EN-DOR

[possibly, Fountain (Spring) of the Generation].

A plains city located in the territory of Issachar but assigned to Manasseh. The Canaanites there were not entirely dispossessed but came under forced labor. (Jos 17:11-13) En-dor is usually identified with Khirbet Safsafeh (Horvat Zafzafot), about 11 km (7 mi) SE of Nazareth.

At Psalm 83:9, 10, En-dor is connected with Jehovah’s victory over Sisera. While not mentioned in the battle account at Judges chapters 4 and 5, it evidently lay only a few miles S of Mount Tabor, from which Barak’s army descended. (Jg 4:6, 12) It was also in the general region of Taanach and Megiddo and the torrent valley of Kishon, where Sisera’s forces were miraculously disrupted. (Jos 17:11; Jg 5:19) So, some feature of the battle evidently extended as far as En-dor, and the psalmist, well acquainted with the historical and geographic details, could speak of En-dor as the place where many of the fleeing Canaanites were annihilated.

En-dor is best known as the place where King Saul went to consult a “mistress of spirit mediumship” shortly before Israel’s defeat at the hands of the Philistines.​—1Sa 28:7; 31:1-13.