It is generally assumed that, in those numerous passages of our version in which the word coal occurs, charcoal, or some other kind of artificial fuel, is to be understood; at all events, that the word has not its English meaning. The idea is founded upon the supposition that fossil coal was not known to the ancients as an article of fuel, and especially to the ancient inhabitants of Syria, whose country it is generally imagined did not produce it. But the existence of coal in Syria is now placed beyond a doubt. Many indications of coal occur in the Lebanon Mountains; the seams of this mineral even protrude through the superincumbent strata in various directions. At Cornale, eight hours from Beirut, at 2500 feet above the level of the sea, where the coal seams are three feet in thickness, a mine is actually being worked by order of Mohammed Ali, in which more than 100 men are employed. The coal is of good quality, and mixed with iron pyrites. In 1837 the quantity of coal extracted was 14,700 cantars of 217 okes, each making about 4000 tons. A furnace for smelting the ore and a railroad to convey the coals to Beirut were then in contemplation.
It appears from the testimony of Theophrastus that pit-coal was used by artificers in Greece, nearly 300 years B.C., and the well-ascertained existence of coal in Syria, emerging to the very surface, may, in conjunction with some particulars respecting the mention of coal in the Scriptures, tend to show the possibility that coal, in the proper sense, was not wholly unknown or unemployed by the ancient Hebrews, etc.
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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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