HABOR

(Haʹbor).

This proper name has been understood as applying either to a place or to a river. At 1 Chronicles 5:26, though, the reference is definitely to a city or district to which the Assyrian king Tiglath-pileser III exiled numerous Israelites of the ten-tribe kingdom. Some scholars have linked this Habor with Abhar, a town located on the Qizil Uzun River of NW Iran about 130 miles (209 kilometers) W of Tehran. At 2 Kings 17:6 and 18:11 some favor the reading “Habor, the river of Gozan” (AS, RS), and suggest identifying the Habor with a tributary of the Euphrates, the Khabur River of SE Turkey and NE Syria. However, in agreement with 1 Chronicles 5:26, this phrase may instead be translated “Habor at [or, by] the river Gozan.”—NW, Yg; see GOZAN.