Bruce R. Crew
Introduction
An earlier article focused upon the possible routes taken by the Magi from their homeland to worship the Christ-Child in the town of Bethlehem in Judea, as well as their escape from King Herod via the land of the Nabateans (Crew 2005c: 102–113). The article supports the view that the town of Bethlehem in Judea comprises the site where this event transpired rather than the town of Bethlehem in the northern Israelite tribal territory belonging to Napthali, situated near the town of Nazareth in Lower Galilee. In addition, the article maintains that following their visit to the town of Bethlehem in Judea, the Magi most likely traveled eastward, passing by Herod’s Herodium fortress near the town of Tekoa, located about 2.5 miles from Bethlehem. The Magi then proceeded to cross the Judean desert via the wilderness of Jeruel to the ascent of Ziz above the Dead Sea’s western shore where they descended into the town of Ein-Gedi. From the harbor at Ein-Gedi, the Magi traversed the Dead Sea by boat and landed safely somewhere in Nabatean territory along the Dead Sea’s southeastern shore. This proposed route enabled the Magi to avoid Herod’s fortress at Machaerus along the Dead Sea’s northeastern shore in the territory of Perea, as well as Herod’s fortress at Masada along the Dead Sea’s southwestern corner in his home territory of Idumea.
The main focus of this article will be a geographical-historical examination of the Nabateans in the context of events surrounding the flight of Joseph’s family from the town of Bethlehem in Judea to Egypt and their eventual decision to migrate to the town of Nazareth in Lower Galilee after their return from Egypt (Mt 2:13–23). It will also look at why the geographical domain of the Nabateans would have provided an attractive alternative to which Joseph and his family could have fled to escape Herod’s forces. Finally, it will examine why the angel who appeared in Joseph’s dreams likely directed him to flee instead with his family to Egypt, as well as migrate to the town of Nazareth in Lower Galilee rather than return to the town of Bethlehem in the Judean hill country.1
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Michael Luddeni
The Treasury at Petra, the capital city of ancient Nabatea.
Nabatean-Judean-Idumean Relations in Written Sources
There is little evidence in Ancient Near Eastern texts that can pinpoint the identification and location of the Nabateans’ original homeland with exact certainty. However, a more recent linguistic study suggests that the Nabateans may in fact be the same people as the Nebaioth from Old Testament (OT) texts and the Nebaiate who appear in the annals of Assyrian kings (Broome 1973: 1–16; Crew 2005b: 83–85). In particular, two OT texts state that Jacob’s son Esau married Mahalath, the daughter of Abraham’s son Ishmael, who was a sister of Nabaioth (Gn 28:9; 36:3). Another OT text also indicates that the relatives of Ishmael probably settled in an area somewhere to the east of Egypt as one travels toward the land of Assyria, situated in northern Mesopotamia (Gn 25:18).In addition, the available geographical information from additional OT texts shows that Ishmael’s relatives most likely settled in an area located somewhere between the Sinai and Arabian Peninsulas. A satisfactory resolution of the linguistics question that equates the Nebaioth in OT texts with the Nebaiate from the Assyrian annals and the Nabateans in New Testament (NT) times, then, points to a probable location for the Nabateans’ original homeland somewhere next to southern Transjordan’s mountains of Edom in the Arabian Peninsula’s northwest portion (Bartlett 1979: 53–66; Broome 1973: 1–16; Crew 2005b: 79–87). This would have placed the Nabateans in an ideal position from which they could have migrated into ancient Edom’s former geographical domain sometime during the sixth century BC following its destruction by the Babylonian king Nebuchadnezzar (Broome 1973: 1–16). The remaining Edomite remnant then proceeded to move westward into the northern Negev and southern portion of the Judean hill country, areas previously controlled by ancient Israel’s southern kingdom of Judah. This Edomite remnant later emerged as the Idumeans during NT times, a people who were later conquered and absorbed into the Hasmonean kingdom of Judea sometime by John Hyrcanus I in 132 BC.
Written sources do not specifically mention the existence of cultural-political ties between the Nabateans and Judeans prior to the Hasmonean revolt that transpired in the second century BC. However, this does not mean that the two peoples lacked prior contacts. The adjacent position of their two geographical domains next to one another placed them at a critical juncture along the sedentary and desert portions of the Ancient Near East. Thus it would have been relatively easy for these two peoples to have developed direct cultural and political links in earlier times, especially in light of the fact that the Nabateans controlled the spice and incense trade supplying religious structures such as the Judean temple at Jerusalem. In addition, the geographical information contained in another OT text mentions a number of returning Judean exiles from Babylon who resettled the northern portion of the Negev near the main trade route that linked the Nabatean capital at Petra with the Mediterranean port of Gaza via the Negev’s Central Highlands (Neh 11:25–30).
Written sources further indicate that the Nabateans and Judeans enjoyed friendly relations with one another prior to the rise of Alexander Jannaeus to power in Judea-Idumea in 102 BC (2 Mc 5:24–37; 1 Mc 9:32–42; Flavius Josephus Antiquities, the Loeb Classical Library [hereafter designated as Antiq.]: 7.233). Based upon the assumption, then, that the Nabateans are the same people as the Nebaioth from OT texts and the Nebaiate who appear in annals of the Assyrian kings, it is likely that ancestral ties between the Nabateans and Idumeans originated from as far back in time as the period of the OT patriarchs. OT texts also point to the beginning of ancestral ties between the Nabateans and Idumeans via Abraham’s son Ishmael and Jacob’s son Esau (Gn 25:13; 28:9; 36:1–3; 1 Chr 1:29). In addition, these texts suggest that the Nabateans and Idumeans shared a common origin as nomadic desert peoples, one due largely to the geographical location of their respective homelands located next to one another along the Ancient Near East’s sedentary and desert portions.
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Moreover, a written source late in the first century BC depicts the Idumeans as a sedentary people who migrated earlier into the southern portion of Judea from the Arabian Peninsula (Strabo, Geography 16.2.34). According to this written source, the Idumeans had acquired sedentary and nomadic elements in their cultural traits by late in the first century BC. Thus the Idumeans somehow managed to forge a cultural bridge between the Nabateans, a nomadic desert people, and the Judeans, a sedentary farming people, by NT times via processes of acculturation and assimilation.
Written sources also attest to friendly ties between the Nabateans, Judeans and Idumeans following the death of John Hyrcanus I in 102 BC. This included the presence of large numbers of foreign residents living in the Nabatean capital at Petra late in the first century BC (Strabo, Geography 16.4.21). In all likelihood, these foreign residents consisted of diplomats from other kingdoms, as well as merchants involved in the handling of international trade passing through the Nabatean capital and individuals who served as technical advisors to the Nabateans in a period of economic growth that peaked in Nabatea during the reign of Aretas IV (9 BC-40 AD). The presence of a similar economic boom in Judea-Idumea during the reign of Herod the Great from 37–4 BC, together with the geographical location of Judea-Idumea next to the land of the Nabateans, makes it hard to believe that large numbers of Judeans and Idumeans would not have been included amongst these foreign residents living at Petra, as well as in other parts of the Nabateans’ geographical domain (Goitein 1975: 125, 200–202; Hirschberg 1975: 123, 142–48).
Written sources also attest to the identification of Judea and Idumea as a single geographical-political entity during every historical period after the reign of John Hyrcanus I that extended well into the first century AD. This includes the following political leaders who ruled over Judea-Idumea from the second century BC to the first century AD:
• Alexander Jannaeus (Josephus, Antiquities 13.395-97).
• Hyrcanus II/Antipater (Josephus, Antiquities 14.73-79; Jewish War 1.199-200).
• Herod the Great (Josephus, Antiquities 14.325-330; 15.216, 253–56; Jewish War 1.244).
• Direct Roman rule over Judea and Idumea (Josephus, Antiquities 17.354-55).
• Archelaus, son of Herod the Great (Josephus, Antiquities 1.640-46, 664–68; 2.1ff; 2.14ff.; Jewish War 2.96).
• Herod Agrippa I (Josephus, Antiquities 19.274-75).
Michael Luddeni
Coin of Herod the Great.
The Flight of Joseph and His Family to Egypt
The previous article in Bible and Spade sought to show that the NT account of the Magi’s visit to Bethlehem of Judea to worship the Christ-Child as described in Matthew 2 can be better understood when viewed in the geographical-historical context of the Nabateans’ rise as a major geo-political power in the Ancient Near East (Crew 2005c: 102–113). In like manner, the account of the flight from Bethlehem of Judea by Joseph and his wife Mary together with the Child Jesus to Egypt to escape Herod’s grasp in Matthew 2 becomes more intelligible when it is examined within this same framework. At first glance, it appears that the geographical domain of the Nabateans would have provided an attractive haven to which Joseph and his family could have fled with the Christ-Child from Herod’s forces. In addition to its closer proximity, the trip from the town of Bethlehem to Nabatea from Judea-Idumea would have taken less time for them to traverse as opposed to a long and arduous trip across the desert sands of the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt.
Michael Luddeni
Coin of Herod Archelaeus.
Moreover, the geographical information contained in written sources and the archaeological evidence shows that the Nabateans, Judeans and Idumeans maintained strong cultural and commercial ties, one that likely resulted from their geographical location in proximity to one another along the sedentary and desert portions of the Ancient Near East (Crew 2005c: 108–110). In addition, the presence of large numbers of Judeans and Idumeans living in Nabatea could have provided a strong economic base that would have enabled Joseph’s family to survive a prolonged period of exile from their native homeland located in Judea-Idumea. This likely included Judeans and Idumeans living amongst the large number of foreigners at Petra and in other locations of the Nabateans’ geographical domain where they had earlier sought refuge in order to escape Herod’s brutal, oppressive regime. This would have allowed these Judean and Idumean refugees living in Nabatea to take advantage of an economic boom that transpired following a similar period of economic growth that earlier transpired during Herod the Great’s reign in Judea-Idumea (Crew 1981: 265–271).
The flow of economic development from Judea-Idumea to Nabatea that took place during the reign of the Nabatean king Aretas IV also displays a geographical pattern that is consistent with historical links between adjacent desert and sedentary por
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Sunset from the top of the Hussan Ridge overlooking the Elah Valley from the Judean hill country.
tions of the Ancient Near East, as well as at other world locations. This pattern shows that the direction and flow of economic development is more likely to move from a sedentary to a desert location rather than vice versa (Nir 1974: 84). Moreover, the internal evidence as revealed in OT passages shows that people who lived in the land of Judah during earlier times often sought refuge in neighboring locations such as Moab and Edom whenever there was a prolonged period of famine caused by military invasions and/or persecutions in ancient Israel that affected their respective homelands (i.e. Jgs 6:1–5; Ru 1:1–6).
The NT account in Matthew 2 also indicates that following the departure of the Magi from the town of Bethlehem in Judea in order to return to their home country via another route, an angel appeared in a dream to Joseph and instructed him to flee with his family to the land of Egypt where they were to remain until further notice since Herod planned to search for the Christ-Child in order to destroy him (Mt 2:13). While it is likely that Joseph and his family were fully aware of Herod’s ruthless tactics employed against his subjects in Judea-Idumea and possessed an accurate knowledge of the best possible escape route from the town of Bethlehem in Judea to the land of the Nabateans via the Judean desert, it is highly unlikely that they would have known the exact location and concentration of
Bruce R. Crew
The Elah Valley, looking southwest. It is part of the Shephelah, a region of low hills between Israel’s central mountain range and the coastal plains of Philistia. The latter included such towns as Ashdod, Ascalon and Gath.
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Moody Press
Map of the routes likely taken by the family of Jesus during their flight to Egypt and their return to Israel.
Herod’s forces that were stationed inside Judea-Idumea.
Moreover, due to the Magi’s probable escape eastward into the land of the Nabateans, there was likely little or no time left in terms of a fast-closing window of opportunity for Joseph and his family to mount a successful escape from Herod’s forces in Judea-Idumea (Crew 2005c: 112). Thus it is likely that Joseph’s family would have encountered serious problems if they had chosen to follow the route of the Magi’s successful escape from Judea-Idumea into Nabatea. The fact that Joseph and his family were traveling together with the Child Jesus would have made it relatively easy for them to stand out from the other travelers who were moving between these two locations. In addition, the NT account in Matthew 2 specifically states that Herod’s forces proceeded to kill all of the male children two years of age and under who were living in Bethlehem, as well as the surrounding environs, according to the information that Herod had gleaned from the Magi’s earlier visit to Jerusalem while en route to Bethlehem to worship the Christ-Child (Mt 2:16).
Finally, even if efforts by Joseph and his family to escape from Judea-Idumea into Nabatea would have proved successful, Herod still retained links with the Nabateans via his mother’s family from the royal court at Petra, despite the fact that the Nabateans comprised one of Herod’s most feared political enemies (Josephus, Antiquities 1.574–77; 14.73-79, 370–75; 15.110-145; 16.271-285, 343–350; 17.296; Jewish War 1.274- 286; 2.76-77). Thus it is likely that Joseph’s family would not have been completely safe from Herod’s grasp even if they had fled to the land of the Nabateans. It would have been relatively easy for Herod to alert any of his possible secret contacts living in Nabatea to be on the lookout for a couple with a small child approximately two years of age or under who had recently arrived from Judea-Idumea. Thus the specific instructions given by to Joseph in his first dream to “take the Child and his mother and flee to Egypt” becomes even more intelligible in light of the available information from archaeological and written sources that pertain to the Nabateans’ geographical domain.
As a result, then, it is likely that in as little as 10–12 hours following the Magi’s departure from the town of Bethlehem in Judea, Herod quickly reached the conclusion that the Magi did not intend to report back to him on the exact location and identity of this newly born ‘King of the Jews’ (Crew 2005c: 112). As a result, Herod then became enraged that he had been tricked by the Magi and proceeded to alert his forces to seal off every possible escape route leading out of Judea-Idumea and into Nabatea before Joseph’s family could manage to successfully escape from the town of Bethlehem and its surrounding environs in Judea-Idumea. Thus it is likely that the initial focus of Herod’s search for the Child Jesus would have been in and around the
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town of Bethlehem in Judea-Idumea, particularly the areas located towards his geographical borders with the Nabateans to the east of the town.
Hence the instructions given by the angel in Joseph’s first dream to flee with the Christ-Child and his mother to Egypt as opposed to the land of the Nabateans most likely provided them with barely enough time for an escape from the town of Bethlehem in the Judean hill country. Thus it is likely that Joseph and his family fled away from the town of Bethlehem by night and proceeded to travel westward along a well-constructed Roman road that descended into the Elah Valley portion of the Shephelah lowlands via the Hussan Ridge away from Nabatea and the direction of Herod’s initial search.
The distance into the Elah Valley from the town of Bethlehem in Judea-Idumea would have taken Joseph and his family approximately four-five hours to traverse on foot, thereby permitting them to successfully escape before Herod and his forces managed to seal off all of the escape routes leading out of the Judean hill country.2
Once Joseph’s family passed through the Elah Valley via Beit Guvrim to the city of Eletherapolis, they proceeded to enter the Mediterranean coastal plain and link up with one of the large trading caravans traveling south along the main international route in this portion of the Ancient Near East. Joseph and his family then turned westward again, moving towards Egypt along either one of two possible routes. First, they could have stopped at the port of Ascalon (modern-day Ashkelon) along the southwestern part of the Mediterranean coast, an area that was not under Herod’s direct political jurisdiction. From the port of Ascalon, they could have used some of the gold earlier given to them by the Magi to board a boat that sailed directly to the port of Alexandria in Egypt, a city that contained the largest Jewish population in the Diaspora outside their ancient homeland (Mt 2:11). Or, Joseph and his family could have continued their travels on land along the northernmost route across the Sinai Peninsula’s desert sands into Egypt (Aharoni and Avi-Yonah 1993: 227). Once they reached Egypt, then it would have been relatively easy for Joseph and his family to quietly blend into the hustle and bustle of Egypt’s large Jewish community without attracting any undue attention from the local authorities, since Herod wielded no political influence in this portion of the Near East (Aharoni and Avi-Yonah 1993: 243).
Following Herod’s death, the angel appeared once again to Joseph in a second dream and instructed him to return together with his family to the “land of Israel” (Mt 2:19–22). However, in a third dream after they entered the “land of Israel,” the angel warned Joseph against returning to the town of Bethlehem in the Judean hill country since Herod’s son Archelaeus now ruled in the place of his late father. While this seems to be a seemingly insignificant piece of information, nevertheless it is important in light of the new instructions given by the angel to Joseph and his family. These new instructions given to Joseph by the angel suggest that prior to his death, Herod likely informed his son Archelaeus about the reasons behind his decision to slaughter all of the male children approximately two years of age and under who were living in the town of Bethlehem in Judea and its surrounding environs. While this event described in Biblical texts is found nowhere else in written sources, other written sources indicate that Herod slaughtered large numbers of innocent people on numerous occasions during his reign as king over Judea-Idumea (Crew 205c: 106–108). Thus the account in Matthew 2 would corroborate the lengths to which Herod was willing to go in order to destroy any perceived threat to his rule.
Therefore, it is likely that a return by Joseph and his family to the town of Bethlehem in Judea would have once again endangered the Christ-Child’s life because He would have undoubtedly been highly visible amongst the local population at a location where there were no other living male children even close to his age. Hence the structure of the population in Bethlehem and its surrounding environs as a result of earlier events in Matthew 2 comprises an example of an indented pyramid where a significant portion of the population from a certain age group has died off due to human or natural catastrophes such as wars, genocides, famines or disease epidemics. Thus Joseph heeded the warning given by the angel in his third dream and proceeded instead to migrate with his family to the town of Nazareth in Lower Galilee, a location where he and his wife Mary had lived prior to Jesus’ birth. Jesus then proceeded to grow up as a normal child in the town of Nazareth in Galilee overlooking the international trade route in a location situated away from the town of Bethlehem in Judea and the watchful eyes of Herod’s remaining family members prior to the time that he began his public ministry at approximately 30 years of age.
Summary and Conclusions
Unlike the direction taken by the Magi eastward from the town of Bethlehem in Judea to the land of the Nabateans in order to escape from Herod’s grasp, then, the angel that appeared in Joseph’s first dream shortly afterwards instructed him to flee with the Christ-Child and his mother to Egypt to elude Herod’s forces. Thus these instructions by the angel went directly against what would have likely been Joseph’s natural inclination to flee with the Christ-Child and his family to Nabatea. In addition to its closer location to Judea-Idumea, the land of the Nabateans contained large numbers of Judeans and Idumeans, political refugees who had earlier fled there to escape Herod’s brutal and repressive regime. Moreover, the direction likely taken by Joseph’s family to escape from King Herod would have been the same as the one traversed in earlier times by people from Judea-Idumea into neighboring Moab and Edom to escape prolonged famines or military invasions that affected this portion of ancient Israel. Finally, the presence of a slowly developing economic boom that had already begun to take place in Nabatea likely could have sustained Joseph and his family, together with the Child Jesus, during any prolonged period of exile from Judea-Idumea.
However, the angel that appeared to Joseph instructed him instead to flee westward to Egypt with the Christ-Child and his mother. These directions were exactly the opposite of the ones given to the Magi to facilitate their earlier escape eastward from the town of Bethlehem in Judea across the Judean desert and into Nabatea. Thus the events surrounding the flight by Joseph and his family with the Christ-Child to Egypt resulted in the fulfillment of an earlier OT prophecy in a pattern similar to the Israelites’ earlier descent into Egypt and later return during the period of the Exodus (Hos 11:1).
After Herod’s death, the angel appeared once again to Joseph in another dream and instructed Joseph to return together with the Christ-Child and his family to “the land
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of Israel” (Mt 2:20). However, once Joseph and his family reached “the land of Israel,” the angel appeared to Joseph in yet another dream warning him against returning to the town of Bethlehem in Judea since Herod’s son Archelaeus now ruled in the place of his late father (Mt 2:22). As a result, Joseph took the Christ-Child with his family to the town of Nazareth in lower Galilee, thereby fulfilling the words of the prophets who foretold that the Christ-Child would also be called a Nazarene (Mt 2:23; Mk 10:47; 14:67; 16:6; Lk 24:19; Jn 18:5, 7; 19:19).
Therefore, even though the area of Nabatea provided an attractive alternative to which Joseph’s family could have fled, it is highly unlikely that the OT prophecies pertaining to the multiple origins of the Christ-Child would have been fulfilled in Jesus’ life. Moreover, since Herod maintained strong ancestral links with the Nabateans via the prominent position that his mother’s family held in the royal court at Petra even though the Nabateans comprised one of Herod’s most feared enemies, there is the question of whether Joseph and his family could have remained safe from Herod’s grasp while living in Nabatea even if a possible flight from Judea-Idumea would have proved successful in their escape from Herod’s forces. Finally, there is the question as to whether Joseph and his family could have completely avoided the possible dangers posed by a return from Nabatea to Judea-Idumea in regards to the notoriety and attention that the Child Jesus might have attracted prior to the beginning of His public ministry at approximately thirty years of age.
The first article in this series focused upon the possible routes taken by the Magi from their homeland to worship the Christ-Child in the town of Bethlehem in Judea-Idumea, as well as their subsequent escape from King Herod into the land of the Nabateans. This article has sought to provide a better geographical-historical understanding of the Nabateans within the context of their role as a geo-political power in the Ancient Near East during NT times in relation to the flight by Joseph and his wife Mary to Egypt with the Child Jesus, as well as the subsequent decision to migrate to the town of Nazareth in Lower Galilee following their return to “the land of Israel.” An additional study is now needed to examine the impact of the Nabateans upon Jesus’ public ministry during his later years and the subsequent development of early Christianity in the Ancient Near East following His death, burial and resurrection in human history.
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