The March of Conquest in Isaiah X 27c-34

Abstract

Interest in topography and historical geography has led to careful study of the various place names in the Old Testament, and the list in Isa. x 27c-34 is no exception. The first modern topographer to trace in detail the ancient track from Geba to Jerusalem, as reflected here, was Federlin who published his conclusions in 1906 1). Hagemeyer carried the discussion further in 1909 in his study of Gibeah 2). Dalman followed in 1916 with an important work, based in part on his earlier studies of the Michmash pass and the Wadi es-Swenit, which remains the standard topographical study of the passage in question 3). Dalman attempted to locate the place names cited in Isa. x and to reconstruct in some detail the precise route taken. His map is still in use, having been reproduced by Kaiser in his commentary in Das Alte Testament Deutsch 4). The Swedish scholar Linder carried the topographical analysis still further in his study of Gibeah published in 1922 5). In 1924 Albright went a step beyond his predecessors in his attempt to reconstruct the text of Isa. x 28-32 on the basis of prosodic structure as well as topographical detail 6). Albright's treatment of the Hebrew text was rather arbitrary involving several relocations and minor emendations. Nonetheless, it is his use of Hebrew prosody as an analytical tool which forms the basis of the present study. During the fifty years since Albright published his brief article, much has been learned about Hebrew poetry. In particular, the Ugaritic texts dis-