Deuteronomy 3:29

the valley over against Beth-peor Heb. the gai= hollow, glen, ravine, inapplicable to the Jordan plain; rather one of the glens descending to this from the Moab-plateau. That suits the probable meaning of P e -or, gap or cleft (Ar. fughrah, -a river-mouth"; cp. the -other Phogor" of Euseb. and Jer. near Bethlehem, the modern Kh. Fâghûr, PEF Map Sh. xvii.). Beth-Pe-orabbrev. from Beth-Ba-al-Pe-or, shrine of the B. of P. (cp. Deuteronomy 4:3). This gaiof Israel's encampment, where also Moses was buried (Deuteronomy 34:6), unnamed, but defined as over against Beth-pe-or(so too Deuteronomy 4:46), is also nameless in E, Numbers 21:20, defined as in the region of Moab, and these words are added, headland of the Pisgah that looks upon the Yeshîmon; and Numbers 23:28 gives a headland of Pe-or that looks out upon the Yeshîmon; while Beth-Pe-or is placed by P, Joshua 13:20, with the slopes of the Pisgah and Beth-Y e shimôth. Again Euseb. and Jer. describe Beth-phogor as near Mt Phogor opposite Jericho 6 Roman miles above Livias, the mod. Tell er-Rameh, on the Jordan plain. These data suit the identification of the gaiwith the W. -Uyûn Musa, on the N. of the Nebo or Pisgah headland (see on Deuteronomy 3:17). So Dillm., G. A. Smith (HGHL, 564) and G. B. Gray (Numbers 21:20). Further, Musil (Moab, 344 f., 348) suggests for the headland of Pe-orthe headland to the N. of W. -Uyûn Musa, and for Beth-Pe-or the ruins and shrine esh-Sheikh Jâyel on one of the steps of that headland, -thence one gets the best view of the lower slopes and of the Jordan valley." The stream of the wady between these two headlands, before it reaches the Dead Sea, passes the ruins es-Sueimeh, in which there is a possible echo of Y e shimon, and Y e shimôth; and the bare district about this lies in full view of both headlands. There is, therefore, no need to read Pisgah for Pe-or in Numbers 23:28 on the basis of Numbers 21:20. On the whole the above identification of the Gaiwith the W. -Uyun Musa is preferable to that with the next wâdy to the N., the W. Hesbân (Driver). Conder's proposal for Beth-Pe-or (Heth and Moab, 146), the headland by -Ain el Minyeh, would remove the Gaitoo far south.