Chapter 2 Endnotes:
The endnotes below are incomplete and will be amplified and revised
in the near future. They are published "as is" only as a stopgap
measure.
1. It is
important
to note that these coregencies must be assumed even if the generation
figure
were increased by five or six years.
2. This late
midrashic
type addition to the biblical text is found in the Septuagint version
of
1 Kings 12:24 which begins by following the Massoretic text then
diverges
into a lengthy narrative describing the exploits of Jeroboam, then
returns
to follow the Hebrew text in 12:25.
3. As for
Solomon
we are told that "he ruled over all the kingdoms west of the River
(i.e.
the Euphrates), from Tiphsah to Gaza, and had peace on all sides.
During
Solomon's lifetime Judah and Israel, from Dan to Beersheba, lived in
safety,
each man under his own vine and fig tree." 1 Kings 4:24,25.
4. Discussion
of Labaya's activity is restricted to a single footnote of page 282
(note
3). Velikovsky views the activity of Labaya as a preliminary phase of
the
revolt of the town of Libnah which took place following the death of
Jehosophat
(2 Chron. 21:10) But Libnah is not mentioned in the Amarna literature
and
Labaya's actions and influence are far more expansive than suggested by
Velikovsky.
5. Letter 227
is written by an unnamed king (šarum) of Hazor; letter 228 by one
Abdi-Tirši,
who identifies himself merely as the "man of Hazura" (amêl
Hazura).
Whether the two individuals are one and the same, what precisely is the
meaning of amêl Hazura (Albright would undoubtedly translate
"chief
of Hazor", a meaning he gives to amêl (Akkadian awilum = "man")
elsewhere,
and what is the status/rank of a šarum (some translators consider him
to
be the equivalent of a "mayor") are all important questions, but of
little
consequence in the discussion at hand. All large towns had a local
chief;
the more important towns acted as the political center of groups of
smaller
towns; much as in countries today. The chief of Hazor proudly declares:
"I protect Hazura together with its cities [fo]r the king, my lord. It
is a moot point whether or not Hazor lay within the area of influence
of
Labaya at this point in time.
6.
The
ending of this name should likely be interpreted as a hypochoristic
form
of the name of Yahweh, the god of Israel. As such the name means
"Yahweh
thunders/storms". The same should be said for Lab'aia (Labaya), a name
which means "Yahweh is a lion". This notion that the Akkadian ending
"ia"
should be so interpreted is absent from the commentaries for
understandable
reasons. The Amarna correspondence is typically dated to the 15th
century
B.C., at a time preceding the arrival of Israel in Palestine.The
presence of this attenuated name of Israel's god is just one more
indication
that the traditional history has misdated the Amarna correspondence.
7.
All
quotations from the Amarna letters, unless otherwise stated, are taken
from the two volume edition of The
Tell-El-Amarna Tablets edited by Samuel A.B. Mercer (1939).
8.
The
editors supply the interpretive note "The home of Labaia was probably
Shechem
(cf. 289:22)" (see note on line 33).. We have more to say on the home
of
Labaya later.
9.
The
Akkadian word which describes this person is particularly troublesome
to
transcribe. Mercer translates it "my son" and adds the following note
which
summarizes other opinion: " mDUMU.MU-ia (also
line
33): an unparalleled personal name, Dumuya (Knudtzon, Oppenheim, Seux),
does not seem likely, and mi-mu-ia, "my father-in-law" (Albright, CAH
2/2,
p. 115, n. 7), must be rejected on grou8nds of grammar (genitive
expected
in line 31) and especially paleography (the DUMU- and I-signs are quite
distinct, and in both instances the sign in question is clearly the
former).
In view of mDUMU-a-ia8 at contemporary Taanach,
most
probably Binaya (Glotz, BASOR 204 (1971) p. 20), the same name may
occur
here. The apparent association, however, of ideas - delivery of a
son, readiness to deliver a wife - favors a common noun and a display
of
provincial learning: Sumerian DUMU.MU, "my son," plus Akkadian
pronomninal
suffix." (note 4, p. 308) It should be noted that the
interpretation
of Knudtzon and others to transcribe as a personal name "Dumuya" may
not
be essentially different than Mercer's opinion, since Dumuya in context
is clearly a close relation of Labaya.
10.
It
has not gone unnoticed that the only two sons of Jeroboam mentioned in
the biblical text, Nadab and Abijah have names similar to the two sons
of the patriarch Aaron (Nadab and Abihu). At least a dozen other
parallels
between Aaron and Jeroboam I, including their worship of a "golden
calf"
idol, exist in the Hebrew Bible. Cf. Moses Aberbach and Leivy Smolar,
"Aaron,
Jeroboam, and the Golden Calves," JBL 86 (1967) 127-140. These close
parallels
suggests to some that scribes have altered the Jeroboam story in at
least
minor ways in order to draw attention to the similarity between the
idolatry
of these two important biblical figures. If so then the likelihood of
some
comparison between the idolatrous 2nd Jeroboam and the idolatrous
founder
of the northern "kingdom" is also possible.
11.
It
is possible that the phoneme "la" represents the ideograph "LA " which
means "abundance, plentitude" and that the signs following represent a
verbal element or nominal complement which contributes to the meaning
of
the name. We recall that name of Jereboam is conjectured to
mean "the people are abundant, many". [I have had no time
to
investigate this intriguing line of thought]
12.
It
is of course possible that all of these references to "king" refer to
the
Egyptian pharaoh in which case this part of the argument is muted. It
remains
significant that Abdi-Hiba nowhere refers to himself as "king"
(sharru).