Ba´shan, a name which probably denotes the peculiar fertility of the soil. The sacred writers include in Bashan that part of the country eastward of the Jordan which was given to half the tribe of Manasseh, situated to the north of Gilead. The first notice of this country is in Genesis 14:5; compare with Joshua 12:4. When the Israelites invaded the Promised Land, Argob, a province of Bashan, contained 'sixty fenced cities, with walls and gates and brazen bars, besides unwalled towns a great many' (Deuteronomy 3:4-5; 1 Kings 4:13). These were all taken by the Israelites, and Og and his people utterly destroyed. Golan, one of the cities of refuge, was situated in this country (Deuteronomy 4:43; Joshua 20:8; Joshua 21:27). Solomon appointed twelve officers to furnish the monthly supplies for the royal household, and allotted the region of Argob to the son of Geber (1 Kings 4:13). Towards the close of Jehu's reign Hazael invaded the land of Israel, and smote the whole eastern territory, 'even Gilead and Bashan' (2 Kings 10:33); but after his death the cities he had taken were recovered by Jehoash (Joash) (2 Kings 13:25), who defeated the Syrians in three battles, as Elisha had predicted (2 Kings 13:19). After the captivity the name Batanaea was applied to only a part of the ancient Bashan; the rest being called Trachonitis, Auranitis, and Gaulanitis. All these provinces were granted by Augustus to Herod the Great, and on his death Batanaea formed a part of Philip's tetrarchy. At his decease, A.D. 34, it was annexed, by Tiberius, to the province of Syria; but in A.D. 37 it was given by Caligula to Herod Agrippa, the son of Aristobulus, with the title of king (Acts 12:1). From the time of Agrippa's death, in A.D. 44, to A.D. 53, the government again reverted to the Romans, but it was then restored by Claudius to Agrippa II (Acts 25:13). The richness of the pasture-land of Bashan, and the consequent superiority of its breed of cattle, are frequently alluded to in the Scriptures. We read in Deuteronomy 32:14, of 'rams of the breed of Bashan.' 'Rams, lambs, bulls, goats, all of them fatlings of Bashan' (Ezekiel 39:18). The oaks of Bashan are mentioned in connection with the cedars of Lebanon (Isaiah 2:13; Zechariah 11:2). In Ezekiel's description of the wealth and magnificence of Tyre it is said, 'Of the oaks of Bashan have they made their oars' (Ezekiel 27:6). The ancient commentators on Amos 4:1, 'the kine of Bashan,' Jerome, Theodoret, and Cyril, speak in the strongest terms of the exuberant fertility of Bashan, and modern travelers corroborate their assertions.
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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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