NAAMAN. An Aramaean commander who as a leper consulted the prophet Elisha and was cured. Converted to the God of Israel, he brought back to Aram two mule loads of earth in order that he should also in the future be able to worship the Lord on Israelite soil (2 Kgs 5). The story about Naaman is part of the Elijah and Elisha cycle of prophetic narratives (1 Kgs 17-2 Kgs 9).
NABAL. (meaning “fool”) A wealthy person from Maon in Judah, a place close to Hebron, rich in sheep and goats. When David demanded protection money from Nabal, he flatly refused the demand. However, when David pressed home his demand, Abigail, Nabal’s wife, paid. When Nabal heard about the danger he had been saved from, he died from a stroke (2 Sam 25).
NABONIDUS. The last king of Babylonia (559-539 B.C.E.). Nabonidus, whose hometown was probably Haran in Upper Mesopotamia, usurped with the help of his son Belshazzar the throne of Babylonia and removed its ruling house. In opposition to the powerful priesthood of Babylon’s city god Marduk, Nabonidus favored the cult of the god Sin, the god of Haran, restoring sanctuaries in the Babylonian province including the ancient Ur. Not very much is known about his reign, except that he stayed away from Babylon for a period of eight years, living in the desert oasis of Tema. During his time in Tema, his son Belshazzar ruled in his place in Babylon. In 539 B.C.E., Nabonidus perished in connection with Cyrus’s conquest of Babylon, probably betrayed by the grandees of Babylon and the priesthood of Marduk. In tradition, he remained a controversial person, on the one hand praised for his piety, and on the other considered a religious fantast and fanatic. In the last capacity, Nabonidus appears in a late tradition such as “the prayer of Nabonidus” found among the Dead Sea Scrolls, and he is most likely also the source of inspiration for the description of Nebuchadnezzar’s madness in the Book of Daniel (Dan 4:25-34).
NABOTH. An Israelite nobleman from Jezreel, whose vineyard became the cause of his death, provoked by a fake process started by Queen Jezebel (1 Kgs 21). The treacherous execution of Naboth was seen as one of the main reasons for the fall of the House of Omri.
NADAB. 1. Oldest son of Aaron, who together with his brother Abihu, Moses, Aaron, and 70 Israelites nobles went up to see the Lord at Sinai (Exod 24:9). He was killed together with his brother because he had misbehaved in ritual matters (Lev 10:1-2).
2. King of Israel 911-910 B.C.E. He succeeded Jeroboam, the first king of the independent Israel, but soon after, while leading the Israelite army against the Philistine town of Gibbethon, was killed by Baasha who consequently exterminated the whole family of Jeroboam (1 Kgs 15:25-31), according to the Old Testament as a fulfillment of the curse put upon Jeroboam by the prophet Ahijah from Shiloh (1 Kgs 14:6-11; 15:29).
NAHASH. A king of Ammon whose war against Jabesh in Gilead provoked a reaction from Saul. Saul rescued the city and was chosen to be king of Israel (1 Sam 11). Nahash was later allied to David (2 Sam 10:1-2).
NAPHTALI. The second son of Jacob and Bilhah, and the eponymous ancestor of the tribe of Naphtali. In the Blessing of Jacob, Naphtali is said to be a “hind to let loose” (Gen 49:21), and in the Blessing of Moses he is described as one who is to conquer land (Deut 33:23). Naphtali’s tribal area was fruitful and productive, the region close to Mount Tabor in eastern Galilee, bordering on the Jordan River. The account of the Israelite victory over the Canaanites in Judges 4-5 is the only tradition pertinent to the history of Naphtali before the introduction of the monarchy. Here Naphtali acted in alliance with Zebulon. In the Period of the Monarchy, Naphtali constituted one of Solomon’s provinces (1 Kgs 4:15). The tribal territory of Naphtali was lost to Israel after the Assyrian reorganization of its provinces in the west in 732 B.C.E.
NATHAN. A prophet at the court of David. It is said that Nathan was responsible for having stopped the king’s plan for building a temple (2 Sam 7), but he also foresaw an eternal kingdom for David and his descendants. On the negative side, Nathan accused the king of having instigated the killing of Uriah after having made Uriah’s wife Bathsheba pregnant (2 Sam 12). As David’s sons fought for the throne, Nathan sided with the winning side and Solomon (1 Kgs 1). Although most if not all of the information about Nathan is legendary, his portrayal in the Books of Samuel is interesting as a testimony to the importance of the prophets as the spokespersons of Yahweh. The prophets are described as the king’s superior advisor and indeed as a more important person than the king himself. It is in accordance with this view of the prophet’s historical role that so much importance has been attached to the promise of Nathan to David in 2 Samuel 7 that his descendants will form an eternally ruling dynasty, if they keep the commandments of the Lord. It has often been assumed that the first part of this promise is old. It established the rights of the Davidic family to rule Jerusalem and Judah. It also appears in Ps 89:28-30 and 132:12. In Psalm 89, the possession of the throne is made dependent on the same conditions as in 2 Samuel 7. The promise of Nathan may therefore have been composed by the later deuteronomistic authors (see also Deuteronomistic History), who are supposed to have written 2 Samuel in order to show why the Davidic kingdom succumbed to foreign powers.
NATION, CONCEPT OF. The concept of the nation in antiquity was most clearly expressed by the Greek historiographer Herodotus (fifth century B.C.E.). His definition of the nation includes three criteria: a common blood, a common language, and a common culture or religion. The concept of nation in the Old Testament shares two of these criteria, the idea of a common blood and a common religion. It departs from the Greek definition by stressing the importance of a common land, the land of Israel, but disregards the demand for a common language, a sensible correction, as the Israelites spoke a dialect belonging to the Amorite language family shared with only a few local varieties by the Phoenicians, the Moabites, the Ammonites, and the Edomites. The modern concept of the nation and ethnicity departs considerably from the ancient ones, defining an ethnic group (nation) in a dynamic and changing way as a group of people who regard themselves as belonging to a certain group or nation, in contrast to other people who are not reckoned to be members of this group and do not regard themselves as members.
NEBO. A mountain east of the Jordan River opposite Jericho. Although Moses was expressly forbidden to enter Canaan, he was allowed to climb this mountain in order to have at least a view of the land of Israel. Here Moses died and was buried.
NEBUCHADNEZZAR, NEBUCHADREZZAR. The second king of the Neo-Babylonian Empire (605-562 B.C.E.). As crown prince he led the Babylonian army to victory against the Egyptians at Charchemish in 605 B.C.E. When his father died, he went home to Babylon and was crowned king. The next few years he spent in Syria forcing the major Syrian cities, including Damascus, to submit to Babylonian rule. A setback in 601 B.C.E., when he turned against Egypt, may have led to the revolt that ended in 597 B.C.E. with the first conquest of Jerusalem and the deportation of King Jehoiachin and a number of Judean citizens, including the future prophet Ezekiel. A new vassal king, Zedekiah, was installed on Judah’s throne, but when he revolted, Nebuchadnezzar finally made up with his Judean adversaries. He conquered Jerusalem in 587 B.C.E., had the royal family of Zedekiah executed at Riblah, and deported a large section of the Judean population. Little is known about the latter part of his reign except that for many years he laid siege to Tyre (585-573 B.C.E.), however without any success.
NEBUZARADAN. The Babylonian officer of Nebuchadnezzar who was entrusted with the destruction of Jerusalem and its temple in 587 B.C.E. (2 Kgs 25; see also Jer 39). Among his duties was to supervise the deportation of the leading Judeans to their death at Riblah, and of ordinary Judeans to their future home in Mesopotamia. He was instructed to save Jeremiah and send him to Gedaliah at Mizpah (Jer 40).
NECHO, NEKO. The Hebrew rendering of the Egyptian Pharaoh Nekau (c. 610-595 B.C.E.). He is mentioned in the Old Testament in connection with Josiah’s death at Megiddo in 609 B.C.E., when Josiah unsuccessfully tried to block the pass at Megiddo in front of the advancing Egyptian army on its way toward Charchemish, where Necho’s forces were routed by the Babylonian army (2 Kgs 23:29).
NEGEB. Or the Negeb of Judah, includes southern Palestine, and probably also parts of northern Sinai. The precise borders of this desertlike territory are difficult to establish, but the center of the biblical Negeb was the territory between Beersheba and Arad. Historically, the Negeb was settled in the Early Bronze Age, and after the general demographic breakdown at the end of this period, it was resettled in the Middle Bronze Age. However, the Late Bronze Age saw a Negeb largely stripped of towns and villages. In the early part of the Iron Age, some resettlement took place. The first millennium witnessed a resurrection of city culture with a major center established at Beersheba. At the end of the Iron Age, the Negeb seems to have been the center of conflict between the Kingdom of Judah and the Edomites, the Edomites successively reducing Judean presence in the Negeb. In the Old Testament, the Negeb was visited by the patriarchs who occasionally lived here. It was allotted to the tribe of Simeon as its territory (Josh 19:1-9), although when Judah swallowed up Simeon, it became Judah’s territory, hence the name “the Negeb of Judah” (e.g., 2 Sam 24:7).
NEHEMIAH, THE BOOK OF NEHEMIAH. Nehemiah served at the Persian court at Susa as a high-ranking official. When he was informed about the conditions of the Jews in Jerusalem, living in a ruined city without walls and gates, he decided to travel there and obtained permission from Artaxerxes, the king of Persia. When he arrived in Jerusalem, secretly and in the middle of the night, he inspected the ruined walls. After having consulted the leading men of the city, the work could begin, although Nehemiah was constantly opposed by three important persons, Sanballat the Horonite, the Tobiah the Ammonite, and the Arab Geshem. In spite of their obstruction, Nehemiah managed to finish the rebuilding of Jerusalem’s walls within the short span of 52 days. Nehemiah also had to attend to other problems, such as a famine, that threatened the survival of the population, and the problem of repopulating Jerusalem. The last problem was solved by moving people from neighboring communities to Jerusalem, while at the same time it became the residence of the leading families of the area. After twelve years Nehemiah could return in peace to his home in Persia, but had to go back to Jerusalem in order to finally settle old scores with the followers of Sanballat and Tobiah, now also including Nehemiah’s former ally, the high priest Eliashib.
Historians generally accept the narrative of the Book of Nehemiah as a historical document including first-rate information about conditions in Judea in the fifth century B.C.E. As such, it narrates about a mission from Persia to Judea that took place around 450 B.C.E., in the time of Artaxerxes I. Nehemiah’s book has, however, been compromised by the Ezra tradition that interrupts the flow of the narrative and has secondarily been inserted by redactors who considered Ezra a contemporary of Nehemiah, although it is generally accepted that Ezra only visited Jerusalem half a century after Nehemiah had ended his mission there.
NINEVEH. The capital of the Neo-Assyrian Empire (see Assyria and Babylonia) c. 700-612 B.C.E., located across the Tigris River from modern Mosul in northern Iraq. The city could trace its origins a long way back but achieved importance in the first millennium when Sennacherib chose it as his new residence. In those days, it was a huge city of not 120,000 inhabitants as claimed by the Book of Jonah (Jonah 4:11) but at least 300,000 inhabitants. In antiquity, the fall of Nineveh in 612 B.C.E. to a coalition of Babylonian and Median armies became proverbial.
NIPPUR. An ancient city of Mesopotamia some 150 kilometers south of Baghdad. Tel-Abib, the home of many deported people from Jerusalem and Judah, was located close to Nippur.
NOB. A city of Benjamin in the vicinity of Jerusalem and the home of a family of priests with roots going back to the sanctuary of Shiloh. When David fled from Saul, Ahimelech, the priest of Nob, supplied him with food and Goliath’s sword. As a consequence, Saul had the priesthood of Nob executed. Only Abiatar escaped (1 Sam 22). Its present location is unknown.
NOMADS. See ECONOMY.
NORTHERN KINGDOM. In scholarly literature one of the terms used to refer to the Kingdom of Israel.
NUBIA. See CUSH.
NUMBERS, BOOK. The fourth Book of Moses. Its name derives from the censuses that open the book. The first section (Num 1-10) includes the final part of the Sinai legislation, but in Numbers 10, the story about the desert migrations (see Desert, Migrations in the Desert) starts again. This time the narrative takes the Israelites from Mount Sinai where they stopped in the Book of Exodus 19 through the desert to the borders of Canaan. Thus Numbers 36—the final chapter of the Pentateuch—leaves the Israelites standing on the eastern bank of the Jordan River, ready to enter the Promised Land. The original plan was that the Israelites should move on from Sinai to southern Palestine, but after having heard the reports of Moses’ spies (Num 13-14), they lost faith and were condemned to continue their travels in the wilderness for another 40 years. During their migration east of Palestine, they encountered numerous foreign peoples and nations, including the Edomites, the Moabites, and the Amorites. They either fought against these foes or circumvented them.