Aj´alon, a town and valley in the tribe of Dan (Joshua 19:42), which was given to the Levites (Joshua 21:24; 1 Chronicles 6:69). It was not far from Bethshemesh (2 Chronicles 28:18); it was one of the places which Rehoboam fortified (2 Chronicles 11:10), and among the strongholds which the Philistines took from Ahaz (2 Chronicles 28:18). But the town, or rather the valley to which the town gave name, derives its chief renown from the circumstance that when Joshua, in pursuit of the five kings, arrived at some point near Upper Beth-horon, looking back upon Gibeon and down upon the noble valley before him, he uttered the celebrated command: 'Sun, stand thou still on Gibeon, and thou moon, in the valley of Ajalon' (Joshua 10:12). The site of the town has been identified with the small village of Yâlo near Beit Ur (Beth-horon), and a broad wady to the north of it appears to be the valley of the same name.
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John Kitto was an English biblical scholar of Cornish descent.Born in Plymouth, John Kitto was a sickly child, son of a Cornish stonemason. The drunkenness of his father and the poverty of his family meant that much of his childhood was spent in the workhouse. He had no more than three years of erratic and interrupted education. At the age of twelve John Kitto fell on his head from a rooftop, and became totally and permanently deaf. As a young man he suffered further tragedies, disappointments and much loneliness. His height was 4 ft 8 in, and his accident left him with an impaired sense of balance. He found consolation in browsing at bookstalls and reading any books that came his way.
From these hardships he was rescued by friends who became aware of his mental abilities and encouraged him to write topical articles for local newspapers, arranging eventually for him to work as an assistant in a local library. Here he continued to educate himself.
One of his benefactors was the Exeter dentist Anthony Norris Groves, who in 1824 offered him employment as a dental assistant. Living with the Groves family, Kitto was profoundly influenced by the practical Christian faith of his employer. In 1829 he accompanied Groves on his pioneering mission to Baghdad and served as tutor to Groves's two sons. In 1833 Kitto returned to England via Constantinople, accompanied by another member of the Groves mission, Francis William Newman. Shortly afterwards he married, and in due course had several children.
A London publisher asked Kitto to write up his travel journals for a series of articles in the Penny Magazine, a publication read at that time by a million people in Britain, reprinted in America and translated into French, German and Dutch. Other writing projects followed as readers enquired about his experiences in the East amidst people living in circumstances closely resembling those of Bible times.
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