Joshua 15:52 — Word Study
WLCאֲרַ֥ב וְרוּמָ֖ה וְאֶשְׁעָֽן׃
BSAArabʼĂrâb△ [a place of ambush] EshanʼEshʻân△ [Eshean, a city in Judah]
| Greek | English | Parsing |
|---|---|---|
| אֲרַ֥ב | Arab | Noun proper |
| וְרוּמָ֖ה | and Rumah | Conjunction, noun proper |
| וְאֶשְׁעָֽן׃ | and Eshan | Conjunction, noun proper |
Every word in the verse. Click a row to open it in the panel on the left.
| BSB | Arab, Dumah, Eshan, |
| KJV | Arab, and Dumah, and Eshean, |
| ASV | Arab, and Dumah, and Eshan, |
| YLT | Arab, and Dumah, and Eshean, |
| WEB | Arab, Dumah, Eshan, |
| BBE | Arab, and Dumah, and Eshan; |
The translations agree on the rendering of the names in this verse.
The verse consists of a simple list of proper nouns, indicating the cities in Judah.
4 commentators on this verse
Gill, Jamieson, Cambridge, Whedon & more — read them ›
clause
The sentence as the grammar sees it Open the tree ›
2 of 3 occur nowhere else in the Old Testament — words chosen on purpose.
Bars are logarithmic — אֵת, the commonest word in the Hebrew Bible, stands about 11,000 times, so a linear scale would leave everything else invisible. Click a row to open that word.
Deep Study — Joshua 15:52
Sections marked generated are written from the data on this page rather than by a named author. Everything else — the lexicon entries, the cross references, the manuscript readings, the counts — is quoted from its source unchanged.
Context — Cities in Judahgenerated
Joshua 15:52 lists several cities located in the territory of Judah, highlighting the geographical distribution of these places. This verse is part of a larger passage that details the cities and their villages allocated to the tribe of Judah, which is significant in understanding the settlement patterns of the Israelites in the Promised Land.
Cross References
| Reference | Text (BSB) | |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Isaiah 21:11 | This is the burden against Dumah: One calls to me from Seir, “Watchman, what is left of the night? Watchman, what is left of the night?” |
The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — 1 reference, hung on the phrase they belong to
The Key Word — אֲרָב, 'a.Ravgenerated
The word אֲרָב ('a.Rav) refers to a city near Hebron, derived from a root meaning 'ambush.' This suggests a hidden or secretive nature of the location, possibly indicating strategic importance in ancient times.
The lexicons consistently identify אֲרָב as a geographical location without significant disagreement, emphasizing its role in the Old Testament narrative.
How Translations Differ — measured against the Berean Standard Biblegenerated
All translations agree on the rendering of אֲרָב as 'Arab.' They consistently identify it as a city in Judah.
Sentence Structuregenerated
The structure of the verse is straightforward, presenting a list of proper nouns: אֲרַ֥ב, רוּמָ֖ה, and אֶשְׁעָֽן. This noun phrase serves as the subject of the clause, indicating the cities being named.
The simplicity of the structure highlights the importance of these locations within the context of the land distribution.
Septuagint Backgroundgenerated
The Septuagint translates אֲרָב as αιρεμ, which maintains the geographical reference but does not provide additional interpretive nuance.
This choice reflects a direct correspondence without expanding upon the meaning found in the Hebrew text.
In plain words — the whole versegenerated
Joshua 15:52 lists three cities: Arab, Dumah, and Eshan, which are part of the territory allocated to the tribe of Judah. These names reflect important locations in the history of Israel.
Frequently Asked Questionsgenerated
These cities represent the allocation of land to the tribe of Judah, which is significant in understanding the heritage and history of the Israelites.
The names of these cities are important for historical and geographical context, as they help trace the settlement patterns of the Israelites.
The name 'Arab' means ambush, suggesting a hidden or strategic location.
This verse is part of the detailed account of land distribution among the tribes of Israel, which is a key theme in the book of Joshua.
Reflection Questionsgenerated
- What can we learn about the significance of place names in our understanding of history?
- How do geographical locations influence the narratives found in the Bible?
- In what ways do the names of cities reflect the culture and history of the people who lived there?
- How does understanding the context of these cities enhance our reading of the book of Joshua?
Commentators on this verse — 4 expositors, verse by verse
Each of these wrote on Joshua 15:52 itself, not merely on the chapter around it.
John Gill1697–1771Gill's Exposition of the Entire BibleArab,.... Arab is the same Jerom (i) calls Ereb, and was in his time a village in the south, and was called Heromith; and Dumah; Duma, Jerom says (k), was a large village in the south, also on the
Read John Gill on Joshua 15 →Robert Jamieson1802–1880Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown's CommentaryArab, and Dumah, and Eshean, Arab , [Septuagint, Airem or Ereb] - not discovered.
Read Robert Jamieson on Joshua 15 →CambridgeThe Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges52. Arab. Group II. includes nine cities to the north of those just enumerated in the country round Hebron:—
Read Cambridge on Joshua 15 →Daniel Denison Whedon1808–1885Whedon's Commentary on the Bible52. This next group of cities was north of the last named, in the vicinity of Hebron. Dumah — Robinson passed the ruins of Ed-Daumeh six miles southwest of Hebron, which are probably the remains of this place.
Read Daniel Denison Whedon on Joshua 15 →The verse in English, compared — 17 translations, and where they part company
Every translation on this page is a decision someone had to make and commit to. Read down a column and you see one translator's judgement; read across a row and you see the range the Greek actually allows. The BSB is the wording the rest of this page is measured against, so it is listed first.
Modern formal
Arab, Dumah, Eshan,
Arab, Dumah, Eshan,
Arab, Dumah, Eshan,
Arab, Dumah, Eshan,
Tyndale line
Arab, and Dumah, and Eshean,
Arab, and Dumah, and Eshan,
Arab, and Dumah, and Eshan;
Arab, and Dumah, and Eshean,
Arab, and Dumah, and Eshean,
Strictly literal
Arab, and Dumah, and Eshan,
Arab, and Dumah, and Eshean,
Arab, and Dumah, and Eshean,
Arab, and Dumah, and Esh'an,
Arab, Dumah, Eshan,
From the Latin
Arab and Ruma and Esaan,
Simplified
Also: Arab, Dumah, Eshan,
Arab, and Dumah, and Eshan;
Counted from the translations carried on this site, not from a survey of every English Bible. A rendering shared by many versions is usually inherited rather than independently arrived at — the Tyndale line in particular runs through most of them.
The sentence as the grammar sees it — from the MACULA Hebrew treebank
This is not our own analysis: it is the scholarly syntax tree for the verse, showing how the clause actually holds together.
Boxes are the grammarian's groupings — clause, noun phrase, prepositional phrase.
The four witnesses to this verse — Masoretic, Septuagint, Samaritan, Qumran
Both the Masoretic Text and the Septuagint agree on the names listed in this verse. The Septuagint matches the Hebrew words directly, indicating consistency in the transmission of this text.
אֲרַ֥ב וְרוּמָ֖ה וְאֶשְׁעָֽן׃
3 of the 3 words are matched. This is the word-by-word correspondence, not the Septuagint's own sentence — its word order and its articles are its own.
Four traditions, not one. “On the leather” means the letters physically survive on the scroll, as against letters an editor has supplied to fill a hole in it — a restoration is a scholar’s reading, not a reading of the manuscript. Words in [square brackets] are supplied; the notes count them apart from what survives.
The map of this verse — what each word keeps company with
This is a map of two things, both counted rather than judged. Company kept: which words stand within three words of each of these, anywhere in the Hebrew Bible — the thicker the line, the more often the pair meet compared with chance. Built from: the words a word is made out of, taken from its own Strong’s entry. It is not a map of meaning: nothing here claims two words mean the same thing. Click any circle to see the numbers behind it.
Lexicons — every word in Joshua 15:52
One dossier per word, with every reference work grouped by kind — Hebrew lexicons, morphology, Bible dictionaries, topical chains and the English of the translators themselves. The verse sits at the head of each block with the word under study lit, so you never lose your place. The panel above gives the short answer; this is the long one, and it is the part of the page worth indexing.
Every entry below is the lexicographer's own text. On the Hebrew: Brown-Driver-Briggs entire and its gloss set, Strong's Hebrew Dictionary, and Tyndale House's Translators Brief lexicon. Where a cell says a work has no entry, that work genuinely has none for this word.
אֲרָב (arab) refers to a city near Hebron, noted in the Old Testament. It is derived from a root meaning 'ambush.' The entries consistently identify it as a geographical location without significant disagreement among the lexicons.
אֲרָב n.pr.loc. city near Hebron Jos 15:52
ref
H694 אֲרָב
694 'Arab ar-awb'
from 693; ambush; Arab, a place in Palestine:--Arab.
see HEBREW for 0693
אֲרָב (a.rav) — Arab.
§ Arab = "ambush"
a city near Hebron
N-proper — Noun properHNpl
a'-rab ('arabh, "ambush"): A city in the hill country of Judah, probably the site of the ruins Er-Rabiyeh South of Hebron (Jos 15:52).
Arab
Ambush, a city in the mountains of Judah (Josh. 15:52), now Er-Rabiyeh.
(ambush) a city of Judah in the mountainous district, probably in the neighborhood of Hebron; mentioned only in (Joshua 15:62)
multiplying; sowing sedition; a window; a locust
רוּמָה (Ruwmah) refers to a place in Palestine, translated as 'height.' It is noted as the home of the grandfather of King Jehoiakim of Judah. The word is derived from רוּם (rum), meaning 'to be high.' It appears in 2 Kings 23:36.
רוּמָה n.pr.loc. 2 K 23:36
base
H7316 רוּמָה
7316 Ruwmah roo-maw'
from 7311; height; Rumah, a place in Palestine:--Rumah.
see HEBREW for 07311
רוּמָה (ru.mah) — Dumah.
§ Rumah = "height"
home of the grandfather of king Jehoiakim of Judah
רוּמָה (ru.mah) — Rumah.
Rumah = "height"
home of the grandfather of king Jehoiakim of Judah
Another name of a.ru.mah (אֲרוּמָה "Arumah" H0725)
HC/Npl — Conjunction · noun properHC/Npl
roo'-ma (rumah; Codex Vaticanus Rhouma; Codex Alexandrinus Rhuma): To this place belonged Pedaiah whose daughter Zebudah (the Revised Version (British and American) "Zebidah") entered the harem of Josiah, king of Judah, and became the mother of Jehoiakim (2Ki 23:36). Josephus (Ant., X, v, 2) calls the place Abouma, but this is an obvious clerical error for Arouma. This suggests a possible identification with Arumah (Jud 9:41), which lay not far from Shechem. Another possible identification is with the Rumah mentioned by Josephus (BJ, III, vii, 21) in Galilee (compare Neubauer, Geog. du Talmud, 203), which may be identical with the modern Khirbet Rumeh, about 3 miles North of Seffuriyeh. Some, however, would identify Rumah with Dumah of
Rumah
Elevation, probably the same as Arumah (Judg. 9:41; 2 Kings 23:36), near Shechem. Others identify it with Tell Rumeh, in Galilee, about 6 miles north of Nazareth.
(high), mentioned once only -- (2 Kings 23:36) It has been conjectured to be the same place as Arumah. (Judges 9:41) which was apparently near Shechem. It is more probable that it is identical with Dumah. (Joshua 15:52)
exalted; sublime; rejected
אֶשְׁעָ֑ן (esh`an) refers to a location, specifically a city in the hills of Judah, mentioned in Joshua 15:52. The name is associated with the meaning 'support.' It is derived from a root meaning support, linking it to the broader context of places in Palestine.
אֶשְׁעָ֑ן n.pr.loc. in hills of Judah Jos 15:52
ref
H824 אֶשְׁעָ֑ן
824 'Esh`an esh-awn'
from 8172; support; Eshan, a place in Palestine:--Eshean.
see HEBREW for 08172
אֶשְׁעָ֑ן (esh.an) — Eshan.
§ Eshean = "support"
a city in Judah
Conj | N-proper — Conjunction · noun properHC/Npl
e'-shan ('esh`an; Esan; the King James Version Eshean):
A town of Judah in the uplands of Hebron (Jos 15:52). No satisfactory identification has yet been suggested. Some think the name may be a corruption of Beersheba (Encyclopaedia Biblica, which see).