HUKOK

HUKOK (Heb. חֻקֹּק ,חוּקֹק), city in the territory of Naphtali. The Bible locates it between Aznoth-Tabor and Naphtali's border with Zebulun on the south (Josh. 19:34) – a location which refutes its generally accepted identification with the abandoned Arab village of Yāqūq, 5½ mi. (9 km.) south of Safed. At Yāqūq B. Ravani excavated four rock-cut burial caves and two small rock-cut tombs in 1956. Ossuaries, lamps, pottery, and glass vessels found there indicate that the tombs date from the second half of the first century C.E. and were reused from the second to the fourth centuries. In the time of Resh Lakish a settlement called Ḥikok was known near Tiberias (TJ, Shev. 9:1, 38c); it may be identical with Hukok since remains of an ancient synagogue were visible there. A levitical city is also called Hukok (I Chron. 6:60) but in the parallel list it is replaced by Helkath, which is apparently the correct version (Josh. 21:31). In the Middle Ages Hukok was considered the site of the tomb of the prophet Habakkuk, apparently because of the similarity of the names. A kibbutz called Ḥukok was founded near the abandoned village of Yāqūq in 1945. It is affiliated with Ha-Kibbutz ha-Me'uḥad and has developed hill farming. It also operated 72 guest rooms and a spa. In the mid-1990s, the population was approximately 310, dropping to 265 in 2002. The Hukok fortress is located nearby. -BIBLIOGRAPHY: Ben-Zvi, in: BJPES, 6 (1939), 30ff.; M. Noth, Das Buch Josua (1938), 92; Ravani and Kahane, in: Atiqot, 3 (1961), 121ff.; Y. Aharoni, Hitnaḥalut Shivtei Yisrael ba-Galil ha-Elyon (1957), 79ff. (Michael Avi-Yonah / Shaked Gilboa (2nd ed.)