Casluhim

Caslu´him, properly Casluchim, a people whose progenitor was a son of Mizraim (Gen 10:14; 1Ch 1:12). He, or they, for the word applies rather to a people than to an individual, are supposed by Bochart and others to have carried a colony from Egypt, which settled in the district between Pelusium and Gaza, or, in other words, between the Egyptians and the Philistines. There are some grounds for this conjecture; but it is impossible to obtain any certainty on so obscure a subject.

Descendants of Mizraim. See CAPHTORIM.\par

Cas’luhim. (fortified). A Mizraite people or tribe. Gen 10:14; 1Ch 1:12.

Of Mizraite (Egyptian) origin (Gen 10:14; 1Ch 1:12). Herodotus (2:104) says the Colchians were of Egyptian origin; so Bochart identifies the Casluhim with the Colchians. Out of them proceeded the Philistines. Forster (Ep. ad Michael., 16, etc.) conjectures Casiotis, a region between Gaza and Pelusium, called from Mount Custos. Knobel says the name in Coptic means burning, i.e. a dry desert region. The Colchians were probably a colony from Casiotis.

(Hebrews Kasluchim´, כִּסְלֻחִים, of uncertain, but prob. foreign etymology; Sept. in Genesis Χασμωνιείμ,Vulg. Chasluin; in Chronicles Χασλωνιείμ v. r. Χασλωείμ, Caslu’m), a people whose progenitor was a son of Mizraim (Gen 10:14; 1Ch 1:12). In both passages it would appear, as the text now stands, that the Philistines came forth from the Casluhim, and not from the Caphtorim, as is elsewhere expressly stated: here, therefore, there may be a transposition. SEE CAPHTOR. The only clue we have as yet to the position of the Casluhim is their place in the list of the sons of Mizraim between the Pathrusim and the Caphtorim, whence it is probable that they were seated in Upper Egypt. SEE PATHROS. The Sept. seems to identify them with the Chashmannim, חִשְׁמִנִּים, of Psa 68:31 (A. V. "princes"), which some (Michaelis, Suppl. p. 973), though not the Sept. in that place, take to be a proper name, and compare with the native civil name of Hermopolis Magna. This would place the Casluhim in the Heptanomis. SEE HASHMANNIM.

Bochart (Phalyg, 4:31) suggests the identity of the Casluhim with the Colchians (comp. Michaelis, Spicilyg. 1:275 sq.), who are said to have been an Egyptian colony (Herod. 2:104; Diod. Sic. 1:28; Dionys. Perieg. p. 689; Ammian. Marc. 22:22; comp. Agath. Hist. 2:18); but this story and the similarity of name do not seem sufficient to render the supposition a probable one, although Gesenius (see Hitzig, Philist. p. 86 sq.) gives it his support (Thes. p. 702; comp. Ritter, Vorhalle, p. 35 sq.; Brehmer, Entdeck. 1:354 sq.). Forster (Ep. ad Michael. p. 16 sq.) conjectures the Casluhim to be the inhabitants of Cassiotis, the tract in which is the slight elevation called Mount Casius (Pliny, 5:12 and 14; Strabo, 17:759; Steph. Byz. p. 455). Bunsen assumes this to be proved (Bibelwerk, p. 26). There is, however, a serious difficulty in the way of this supposition — the nature of the ground, a low littoral tract of rock, covered with shifting and even quick sand. But Ptolemy (Geogr. 4:5, 12; comp. Joseph. War, 4:5, 11) gives us the names of several towns lying in this district, so that it must have been capable of supporting a population, and may, in an earlier period, have been quite adequate to the support of a tribe. The position of the Casluhim in the list beside the Pathrusim and the Caphtorim renders it probable that the original seat of the tribe was somewhere in Lower Egypt, and not far from the vicinity of that "Serbonian Bog betwixt Damiata and Mount Casius old" (Par. Lost, 2:592). Hiller (Syntag. Herm. p. 178 sq.) refers the name to the Solymi of the Greeks (Strabo, 1:34; 14:667), in the neighborhood of the Lycians (comp. Schulthess, Parad. p. 166 sq.). The supposition of Hitzig (Philist. p. 90 sq.) that the Casluhim were a Cretan colony in Libya, whence again a colony was sent to Philistia, is merely based upon a vague allusion in Tacitus (Hist. 5:2). SEE ETHNOLOGY.

[Cas’luhim]

People who descended from Mizraim, and ’out of whom came Philistim’ or the Philistines (some of the Philistines: see CAPHTOR). Gen 10:14; 1Ch 1:12.

By: Richard Gottheil, W. Max Muller

According to Gen. x. 14 (= I Chron. i. 12), the Casluhim are sons of Mizraim; i.e., a part or dependency of the Egyptians. Bochart ("Geographia Sacra," iv. 31) knew no better identification than the Colchians in the eastern corner of the Black Sea, because, according to a strange and utterly improbable statement of Herodotus (ii. 104), repeated by Diodorus Siculus (i. 28, 55), Strabo, and others, these were Egyptians who had emigrated. Knobel ("Völkertafel"), after Forster, suggested their identity with the Casiotis between Pelusium and Rinocolura, a tract of desert coast before the Sirbonis lake, which is almost uninhabitable. Ebers, "Ägypten und die Bücher Moses" (p. 120), tried to support this view by an alleged Coptic etymology, "kaslokh" (arid mountain), which is impossible in every respect (the correct Egyptian form would be "tasrokḥ"). It is not possible to say anything on the name "Casluhim," the more so because the LXX. reads differently. Whether the latter's Xασμωνιείμ (!) has anything to do with the "Nitriotes nomos," or Natron valley, west of Egypt ("ḥesmen"; Egyptian, "Natron"; compare Ebers, l.c.), is very questionable.

CASLUHIM.—A name occurring in Gen 10:14, 1Ch 1:12, in connexion with the names of other peoples there spoken of as descended from Mizraim, esp. the Caphtorim and Philistines.

kas´lū̇-him, kas-lū-him (כּסלחים, kaṣlūḥı̄m; Χασμωνιείμ, Chasmōnieı́m): The name of a people mentioned in Gen 10:14; 1Ch 1:12 as descended from Mizraim. The parenthesis should probably follow Caphtorim. From them, it is said, sprang the PHILISTINES.