherent geological formations, .... 20 miles from the rift, was the most severely shaken town in the state and suffered the greatest disaster relatively to its population and extent" (Report, 13 and 15). Thus an earthquake, such as is easily...