Joshua 15:61

Study note

Setting — Joshua records the specific cities assigned to Judah’s wilderness territory during the tribal land division. The passage follows a list of mountain settlements and precedes another cluster of southern locations.

The words — The Hebrew midbar (H4057) translates literally to "wilderness" or "desolate region," locating these settlements outside fertile zones. The compound name Beth-arabah combines beit ("house") and arabah ("plain" or "valley") to mark a specific geographic cluster.

The thread — The location Beth-arabah reappears in Joshua 15:6 as a point the border proceeds north of, and in Joshua 18:18 where the boundary follows its northern slope. These passages use the site to trace the territorial limits of Judah and Benjamin.

Why it lands — The verse functions as a geographic inventory, requiring the reader to track how tribal inheritance was physically distributed. It demands attention to the precise placement of settlements in harsh terrain to understand Judah’s expanded southern claim.

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.