Boyd’s Bible Dictionary:
Land of the Ammonites was east of the Dead Sea between the Arnon on the south to the Jabbok on the north (Num. 21:24; Deut. 2:19-20). People called Ammonites from their ancestor Ben-Ammi (Gen. 19:38). Nomadic, idolatrous, incursive and cruel (1 Sam. 11:1-3; Amos 1:13; Judg. 10:6). Reduced to servitude by David (2 Sam. 12:26-31). Denounced by Jeremiah and Ezekiel (Jer. 49:1-6; Ezek. 25:2-10).
Concise Bible Dictionary:
Ben-ammi was the son of Lot by his youngest daughter. “The same is the father of the children of Ammon” (Gen. 19:38). His descendants were neighbors to Israel between the Arnon and the Jabbok on the east, and had much to do with Israel. God had bidden Moses not to touch the Ammonites, nor was their land to be possessed by Israel: it had been given to the children of Lot. Their city was Rabbath-ammon, perhaps their only city, as they were a nomadic people. None of the nation were to be allowed to enter the congregation of Israel to the tenth generation, that is, forever (Deut. 23:3; Neh. 13:1). With Amalek they assisted the king of Moab against Israel, and Jericho fell into their hands (Judg. 3:13). Israel served their gods, and God gave them up on both sides of the Jordan to serve the Ammonites. On Israel crying to Jehovah the children of Ammon were defeated under Jephthah. In the early days of Saul’s reign they besieged Jabesh-gilead, and would only make peace on the condition that the right eyes of the inhabitants should be thrust out, in order that it might be a reproach on Israel; but Saul hastened to their aid, and routed the Ammonites (1 Sam. 11:1-11; 1 Sam. 12:12). Their gold and silver taken in battle were dedicated by David to Jehovah. Their king insulted David’s servants sent to show kindness to him, as the world refuses the kindness of God’s king, and brings judgment upon it (2 Sam. 10:1-10; 2 Sam. 11:1; 2 Sam. 12:26-31).
On the other hand, Shobi, of Rabbah, brought provisions when David fled from Absalom (2 Sam. 17:27), and Zelek, an Ammonite, was one of David’s thirty valiant men. Solomon loved some of their women, and the mother of his son Rehoboam was Naamah an Ammonitess (1 Kings 14:21, 31). They molested Israel with varied success until the days of Jehoiakim (2 Kings 24:2). Lot being the father of both Moab and Ammon, it is not surprising that the Moabites were often linked with the Ammonites in their attacks upon Israel. Hatred of God’s people united them in one common desire to cut them off from being a nation (Psalm 83:4-8). Tobiah, an Ammonite, was a troublesome adversary to the Jews on their return from captivity. (Neh. 2:10,19; Neh. 4:3,7). Nevertheless the Jews intermarried with this nation, thus mixing “the holy seed” with the people of the land. (Ezra 9:1-2; Neh. 13:23-25).
The whole history supplies us with instruction as to the imperative necessity of keeping separate from the contaminations of the world in order to walk with God, and be blessed by Him.
When the king of the north, in a future day, shall enter into “the glorious land,” Edom, Moab, and Ammon shall escape his hand (Dan. 11:41); they are reserved to be subdued by Israel, whom they seduced and persecuted in by-gone ages (Isa. 11:14).
Milcom and Molech were the gods of the Ammonites: to the worship of which Solomon had been seduced by his strange wives (1 Kings 11:5,7).
Jackson’s Dictionary of Scripture Proper Names:
tribal (peoplish)
“557. The God Ammon” From Manners and Customs of the Bible:
Jeremiah 46:25. Behold, I will punish the multitude of No, rand Pharaoh, and Egypt, with their gods, and their kings.
The most of commentators now agree that amon, here rendered “multitude,” should be taken as a proper name, and left untranslated. The original is amon minno, “Amon of No.” By No is undoubtedly meant the celebrated Egyptian city of Thebes, which was situated on both sides of the Nile, and was noted for its hundred gates of brass, its numerous and splendid temples, obelisks, and statues. Amon was the name of an Egyptian deity, and probably of a Libyan and Ethiopian god, whose worship had its seat in Thebes, where was an oracle of the deity; for which reason the name of the city was joined to that of the god. This is to be noticed not only in this text, but also in Nahum 3:8, where for the “populous No” of our version the original has No Anion. The Greeks likened this god to Zeus, and the Romans called him Jupiter Ammon or Hammon. He appears to have been a personification of the sun, and is thought to have corresponded to Baal of the Phenicians. The ancient Egyptian name is said to have been Amen. On the monuments it is written Amn or Amn-Re, Amon the Sun.
It was formerly supposed, and is still commonly asserted, that this god was represented under the figure of a human form with a ram’s head. This, however, has of late been denied. Fairbairn says: “It was the god Neph, sometimes written Kneph, and by the Greeks Chnoubis, who was so represented, and the proper seat of whose worship was not Thebes, but Meroë, who also had a famous oracle in the Lybian desert. The Amon of Thebes, ‘king of gods’ as he was called, always had the form simply of a man assigned him, and in one of the characters under which he was worshiped appears to have been virtually identified with the sun, and in another with the Egyptian Pan” (Imperial Bible Dictionary).
Wilkinson says, “The figure of Amun was that of a man, with a head-dress surmounted by two long feathers; the color of his body was light blue, like the Indian Vishnoo, as if to indicate his peculiarly exalted and heavenly nature; but he was not figured with the head or under the form of a ram, as the Greeks and Romans supposed” (Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, vol. 4, p. 246).
“557. The God Ammon” From Manners and Customs of the Bible:
Jeremiah 46:25. Behold, I will punish the multitude of No, rand Pharaoh, and Egypt, with their gods, and their kings.
The most of commentators now agree that amon, here rendered “multitude,” should be taken as a proper name, and left untranslated. The original is amon minno, “Amon of No.” By No is undoubtedly meant the celebrated Egyptian city of Thebes, which was situated on both sides of the Nile, and was noted for its hundred gates of brass, its numerous and splendid temples, obelisks, and statues. Amon was the name of an Egyptian deity, and probably of a Libyan and Ethiopian god, whose worship had its seat in Thebes, where was an oracle of the deity; for which reason the name of the city was joined to that of the god. This is to be noticed not only in this text, but also in Nahum 3:8, where for the “populous No” of our version the original has No Anion. The Greeks likened this god to Zeus, and the Romans called him Jupiter Ammon or Hammon. He appears to have been a personification of the sun, and is thought to have corresponded to Baal of the Phenicians. The ancient Egyptian name is said to have been Amen. On the monuments it is written Amn or Amn-Re, Amon the Sun.
It was formerly supposed, and is still commonly asserted, that this god was represented under the figure of a human form with a ram’s head. This, however, has of late been denied. Fairbairn says: “It was the god Neph, sometimes written Kneph, and by the Greeks Chnoubis, who was so represented, and the proper seat of whose worship was not Thebes, but Meroë, who also had a famous oracle in the Lybian desert. The Amon of Thebes, ‘king of gods’ as he was called, always had the form simply of a man assigned him, and in one of the characters under which he was worshiped appears to have been virtually identified with the sun, and in another with the Egyptian Pan” (Imperial Bible Dictionary).
Wilkinson says, “The figure of Amun was that of a man, with a head-dress surmounted by two long feathers; the color of his body was light blue, like the Indian Vishnoo, as if to indicate his peculiarly exalted and heavenly nature; but he was not figured with the head or under the form of a ram, as the Greeks and Romans supposed” (Manners and Customs of the Ancient Egyptians, vol. 4, p. 246).
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