Cyrus H. Gordon - Land Quotes

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Manslaughter was requited through blood revenge. Accordingly the offender, to escape the avenger, would be forced to flee, cut off from his land and people, at the mercy of strangers far from home. [Examples are] 2 Samuel (14: 5-7)... Iliad a6: 571-574... Odyssey (15: 271-278)... (Genesis 4: 14)... (Genesis 4: 15)

Cyrus H. Gordon
The fitness (physical and moral) of kings were serious matters, for they were believed to bring on a corresponding state of land and people.

Cyrus H. Gordon
The [Judaic] Patriarchs are depicted as Arameans as long as they remained in their native lands.

Cyrus H. Gordon
The warriors who constituted the aristocracy were awarded land grants to recompense them for their share in conquering the country. Both in Greece and in Israel, the theory of society was basically the same. The conquerors were the fighting and ruling stratum; the conquered natives were degraded to the labouring class. In Sparta the latter were called Helots. In Israel the Canaanites were the "hewers of wood and the drawers of water."

Cyrus H. Gordon
Mesopotamian merchants spread their commercial institutions far and wide, into Western Asia, Egypt and Europe. The ancient inhabitants of Babylonia used the word qaqqadum, 'head', in the sense of 'principal'... our English word 'capital' (via Latin caput [head]) reflects ancient Mesoptamian usage.... our financial system, that reckons with interest on principal, harks back to the land between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.

Cyrus H. Gordon
The Conquest of Joshua could not have been a primitive assault, because a civilized land like Canaan with well-fortified cities could easily have repulsed an attack that was militarily naïve.... Spies were sent to search out the land and lay the groundwork.

Cyrus H. Gordon