Koa
Koa is a region mentioned in the Old Testament, located in the region of Mesopotamia in modern-day Iraq. Known today as Kermanshah. It appears across 1 verse in Scripture.
Biblical History
Koa appears solely in Ezekiel 23:23, within the prophet's extended allegory of Oholah (Samaria) and Oholibah (Jerusalem) as unfaithful sisters. In this passage, God declares that He will bring Oholibah's former lovers against her in judgment, listing a coalition of Babylonian forces including "the Babylonians and all the Chaldeans, Pekod, Shoa, and Koa, and all the Assyrians with them." Koa is understood to represent an eastern people group from the Zagros Mountains region, identified by some scholars with the Qutu (Gutians), a people known from Akkadian sources as inhabitants of the mountains east of Mesopotamia. In Ezekiel's oracle, Koa and its companion peoples symbolize the terrifying forces that God would marshal against Jerusalem as instruments of divine judgment for her spiritual adultery and covenant unfaithfulness. The inclusion of these obscure eastern peoples alongside Babylon and Assyria emphasizes the comprehensiveness and overwhelming nature of the coming judgment, drawing from every direction to execute God's sentence upon the faithless city.
Archaeological & Historical Notes
Koa is tentatively identified with a people group from the Zagros Mountains region, possibly related to the Qutu or Gutians known from Mesopotamian cuneiform texts. Some scholars associate Koa with the region around modern Kermanshah in western Iran, a major city situated in the central Zagros Mountains along ancient trade routes between Mesopotamia and the Iranian plateau. Akkadian and Sumerian records reference the Gutians as mountain peoples who periodically raided Mesopotamian lowlands and even briefly ruled Sumer in the late 3rd millennium BCE. The precise identification remains debated among scholars, with alternative proposals suggesting connections to other eastern tribal groups mentioned in Assyrian administrative texts. The region around Kermanshah has yielded significant archaeological discoveries, including the famous Behistun inscription of Darius I.
Verse Appearances (1)
Ezek
Sources: ISBE Encyclopedia · OpenBible Geocoding (CC BY) · Pleiades Gazetteer View all →