64 HEBREW LIFE AND CUSTOM
is evident from place-names.1 Other wild creatures,
such as jackals (tannɪm),2 whose dismal howling suggested
the wailing of mourners/ foxes,4 and pariah dogs/ were
plentiful, but were not regarded as a menace to the living,6
and would not normally be hunted unless they were a
nuisance in the vineyards.7 In the hunting of game (in-
cluding antelopes and various kinds of deer and wild
goats),8 bows and arrows9 were used, the latter being
apparently sometimes poisoned.10 Snaring by means of
various contrivances of nets11 was extensively employed,
especially for birds,12 and traps were also used which
sprang up with the weight of the bird and caught it.13
There are various references to fishers, fishing, and fish-
hooks,14 and it may be assumed that fishing was always an
important industry in the neighbourhood of the Sea of
Galilee. In the greater part of the country, however, there
were no streams in which fish could live. It is significant
that fish is not mentioned in Solomon’s bill of fare.15 In
post-exilic times there was apparently a fish-market at
Jerusalem, the trade being in the hands of Syrians.16 The
dugong was harpooned 17 for the sake of its skin,18 but this
does not appear to have been an Israelite industry.
’ E.g. ‘ Zeboimɪ Sam. xiii. 18 ; Neh. xi. 34.
2 Jer. ix. Ii (Heb. 10) ; Isa. xxxiv. 13 ; Ps. xliv. 19.
3 Mic. i. 8 ; Isa. xiii. 32.
4 Ezek. xiii. 4 ; Neh. iv. 3 (Heb. iii. 35). It is possible that the
same word was also applied to jackals.
5 i Kings xiv. Ii ; 2 Kings ix. 10, 36; Jer. xv. 3.
6 The references to dogs in the Psalms (xxii. 16, 20. Ixviii. 23)
imply that the dogs only attack the dead or dying.
7 Cant. ii. 15. 8 See Deut. xiv. 4 ff. 9 Gen. xxvii. 3.
*0 Job vi. 4. ɪ' Isa. li. 20; cf. Mic. vii. 2 ; Ps. cxli. 10.
ɪ2 Prov. i. 17. ɪ3 Amosiii. 5.
"4 Jer. xvi. 16 ; Ezek. xlvii. 9 f. ; Eccles, ix. 12 ; Amos iv. 2 ; Ezek.
xxix. 4 ; cf. Lev. xi. 9 ff. '5 ɪ Kings iv. 22 f.
ɪ6 Neh. iii. 3, xii. 39; 2 Chron. xxxiii. 14. The ‘ Fish Gate’ was
certainly pre-exiîic; see Zeph. i. 10 and the true text of 2 Kings
xxiii. 8.
ɪ7 Job xli. 7. ɪ8 Ezek. xvi. 10; Exod. xxv. 5, xxxvi. 19.
SOCIAL POSITION OF AGRICULTURE
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AGRICULTURE
Apart from the large towns, though even these had
their fields, the cultivators of which lived within the walls,
the greater part of the population was engaged in agri-
culture. It is noteworthy that those who cultivated the
land, the ‘ ploughman ’ and the ‘ vine-dresser ’, seem to
have been regarded as socially somewhat inferior.1 This
general truth, however, must not be exaggerated or un-
duly insisted upon, since, for example, Boaz, and Kish,
the father of Saul, are evidently regarded as belonging to
the gentry. Nevertheless, in the late post-exilic ideal of
peace after victory,2 husbandmen together with shepherds
held a subordinate position in society. This might mean
that the Israelites will no longer be obliged to maintain
themselves by hard work : nevertheless Ben Sira seems to
consider husbandmen of least account among those who
live by manual labour.3 In any case it is likely that in
the days of the Hebrew monarchy the small cultivators
were to a large extent descended from the Canaanite
population, and were accordingly regarded by the
conquering Hebrews much as the Norman settlers regarded
the pre-Conquest inhabitants of England. The Book of
Hosea, with its vehement denunciations of the superstitions
surviving among the agricultural community,4 is sufficient
evidence of this Canaanite element in the population ; and
we know how frequently both in Britain and on the Con-
tinent primitive paganism has survived with, or even
without, a veneer of Christianity.
It is, however, an indication of the great importance of
agriculture in primitive times that the year ended after
the ingathering of the summer fruits, and that seed-time
and harvest, summer—used also to denote the fruit which
ripens in summer—and winter, are the most ancient
divisions of the year,5 and that the three obligatory feasts
ɪ 2 Kings xxiv. 14, xxv. 12. 1 Isa. lxi. 5. 3 Ecclus. xxxviii. 25ff.
4 See especially Hos. ii. 5 Gen. viii. 22.
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