Atlas Biblica

    place

    Chephirah

    כְּפִירָה

    Chephirah was one of the Gibeonite towns that became part of the territories of Benjamin and Judah.

    Where the story of Chephirah happensWhere the gazetteer locates Chephirah, framed to them: Chephirah. Each dot is a coordinate from the gazetteer. The coastline is a modern one, simplified; no border, road or settlement of any period is drawn, and no line joins two points, because the rows state where and not in what order.Chephirah
    Where the gazetteer locates Chephirah
    verses
    4
    first named
    Joshua 9:17
    last named
    Nehemiah 7:29
    feature
    settlement
    coordinates
    31.83°N · 35.11°E
    settlement31.83°N · 35.11°E

    Khirbet el Kefireh (OpenBible)

    The gazetteer records one identification, and no competing one.

    Description

    Chephirah in the text

    In the words of STEPBible TIPNR:

    Chephirah was one of the four Gibeonite cities, along with Gibeon, Beeroth, and Kirjath-jearim, that deceived Joshua and the Israelites into making a peace treaty with them (Joshua 9:17). The Gibeonites, fearing destruction by the Israelites, sent ambassadors disguised as travelers from a distant land to seek a covenant of peace. Joshua and the leaders of Israel made a treaty with them without consulting the Lord, only to discover later that the Gibeonites were actually their neighbors.

    As a result of the treaty, the Gibeonites were spared but were assigned to serve as woodcutters and water carriers for the congregation and the altar of the Lord (Joshua 9:27). Chephirah, along with the other Gibeonite cities, was initially allotted to the tribe of Benjamin (Joshua 18:26) but later became part of the territory of Judah.

    After the Babylonian exile, the descendants of the Gibeonites, including those from Chephirah, returned to their cities and were counted among the people of Israel (Ezra 2:25; Nehemiah 7:29). The town's mention in these post-exilic records indicates that it was still inhabited and recognized as a distinct community during the Persian period.

    Relations

    Direct connections

    Every entity the graph places in a stated relation with this one, grouped by the kind of link. Each relation is authored once and its inverse derived, so both ends always agree. Rows marked “registry” come from the identity spine rather than from a verse, and a row marked “which bearer is the source’s decision” is one where the name could have meant more than one person. The last group is not a relation at all — it counts the events two entities stand in together.

    Stands in the same events as

    Read it

    Where to read it

    Every verse of the text carried here that names this entity — 4, across 3 books.

    1. Joshua2 verses

      9:1718:26

    2. Ezra1 verse

      2:25

    3. Nehemiah1 verse

      7:29

    Onward

    Where this page goes

    Nothing in the graph stands one hop from this entity yet. These are the best-connected entities of the same type, so the page still ends somewhere. Descriptions by STEPBible TIPNR.

    ElsewhereJerusalemThe capital of Israel, a holy city for three religionsElsewhereEgyptAncient nation; Israelites enslaved there; plagues and ExodusElsewhereJordanA river and region, significant in Israel's history

    Where they appear

    What happened here

    Atlas's reading of each chapter this place appears in, in canonical order. One line per chapter, and each leads to the whole of it.

    Sources

    What this rests on