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Mizpah - location profile

Location and Setting

• Mizpah of Benjamin was an important city on the "Patriarch's Highway," the north-south route that follows the watershed of the Hill Country. The city was located between Ramah and Bethel, near the northern border of the tribe of Judah.
  
• Two locations have been identified as the site of Mizpah. One is present day Nebi Samwil, five miles north of Jerusalem. It is the highest hill in northern Judea at 2,942 feet. The other is the site of Tell en-Nasbeh, about eight miles north of Jerusalem. Evidence for each of these sites is credible and their heights would be compatible with the name Mizpah, which means "watchtower."
  
• Mizpah was also the name of five other Old Testament sites:
  1. It was a place in Gilead where Jacob built a monument as a confirmation of the covenant between his father-in-law, Laban, and himself (Gen 31:49).
  2. Mizpah was the designation of a region at the foot of Mount Hermon (Josh 11:3, 8).
  3. Mizpah also referred to a city in Judah located in the Shephelah (Josh 15:38).
  4. Mizpah of Gilead was probably Ramoth-gilead, the home of Jephthah, and a city of refuge (Josh 13:26; 20:8; Judg 11:29, 34).
  5. Mizpah of Moab was the city where David brought his parents for safety from Saul (1 Sam 22:3).

Historical and Biblical Significance

• When the Levite's concubine was raped by the men of Gibeah, the sons of Israel met at Mizpah of Benjamin, where they decided to attack the men of Benjamin for this grievous sin (Judg 20:1-11).
• After the debacle at Aphek, where they lost the ark to the Philistines, Samuel gathered all Israel to Mizpah to offer sacrifices to the Lord and ask Him to forgive their sin. The Philistines, assuming that Israel had gathered for battle against them, went up to the Central Benjamite Plain to attack Israel. Samuel cried out to the Lord for deliverance and the Lord brought thunder against the Philistines. The Israelites then routed the confused and panic-stricken Philistines, driving them down to Beth-car. To memorialize this event, Samuel set up a stone between Mizpah and Shen and named it Ebenezer ("stone of help"), because the Lord had helped them (1 Sam 7:5-12).
• Mizpah was one of the cities to which Samuel traveled on his annual circuit to judge Israel (1 Sam 7:16).
  
• Samuel gathered the people of Israel to Mizpah for the Lord to identify their first king. There, Saul was chosen by lot from all the tribes and families of Israel (1 Sam 10:17-24).
  King Asa fortified Mizpah, along with Geba, against the attack of the Northern Kingdom using stones and timbers from Ramah (1 Kgs 15:22; 2 Chr 16:6).
  
• After they had destroyed Jerusalem in 586 B.C., the Babylonians appointed Gedaliah governor in Mizpah over the remaining residents of Judah. Many Jews returned to Mizpah from where they had fled. The prophet Jeremiah came to Mizpah from Ramah, where the Babylonians had released him. Later Ishmael, a member of the royal family, assassinated Gedaliah. The inhabitants of Mizpah feared retribution from Nebuchadnezzar, but Jeremiah assured them the Lord would protect them. Despite Jeremiah's warning that the people would be a reproach and die if they went to Egypt, they persisted in going there (2 Kgs 25:23-26; Jer 40:6- 42:22).
  
• Men from Mizpah helped repair the wall of Jerusalem under Nehemiah (Neh 3:7,15,19).

• Kelso, J.L. "Mizpah Mizpeh" The Zondervan Pictorial Encyclopedia of the Bible. Ed. Merrill C. Tenney. 5 vols. Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1976.
• Lockyer, Sr., Herbert, ed. Nelson's Illustrated Bible Dictionary. Nashville: Thomas Nelson Publishers, 1986