LUBIM, LUBIMS, and in Dan. xi. 43 LIBYANS 0=6 ; but in Dan. n4m9; Aipues ; Libyes, Libya); in the N. T. LIBYA (A/13677). When, during the reign of Rehoboam, Shishak king of Egypt invaded Judah, he was accompanied by the Laibims, the Sukkims, and the Ethiopians' (2 Chron. xii. 3) ; and in all the other passages in which the Lubim are mentioned, they appear as the allies or com panions in war of the Ethiopians (Cuskint) and Egyptians (2 Chron. xvi. 8 ; Dan. xi. 43 ; Nahum. iii. 9). From these circumstances, and front the radical identity in name, we infer that they were the inhabitants of the great province of Libya in northern Africa, and that they were identical with the Lehabim who sprung from Mizraim (Gen. x.
; see LEHABIM).
Originally the Lubims appear to have been de pendent on, or under the command of, the Mizrahn (Egyptians). In fact, they were just a tribe or family of Mizraim, who, for the sake of distinction, took the name of their more immediate progeni tor, and settled down in a district of their own. They appeared to have multiplied with amazing rapidity, and to have early become a powerful nation. Less civilized than the Egyptians, mOre addicted to the arts of war than peace, being, besides, mainly a pastoral people, they roamed far and wide over the arid plains of north ern Africa, and gave their name to a region sup posed by ancient geographers to extend from the banks of the Nile to the Atlantic, and from the shores of the Mediterranean to the equator.
Early geographers employed the name Libya in a somewhat vague sense. Sometimes they make it include all Africa ; sometimes all except Egypt ; and sometimes that region which lies immediately on the west side of Egypt. The truth seems to be that the Greeks were best acquainted with two African nations—the Egyptians and the Libyans. The boundaries of Egypt were known to thcm, and they gave the name Libya vaguely to the rest of the continent, just as they called the whole of southern Syria Palestine from the Philistines (Homer, Or/. iv. 87, seq. ; cf. Strabo, book i. gene rally). Herodotus was the first to give definite information about Libya. He applied the name to
all Africa, except Egypt. As for Libya, we know it to be washed on all sides by the sea, except where it is attached to Asia ;' and he then tells the manner in which Phoenician mariners sailed round the continent from the Red Sea to the month of the Nile (iv. 4t, 42). He describes the vast deserts of the interior (ii. 32), and the nomad and warlike character of the people (iv. i82, seq.) He classes the Ethiopians and Libyans together, as the sacred writers do (iv. 197). The accounts of Strabo and Ptolemy agree in the main with Herodottts (Strabo, ; Ptolemy, iv. 4). The physical geography of Libya is remarkable. The country consists of two great belts (IIerodotus says three, iv. 18i) : 1. A belt of desert running across the whole interior, from east to west, appropriately called Stihdra, the Desert.' It is covered with loose shifting sand, or dry gravelly soil ; it is without water ; its pastures are very scanty ; in some places for scores of miles there is not a blade of grass. But here and there it is dotted with little tracts of fertile ground, green with herbs and trees (Bruce, Travels ; Burckhardt, Nubia). This vast and dreary region, with the mountain-ranges along portions of its northern and southern borders, was the home of the warlike and nomad Lubim, as it still is of numerous and power ful Arab tribes. 2. A belt of cultivated ground, in some places narrow, in others stretching far into the interior. At favourable positions along the coast, the Greeks and Phcenicians formed settle ments at a very early period. The most celebmted of these colonies was Cyrene, founded by Greeks about 600 years B.C. A large province was in time attached to the city, and took its name [CvRENEj. To this province those belonged who were present at the miraculous gift of tongues on the day of Pen tecost, and who are correctly described by Luke as 6dwellers in the parts of Libya about Cyrene' (Acts ii. to). For full accounts of Libya, see Ritter, ; Mannert, Geographie; Heeren, African Nations ; Smith, .Dict. of G. and R. Geog., s.v .; and the works cited above.—J. L. P.