CHAPTER 1

INTRODUCTIONTO THEMIDDLE EASTAS A WHOLE

The stage on which the major events of Old Testamenthistory took place includes all the major countriesshown on page 9. This large land mass is bounded onthe west by the Nile River and the Mediterranean Sea, on thenorth by the Amanus and Ararat Mountains, and on the eastby the Zagros Mountains and the Persian Gulf. To the south,the Nafud Desert and the southern tip of Sinai form a ratherloose boundary.

Much of the Middle East is desert. Large portions ofmodern-day Syria, Iraq, Jordan, and Saudi Arabia include desertwastes such as the Syrian Desert, the Nafud, the ArabianDesert, the Ruba al-Khali, Negev, Sinai, and Egypt. The seasand gulfs that help outline the Middle East have influenced lifein the area. The most important of these is the MediterraneanSea, which offers life-giving rains to most of the region. Muchof what has occurred in the Middle East can be summed up asa struggle between the influences of the desert and the MediterraneanSea over against the people who have lived there.

The first section of this book outlines briefly some of thesignificant challenges of this part of the world — geography,climate, roads, trade routes, food supply, and the like. It iseasy to determine where the majority of people have lived inthe Near East by highlighting on a map (see p..9) the areaswatered by the Nile, the Tigris, and the Euphrates, as well asthose regions that receive over twelve inches of rainfall annually.This area is roughly the shape of a crescent, with one pointin the Nile River and the other in the Persian Gulf. It is aptlynamed the "Fertile Crescent."

CHAPTER 2

THE GEOGRAPHYOF ISRAEL ANDJORDAN

Terrain

At the southeastern end of the Mediterranean Sea, we can distinguishfive major longitudinal zones. As one moves from west toeast they are: the coastal plain, the central mountain range, therift valley, the Transjordanian mountains, and the eastern desert.

(1) The coastal plain stretches approximately 120 milesalong the Mediterranean coast from Rosh HaNiqra south toGaza. It receives 25 to 16 inches of rain per year, the northernsections receiving more rain than the southern. A fewpowerful springs provided water, but more commonly theinhabitants used wells to tap the water table. The coastal plainconsists mainly of low, rolling hills covered with fertile alluvialsoils. Grain crops flourished in the winter and spring months,while flocks grazed there during the remainder of the year.

While travel was easy in this area, travelers did have to becareful to avoid sand dunes, large rivers such as the YarkonRiver, and low-lying areas that became swampy during thewinter months. Also, they had to choose the most appropriatetrack through Mount Carmel. The only natural seaport isat Acco.

(2) The central mountain range runs from Galilee in thenorth to the Negev Highlands in the south. It rises in places tomore than 3,000 feet and is severed in an east – west directionby the Jezreel Valley in the north and the Negev Basin in thesouth, where east – west traffic can flow with relative ease.

Cutting through the limestone hills are deep V-shapedvalleys, usually called wadis. They are dry during the summermonths but sometimes flow with water during thewinter. They drain either toward the rift valley or the MediterraneanSea. Travel along the bottoms of these deep wadisis difficult because of boulders and occasional cliffs, andnorth – south travel across the wadis is almost impossible.Thus roads tended to be located on the mountain ridges.

The western slopes of the mountains receive considerablerainfall (20 to 40 in.); this, along with the fertile soil,ensures the fertility of the area. Here — largely on hillsideterraces partially formed by the natural bedding of the limestone— small fields of wheat, groves of olive trees, and vineyardsflourish (Deut 8:8; Ps 147:14; Hab 3:17 – 19).

Winter rainwater seeps into the limestone until it reachesan impermeable layer, where it begins to flow laterally until itemerges as a spring. Settlements often developed close to thesefreshwater springs, but being on the slopes of the hills theywere difficult to defend. By about 1400 BC, the construction ofcisterns, lined with plaster to prevent leakage, began to solvethe problem of complete dependency on natural water sources.

The Israelites first settled in the central mountain range.Because international powers were primarily interested incontrolling the coastal plain, the...