The Rural Voice, 2002-12, Page 19the walls and create terraces. This
allowed the mountainous districts of
Samaria, Gilboa, Carmel and other
ranges to become celebrated areas of
productivity but this method of
farming required constant attention to'
protect the terraces from the heavy
winter rains. Wars and subsequent
depopulation made these
improvements vulnerable to loss.
Jews dating centuries before
Christ's birth were very proud of
their agricultural skills according to
JewishEncyclopedia.com but they
learned many of these skills from the
Canaanites. Israel had conquered
Canaan and the local population was
forced to teach the invaders the
secrets of cultivating crops.
Until then Israelites were known
mostly as herdsmen, pasturing their
sheep and cattle on commons without
generally cultivating soil.
According to The American
Wool Council Education
Center, it's thought the
domestication of sheep goes back
probably 10,000 years to the
discovery by residents of central Asia
that sheep could provide both food
and clothing. The clothing, in those
times, meant using the soft skin of
the animal. It was probably about
3500 BC that people learned how to
spin wool and make clothing from it.
The fact that the shepherds in the
biblical story were said to be minding
their flocks of sheep the night of
Christ's birth has been used as proof
by some biblical scholars that the
December 25 date we celebrate could
not have been the actual historical
date of the birth. Harold W. Hoehner
in Chronological Aspects of the Life
of Christ, for instance, notes that
from November until March sheep
were generally brought down from
the cold hills and herded into
enclosures, though he acknowledges
that this might have been a mild
winter. Also, he notes, the shepherds
were said to have been in the hills
around Bethlehem which might mean
the sheep had been brought down
from the more rugged, wilderness
pastures for the winter.
According to the website
StudyLight.org, the Jordan River was
the boundary between two very
different kinds of agriculture in
biblical days. On the east side of the
Jordon there were wide plains,
upland valleys, park -like forests and
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