The reference made to Paran in I Sam. xxv shows that it bordered upon the southern decli vities of the mountains of Judah. Probably its boundary was not very accurately defined • and whatever part of that region lay beyond the limits of settled habitation was called the wilderness, or pasture-land, of Paran.' It thus included a large section of the Negeb [NEGEB]. The reference to Paran in Deut. i. t, is not so clear. The object of the sacred writer is to describe the place where Moses gave his long address to the Israelites. It was on this (the east) side of Jordan, in the wilderness (or Midbar of Moab ; cf. ver. 5), in the plain (the Arabah, nziy) over against the Red Sea (or opposite to Suf,' 11D 9117), between Paran and Tophel, etc. ("between Paran, and between Tophel and Lahan,' etc.) The sense appears to be that the Arabah in which Moses stood was op posite to the northern gulf of the Red Sea, and had on the one side Paran, and on the other Tophel, etc. It must not be inferred that Paran extended up to Jericho ; all that seems to be meant is that it formed the western boundary of the greater part of the Arabah. It would seem from the incidental statement in t Kings xi. 18 that Paran lay between Midian and Egypt. The region here called Midian was situated on the south of Edom [MIDIAN], ap parently at the head of the Alanitic gulf; and the road taken by the fugitive Hadad was most pro bably that now traversed by the Egyptian Haj, which passes through the whole desert of Tih.
It is strange that both Eusebius and Jerome speak of Paran as a city, which they locate three days' journey east (71-p6s civaroXas, but they must evidently mean west) of Ada " (Onomast., s. v. Pa ran). They refer doubtless to the old town of Faran, the ruins of which still exist in the valley of Feiran, at the foot of Mount Serbfil, in the desert of Sinai. Feirfin was an important place in the early ages of Christianity (Burckhardt, Travels in Syria, p. 616 ; Robinson, i. 126, 592) ; but it lies nearly thirty miles beyond the southern bound ary of Paran. Josephus mentions a valley of Paran ; but it was situated somewhere in the wilderness of Judaea 7na'. iv. 9. 4).
Paran is not strictly speaking a wilderness.' The sacred writers call it Midbar ; that is, a pasture-land, as distinguished from an agricultural country. Its principal inhabitants were nomads ; though it had a few towns and some corn-fields (Robinson, B. R., i. 19o, seq.) The leading features of its physical geography are as follows :—The cen tral section, from Beersheba to Jebel el-Tfh is an undulating plateau, from 600 to oo feet in height, traversed by bare rounded ridges, and shallow dry valleys, running on the one side into the Arabah, and on the other to the Mediterranean. The soil is scanty, white, and thickly strewn with nodules of flint. In early spring it is partially covered with grass, shrubs, and weeds;* but during the heat and drought of summer all vegetation disap pears, and the whole surface assumes that aspect of dreary desolation which led the Israelites to call it a great and terrible wilderness' (Deut, i. 19) ; and which suggested in recent times the some what exaggerated language of Mr. Williams— `A frightfully terrific wilderness, whose horrors language must fail to describe' (Holy Ci)', i. App. I. p. 464). Fountains are rare, and even wells and tanks are far apart. The plateau rises con siderably towards the north-east ; and, as deep glens descend from it to the Arabah, this section presents the appearance of a series of parallel ridges extending east and west. Their southern sides are mostly bluffs of naked white rock, which seem from a distance like colossal terrace walls. These are the mountains of the Amorites mentioned in Dent. i. 19, 20, to which the Israelites ap proached through the wilderness, and which formed the southern barrier of Canaan.
Besides these there is a line of bare white hills running along the whole western border of the Arabah, and forming the support of the table-land of Paran. Toward the valley they descend in steep shelving slopes and rugged precipices, averag ing about a thousand feet in height ; and every where deeply furrowed by wild ravines. The passes from Arabah to Paran are difficult, and a compara tively small band of resolute men might defend them against an army. The southern declivities of the mountain of the Amorites would also pre sent serious obstacles to the advance of a large host.
These natural features enable us to understand more fully some points in the history of the wilder ness journey, and to illustrate many incidental ex pressions in the sacred narrative. They show why the Israelites feared to enter Canaan from Kadesh, until they had ascertained by the report of the spies that those formidable mountain-passes were open (Dent. i. 22). They show how the Amorites, which dwelt in that mountain,' were able to drive them back when they attempted to ascend (ver. 44 ; cf. Num. xiv. 4o-45). They show how ex pressive and how natural is the language so often used by Moses at Kadesh. When he sent the spies he said unto them, Get you 21P this way southward, and go up into the mountain ;' so they went np . . . they ascended by the south' . . Caleb said, Let us go up at once. But the men that went up with him said, We be not able to go up against the peoole' (xiii. 17, 21, 22, 30, 31). And again, in describing the defeat of the people, They rose up early .. . and gat them up into the top of the mountain, saying, We will go up into the place which the Lord hath promised. . . Moses said, Go not up.. . . But they presumed to go up .. and the Amalekites came down,' etc. (xiv. 40, 42, 44, 45) It is worthy of special note that the w anderings of the Israelites through Paran became to it as a new baptism. Its name is now, and has been for ages, Bedu et- Tih, The wilderness of wander ing ' (Abulfeda, Tab. Syr., ed. Kohler, p. 4; Jau bert's p. 360). In addition to the authorities already referred to, notices of Paran will be found in the writings of Burckhardt, Travels in Spiel, 444), Seetzen (Zach's Monad. Corresp., xvii.), Ruppell (Reiscu, 241), Bartlett (Forty Days in the Desert, 149, seq.), Ritter (Pal. nnd Syr., i. r47, seq., seg.), Olin ( Travels in Egypt, etc., ii. 59, seq.), and Martineau (Eastern Life, 418, seq.) 2. Mount Paran nil) is mentioned only in two passages, both sublime odes celebrating the Divine Majesty. The same glorious event, what ever it may have been, is plainly alluded to in both. Moses says, ' The Lord came from Sinai, and rose up from Seir unto them ; he shined forth from Mount Paran,' etc. (Dent. xxxiii. 2) ; and Habakkuk writes ; God came from Teman, and the Holy One from Mount Pamn' (iii. 3). The object of both writers is to call attention to those places where the most striking manifestations of divine power and majesty were made to Israel. Next to Sinai, Kadesh stands out as the theatre of the Lord's most remarkable workings. It lies in the valley of Arabah, with Seir on the one side and the highlands of Paran on the other. The summits of both these ranges were, doubtless, now illumined, now clouded, like the brow of Sinai, by the divine glory (KADEsx, cf. Num. xvi. 19-35, 42 ; xx. 1, 6-12). Teman was another name for Edom, or Seir [TEmAx]; and hence the local al lusions of Moses and Habakkuk are identical. It may therefore be safely concluded that Mount Paran is that ridge, or series of ridges, already de scribed, lying on the north-east part of the wilder ness of Tilt. There is nothing in Scripture which would lead us to connect it more closely with Sinai than with Seir, or to identify it with Mount Serbal, which overlooks Wady Feiran.—J. L. P.