Genesis 14:13 names him as the brother of Mamre and Aner, an Amorite. Av-Raham dwelled beside the terebinths of Mamre, which is to say at the sacred shrine of the oak-god there. Eshkol's brother Aner (ענר) is probably an error for Na'ar (נער), meaning "youth", for which see the notes at the link to his name.
Eshkol means "a braid of grapes", whence the modern Eshkolit (אשכלית) for a grapefruit. The vine was sacred to the earth-goddess, and if Mamre is the oak-god and Aner the divine child, Eshkol would logically make up the trinity in precisely the role of mother-goddess: here the grape, but elsewhere, as we have seen, the honey-bee, the date-palm etc.
Numbers 13:23 speaks of the gorge of Eshkol, named by Mosheh's spies as being a valley replete with vines.
Numbers 32:9 has the same gorge, seen by the Beney Re'u-Ven and the Beney Gad, who then discouraged the Beney Yisra-El from entering Kena'an.
Whereas in Deuteronomy 1:24-25, the spies had actually approved of it, much to Mosheh's annoyance in verse 26.
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