Bible Dictionary
CRAG
A crag is a steep, projecting, or broken rocky cliff. In Scripture, crags could provide notable landmarks or secure resting places for birds and other creatures.
Definition
A crag is a projecting or broken section of steep rock, often left where harder strata overhang softer rock. Such formations may occur at the top or side of a cliff and may provide a stronghold or resting place.
Biblical Usage
Two rocky crags, Bozez and Seneh, marked the setting of Jonathan’s exploit. The eagle is described as lodging on a rocky crag and stronghold.
Historical Background
In Palestine’s sedimentary and cretaceous terrain, softer layers erode beneath harder strata, which project and eventually break away, leaving crags and talus slopes.
Related Figures
Historical Bible Dictionaries
International Standard Bible Encyclopedia (ISBE)
<p>krag (shen (1Sa 7:12; 14:4; Job 39:28 the King James Version and the English Revised Version)): In a mountainous country composed of sedimentary rocks, like the cretaceous rocks of Palestine, cliffs are formed on a slope where hard strata are underlaid by softer strata. The soft strata wear away more rapidly, undermining the hard strata above them, which for a time project, but finally break off by vertical joint planes, the fragments rolling down to form the talus slope at the foot of the cliff. As the breaking off of the undermined hard strata proceeds irregularly, there are left projecting crags, sometimes at the top of the cliff, and sometimes lower down. Two such crags (shen ha-cela`, "sharp rock," the Revised Version (British and American) "rocky crag"), which were given particular names, Bozez and Seneh, marked the scene of the exploit of Jonathan described in 1Sa 14. Conder failed to identify the crags, and it has been proposed to alter the text rather extensively to make it read: "wall of rock" instead of "crag" (Encyclopedia Biblica, under the word "Michmash"). Such rocks form safe resting-places for birds of prey, as it is said of the eagle in Job 39:28 English Revised Version: "She dwelleth on the rock and hath her lodging there, Upon the crag of the rock, and the stronghold." Alfred Ely Day</p>