Solitude

SOLITUDE, Desart, or Wilderness¹. The Hebrews give the Name of Wilderness to all Places that are not cultivated, but which are chiefly destin’d to the feeding of Cattle, and on which Trees grow wild. So when a Desart or Wilderness is mention’d in Scripture, we must not imagine it to be a Place forsaken, abandon’d, void of Cities or Inhabitants; this Word only represents the Soil near a City or Village which was appointed for Pasture, and where the Plough never came. Thus, in Scripture, there are few Cities which had not their Wilderness, Desart, or Solitude. Thus we read of the Desarts of Zin, of Kadesh, of Tekoa, of Auran, of Damascus, of Ziph, of Jeruel, of Jericho, of Jerusalem, of Maon, of Gibeon, of Bethel, of En-geddi, of Bethsaida, and so of others. See DESART.

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