Gibeon

Gibeon (meaning hill-city) was a major Hivite city northwest of Jerusalem within the territory of Benjamin, described as "greater than Ai, and all the men thereof were mighty" (Josh. 10:2). Its inhabitants famously deceived Joshua into making a covenant of peace by pretending to be travelers from a distant country (Josh. 9). The deception was discovered but the covenant was upheld, and the Gibeonites became servants — hewers of wood and drawers of water — for the Israelite community. Gibeon became the site of the tabernacle after the conquest and was important in David's and Solomon's reigns; it was at Gibeon that God appeared to Solomon in a dream and offered him the gift of wisdom (1 Kings 3:5). The miraculous battle at Gibeon, in which Joshua commanded the sun and moon to stand still, was the decisive engagement securing the southern Canaanite coalition's defeat (Josh. 10:12–14).