Bible Strands
Joshua 15:33
These were in the foothills: Eshtaol, Zorah, Ashnah,
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — Joshua records the territorial allotment to Judah, cataloging specific towns assigned to the tribe during the conquest period. The passage functions as a geographic inventory immediately following the count of twenty-nine cities in the preceding verse.
The words — The text locates the towns in the Shephelah (בַּשְּׁפֵלָה, ba/shefeLah), meaning the lowland foothills, before listing Eshtaol, Zorah, and Ashnah. These proper names designate a distinct subregion within Judah’s inheritance.
The thread — The same locations reappear in Judges 13:25 and Judges 16:31 as the geographic markers for Samson’s Spirit-led activity and final burial. The listing pattern continues the territorial documentation established in Numbers 13:23 regarding the region's boundaries.
Why it lands — The text requires a reader to accept that tribal inheritance was recorded with precise geographic boundaries and specific community names. It demands acknowledgment that the allotment process mapped defined settlements to concrete regions without leaving the distribution to abstraction.
Drafted by a language model from the text, its original words and its cross-references, then checked against them. It can still be wrong: open the verse in the app to report it.
The Hebrew words
King James Version
And in the valley, Eshtaol, and Zoreah, and Ashnah,
Cross-references
- Judges 13:25 And the Spirit of the LORD began to stir him at Mahaneh-dan, between Zorah and Eshtaol.
- Judges 16:31 Then Samson’s brothers and his father’s family came down, carried him back, and buried him between Zorah and Eshtaol in the tomb of his father Manoah. And he had judged Israel twenty years.
- Numbers 13:23 When they came to the Valley of Eshcol, they cut down a branch with a single cluster of grapes, which they carried on a pole between two men. They also took some pomegranates and figs.
- Joshua 19:41 The territory of their inheritance included Zorah, Eshtaol, Ir-shemesh,