Phenicia

Phenicia (also spelled Phoenicia, and called Phenice in older usage) is the coastal strip north of Israel whose chief cities are Sidon and Tyre. The UPDV traces its inhabitants to Canaan, marks its northern frontier at Sidon, calls its people Sidonians, and shows its crowds reaching Jesus and its women petitioning him.

Descended from Canaan

The Phenicians enter the table of nations through Canaan: "And Canaan begot Sidon his firstborn, and Heth" (Gen 10:15). The list goes on to name the coastal peoples — "and the Arvadite, and the Zemarite, and the Hamathite: and afterward were the families of the Canaanite spread abroad" (Gen 10:18). The geographical sweep then plants Sidon at the northern edge of the Canaanite frontier: "And the border of the Canaanite was from Sidon, as you go toward Gerar, to Gaza; as you go toward Sodom and Gomorrah and Admah and Zeboiim, to Lasha" (Gen 10:19). Phenicia is, in this account, the seaward and northernmost branch of the Canaanite family.

Called Sidonians

In narrative the inhabitants are most often named after their leading city. The five Danite scouts at Laish find a population living "after the manner of the Sidonians, quiet and secure; for there was no one possessing authority that might put [them] to shame in anything in the land, and they were far from the Sidonians, and had no dealings with man" (Jud 18:7). Ezekiel later sets the same people among the fallen pagan powers: "There are the princes of the north, all of them, and all the Sidonians, who have gone down with the slain; in the terror which they caused by their might they are put to shame; and they lie uncircumcised with those who are slain by the sword, and bear their shame with those who go down to the pit" (Eze 32:30).

Encounters with Jesus

The Phenician coast appears in the Gospels as one of the regions from which crowds come to hear Jesus. Mark records that "from Jerusalem, and from Idumea, and beyond the Jordan, and about Tyre and Sidon, a great multitude, hearing what great things he did, came to him" (Mr 3:8). One such Phenician — "a Greek, a Syrophoenician by race" — implores Jesus to cast a demon out of her daughter (Mr 7:26). The encounter binds the region's identity (Greek by culture, Syrophoenician by race) to a moment of faith addressed to Jesus.