Bible Strands
Judges 1:18
And Judah also captured Gaza, Ashkelon, and Ekron—each with its territory.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The narrator records Judah’s military campaign immediately after the destruction of Zephath and before the account of Judah’s inability to clear the plains. The text describes Judah’s actions without direct speech, framing the conquest within a sequential military report.
The words — גְּבוּלָהּ (ge.vu lah) = its territory and אַשְׁקְלוֹן ('ash.ke.lon) = Ashkelon. These terms anchor the verse’s claim of complete seizure, specifying that each captured city included its surrounding lands.
The thread — Gaza reappears in Joshua 11:22 as one of three Philistine cities retaining Anakim survivors, and in Exodus 23:31 as a defined border marker toward the Sea of the Philistines. Judges 3:3 later lists Gaza’s rulers among the remaining hostile powers.
Why it lands — The verse demands the reader track Judah’s territorial gains against the backdrop of incomplete conquest. It requires noting where military success aligns with earlier promises and where subsequent limitations will emerge.
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
Also Judah took Gaza with the coast thereof, and Askelon with the coast thereof, and Ekron with the coast thereof.
Cross-references
- Joshua 11:22 No Anakim were left in the land of the Israelites; only in Gaza, Gath, and Ashdod did any survive.
- Judges 3:3 the five rulers of the Philistines, all the Canaanites, the Sidonians, and the Hivites who lived in the mountains of Lebanon from Mount Baal-hermon to Lebo-hamath.
- Exodus 23:31 And I will establish your borders from the Red Sea to the Sea of the Philistines, and from the desert to the Euphrates. For I will deliver the inhabitants into your hand, and you will drive them out before you.
- Joshua 13:3 from the Shihor east of Egypt to the territory of Ekron on the north (considered to be Canaanite territory)—that of the five Philistine rulers of Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gath, and Ekron, as well as that of the Avvites;
- Joshua 15:45 Ekron, with its towns and villages;
- Judges 16:1 One day Samson went to Gaza, where he saw a prostitute and went in to spend the night with her.
- Judges 16:21 Then the Philistines seized him, gouged out his eyes, and brought him down to Gaza, where he was bound with bronze shackles and forced to grind grain in the prison.
- 1 Samuel 6:17 As a guilt offering to the LORD, the Philistines had sent back one gold tumor for each city: Ashdod, Gaza, Ashkelon, Gath, and Ekron.