Dr. Davidson, in Introduction to O. T., vol. i., conjectures that Morel was the original reading, but neither Kennicott, De Rossi, nor Dr. Davidson himself in his Printed Text of O. T., give any diplomatic authority for such a reading. The translations of Aquila and Symmachus may have originated with some reading resembling that in the Samaritan text, umn, and signifying far seen' or conspicuous.' But when Josephus wrote i. 13. 2), it is quite clear that the ing in Gen. xxii. 2 and 2 Chron. iii. I must have been identical, as he speaks of the place of Abraham's sacrifice as 1-6 6pos ey5' oil ro lepdv Aapths o gaaIXetis licrrepov lapi,erat.. In 2 Chron. iii. 1, the LXX. do not attempt to translate the proper name rinvn, but write ev Oct TOE; ' Agcopla. It is true • that there is no reference to the original manifesta tion of God on this site to the Patriarch, and ex press mention is made of second and additional reasons for this hill being called Moriah ; see Chron. xxi. 16, xxii. I ; 2 Sam. xxiv. I ; 2 Chron. iii. I. This was in perfect harmony with the law of God, that forbade the offering of burnt sacrifices in any place which the Lord had not consecrated by his visible manifestation (Hengstenberg, Diss., vol. ii., 32, ff.) The geographical conditions sup plied by the narrative in Genesis are not incon sistent with the Samaritan tradition (see Robinson, Biblical Researches, vol. iii. p. roo) that Gerizim was the scene of the sacrifice, and that the moun tains of Gerizim and Ebal, from their neighbour hood to Moreh, a spot well known to Abraham, were the mountains in the land of Moriah (Co lenso, pt. ii. chap. x.) They have led Dean Stanley (S. and P., p. 250, ff. ; Lectures, Yewish Church, pp. 49) to decide on Gerizim as the scene of the event. His arguments are weighty but not conclusive. (1.) The distance from Beer sheba to the plain of Sharon, from which Gerizim might be seen ' afar off,' corresponds with the two days' journey of Abraham ; while the third day, which would be occupied by the great event, would be sufficient for the journey to the summit and the return. The same thing, however, may be said with greater certainty of Jerusalem itself. (2.) Stanley objects that there is no spot from which the place where the sacrifice was to be offered could•be seen from afar off,' that the hill of Mo riah is not visible at all until the traveller is close upon it, at the southern edge of the valley of Hin nom, from whence he looks down upon it, as on a lower eminence.' Now the narrative informs us that Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place of which the Lord had spoken to him. That
place' was the rrIbrITTINI, or, as Gesenius trans lates, the land about Moriah,' just as is the land about Ai. It was very possible to see from the ridge Afar Elias the heights about Jeru salem, if not the hill of Moriah itself; and we are expressly told that Abraham did not see the place until he was fairly within a walk of the spot, and could leave the young men and the ass while he and Isaac proceeded, personally laden with the material for the sacrifice. (3.) A formidable diffi culty urged by others is, that the fortress of Zion must at that time have been occupied by the king of the Jebusites, some forerunner of Adonizedeck, or by Melchizedeck himself, and therefore Abra ham must have prepared to perform this awful sacrifice under the walls of the city. To obviate the great apparent improbability of this, it may be said that sometimes the outside of fenced cities— where a deep ravine runs between the wall and the suburb—is often one of the loneliest spots in the world. The name Moriah is unquestionably given by the chronicler to the Temple Hill, but this pas sage is a solitary one. The more ordinary name even for the entire city of Jerusalem and for the holy mountain is Mount Zion, and various psalms and prophecies speak of the dwelling-place of Jehovah under this old and honoured name. It cannot be true that any writer of the time of Solo mon composed the narrative of Abraham's sacrifice to do honour to the Temple Hill, as it was sug gested by De Wette. For if that had been his intention, he would have called it Zion and not Moriah. Great stress has been laid by Bishop Colenso, and by the writer in Smith's Dictionary, vol. ii. 423, on the absence of other reference be sides that of the Chronicler, to the name of Moriah as the site of the Temple Hill, and also on the im propriety of associating the name and career of Abraham so vitally with Jerusalem. In the same article, however, Jerusalem is spoken of as the city of Melchizedeck. For the shape of Moriah, its re lations with Bezetha and Acra, the bridge that con nected it with Zion across the valley of the Tyro pceon, see Art. JERUSALEM. Notwithstanding the various and variously-motived endeavours to dis turb the old Hebrew tradition, it has not been proved necessary to deny the identification of the two sites, nor to denounce the old etymology, nor cease to perceive the interesting link of connection supplied by it between the sacrifice of Isaac, the vision of God's judgment and mercy, the erection of the temple, and the offering up of God's only begotten Son.—H. R. R.