Chapter 34. The Amaleqim and Agagite Bloodline
Amalekites were tallied in the Numbers 13 accounting as immediately following the Anakim and before the hybrid Canaanite, Hittite, Jebusite, and Amorite families. The order indicates that Amalekites were more powerful than the other hybrid nations or were Amaleqim closely related to the Anakim. In the scouts’ report, Amalekites dwelled south of Hebron, in the Negev and thus in the Edom/Horim region.
Nelson’s Dictionary authenticated that Amalek’s name was patronymic from the Amaleqim, that Amalekites were the eponymously named posterity, as were the original Amaleqim by implication. It follows that Amalek’s patronymic name came about by some form of close association with the Amaleqim. Unger’s Dictionary concurs, suggesting Amalekites merged with the original inhabitants of Seir, the Amaleqim by implication, versus Horim. Hence the Amalekites documented in Numbers 13 were likely the remnant of Amaleqim that included hybrids.
Josephus commented on the descendants of Amalek and Timna, stating: “Amalek was not legitimate, but by a concubine, whose name was Thamna. These dwelled in that part of Idumea which is called Gebalitis, and that denominated from Amalek, Amalekitis; for Idumea was a large country, and did then preserve the name of the whole, while in its several parts it kept the names of its peculiar inhabitants.” Strong’s Dictionary concurred with Josephus, stating that `Amaleqiy derived “patronymically from” `Amaleq, a name of foreign origination meaning a valley dweller, an eponymous and patrial name of their people and country respectively. Scripturally, Gebal was an Idumean mountain located toward the Dead Sea, a word meaning “a boundary,” and the name of a people listed in the conspiracy to wipe Israel from the face of the earth. A remnant group of Gebal were described later dwelling in Sidon as the “ancients of Gebal” and “wise men” and “calkers” (Ezek 27:9). The Gebalim ancients/zaqen were wise/chakam meaning intelligent, skillful, artful, and cunning, and calkers/chaqaz meaning strong, courageous, and stout, akin to how the Rephaim and Terrible Ones were described. The Gebalim were a patrial and anonymous branch of the Aboriginal Amaleqim.
