xvi. 21-5), was a national, and not merely a local god among the

Philistines. During the Maccabean wars Jonathan destroyed the temple of Dagon at Azotus (1 Macc. x. 84). He was eminently the god of agriculture.

9. 1 Samuel vi. 17.--_The golden emerods which the Philistines returned for a trespass offering unto the LORD ... for Gaza one._

During the "seven months" the sacred chest was, no doubt, located in each of the five Philistine cities, in the Dagon temple, which each of the cities possessed.

The god Dagon was worshipped at Gaza and Ashdod, and the goddess Derketo at Askelon. It has been assumed that the two divinities were akin. According to Lucian, Derketo was worshipped under the form of a woman with the body and tail of a fish, fish being sacred to her, and was probably identical with Atargatis, in 2 Macc. xii. 26. Hence Dagon was supposed to have been the male counterpart of Derketo. This view, however, Prof. Sayce now repudiates, preferring to regard Dagon as a purely agricultural deity.

10. 2 Kings xviii. 8.--_Hezekiah smote the Philistines, even unto Gaza, and the borders thereof._

The entire land of Philistia was ravaged by the Judæan forces.

After continual wars under the Judges, with Saul (1 Sam. xiv. 52, xxxi. 1), and David (2 Sam. v. 17-25), the Philistines appear to have been subdued by the latter, and Gaza became the border of Solomon's kingdom "on this side of the river" (1 Kings iv. 21, 24). In verse 24 Azzah, or rather ‘Azza, is the more correct spelling of Gaza. There is a reference to Gaza under the name of Azzah in Deut. ii. 23, and 1 Chron. vii. 28 (R.V.). With this exception the R.V. adopts the reading Gaza.

In Joshua xv. 47 "the river of Egypt" (A.V.) refers to the desert stream, one mile wide, which still occasionally flows in the valley called El Arîsh, twelve hours' ride south of Gaza. Palm trees are abundant in the bed of this torrent. See Gen. xv. 18; Joshua xv. 4; 1 Kings viii. 65; Is. xxvii. 12.

11. 1 Chronicles vii. 28.--_And their possessions were ... unto Gaza and the towns thereof._

The passage refers to Ephraim's habitations, but this is a doubtful reading. The Revised Version of the Old Testament reads _Azza_, in the margin _Ayyah_.

12. Jeremiah xxv. 17-20.--_Then took I the cup at the LORD'S hand, and made all the nations to drink, unto whom the LORD had sent me: to wit ... all the kings of the land of the Philistines, and Ashkelon, and Azzah, and Ekron, and the remnant of Ashdod._

The words describe the act of the prophet as in the ecstasy of vision. One by one the nations are made to drink of the cup of the wrath of Jehovah. Among them are four of the cities of the Philistines, including Gaza.

13. Jeremiah xlvii. 1.--_The word of the LORD that came to Jeremiah the prophet against the Philistines, before that Pharaoh smote Gaza._

This passage probably refers to Pharaoh Necho II's (610-594 B.C.) first advance to Carchemish in 609 B.C. Having defeated and killed Josiah, King of Judah, at Megiddo, he advanced to the Euphrates, and on his return smote the city of Kadytis which is probably Gaza.

14. Jeremiah xlvii. 5.--_Baldness is come upon Gaza._

The reference is to the destruction which Nebuchadrezzar inflicted upon the whole Syrian seaboard from Sidon to Gaza after Pharaoh Necho's defeat at Carchemish in 604 B.C. (Jeremiah xlvi. 2).

Gaza had to recognise the supremacy of Babylon. "Baldness" is the sign of mourning (Micah i. 16).

Destroyed again and again, its situation has always secured its being rebuilt.

15. Amos i. 6, 7.--_Thus saith the LORD; for three transgressions of Gaza, and for four, I will not turn away the punishment thereof; because they carried away the whole captivity, to deliver them up to Edom: but I will send a fire on the wall of Gaza, which shall devour the palaces thereof._

The proceedings of Philistia against Judah are here represented by Gaza as the principal city. See 2 Chron. xxi. 16-17, which implies a veritable sack of Jerusalem. The extreme barbarity of which Judah complained was that her children were delivered up to her old implacable enemy, Edom.

16. Zephaniah ii. 4.--_Gaza shall be forsaken ... and Ekron shall be rooted up._

There is a play on the meaning of these words, "Gaza (Azzah = strong) shall be forsaken (âzab)" and "Ekron (deep-rooting) shall be rooted up (âkar)," similar to that in Micah i. 10, _et seq._

The chastisement of Philistia is prophesied in verses 4-7. "The fulfilment of the prophecy is not tied down to time" (Pusey, _Minor Prophets_).

17. Zechariah ix. 5.--_Gaza shall see it, and be very sorrowful.... The king shall perish from Gaza._

Well might Gaza fear and tremble on hearing of the destruction of Tyre.

Gaza was taken by Alexander the Great after a siege of two months.[7] When he subdued it, he ordered all the men to be slaughtered without quarter, and carried away all the women and children into bondage, 332 B.C. New colonists settled within the city, which now ceased to be a Philistine centre, only to become a Greek one.

Gaza must have been at this time a city of great strength, for Alexander's Greek engineers acknowledged their inability to invent engines of sufficient power to batter its massive walls. Alexander himself was severely wounded in the shoulder during a sortie of this garrison.

Special mention is made by Hegasias (a contemporary of Alexander) of the "King" of Gaza being brought alive to Alexander after the captivity of the city. The name of the governor of the garrison at Gaza was Babemeses.

In Pusey's _Commentary on the Minor Prophets_--Amos i. 6, 7; Zephaniah ii. 4; Zechariah ix. 5, there is much additional information concerning the prophecies against Gaza.

Gaza is there described as first Canaanite; then Philistine; then, at least after Alexander, Edomite; after Alexander Jannæus, Greek; conquered by Abu-Bekr the first Khalif, it became Mohammedan; it was desolated in their civil wars until the crusaders rebuilt its fort; then again Mohammedan.

1. 1 Maccabees xi. 61, 62.--_From whence he_ [Jonathan] _went to Gaza, but they of Gaza shut him out; wherefore he laid siege unto it, and burned the suburbs thereof with fire, and spoiled them. Afterward, when they of Gaza made supplication unto Jonathan, he made peace with them, and took the sons of their chief men for hostages._

After the death of Alexander, the territory of Gaza became for two centuries the battlefield between the Egyptian, Syrian, and Jewish armies. Twice (315 and 306 B.C.) Antigonus took the city from Ptolemy I. The latter re-took it twice at the point of the sword, and for a century it remained under the power of Egypt.

The Syrians again devastated it in 198 B.C.

Jonathan Maccabeus (the wary), the Jewish leader and high priest (161-143 B.C.) laid siege to its suburbs, and forced the inhabitants to sue for terms (1 Macc. xi. 61, 62).

2. 1 Maccabees xiii. 43-8.--_In those days Simon camped against Gaza,_[8] _and besieged it round about; he made also an engine of war, and set it by the city,_[9] _and battered a certain tower, and took it._

Simon the Maccabee, Ethnarch, and High Priest, 142-135 B.C., laid siege to the fortress of Gaza, and expelled the heathen inhabitants. Shortly afterwards he appointed his third son, John Hyrcanus I, as commander-in-chief of all his forces.

1. Acts viii. 26.--_And the angel of the LORD spake unto Philip, saying, Arise, and go toward the south unto the way that goeth down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert._

There is only one New Testament reference to Gaza, and it has given rise to much controversy.

The pronoun αὕτη may either relate to ὁδὸν (way) or to Gaza. If the former, then it is the _way_ which is desert; if the latter, it is the _city_. If we apply it to the city it is difficult to reconcile the statement with the facts of history; unless we regard the phrase "which is desert" as a parenthetic explanation of St. Luke's written soon after the destruction of Gaza by the Jews in A.D. 66.

Some refer ἔρημος to the _ancient city_ destroyed by Alexander, and affirm that the new city occupied a different site.

The words αὕτη ἐστὶν ἔρημος, however, were probably intended to describe the Roman highway on which St. Philip the Evangelist should find the Eunuch. There were then, as now, several roads leading from Jerusalem to Gaza. Two traversed the rich plain of Philistia; but one ran to Eleutheropolis (Beit Jibrîn), and thence direct through an uninhabited waste to Gaza.

See Alford's _Greek Testament_ on Acts viii. 26, and Wordsworth's _Greek Testament_ on the same passage, which he thus explains: "Go by the road which leads to Gaza--which is desert; Almighty GOD has something for thee to do there. He can enable thee to do the work of an Evangelist, not only in the city of Samaria, but in the wilderness of Philistia."

Note on Acts viii. 38.--Deacons in the early Church, notwithstanding the precedent of St. Philip, were not usually allowed to baptise alone. Wordsworth's _The Ministry of Grace_, p. 161.

FOOTNOTES:

[4] In Judith ii. 28; 1 Macc. x. 86, xi. 60; both in A.V. and R.V. Askelon is called Ascalon.

[5] Ethnology of the Bible. _The Bible Educator_, vol. iii, pp. 197-200.

[6] See also _The Historical Geography of the Holy Land_, 1902, p. 189.

[7] See Josephus, _Antiq. Jews_, XI. 8, 4, section 325.

[8] The Revised Version of the Apocrypha reads "against Gazara." See Josephus, _The Jewish War_, Book I, Chap. II, section 2 (50).

[9] In the Old Testament the distinction between a town and a village is not generally defined. The former, as a rule, was an inhabited place surrounded by a wall. The latter, one that is not so enclosed (Lev. xxv. 29-31). Towns themselves, however, are also sometimes distinguished as walled and unwalled (Deut. iii. 5; Esther ix. 19). The New Testament and Josephus uniformly distinguish between πόλις and κώμη (an unwalled village, opposite to a fortified city).--Schürer, II. i. 154.