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Kefar Shiḥlayim

KEFAR SHIḤLAYIM (Heb. כְּפַר שִׁיחְלַיִים), village in Idumea, probably identical with the Sallis in which the Jewish general Niger took refuge after an unsuccessful assault on Ashkelon (Jos., Wars, 3:20). According to talmudic sources, Kefar Shiḥlayim was a large village, which was destroyed either in the First Jewish War against Rome or in the war of Bar Kokhba (Lam. R. 2:2, no. 4). The inhabitants of the village grew cress (shiḥlah). A man from the village appeared before R. Tarfon in the early second century (TJ, Jer. 16:5, 15d). The location of the village of Saleim, mentioned by Eusebius (Onom. 160:9–10) as lying seven Roman miles west of Eleutheropolis (Bet Guvrin), seems to correspond to that of Kefar Shiḥlayim. This would place the ancient site of Khirbat Shaḥla, 2 mi. (3.2 km.) east of ʿ Irāq al-Manshiyya. The suggested identification with the biblical Shilhim (Josh. 15:32) is doubtful.

BIBLIOGRAPHY:

Loew, Flora, 1 (1924), 50ff.; P. Romanoff, Onomasticon of Palestine (1937), 215ff.


Sources: Encyclopaedia Judaica. © 2007 The Gale Group. All Rights Reserved.