the son of Cush, Gen 10:7. There must have been other, and perhaps many, Havilahs beside the original one, a part of the numerous and wide-spread posterity of Cush. By one and the first of these, it is probable that the western shores of the Persian Gulf were peopled; by another, the country of Colchis; and by another, the parts about the southern border of the Dead Sea and the confines of Judea, the country afterward inhabited by the Amalekites.
Hav´ilah
1. A district in Arabia Felix, deriving its name from the second son of Cush (Gen 10:7), or, according to others, from the second son of Joktan (Gen 10:29; comp. 25:18). There can be no doubt, however, of the existence of a double Havilah; one founded by the descendant of Ham, and the other by that of Shem. From Gen 25:18, it would appear that the land of Havilah formed the eastern boundary of the Israelites, and so likewise from 1Sa 15:7, where it seems, moreover, to have been a possession belonging to the Amalekites.
2. A land rich in gold, bdellium, and shoham, mentioned in Gen 2:11, in the geographical description of Paradise. Some identify this with the preceding; but others take it to be Chwala on the Caspian Sea; and others suppose it a general name for India, in which case the river Pison, mentioned as surrounding it, would be identified with the Ganges.
The Scripture mention a Havilah descended from Ham, Gen 10:7, and another from Shem, Gen 11:29 . We must assume a double Havilah, corresponding to each of these.\par 1. The location of one Havilah is connected with that of the Garden of Eden. According to one theory, it is to be sought on the southeastern extremity of the Black Sea; according to another, at the head of the Persian Gulf. See EDEN.\par 2. The other Havilah seems to have in Arabia. From the statement in 1Sa 15:7, that "Saul smote the Amalekites from Havilah unto Shurm that is over against Egypt," it would seen to have been somewhere in the north-western part of Arabia; since, from the circumstances of this campaign, we cannot well suppose that it extended over a great tract of country.\par
Hav’ilah. (circle).
1. A son of Cush. Gen 10:7.
2. A son of Joktan. Gen 10:29.
3. Gen 2:11. A part of Eden through which flowed the river Pison (Araxes). It was probably the , Colchis, in the northeast corner of Asia Minor, near the Caspian Sea.
4. A district in Arabia Felix, Gen 10:7, named from the second son of Cush; probably the district of Kualan, in the northwestern part of Yemen.
1. Gen 10:7.
2. Descendants of Havilah, son of Cush, probably intermingled with the descendants of Havilah the Joktanite Havilah. So one people was formed, occupying Khawlan, the fertile region in the N.W. portion of Yemen or Arabia Felix. The Joktanite settlement was probably the earliest, the Arabs tracing the name Khawlan (which is another form of Havilah or Chavilah, with the ending n) to a descendant of Kahtan or Joktan. The region is fertile, abounding in myrrh, well watered, and populous. The Havilah bordering on the Ishmaelites "as thou goest to Assyria" (Gen 25:18), also on Amalek (1Sa 15:7), seems distinct. This Havilah is not as the former Havilah in the heart of Yemen, but on the border of Arabia Petrea toward Yemen, between the Nabateans and the Hagarites; the country of the Chauloteans.
Havilah (hăv’i-lah or ha-vî’lah), circle, district. A country abounding in gold, bdellium, and onyx stone. Gen 2:11. Havilah is mentioned as a boundary of the children of Ishmael. Gen 25:18. Kalisch supposes that it was a country between the Persian and the Arabian gulfs; others hold that the "country of Havilah" in 1Sa 15:7 refers to the region about Mount Seir, and that it was not probably identical with the Havilah of Gen 2:11.
[Havi’lah]
1. Son of Cush, a descendant of Ham. Gen 10:7; 1Ch 1:9.
2. Son of Joktan, a descendant of Shem. Gen 10:29; 1Ch 1:23.
3. Land compassed by the river Pison, where there was fine gold and precious stones. Gen 2:11. It has not been identified.
4. District near or connected with that of the Amalekites, on the south of Palestine, reaching towards Shur ’that is over against Egypt.’ Gen 25:18; 1Sa 15:7. It was probably named from No. 2.
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By: Emil G. Hirsch, A. H. Sayce
Name of a district, or districts, in Arabia. According to I Sam. xv. 7, Saul smote the Amalekites from Havilah to Shur (the region of the "wall"), "over against Egypt"; the Ishmaelites are also placed in the same locality (Gen. xxv. 18), which will thus correspond with the northern part of Arabia, the "Melukhkha" or "Salt Desert" of the cuneiform inscriptions. In Gen. x. 29 and I Chron. i. 23, on the other hand, Havilah is a son of Joktan, associated with Sheba and Ophir in the southern portion of the peninsula. As, however, the Assyrian inscriptions show that the power of Sheba extended as far north as the frontiers of Babylonia, it is not necessary to transplant Havilah from the north to the south, more especially as Mesha (Gen. x. 30) is probably the Assyrian "Mas," the northern desert of Arabia. The Havilah of Gen. ii. 11 is certainly to be sought in this direction, since the Pison, which "compassed" it, was, like the Euphrates and Tigris, a river of Eden, the Babylonian "Edin," or the Chaldean plain. It is said that it produced gold, bdellium, and the "shoham" stone. This last has been identified by some Assyriologists with the "samtur" stone of the monuments, which was found in Melukhkha. Glaser makes bdellium the exudation of the balsam-tree.
It is questionable whether the Cushite Havilah mentioned in Gen. x. 7 is to be looked for in Arabia or Africa. Arabian tribes migrated to the opposite coasts of Africa in early times. The fact, however, that Raamah, Sheba, and Dedan are coupled with Havilah is in favor of Arabia; and Havilah, like Sheba, might geographically be described as both Joktanite, or southern, and Cushite, or northern.
Havilah was identified by Bochart and Niebuhr with Khaulan in Tehamah, between Mecca and Sana; by Gesenius with the Khaulotæi of Strabo in northern Arabia; and by Kautzsch with Ḥuwailah on the Persian Gulf; while the supposed African Havilah has been found in the Aualis of Ptolemy and Pliny, now Zeila. Glaser places it in Yemama (central and northeastern Arabia), from which gold was "almost exclusively" brought in ancient times. Ball has pointed out a statement of the Arabic writer Yaḳut that Ḥawil was the dialect spoken not only by the people of Mahrah in the south, but also by "the descendants of Midian, the son of Abraham."
HAVILAH.—A son of Cush according to Gen 10:7, 1Ch 1:9, of Joktan according to Gen 10:29, 1Ch 1:23. The river Pison (see Eden [Garden of]) is said to compass the land of Havilah (Gen 2:11-12), and it formed one of the limits of the region occupied by the sons of Ishmael (Gen 25:18) in which also Saul smote the Amalekites (1Sa 15:8). It has been suggested that it formed the N.E. part of the Syrian desert, but it may with greater probability be identified with central and N.E. Arabia.
L. W. King.
(1) Son of Cush (Gen 10:7; 1Ch 1:9).
(2) Son of Yoktan, descendant of Shem (Gen 10:29; 1Ch 1:23).
(3) Mentioned with Shur as one of the limits of the territory of the Ishmaelites (Gen 25:18); compare the same limits of the land of the Amalekites (1Sa 15:7), where, however, the text is doubtful. It is described (Gen 2:11, Gen 2:12) as bounded by the river Pishon and as being rich in gold, bdellium and “shoham-stone” (English Version of the Bible, “onyx”). The shoham-stone was perhaps the Assyrian