Ar, the capital city of the Moabites (Numbers 21:28; Deuteronomy 2:9; Deuteronomy 2:18; Deuteronomy 2:29), near the river Arnon (Deuteronomy 2:18; Deuteronomy 2:24; Numbers 21:13-15). It appears to have been burnt by King Sihon (Numbers 21:28), and Isaiah, in describing the future calamities of the Moabites, says, 'In the night, Ar of Moab is laid waste and brought to silence' (Isaiah 15:1). In his comment on this passage, Jerome states that in his youth there was a great earthquake, by which Ar was destroyed in the nighttime.
This city was also called Rabbah or Rabbath, and, to distinguish it from Rabbath of Ammon, Rabbath-Moab. The site still bears the name of Rabbah. It is about 17 miles east of the Dead Sea, 10 miles south of the Arnon (Modjeb), and about the same distance north of Kerek. The ruins of Rabbah are situated on a low hill, which commands the whole plain. They present nothing of interest except two old Roman temples and some tanks.
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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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