Ezekiel 27:21

21. Arabia It is only recently that Arabia has been explored and its inscriptions examined. The result shows us why this country occupied such an important place in the ancient world. Two great kingdoms have been revealed in South Arabia: one, that of Saba (Sheba), reaching back to Solomon’s time, while the Minaean probably precedes it by many centuries (Glaser, Hommel). The inscriptions prove that this people had rather a high civilization, lived in walled towns, built magnificent temples, carried on agriculture, mining, and manufactures, had an elaborate code of civil law, honored women, who could even rule as queens, cultivated the fine arts, and enjoyed an extended commerce. Incense was the chief export and the basis of the nation’s wealth. Mr. Bent has discovered that it is still produced at Dhofar at the rate of nine thousand hundredweight annually and myrrh also in large quantities ( Nineteenth Century, October, 1895). Gold was another leading export, the mines being located in central Arabia. (Compare Ezekiel 27:22.)

Kedar a nomadic tribe in northern Arabia (Psalms 120:5; Song of Solomon 1:5) famous for its flocks, yet possessing “villages” (Isaiah 42:11.) In Assyrian inscriptions this tribe is located between Babylon and the Gulf of Akaba. (Compare Jeremiah 2:10; Isaiah 60:7; Jeremiah 49:28.) It may have been the king of these “Arabs” that Cambyses had to conciliate before crossing the desert. The term “Arab” in the Assyrian, as in the Bible writings, had a limited application and did not refer to the entire Sinaitic peninsula ( Herodotus, Ezekiel 3:5).