Hazor
City · Hazor → Tel Hazor, Israel
The greatest city of Canaan, head of all those kingdoms, whose king gathered the north against Joshua at the waters of Merom. Israel burned it, Solomon walled it, and Assyria at last carried its people away.
People
- Jabin
- Joshua
- Deborah
- Barak
- Solomon
- Tiglath-Pileser III
At a glance
- Realm
- Canaan, then Israel (Naphtali)
- Role
- Greatest Canaanite city, head of the northern kingdoms
- Peoples
- Canaanites, then Israel
- First mention
- Joshua 11 (Jabin’s coalition)
The story
Hazor in upper Galilee was the largest city of Canaan, a walled citadel above a vast lower town, and Scripture calls it the head of all those northern kingdoms. Its ashes still show a great burning at the end of the Bronze Age.
Its king Jabin gathered the kings of the north against Joshua at the waters of Merom, and Israel routed them and burned Hazor with fire. A later Jabin of Hazor oppressed Israel until Deborah and Barak broke him, Solomon walled the city among his strongholds, and at last Assyria carried its people away.
Through the eras
- The Patriarchs · standing. The greatest city of Canaan in its age, named in the old archives of the east.
- Conquest & Judges · at its height. Head of all those kingdoms, burned in Joshua’s war; its great ash layer is dated by many nearer 1230 BC.
- The United Kingdom · rebuilt. Solomon walled Hazor with Megiddo and Gezer; whether its gate is his or a later king’s is debated.
- Divided Kingdoms · in ruins. Destroyed by Tiglath-Pileser of Assyria in 732 BC; Galilee was carried away.
- The Exile · in ruins.
- The Return · absent from the map.