Cushan

Cushan (likely a poetic or extended form of Cush) appears in Habakkuk 3:7 in the prophet's vision of divine theophany: I saw the tents of Cushan in affliction: and the curtains of the land of Midian did tremble. The name here is linked with Midian in a parallel structure, suggesting a region in or near Arabia or the Sinai peninsula associated with the southern Cushite population rather than the Nile-region Ethiopia. Some scholars identify Cushan with the Cushan-rishathaim of Judges 3:8–10 — the king of Mesopotamia who oppressed Israel before the judge Othniel delivered them.

The geography of Habakkuk 3 follows the route of the divine warrior coming from the south — from Teman and Mount Paran — through Cushan and Midian, the wilderness regions south and east of Canaan through which God had led Israel in the Exodus. Cushan's trembling in Habakkuk's vision recalls the terror that fell on surrounding peoples at the approach of Israel's God during the conquest period.