Q. 117. In confirmation of your reply to the above query (p. 90), and of the opinion that leaven is always used in scripture in a bad sense, and would be so understood by our Lord’s hearers, the following remark of a recent writer may be interesting:— “No Arabic protestant minister or preacher in the Holy Land would speak of the world as being leavened by Christianity, but would consider such an association of ideas as incongruous and unnatural.”
Q. 214, 215. I should be glad to have the position of the valley of Hinnom further elucidated. By your references to this valley, you appear to regard it as the valley bounding the modern city of Jerusalem on the south and west.
Is this really the valley called in scripture the valley of (Ge)-hinnom?
The Revelation W. F. Birch (in Palestine Exploration Quarterly Statement, for April, 1882, pp. 55, etc.) maintains that scriptural statements respecting the valley show that it was the one which separated the Temple Hill and Ophel, from that part now known as Zion.
In previous articles he has, I think, shown that in Scripture, “Zion,” the “City of David” and “Jebus,” are all names of one place, and that situated on the Eastern hill of Jerusalem. If he is wrong will you please give the passages which prove (Qy. 215, 4), “The city of the Jebusites was the part known in modern times as Zion.” H. S.
(We do not think that we can open our pages to the discussion of a subject such as this, which, deeply interesting as it must be to all our readers, cannot we think be independently investigated by many. In the answer referred to, we gave the view generally adopted, which distinguishes the valley of Hinnom from the Tyropoeon: but as to the identification of the different localities in Jerusalem, we have no doubt much to learn, and we may look for further light from the explorations now being carried on. That Zion was the Eastern Hill of Jerusalem, is a view that has been maintained by several writers. —En.)