AGRICULTURE. The antiquity of agriculture is indicated in the brief history of Cain and Abel, when it tells us that the former was a 'tiller of the ground,' and brought some of the fruits of his labour as an offering to God (Gen. iv. 2, 3), and that part of the ultimate curse upon him was : `when thou tillest the ground, it shall not hence forth yield to thee her strength' (iv. 12). Of the actual state of agriculture before the deluge we know nothing. It must have been modified con siderably by the conditions of soil and climate, which are supposed by many to have undergone some material alterations at the flood. Whatever knowledge was possessed by the old world was doubtless transmitted to the new by Noah and his sons ; and that this knowledge was considerable is implied in the fact that one of the operations of Noah, when he `began to be a husbandman,' was to plant a vineyard, and to make wine with the fruit (Gen. ix. 2o). There are few agricultural notices belonging to the patriarchal period, but they suffice to show that the land of Canaan was in a state of cultivation, and that the inhabitants possessed what were at a later date the principal products of the soil in the same country. It is reasonable, therefore, to conclude that the modes of operation were then similar to those which we afterwards find among the Jews in the same country, and concerning which our information is more exact.
In giving to the Israelites possession of a country already under cultivation, it was the Divine inten tion that they should keep up that cultivation, and become themselves an agricultural people ; and in doing this they doubtless adopted the prac tices of agriculture which they found already established in the country. This may have been the more necessary, as agriculture is a practical art ; and those of the Hebrews who were acquainted with the practices of Egyptian husbandry had died in the wilderness ; and even had they lived, the processes proper to a hot climate and alluvial soil, watered by river inundation, like that of Egypt, although the same in essential forms, could not have been altogether applicable to so different a country as Palestine.
As the nature of the climate and of the seasons affects all agricultural operations, it should be noticed that the variations of sunshine and rain, which with us extend throughout the year, are in Palestine confined chiefly to the latter part of autumn and the winter. During all the rest of the year the sky is almost uninterruptedly cloudless, and rain very rarely falls. The autumnal rains usually commence at the end of October, or at the beginning of November, not suddenly, but by degrees, which gives opportunity to the husbandman to sow his wheat and barley. The rains continue during November and December, but afterwards they occur at longer intervals ; and rain is rare after March, and almost never occurs as late as May. The cold of winter is not severe ; and as the ground is never frozen, the labours of the husbandman are not entirely interrupted. Snow falls in different parts of the country, but never lies long on the ground. In the plains and valleys the heat of summer is oppressive, but not in the more elevated tracts. In these high grounds the nights are cool, often with heavy dew. The total absence of rain in summer soon destroys the verdure of the fields, and gives to the general landscape, even in the high country, an aspect of drought and barrenness. No green thing remains but the foliage of the scattered fruit-trees, and occasional vineyards and fields of millet. In autumn the whole land becomes dry and parched ; the cisterns are nearly empty ; and all nature, animate and inanimate, looks forward with longing for the return of the rainy season. In the hill country the time of harvest is later than in the plains of the Jordan and of the sea-coast. The barley harvest is about a fortnight earlier than that of wheat. In the plain of the Jordan the wheat harvest is early in May ; in the plains of the coast and of Esdraelon, it is towards the latter end of that month ; and in the hills, not until June. The general vintage is in September, but the first grapes ripen in July ; and from that time the towns are well supplied with this fruit (Robinson, Biblical Researches, ii. 96-too).