Bible Strands
Numbers 33:49
And there on the plains of Moab they camped by the Jordan, from Beth-jeshimoth to Abel-shittim.
Berean Standard Bible
Follow its threads on the canvas →
Study note
Setting — The narrator records Israel's final encampment on the plains of Moab by the Jordan River, positioned immediately after their departure from the mountains of Abarim and immediately before God's address to Moses.
The words — The text pinpoints their camp's boundaries using מִ/בֵּ֣ית (mi./Beit) Jeshimoth and אָבֵ֣ל (a.Vel) ha.shi.Tim, with the latter term sharing its root with the acacia wood (shittim) specified for sacred construction.
The thread — This geographic span from Beth-jeshimoth to Abel-shittim shares its lexical root with the materials listed in Exodus 25:5, 10, 23, where the same Hebrew word for shittim denotes the acacia wood for the ark, table, and altar.
Why it lands — The verse requires the reader to acknowledge the precise, bounded geography of Israel's stopping point, establishing a concrete territorial baseline before the subsequent divine instructions.
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 they pitched by Jordan, from Beth–jesimoth even unto Abel–shittim in the plains of Moab.
Cross-references
- Exodus 25:5 ram skins dyed red and fine leather; acacia wood;
- Exodus 25:10 And they are to construct an ark of acacia wood, two and a half cubits long, a cubit and a half wide, and a cubit and a half high.
- Exodus 25:23 You are also to make a table of acacia wood two cubits long, a cubit wide, and a cubit and a half high.
- Numbers 25:1 While Israel was staying in Shittim, the men began to indulge in sexual immorality with the daughters of Moab,
- Joshua 2:1 Then Joshua son of Nun secretly sent two spies from Shittim, saying, “Go, inspect the land, especially Jericho.” So they went and entered the house of a prostitute named Rahab and stayed there.
- Joshua 13:20 Beth-peor, the slopes of Pisgah, and Beth-jeshimoth—
- Ezekiel 25:9 therefore I will indeed expose the flank of Moab beginning with its frontier cities—Beth-jeshimoth, Baal-meon, and Kiriathaim—the glory of the land.