MOAB. — Son of Lot by incest with his firstborn daughter (Hebrew Mô'âbh; in the Mesha Stele m'b; Assyrian Mâ'aba, Mâ'b, Mu'aba; Egyptian Muaba; interpreted by the Septuagint as ἐκ τοῦ ποτὸς τοῦ γάμου μοῶ, μὲ-ᾱβῆ, in reference to the episode of Lot’s daughters, Gen. 19:34–37). From him originated the people of the Moabites, who gave their name to the territory they occupied; hence M. is both an ethnographic (mô'âbhî) and a geographic designation (ereş M. or têdhê M., “the fields of M.,” Ruth 1:1, etc.).
The land of M., situated between Ammon to the north and Edom to the south, originally inhabited by the Emim, bordered to the east on the great Syrian-Arabian desert by a broad strip called “the desert of M.” (Deut. 2:8, 13; Judg. 11:17), along which Israel traveled so as not to enter the land of M. The Zered Wadi (Wâdi el-Ḥesâ) clearly marked its southern boundary (Num. 21:11–12; 33:43–44); to the west lay the Dead Sea and the lower course of the Jordan. To the north, the frontier was unstable, and there were many Ammonite infiltrations. In ancient times it extended as far as Wâdi Nâ'ûr, beyond Heshbon, and Wâdi Nimrin. The kingdom ruled by Sihon and the settlement of the Israelite tribes of Gad and Reuben reduced M. to the south of the Arnon, which was often considered its northern boundary. Stele (v.), the claims of Jephthah, and the allusions of Isaiah and Jeremiah, however, demonstrate that M. had gradually recovered its northern territories beyond the Arnon (Num. 21:25–32; Deut. 2:24, 36; Josh. 13:25; Judg. 18:18, 22; Isa. 15:4; Jer. 48:21; F.-M. Abel [op. cit. in bibl.], I, p. 279); as far as the “steppes of M.” (ʿarbôth M.), the fertile plain between the Jordan and the ʿArâbhîm mountains, between the Dead Sea and Wâdi Nimrin, where the Israelites camped before crossing the Jordan and where they practiced the licentious worship of Baal of Peor (v. BEELPHEGOR), which is none other than Chemosh, the national god of the Moabites (cf. the Mesha Stele, the el-Baʿûh Stele [ca. 1300 B.C.]; Num. 22:26; Deut. 3:29; Josh. 13:20).
M. was already hostile to the Israelites at that time, particularly under its king Balak, son of Zippor, famous for the episode of the seer Balaam (Num. 22–24). Because of this hostility, no Moabite could be admitted into the assembly of the Lord, even to the tenth generation (Deut. 23:3–6). In the time of the Judges, Eglon, king of M., oppressed the Hebrews in the Jericho plain and throughout the surrounding region; they were liberated by Ehud (Judg. 3:11–30). Saul fought against M. (1 Sam. 14:47). David finally defeated and subdued M., severely punishing its soldiers in a kind of decimation (2 Sam. 8:2). While fleeing from Saul, David had taken his parents to Mizpah in M., entrusting them to the king’s care to escape Saul’s vengeance (1 Sam. 22:3–4), for Ruth, his ancestor, was a Moabitess (Ruth 4:13–22). After Solomon’s death, M. regained independence until the reign of Omri (v.), who made it tributary to the king of Israel at Tirzah, to whom it paid annually 100,000 lambs and an equal number of rams (Mesha Stele; 2 Kgs. 1:1). King Mesha (9th century B.C.) in his stele enumerates the successes he achieved against Jehoram (853–842 B.C.), king of Israel, from whom he remained independent (2 Kgs. 3). Later, Jehu recovered some of the lost cities, but all of M. was conquered by Hazael of Damascus (2 Kgs. 10:33). Under Jeroboam II (783–743 B.C.), it again became tributary to Israel (2 Kgs. 14:25).
In the 8th–7th centuries B.C., M. was under Assyrian domination. Its kings appear in the cuneiform lists of tributaries: Salamanu under Tiglath-Pileser III (731 B.C.), Kamus-nadbi (Chemosh-nadab) under Sennacherib (701 B.C.), and Musuri (the Egyptian) under Esarhaddon and Ashurbanipal (673–668 B.C.) (F.-M. Abel [op. cit. in bibl.], p. 280). After the rebellion of Jehoiakim (ca. 601 B.C.), bands of Moabites, Ammonites, and Edomites joined the Chaldeans and attacked Judah (2 Kgs. 24:2; cf. Jer. 12:7–17). In 594 B.C., M., along with Ammon, Edom, Tyre, and Sidon, urged Judah to rebel against Nebuchadnezzar (Jer. 27:1–11). In 588 B.C., it rebelled against the Chaldeans together with Judah. Flavius Josephus (Antiq. Jud., X, 9, 7) relates that five years after the destruction of Jerusalem, Nebuchadnezzar waged war on Ammon and M. (cf. Ezek. 21:28–32). From the Persian period onward, M. was gradually absorbed by the Arabs (cf. Ezek. 25:10) and later by the Nabataean Kingdom (cf. Flavius Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews, XIV, 1, 4; 5, 2). “The Hasmoneans contested with the Nabataeans the possession of M., on the basis of the ancient rights of Gad and Reuben. Herod annexed to the region of Gilead the territory north of the Arnon, forming Perea. M. fell for a time under the rule of Aretas before being incorporated into the Roman province of Arabia” (F.-M. Abel [op. cit. in bibl.], p. 280). Thus were fulfilled the prophecies against M. (Isa. 15–16; Jer. 48; Ezek. 25:8–11; Zeph. 2:8–11), often cruel and inhumane (Amos 2:1).
MOBILE, DIOCESE OF. A city and diocese in the State of Alabama, United States of America.
It comprises the entire State of Alabama (51,540 square miles) and the western part of Florida (7,281 square miles), for a total area of 58,821 square miles. The diocese has a population of 3,048,891 (1940 census), of whom 70,739 are Catholics (1950); it includes 101 parishes, 69 chapels, 61 missions, 60 stations, served by 124 diocesan and 178 religious priests; there are 15 male religious communities, including St. Bernard Abbey at Brookside, and 29 female communities; 4 seminaries and scholasticates, 3 colleges, including the flourishing Spring Hill College of the Jesuits; 15 diocesan and parochial high schools, and 60 parochial elementary schools; in 1949 there were 797 converts.
The diocese takes its name from Mauvila, the capital city of the Gulf Indians, conquered by the Spanish explorer Hernando de Soto in 1540. From that time until the early 18th century, the Mississippi Valley was attended by Dominican, Jesuit, and Capuchin missionaries, until the establishment of the first parish on July 20, 1703, in Fort St. Louis de la Mobile, founded by the explorer Iberville; however, the parish remained under the jurisdiction of the Paris Foreign Missions Seminary until April 25, 1703, when Pius VI erected the Diocese of St. Louis (Louisiana and Florida), now New Orleans. Pope Leo XII established Mobile as an apostolic prefecture in 1824 and the following year as an apostolic vicariate.
Pius VIII, on May 15, 1829, erected the Diocese of Mobile. Its first bishop was Mgr. M. Portier (d. 1859); his successors were Mgr. J. Quinlan (1859–83), Mgr. D. Manucy (1884–85), J. O’Sullivan (1885–96), E. P. Allen (1897–1926), and J. J. Toolen, since 1927.
The diocese is a suffragan of New Orleans. Its cathedral is dedicated to the Immaculate Conception.