 | Jezreel | |
God scatters.
(1.) A town of Issachar (Joshua 19:18), where the kings of Israel often resided (1 Kings 18:45; 21:1; 2 Kings 9:30). Here Elijah met Ahab, Jehu, and Bidkar; and here Jehu executed his dreadful commission against the house of Ahab (2 Kings 9:14-37; 10:1-11). It has been identified with the modern Zerin, on the most western point of the range of Gilboa, reaching down into the great and fertile valley of Jezreel, to which it gave its name.
(2.) A town in Judah (Joshua 15:56), to the south-east of Hebron. Ahinoam, one of David's wives, probably belonged to this place (1 Samuel 27:3).
(3.) A symbolical name given by Hosea to his oldest son (Hosea 1:4), in token of a great slaughter predicted by him, like that which had formerly taken place in the plain of Esdraelon (Comp. Hosea 1:4, 5).
Jezreel, Blood of
The murder perpetrated here by Ahab and Jehu (Hosea 1:4; Comp. 1 Kings 18:4; 2 Kings 9:6-10).
Jezreel, Day of
The time predicted for the execution of vengeance for the deeds of blood committed there (Hosea 1:5).
Jezreel, Ditch of
(1 Kings 21:23; Comp. 13), the fortification surrounding the city, outside of which Naboth was executed.
Jezreel, Fountain of
Where Saul encamped before the battle of Gilboa (1 Samuel 29:1). In the valley under Zerin there are two considerable springs, one of which, perhaps that here referred to, "flows from under a sort of cavern in the wall of conglomerate rock which here forms the base of Gilboa. The water is excellent; and issuing from crevices in the rocks, it spreads out at once into a fine limpid pool forty or fifty feet in diameter, full of fish" (Robinson). This may be identical with the "well of Harod" (Judges 7:1; Comp. 2 Samuel 23:25), probably the `Ain Jalud, i.e., the "spring of Goliath."
Jezreel, Portion of
The field adjoining the city (2 Kings 9:10, 21, 36, 37). Here Naboth was stoned to death (1 Kings 21:13).
Jezreel, Tower of
One of the turrets which guarded the entrance to the city (2 Kings 9:17).
Jezreel, Valley of
Lying on the northern side of the city, between the ridges of Gilboa and Moreh, an offshoot of Esdraelon, running east to the Jordan (Joshua 17:16; Judges 6:33; Hosea 1:5). It was the scene of the signal victory gained by the Israelites under Gideon over the Midianites, the Amalekites, and the "children of the east" (Judges 6:3). Two centuries after this the Israelites were here defeated by the Philistines, and Saul and Jonathan, with the flower of the army of Israel, fell (1 Samuel 31:1-6).
This name was in after ages extended to the whole of the plain of Esdraelon (q.v.). It was only this plain of Jezreel and that north of Lake Huleh that were then accessible to the chariots of the Canaanites (Comp. 2 Kings 9:21; 10:15).
