Deuteronomy 3

De. 2 26 And I sent messengers out of the wilderness of Kedemoth unto Sihon king of 27 Heshbon with words of peace, saying, Let me pass through thy land : I will go along by the high way, I will neither turn unto the 28 right hand nor to the left. Thou shalt sell me food for money, that I may eat ; and give me water for money, that I may drink : only 29 let me pass through on my feet ; as the children of Esau which dwell in Scir, and the Moabites which dwell in Ar, did unto me ; until I shall pass over Jordan into the land 30 which the LORD our God giveth us. But Sihon king of Heshbon would not let us pass by him : for the LORD thy God hardened his spirit, and made his heart obstinate, that he might deliver him into thy hand, as at this 31 day. And the LORD said unto me, Behold, I have begun to deliver up Sihon and his land before thee : begin to possess, that thou may 32 est inherit his land. Then Sihon came out against us, he and all his people, unto battle 33 at Jahaz. And the LORD our God delivered him up before us ; and we smote him, and 34 his sons, and all his people. And we took all his cities at that time, and utterly destroyed every inhabited city, with the women and the little ones; we left none remaining: 35 only the cattle we took for a prey unto ourselves, with the spoil of the cities which we 36 had taken. From Aroer, which is on the edge of the valley of Arnon, and from the city that is in the valley, even unto Gilead, there was not a city too high for us: the LORD our God delivered up all before us: 37 only to the land of the children of Ammon thou camest not near; all the side of the river Jabbok, and the cities of the hill country, and wheresoever the LORD our God forbad us.

3 1 Then we turned, and went up the way to Bashan: and Og the king of Bashan came out against us, he and all his people, unto 2 battle at Edrei. And the LORD said unto me, Fear him not: for I have delivered him, and all his people, and his land, into thy hand; and thou shalt do unto him as thou didst unto Sihon king of the Amorites, which 3 dwelt at Heshbon. So the LORD our God delivered into our hand Og also, the king of Bashan, and all his people: and we smote him until none was left to him remaining. 4 And we took all his cities at that time; there was not a city which we took not from them; threescore cities, all the region of 5 Argob, the kingdom of Og in Bashan. All these were cities fenced with high walls, gates, and bars; beside the unwalled towns 6 a great many. And we utterly destroyed them, as we did unto Sihon king of Heshbon, utterly destroying every inhabited city, 7 with the women and the little ones. But all the cattle, and the spoil of the cities, we look 8 for a prey unto ourselves. And we took the land at that time out of the hand of the two kings of the Amorites that were beyond Jordan, from the valley of Arnon unto mount 9 Hermon; (which Hermon the Sidonians call 10 Sirion, and the Amorites call it Senir); all the cities of the plain, and all Gilead, and all Bashan, unto Salecah and Edrei, cities 11 of the kingdom of Og in Bashan. (For only Og king of Bashan remained of the remnant of the Rephaim; behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron; is it not in Rabbah of the children of Ammon? nine cubits was the length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it, after the cubit of a man.)

In striking contrast with the west of Palestine, with its narrow valleys and broken ridges of hill, crowded with towns, and their sides ribbed with terraces, stretches forth the wide trans-Jordanic region in actual extent far greater than the whole inheritance of the ten tribes, if we except the south country of Judah, yet having the most insignificant bearing on the future history of the nation. The first conquered, these regions were the first lost, and after the Assyrian captivity of Israel they were never repeopled by the chosen race, but remained in Gentile occupation. H. B. T.

At the time of Moses we find two Amoritish kingdoms on the other side of the Jordan. The most southerly of the two, between the Jabbok and the Arnon, was founded by King Sihon, who still resided at Heshbon. The northern kingdom, which covered the whole land of Bashan, was governed by King Og. His palace was at Ashtaroth (Josh. 13:12). The territory of Og is expressly described (De. 31:4) as an Amoritish kingdom. After the immigration of the Amorites, they soon gained the upper hand over the early inhabitants. K.

From the Wady Zered on the south to the broad ravine of the river Arnon on the north, lay the territory of Moab, also called Ar, along the southern half of the eastern shore of the Dead Sea; and a southern branch of the Arnon bounded their country on the east. Shortly before the exodus, the warlike Amorites (highlanders) had passed the Jordan under their King Sihon, and had driven the Moabites and Ammonites out of the region between the Arnon and the Jabbok; so that these rivers were now the southern and northern boundaries of the kingdom of Sihon, whose capital was Heshbon. North of the Jabbok, the great upland territory of Bashan, extending to Mount Hermon, formed the kingdom of the giant Og, who is also called an Amorite. Such was the state of the country east of Jordan, which formed no part of the land marked out for the first settlement of the Israelites, but events drew them on to its conquest. Having been forbidden to molest Moab or Ammon, they had asked for a peaceable passage through the former. Probably, as in the case of Edom, a direct passage was refused, but the people were left unmolested in passing over the upper courses of the Zered and the Arnon, and round the eastern slope of the intervening hills by the margin of the desert. P. S.

The country ruled by Sihon lay between the Arnon and the river Jabbok, now Wady Zerka. The name most frequently given in the Old Testament is the land of Gilead. In the Roman period it was called Perea. It is intersected throughout its entire extent and divided into two nearly equal parts by the Wady Hesban, which pours its waters into the Jordan (not far from its mouth). The southern half, between Arnon and Wady Hesban, is again divided in the middle by the Wady Zerka Main, which flows into the Dead Sea. In the time of Moses the whole was inhabited and governed by the Amorites; but it had previously been in the possession of the Moabites and Ammonites. The former had been driven southward across the Arnon, the latter more in an easterly direction. This serves to explain the fact that the broad plain on the east bank of the Jordan is constantly designated in the Pentateuch the Arboth Moab or Plains of Moab. K.

sometimes called “Mount Gilead,” and “the land of Gilead,” extended from the river Yarmuk on the north to the borders of Moab on the south—that is, to the Arnon. It would appear that at a very early period the Moabite territory extended far to the north of the Arnon, and embraced the “plain country” or Mishor, and southeastern portion of the Jordan Valley, but that when the Israelites reached the country the Moabites had been driven out by Sihon, king of the Amorites, who was in possession and living at Heshbon. On the defeat of Sihon at the decisive battle of Jahaz the country fell into the hands of the Israelites, and was afterward given to Reuben and Gad, but this particular district, the modern “Belka,” still retained the distinctive name of “Mishor,” or sometimes the “land of Moab,” and the plains east of Jordan were also known as the Arboth Moab, “or Plains of Moab.” In the southern half of Gilead were situated Mount Abarim, Mount Nebo, Pisgah, and Peor, which are mentioned in connection with the approach of the Israelites to the Promised Land and the death of Moses. It was this rich district of Gilead, with its abundant pasturage “a place for cattle,” that the two tribes of Gad and Reuben desired for their “very great multitude of cattle,” and in which they afterward led a pastoral life, to which there are several allusions in the Bible. Wilson.

Sihon Rejects Moses’ Request. He Attacks, and is Exterminated. His Cities Occupied by Israel.