Sama´ria (watch-height), a city, situated near the middle of Palestine, built by Omri, king of Israel, on a mountain or hill of the same name, about B.C. 925. It was the metropolis of the kingdom of Israel, or of the ten tribes. The hill was purchased from the owner, Shemer, from whom the city took its name (). Samaria continued to be the capital of Israel for two centuries, till the carrying away of the ten tribes by Shalmaneser, about B.C. 720 (; ). During all this time it was the seat of idolatry, and is often as such denounced by the prophets, sometimes in connection with Jerusalem. It was the seat of a temple of Baal, built by Ahab, and destroyed by Jehu (; ). It was the scene of many of the acts of the prophets Elijah and Elisha, connected with the various famines of the land, the unexpected plenty of Samaria, and the several deliverances of the city from the Syrians. After the exile of the ten tribes, Samaria appears to have continued, for a time at least, the chief city of the foreigners brought to occupy their place; although Shechem soon became the capital of the Samaritans as a religious sect. John Hyrcanus took the city after a year's siege, and razed it to the ground. Yet it must soon have revived, as it is not long after mentioned as an inhabited place, in the possession of the Jews. Pompey restored it to its former possessors; and it was afterwards rebuilt by Gabinius. Augustus bestowed Samaria on Herod; who eventually rebuilt the city with great magnificence, and gave it the name of Sebaste. Here Herod planted a colony of 6000 persons, composed partly of veteran soldiers, and partly of people from the environs; enlarged the circumference of the city; and surrounded it with a strong wall twenty stades in circuit. In the midst of the city—that is to say, upon the summit of the hill—he left a sacred place of a stade and a half, splendidly decorated, and here he erected a temple to Augustus, celebrated for its magnitude and beauty. The whole city was greatly ornamented, and became a strong fortress. Such was the Samaria of the time of the New Testament, where the Gospel was preached by Philip, and a church was gathered by the apostles (; , sq.). At what time the city of Herod became desolate, no existing accounts state; but all the notices of the fourth century and later lead to the inference that its destruction had already taken place. A few scanty notices of Samaria are found scattered through the works of ancient travelers, but it was not till the present century that it was fully explored and described.
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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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