Gibeah: The Search for a Biblical City

This work is a cross-disciplinary study of Israel’s first ‘capital city’ from topographical, archaeological, historical, and literary perspectives. Challenging William F. Albright’s claim that the ancient city is to be identified with Tell el-Ful, the book develops the case for a location instead at modern Jeba, 9 km north-east of Jerusalem, a site-change that bears important consequences for several scholarly theories relating to Gibeah. Among these are the inquest into the historicity and literary composition of the story of the ‘Outrage of Gibeah’ (Judg. 19-21) and the origins and nature of Saul’s kingship (1 Sam. 9-15). Both of these texts are treated thoroughly as preparation for a concluding investigation into the meaning of the prophet Hosea’s references to Israel’s sins ‘in the days of Gibeah’.