The Pulpit Commentary — Numbers — Section 440

Arabs. The nRme itself would seem to be ever, the march of the Israelites lay fu1·ther Jue to some peculiar rock formation-pro- to the ea.st, inasmuch e.s they scrupulously bably the serrated crest either of e. neigh- abstained from trespassiu~ upon Edom. bouring mountain or of e. half-submerg~d Ver. 44.-0both, , . Ije-abarim. See on reef. eh. :u:i. 11. Ver. 36.-Thewildemess of Zin, which is Ver. 45.-Dibon-ge.d. This encampment Xadesh. See on eh. xx. 1. may he.ve been the same e.s that previously Ver. 37.-llonnt Hor. See on eh. xx. 22. ce.lled by the name of Nahe.liel or.Be.moth Ver. 38.-In the fortieth year, . . in the (eh. xxi. 19, and see on xxxi.i.i. 34). Several first day of the :fifth month. This is the stages are here passed over in the Itinerary. only place where the date of Aaron's death is At a time when the conquest e.nd partial j?iven. It is in strict accordance with the occupation of large districts was going on, it Dinne intimation that Israel was to wander would be hard to say what regular stages forty years in the wilderness (eh. xiv. 33, were made by the host as such (see note at 84), that period being understood, according end of chapter). to the usual mercy of God, which shortens Ver. 46. -Almon-dible.the.im. Probably the days of evil, to include the time already the same as the Beth-diblathe.im mentioned spent in the wilderness. in Jer. xlviii. 22 as a Moabitish town con- Yer. 39.-An hundred e.nd twenty e.nd tiguous to Dibon, N ebo, e.nd Kiriathnim. three years old. He had been eighty-three 'fhe na.me, which signifies "hiding-place of years old when he first stood before Phare.oh, the two circles" or "cakes," we.s doubtless forty years before (Exod. vii. 7). due either to some local legend, or more pro- Ver. 40. -And king Are.d .. heard of bably to the fanciful interpretation of some the coming. See on eh. xxi. 1. The intro- peculiar feature in the landscape. duction of this notice, for which there seems Ver. 47. -The mounts.ins of Abe.rim, no motive, and which has no assignable con- before Nebo. The same locality is called nection mth the con text, is extremely per- "the top of Pisge.h, which ]ooketh toward plexi ng. It is not simply a fragment which the waste," in eh. xxi. 20 (see note there, ha.s slipped in by whe.t we call accident (like and at eh. xxvii. 12). Nebo is the name of a Deut. x. 6, 7), for the longer statement in town here, e.s in eh. xxxii, 3, 38, e.nd in the eh. xri. 1-8 occupies the same position in later books ; in Deut. (xxxii. 49 ; x:xxiv. 1) the histories.I narrative irnmedie.telye.fter the it is the name of the mountain, here included death of Aaron. It is difficult to suppose in the general designation Abarim. that Moses wrote this verse and left it as it Ver. 48.-In the pie.ins of Moe.b. See on stands ; it would rather seem as if a later eh. xxii. 1. hand had begun to copy out Q statement Ver. 49.-From Beth-jesimoth even unto from some earlier document-in which it had Abel-shittim. Beth-jesimoth, " house of itself perh.a.ps become misplaced-and had the we.stes," must have been very near the not gone on -with it. point where Jordan empties itself into the Ver. 41.-Ze.lmonah. This place is not Dead Sea, on the verge of the salt desert elsewhere mentioned, and cannot be identi- which bounds that see. on the ee.st. It fied. Either this or Punon may be the en- formed the boundary of Sihon'e kingdom campment where the brazen serpent was set at the south-west corner. Abel-shittim, up ; according to the Targum of Palestine it " meadow of acacias," is better known by the was the latter. abbreviated name "Shittim" (eh. xxv. 1; Ver. 42. - Punon. Perhaps connected Micah vi. 5). Its exact site cannot bo re- -with the Pinon of Gen. xxxvi. 41. The covered, but the Talmud states that it was Septuagint has ol>,vw, and it is identified by twelve miles north of the Jordan mouth. Eusebius and Jerome with Phamo, a place Probably the centre of the camp was opJ>O• between Petra and Zoar where convicts were site to the great fords, and the road lee.ding sent to labour in the mines. Probably, how• to Jericho. OB, XXXJIJ. 1-49.) THE BOOK OF NUMBERS. 429