Bible Strands
Joshua 19:22
The border reached Tabor, Shahazumah, and Beth-shemesh, and ended at the Jordan. There were sixteen cities, along with their villages.
Berean Standard Bible
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Study note
Setting — Joshua records the territorial boundaries assigned to the tribe of Issachar during the division of the Promised Land. The verse functions as a geographic marker within a systematic inventory of inherited cities and their surrounding villages.
The words — The text uses פָּגַע (pa.ga) for the border "reaching" or touching specific locations, and תּוֹצְאוֹת (to.tse.ot) to denote the "extremities" or endpoints of the territory. These terms frame the boundary as a precise, surveyed line rather than a vague region.
The thread — This boundary description connects to earlier markers near Chisloth-tabor in Joshua 19:12 and later references to Beth-shemesh in Joshua 19:38. The geographic trajectory also appears in Judges 4:6, where the same region serves as a strategic location for military mobilization.
Why it lands — The verse demands recognition of how divine allocation is documented through concrete geography and administrative detail. It requires the reader to accept that inherited land is defined by specific, verifiable boundaries rather than abstract promises.
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 the coast reacheth to Tabor, and Shahazimah, and Beth–shemesh; and the outgoings of their border were at Jordan: sixteen cities with their villages.
Cross-references
- Judges 4:6 She summoned Barak son of Abinoam from Kedesh in Naphtali and said to him, “Surely the LORD, the God of Israel, is commanding you: ‘Go and march to Mount Tabor, taking with you ten thousand men of Naphtali and Zebulun.
- Joshua 19:12 From Sarid it turned eastward along the border of Chisloth-tabor and went on to Daberath and up to Japhia.
- Joshua 19:38 Iron, Migdal-el, Horem, Beth-anath, and Beth-shemesh. There were nineteen cities, along with their villages.
- Joshua 21:16 Ain, Juttah, and Beth-shemesh—nine cities from these two tribes, together with their pasturelands.
- 1 Samuel 6:9 but keep watching it. If it goes up the road to its homeland, toward Beth-shemesh, it is the LORD who has brought on us this great disaster. But if it does not, then we will know that it was not His hand that punished us and that it happened by chance.”
- 1 Kings 4:9 Ben-deker in Makaz, in Shaalbim, in Beth-shemesh, and in Elon-beth-hanan;
- 2 Kings 14:11 But Amaziah would not listen, so Jehoash king of Israel advanced. He and King Amaziah of Judah faced each other at Beth-shemesh in Judah.
- 1 Chronicles 6:77 The Merarites (the rest of the Levites) received the following: From the tribe of Zebulun they were given Rimmono and Tabor, together with their pasturelands.
- Psalms 89:12 North and south You created; Tabor and Hermon shout for joy at Your name.
- Jeremiah 46:18 As surely as I live, declares the King, whose name is the LORD of Hosts, there will come one who is like Tabor among the mountains and like Carmel by the sea.