Place · Water · River
Kishon
Also known as Kison
Named in 5 verses across 3 books, first in Judges 4:7.
In the Bible
All 5 verses, in Bible order. Text from the Berean Standard Bible; verse numbers follow the KJV.
Judges
- Judges 4:7
And I will draw out Sisera the commander of Jabin’s army, his chariots, and his troops to the River Kishon, and I will deliver him into your hand.’”
- Judges 4:13
he summoned all nine hundred of his iron chariots and all the men with him, from Harosheth-hagoyim to the River Kishon.
- Judges 5:21
The River Kishon swept them away, the ancient river, the River Kishon. March on, O my soul, in strength!
1 Kings
- 1 Kings 18:40
Then Elijah ordered them, “Seize the prophets of Baal! Do not let a single one escape.” So they seized them, and Elijah brought them down to the Kishon Valley and slaughtered them there.
Psalms
- Psalms 83:9
Do to them as You did to Midian, as to Sisera and Jabin at the River Kishon,
Dictionary
From Easton’s Bible Dictionary (1897), as attached to this record by Theographic. Its geography and “modern” descriptions date from the 1890s. Easton wrote in 1897, and some of his views are now debated.
Read Easton’s entry
Winding, a winter torrent of Central Palestine, which rises about the roots of Tabor and Gilboa, and passing in a northerly direction through the plains of Esdraelon and Acre, falls into the Mediterranean at the north-eastern corner of the bay of Acre, at the foot of Carmel. It is the drain by which the waters of the plain of Esdraelon and of the mountains that surround it find their way to the sea. It bears the modern name of Nahr el-Mokattah, i.e., “the river of slaughter” (comp. 1 Kings 18:40). In the triumphal song of Deborah (Judg. 5:21) it is spoken of as “that ancient river,” either (1) because it had flowed on for ages, or (2), according to the Targum, because it was “the torrent in which were shown signs and wonders to Israel of old;” or (3) probably the reference is to the exploits in that region among the ancient Canaanites, for the adjoining plain of Esdraelon was the great battle-field of Palestine.
This was the scene of the defeat of Sisera (Judg. 4:7, 13), and of the destruction of the prophets of Baal by Elijah (1 Kings 18:40). “When the Kishon was at its height, it would be, partly on account of its quicksands, as impassable as the ocean itself to a retreating army.”