KETURAH (rITI.07, incense ; Sepkt. Xer rob pa), the second wife, or, as she is called in Chron. i. 32, the concubine of Abraham, by whom he had six sons, Zimran, Jokshan, Medan, Midian, Ishbak, and Shuah, whom he lived to see grow to man's estate, and whom he established 'in the East country,' that they might not interfere with Isaac (Gen. xxv. 1-6). As Abraham was too y-ears old when Isaac was lxmn, who was given to him by the special bounty of Providence when he was as good as dead' {lleb. xi. 12), as he was 14o years old when Sarah died ; and as he him self died at the age of 175 years,—it has seemed improbable that these six sons should have been born to Abraham by one woman after he was 14o years old, and that Ile should have seen them all grow up to adult age, and have sent them forth to form independent settlements in that last and feeble period of his life. If Isaac was born to him out of the course of nature when he was too years old, how could six sons be born to him in the course of nature after he was 14o? It has there fore been suggested by good commentators, that as Ketumh is called Abraham's concubine ' in Chronicles, and as she and Hagar are, probably in dicated as his concubines ' in Gen. xxv. 6, Ketu rah had in fact been taken by Abraham as his secondary or concubine-wife before the death of Sarah, although the historian relates the incident after that event, tbat his leading narrative might not be interrupted. According to the standard
of morality then acknowledged, Abraham might quite as properly have taken Keturah before as after Sarah's death ; nor can any reason why he should not have done so, or why he should have waited till then, be conceived. This explanation obviates many difficulties, and does not itself con tain any. [ABRAtinm.)—J. K.
Aa'a'endum.—From Keturall descended the pro genitors of several of the Arab tribes (Muir, life of Mohammed cxii.) M. Caussin de Perceval thinks that the Bani Katoora, an Arab tribe who settled at Mecca with the Jorhomites, are direct descendants of Keturah, but Ile has no ground for this except the similarity of the names. It is im probable that where so many tribes, descended from Keturah's sons, took the names of their respective progenitors, one should have been distinguished by the name of the one mother of the whole ; and besides, the Bani Katoora came from the south, whereas the descendants of Keturah seem to have resided in the north of the peninsula. The Midianites, the Dedanites, the Sbebnites, are the descendants of Keturah connected with Arab asso ciations.--W. L. A.