Genesis 10 - Noah’s Family Tree - Havilah
The name Havilah appears two time in Noah’s family tree:
- Shem >Â Arphaxad > Shelah > Eber > Peleg > Joktan > Havilah
- Ham > Cush > Havilah
The name Havilah appears in scripture 7 times. Most of those times simply recall one of these genealogies…
- Genesis 10:7Â - Son of Cush
- Genesis 10:29Â - Son of Joktan
- 1 Chronicles 1:9Â - Son of Cush
- 1 Chronicles 1:23Â - Son of Joktan
The other three references are to locations…
- Genesis 2:11Â - Location of Pishon River
- Genesis 25:18Â - Ishmael’s descendants settled from Havilah to Egypt
- 1 Samuel 15:7Â - Saul attacked the Amalekites from Havilah to Shur
I discussed Havilah a bit in Genesis 10 - Noah’s Family Tree - Ashur may have settled along the Tigris, and the bottom line is that the location of Havilah is not certain. From what I could tell, it would located in Western Iran, east of the Tigris River.
According to Wikipedia…
One is the son of Cush, the son of Ham; the other, a son of Joktan and descendant of Shem. The former is listed with names associated with the region of the Gulf of Aden while the latter is listed with names associated with the Arabian desert. Such a land in the Arabian desert is mentioned in Genesis 25:18, where it defines the border of the territory inhabited by the Ishmaelites, and in 1 Samuel 15:7, which states that king Saul of Israel attacked the Amalekites who were living there.
Therefore, it would seem that the location of Havilah in Genesis 2:11 would appear to be associated with Shem in the Arabian desert, and not Ham. As I discussed in my post on Ashur…
According to Wikipedia…
David Rohl identified Pishon with the Uizhun, placing Havilah to the northeast of Mesopotamia. The Uizhun is known locally as the Golden River. Rising near Mt. Sahand, it meanders between ancient gold mines and lodes of lapis lazuli before feeding the Caspian Sea. Such natural resources correspond to the ones associated with the land of Havilah in Genesis.
This places on end of the pishon at Rasht, by the Southern side of the Caspian Sea, and also near Mt. Sahand. In the following map, you can see the Caspian in at the top of the map. Using the previous map’s labeling as a guide, it is West of the Caspian by Lake Urmia, just south of Tabriz. You can see exactly where here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sahand.
December 26th, 2010 at 9:15 pm
I just posted on Joktan’s sons. I was able to find locations for 6 of his 13 sons within the eastern coast documented in Genesis… including his son Havilah. This conflicts with the theory that Ham’s grandson was in the Gulf of Aden, because that’s exactly where Joktan’s descendents were. I am wondering whether the writers I cited didn’t get the two Havilahs backwards.