1. Gi´hon, a fountain near Jerusalem. The place outside the city to which the young Solomon was taken to be anointed king, was called Gihon, but its direction is not indicated (; ). Subsequently king Hezekiah 'stopped the upper water-course [or upper out-flow of the waters] of Gihon, and brought it straight down to the west side of the city of David' (; ). This was, perhaps, on occasion of the approach of the Assyrian army under Sennacherib, when, to prevent the besiegers from finding water, great numbers of the people labored with much diligence in stopping the water of the fountains without the city, and in particular of 'the brook that ran through the midst of the land' (). The author of the book of Sirach () also states, that 'Hezekiah brought water into the midst of the city; he dug with iron into the rock, and built fountains for the waters.' The fountain of Gihon is also mentioned by Josephus. From a comparison of these passages the editor of the Pictorial Bible (on 2 Chronicles 32) arrived at the conclusion, since confirmed by Dr. Robinson, that there existed anciently a fountain of Gihon, on the west side of the city, which was 'stopped' or covered over by Hezekiah, and its waters brought by subterraneous channels into the city. Before that time it would naturally have flowed down through the valley of Gihon, and probably formed the brook which was stopped at the same time. 'The fountain may have been stopped, and its waters thus secured very easily by digging deep and erecting over it one or more vaulted subterranean chambers.'
Gihon, 2
Gihon; The name of one of the rivers of Paradise [PARADISE].
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John Kitto was an English biblical scholar of Cornish descent.Born in Plymouth, John Kitto was a sickly child, son of a Cornish stonemason. The drunkenness of his father and the poverty of his family meant that much of his childhood was spent in the workhouse. He had no more than three years of erratic and interrupted education. At the age of twelve John Kitto fell on his head from a rooftop, and became totally and permanently deaf. As a young man he suffered further tragedies, disappointments and much loneliness. His height was 4 ft 8 in, and his accident left him with an impaired sense of balance. He found consolation in browsing at bookstalls and reading any books that came his way.
From these hardships he was rescued by friends who became aware of his mental abilities and encouraged him to write topical articles for local newspapers, arranging eventually for him to work as an assistant in a local library. Here he continued to educate himself.
One of his benefactors was the Exeter dentist Anthony Norris Groves, who in 1824 offered him employment as a dental assistant. Living with the Groves family, Kitto was profoundly influenced by the practical Christian faith of his employer. In 1829 he accompanied Groves on his pioneering mission to Baghdad and served as tutor to Groves's two sons. In 1833 Kitto returned to England via Constantinople, accompanied by another member of the Groves mission, Francis William Newman. Shortly afterwards he married, and in due course had several children.
A London publisher asked Kitto to write up his travel journals for a series of articles in the Penny Magazine, a publication read at that time by a million people in Britain, reprinted in America and translated into French, German and Dutch. Other writing projects followed as readers enquired about his experiences in the East amidst people living in circumstances closely resembling those of Bible times.
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