The Fallible · Synthetic · Study Bible
The Capture of Jerusalem and Hebron
Judges 1:8–26 — The Capture of Jerusalem and Hebron. Each verse below carries the full apparatus: the Berean Standard Bible, the vocalized original (tap any word), and a parsed breakdown of every term transcribed from the interlinear. Synthesized commentary, canonical threads, and the reading of Christ gather at the end, over the whole unit.
8Then the men of Judah fought against Jerusalem and captured it. They put the city to the sword and set it on fire.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ḇə·nê- yə·hū·ḏāh way·yil·lā·ḥă·mū bî·rū·šā·lim way·yil·kə·ḏū ’ō·w·ṯāh way·yak·kū·hā lə·p̄î- ḥā·reḇ wə·’eṯ- šil·lə·ḥū hā·‘îr ḇā·’êš
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-they-warred, sons-of-Judah, against-Jerusalem, and-they-seized her; and-they-struck-her to-the-mouth-of-the-sword, and-the-city they-sent-away into-the-fire.
Where the English smooths the original
It seems to mean that no quarter was given. Set the city on fire. —Literally, sent the city into fire, as in Judges 20:48 ; 2Kings 8:12 ; Psalm 74:7 . The phrase does not occur elsewhere.
Jerusalem was not taken till the time of David; this verse contradicts Jdg 1:21 and the known course of history; see Jdg 19:11 f.; 2 Samuel 5:6-9 . We have here a late insertion, founded on a misunderstanding of Jdg 1:7 b, and designed to explain how the Judahites came to carry the wounded chief to Jerusalem.Cambridge's judgment is the most sceptical in this apparatus and rests on nineteenth-century source criticism. It is recorded because it names the real difficulty — this verse and v. 21 pull against each other — not because the FSSB endorses the verdict that the verse is an insertion.
Joshua had already slain the king of Jerusalem and his four allies after the battle at Gibeon ( Joshua 10:3 , Joshua 10:18-26 ), but had not conquered Jerusalem, his capital.
9Afterward, the men of Judah marched down to fight against the Canaanites living in the hill country, in the Negev, and in the foothills.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
wə·’a·ḥar bə·nê yə·hū·ḏāh yā·rə·ḏū lə·hil·lā·ḥêm bak·kə·na·‘ă·nî yō·wō·šêḇ hā·hār wə·han·ne·ḡeḇ wə·haš·šə·p̄ê·lāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-afterward went-down sons-of-Judah to-do-battle against-the-Canaanite, the-one-sitting-in the-hill-country, and-the-Negeb, and-the-Shephelah.
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“Went up” is the phrase applied to military expeditions (see Judges 1:2 ); “went down ” is the phrase for special battles ( 1Samuel 26:10 ; 1Samuel 29:4 ), like the Latin descendere in aciem.
they went down; from Jerusalem; which was on high ground: to fight against the Canaanites that dwelt in the mountain, and in the south, and in the valley; into which several parts the lot of the tribe of Judah was divided; in each of which they had cities, and some, as it seems, yet unsubdued, and in the hands of the Canaanites
or lowlands, between the mountains and the coast of the Mediterranean, occupied by the Philistines.
10Judah also marched against the Canaanites who were living in Hebron (formerly known as Kiriath-arba), and they struck down Sheshai, Ahiman, and Talmai.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
yə·hū·ḏāh way·yê·leḵ ’el- hak·kə·na·‘ă·nî hay·yō·wō·šêḇ bə·ḥeḇ·rō·wn ḥeḇ·rō·wn lə·p̄ā·nîm wə·šêm- qir·yaṯ ’ar·ba‘ way·yak·kū ’eṯ- šê·šay wə·’eṯ- ’ă·ḥî·man wə·’eṯ- tal·māy
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-went Judah against the-Canaanite the-one-sitting in-Hebron — and-the-name-of Hebron to-the-face formerly Kiriath-Arba — and-they-struck Sheshai and-Ahiman and-Talmai.
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Kiriath-arba = lit. ‘city of four,’ i.e. Tetrapolis, perhaps because the city was divided into four quarters inhabited by different races
Hebron was first taken by Joshua, and the inhabitants of it put to the sword, Joshua 10:36 ; but while Joshua was employed in making other conquests, the Canaanites found ways and means of getting into the possession of it again
Hebron is midway between Jerusalem and Beersheba, and twenty miles from either.
11From there they marched against the inhabitants of Debir (formerly known as Kiriath-sepher).
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miš·šām way·yê·leḵ ’el- yō·wō·šə·ḇê də·ḇîr də·ḇîr lə·p̄ā·nîm wə·šêm- qir·yaṯ- sê·p̄er
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-he-went from-there against the-ones-sitting-of Debir — and-the-name-of Debir to-the-face formerly Kiriath-Sepher.
Where the English smooths the original
Kirjath-sepher. —The name is curious and interesting. It means “the city of the book,” and is rendered in the LXX. by “city of letters.” It was also called Kirjath-sannah ( Joshua 15:49 ), which, according to Bochart, means “city of learning.” Perhaps, therefore, we may consider that it was a famous centre of Canaanite culture and worship.
It has been suggested that the town was called Kiriath-sepher because it contained the record-office of the Anâkim, or a library like those preserved in the great cities of Babylonia and Assyria (Sayce). Such fancies are spun out of a dubious etymologySet deliberately against Ellicott's note on the same verse. Cambridge is dismissing precisely the romantic reading Ellicott entertains; the FSSB records the disagreement rather than resolving it.
12And Caleb said, “To the man who strikes down Kiriath-sepher and captures it, I will give my daughter Acsah in marriage.”
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
kā·lêḇ way·yō·mer ’ă·šer- yak·keh ’eṯ- qir·yaṯ- sê·p̄er ū·lə·ḵā·ḏāh wə·nā·ṯat·tî lōw ’eṯ- ḇit·tî ‘aḵ·sāh lə·’iš·šāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-said Caleb: “He-who strikes Kiriath-Sepher and-seizes her — then-I-shall-give to-him Acsah my-daughter for-a-woman.”
Where the English smooths the original
13So Othniel son of Caleb’s younger brother Kenaz captured the city, and Caleb gave his daughter Acsah to him in marriage.
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‘ā·ṯə·nî·’êl ben- ḵā·lêḇ haq·qā·ṭōn mim·men·nū ’ă·ḥî qə·naz way·yil·kə·ḏāh way·yit·ten- ’eṯ- ḇit·tōw ‘aḵ·sāh lōw lə·’iš·šāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-seized-her Othniel son-of-Kenaz, brother-of-Caleb, the-younger-than-him; and-he-gave to-him Acsah his-daughter for-a-woman.
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The Hebrew may mean either that Othniel was “son of Kenaz and brother of Caleb” (in which case he married his niece); or “son of Kenaz, who was Caleb’s brother” (as in “Jonadab, the son of Shimeah David’s brother,” 2Samuel 13:3 ), in which case Achsah was his cousin.
Kenaz was not the actual father, but the name of an Edomite tribe Genesis 36:15 ; Genesis 36:42 ; ‘the son of Kenaz,’ therefore, is equivalent to ‘the Kenizzite.’Cambridge reads the whole episode as tribal history told through individuals; readers who take the narrative as family history will still find the philological point about Kenaz useful independently of that framework.
14One day Acsah came to Othniel and urged him to ask her father for a field. When she got off her donkey, Caleb asked her, “What do you desire?”
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way·hî bə·ḇō·w·’āh wat·tə·sî·ṯê·hū liš·’ō·wl mê·’êṯ- ’ā·ḇî·hā haś·śā·ḏeh wat·tiṣ·naḥ mê·‘al ha·ḥă·mō·wr kā·lêḇ way·yō·mer- lāh mah- lāḵ
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-it-came-to-pass at-her-coming, that-she-goaded-him to-ask from-with her-father the-field; and-she-dropped-down from-upon the-donkey, and-said to-her Caleb: “What to-thee?”
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Lighted. —Not merely in sign of reverence (like Rebecca in Genesis 24:64 , and Abigail in 1Samuel 25:25 ), but “leaped off” with eager impetuosity.
But the Hebrew reading may be right, and it may be that when her husband, brave in storming a city, but timid in asking a favour, hung back, she, with the tenacious will of a woman, sprang off the ass herself, and successfully preferred her request.
it is more natural to read he moved , instigated , her to ask . The LXX and Vulgate give this sense, but their evidence as to the original reading is not very decisiveCambridge argues for the LXX/Vulgate reading in which Othniel instigates Acsah, and then admits the evidence is weak. The Masoretic Hebrew read by BSB and by the note above keeps Acsah as the instigator.
15“Give me a blessing,” she answered. “Since you have given me land in the Negev, give me springs of water as well.” So Caleb gave her both the upper and lower springs.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
hā·ḇāh- lî ḇə·rā·ḵāh wat·tō·mer lōw kî nə·ṯat·tā·nî ’e·reṣ han·ne·ḡeḇ wə·nā·ṯat·tāh lî gul·lōṯ mā·yim kā·lêḇ ’êṯ way·yit·ten- lāh ‘il·lîṯ wə·’êṯ gul·lōṯ taḥ·tîṯ gul·lōṯ
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-she-said to-him: “Give-now to-me a-blessing, for land-of the-Negeb you-have-given-me — so-give to-me basins-of water.” And-gave to-her Caleb the-upper basins and-the-lower basins.
Where the English smooths the original
In thus asking for the fertile land which lay at the foot of the mountain slope, she showed herself at once more provident and less bashful than her husband.
an ancient place-name, called after the springs mentioned further on: land in Palestine is valueless without springs.
and are construed with the plural form of the feminine גּלּות, because this is used in the sense of the singularA purely grammatical note, given here because it is the strongest single piece of evidence that Judges 1:15 and Joshua 15:19 are the same text in two states.
16Now the descendants of Moses’ father-in-law, the Kenite, went up with the men of Judah from the City of Palms to the Wilderness of Judah in the Negev near Arad. They went to live among the people.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ū·ḇə·nê mō·šeh ḥō·ṯên qê·nî ‘ā·lū ’eṯ- bə·nê yə·hū·ḏāh mê·‘îr hat·tə·mā·rîm miḏ·bar yə·hū·ḏāh ’ă·šer bə·ne·ḡeḇ ‘ă·rāḏ way·yê·leḵ way·yê·šeḇ ’eṯ- hā·‘ām
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-sons-of the-father-in-law-of Moses, the-Kenite, went-up from-the-city-of the-palms with the-sons-of-Judah to-the-wilderness-of Judah which is-in-the-Negeb-of Arad; and-he-went and-sat with the-people.
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Went up from the city of palm-trees — That is, from Jericho, so called, Deuteronomy 34:3 ; not indeed the city, which had been destroyed; but the territory belonging to it, where, it seems, they were seated in a most pleasant, fruitful, and safe place
or to avoid temptations to luxury, and exercise themselves in self-denial and contempt of the present evil world, and the lusts thereofPoole offers this as one of several possible motives and explicitly concedes the true cause may be “for some other cause unknown to us at this distance.” The ascetic reading is his conjecture, not the text's statement.
These Kenites had accompanied the Israelites to Canaan at the request of Moses ( Numbers 10:29 .); and when the Israelites advanced into Canaan itself, they had probably remained as nomads in the neighbourhood of the Jordan near to Jericho, without taking any part in the wars of Joshua.
The Kenites were the elder branch of the tribe of Midianites. They lived in the rocky district on the shores of the gulf of Akabah
17Then the men of Judah went with their brothers the Simeonites, attacked the Canaanites living in Zephath, and devoted the city to destruction. So it was called Hormah.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
yə·hū·ḏāh way·yê·leḵ ’eṯ- ’ā·ḥîw šim·‘ō·wn way·yak·kū ’eṯ- hak·kə·na·‘ă·nî yō·wō·šêḇ ṣə·p̄aṯ way·ya·ḥă·rî·mū ’ō·w·ṯāh way·yiq·rā ’eṯ- šêm- hā·‘îr ḥā·rə·māh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-went Judah with Simeon his-brother, and-they-struck the-Canaanite sitting-in Zephath, and-they-devoted-her-to-the-ban; and-he-called the-name-of the-city Hormah.
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The name Chormah is derived from Cherem (anathema or oan), and the verb rendered “utterly destroyed” means ‘executed the ban upon it.
was something separated from common use, secluded , wholly made over to the deity and therefore inviolable.
Judah went with Simeon — According to their promise, Jdg 1:3 , and the laws of justice and gratitude: having finished, as far as they were able, the conquest of what belonged to the tribe of Judah, they went to assist the Simeonites to acquire the possession of what was comprehended in their lot.
18And Judah also captured Gaza, Ashkelon, and Ekron—each with its territory.
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yə·hū·ḏāh ’eṯ- way·yil·kōḏ ‘az·zāh wə·’eṯ- gə·ḇū·lāh wə·’eṯ- ’aš·qə·lō·wn wə·’eṯ- gə·ḇū·lāh wə·’eṯ- ‘eq·rō·wn wə·’eṯ- gə·ḇū·lāh
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-seized Judah Gaza and-her-border, and-Ashkelon and-her-border, and-Ekron and-her-border.
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The statement that Judah captured three out of the five chief cities of the Philistines cannot be reconciled with any ancient tradition; it contradicts the next verse and Jdg 3:3 , Joshua 13:2 f.; it represents the unhistorical theory of the conquest which is found in Jdg 1:4 ; Jdg 1:8-9 , and like them must be regarded as the work of a late redaction.Cambridge's verdict rests on a reconstruction of the book's sources. Poole's note on the same verse reaches a compatible historical result — the cities were taken but not held — without the redactional argument; both are given so the reader can weigh them.
It is only said that they took the cities, and probably contented themselves with making them tributary; but it is not said that they slew the people, as they ought to have done
It is a curious fact that when Rameses III took Askelon it was occupied, not by Philistines, but apparently by Hebrews.Barnes is citing nineteenth-century Egyptology and a date for Rameses III that later scholarship has revised. The observation is recorded as his; the chronology should not be taken as current.
19The LORD was with Judah, and they took possession of the hill country; but they could not drive out the inhabitants of the plains because they had chariots of iron.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
Yah·weh way·hî ’eṯ- yə·hū·ḏå̄h way·yō·reš ’eṯ- hā·hār kî lō lə·hō·w·rîš ’eṯ- yō·šə·ḇê hā·‘ê·meq kî- lā·hem re·ḵeḇ bar·zel
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-was YHWH with Judah, and-he-took-possession-of the-hill-country; for not to-dispossess the-ones-sitting-of the-valley, because chariots-of-iron belonged-to-them.
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The Canaanites had iron chariots; but Israel had God on their side, whose chariots are thousands of angels, Ps 68:17. Yet they suffered their fears to prevail against their faith.
The war was of the Lord, whose omnipotent aid would have ensured their success in every encounter, whether on the mountains or the plains, with foot soldiers or cavalry. It was distrust, the want of a simple and firm reliance on the promise of God, that made them afraid of the iron chariots
The Hebrew seems purposely to avoid this expression, and says “ there was no driving out.”
we note a tendency to obliterate the impotence of Israel. In this chap. the editor’s theory ( Jdg 2:1 b–5a) has influenced the alteration: the cause of the tribes’ failure was not their inability to match the Canaanites, but their unfaithfulness (so Targum here).Cambridge reads the theological explanation as a later editorial overlay on a text that originally admitted simple military weakness. The devotional tradition (Henry, JFB, Benson, Poole) reads it as the text's own diagnosis. Both readings are in the apparatus because the verse's odd grammar is what generates the dispute.
20Just as Moses had promised, Judah gave Hebron to Caleb, who drove out the descendants of the three sons of Anak.
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’eṯ- ka·’ă·šer mō·šeh dib·ber way·yit·tə·nū ḥeḇ·rō·wn lə·ḵā·lêḇ way·yō·w·reš miš·šām šə·lō·šāh bə·nê hā·‘ă·nāq ’eṯ-
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-they-gave to-Caleb Hebron, just-as spoke Moses; and-he-dispossessed from-there the-three sons-of the-Anak.
Where the English smooths the original
When all the spies brought up an evil report of the land, and by doing so raised a rebellion against Moses and Aaron, Caleb the Kenezite, alone with Joshua, stood firm, and, as a reward of his faithfulness, received the promise that he and his seed should possess the land on which his feet had trodden.
the article shews that the noun is to be taken as a collective, i.e. as the name, not of an individual but of a tribe of people
It is remarkable that after this time Judah is only mentioned in Judges 10:9 ; Judges 15:10 ; Judges 20:18 . The tribe produced no judge, with the possible exception of Ibzan (see Judges 12:8 ), nor is it mentioned in the song of Deborah.Ellicott's observation is about the rest of the book, not this verse, and is included because it is the sharpest available comment on what becomes of the tribe that leads this chapter.
21The Benjamites, however, failed to drive out the Jebusites living in Jerusalem. So to this day the Jebusites live there among the Benjamites.
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bə·nê ḇin·yā·min wə·’eṯ- lō hō·w·rî·šū hay·ḇū·sî yō·šêḇ yə·rū·šā·lim ‘aḏ haz·zeh hay·yō·wm hay·ḇū·sî way·yê·šeḇ bî·rū·šā·lim ’eṯ- bə·nê ḇin·yā·min
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-the-Jebusite the-one-sitting-in Jerusalem, not did-the-sons-of-Benjamin dispossess; and-the-Jebusite has-sat with the-sons-of-Benjamin in-Jerusalem unto this day.
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Probably the original reading Judah was altered in later times to Benjamin, because Jebus was within the border of Benjamin, and neither had the Benjamites expelled the Jebusites.
The people of Israel were very careless of their duty and interest. Owing to slothfulness and cowardice, they would not be at the pains to complete their conquests.
The border of the two tribes ran through the city—Israelites and natives must have been closely intermingled.
For after the tribe of Judah had burnt it, they built it again.The Geneva gloss is the marginal note's harmonisation of v. 8 with this verse: the city was burnt and then rebuilt by its old inhabitants. It is offered as a proposed reconciliation, not as something the text states.
22The house of Joseph also attacked Bethel, and the LORD was with them.
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ḇêṯ- yō·w·sêp̄ gam- hêm way·ya·‘ă·lū bêṯ- ’êl Yah·weh ‘im·mām
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-went-up the-house-of-Joseph, they also, against Beth-El; and-YHWH was with them.
Where the English smooths the original
The account of the capture of Beth-el ( Jdg 1:22-26 ) has all the marks of antiquity, like the early fragments preserved in Jdg 1:1-21 . After the invasion of the South comes the invasion of Central Palestine, and, as this ancient version of the history shews, the two were independent of one another.Notable as the one place in this chapter where Cambridge argues for antiquity rather than lateness; he treats vv. 22-26 as among the oldest material here.
so that the tribe of Joseph could not tolerate the Canaanites in this border town, if it would defend its own territory against them, and purge it entirely of them.
the Word of the Lord, as the Targum, directing, assisting, and succeeding them in their attempt.
23They sent spies to Bethel (formerly known as Luz),
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
ḇêṯ- yō·w·sêp̄ bə·ḇêṯ- way·yā·ṯî·rū ’êl hā·‘îr lə·p̄ā·nîm wə·šêm- lūz
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-they-had-spied-out the-house-of-Joseph at-Beth-El — and-the-name-of the-city to-the-face formerly Luz.
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Luz is supposed to mean ‘almond-tree’; more suggestively Winckler proposes ‘asylum,’ from the Arab lâdha ‘to seek a refuge’
As soon, however, as the Ephraimites conquered it, they reimposed the name, in memory of their father Jacob.
which signifies a "nut"; perhaps it was so called from large numbers of nut trees which grew near it; the Jews suggest as if it was like a nut, no entrance into it but through a cave or some subterraneous passageGill is relaying a rabbinic tradition about a hidden entrance, which he introduces as what “the Jews suggest.” It is reported here as tradition, not as an established fact about the site.
24and when the spies saw a man coming out of the city, they said to him, “Please show us how to get into the city, and we will treat you kindly.”
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haš·šō·mə·rîm way·yir·’ū ’îš yō·w·ṣê min- hā·‘îr way·yō·mə·rū lōw nā ’eṯ- har·’ê·nū mə·ḇō·w hā·‘îr wə·‘ā·śî·nū ‘im·mə·ḵā ḥā·seḏ
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-saw the-watchers a-man coming-out from the-city, and-they-said to-him: “Show-us, we-pray, the-way-in-of the-city, and-we-will-do with-thee ḥesed.”
Where the English smooths the original
The Israelites, like most ancient nations, were little able to take cities by storm, and relied either on blockade or on internal treachery.
but we may assume the promise was suspended on his embracing the true religion, or quitting the country, as he did.JFB explicitly marks this as an assumption (“we may assume”). The text records no conversion and no condition; the inference is his attempt to reconcile the promise with the ban, and should be weighed as such.
i.e. not the gate, but the point where the city could be most easily entered by an attacking party.
25So the man showed them the entrance to the city, and they put the city to the sword but released that man and all his family.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
way·yar·’êm ’eṯ- mə·ḇō·w hā·‘îr way·yak·kū ’eṯ- hā·‘îr lə·p̄î- ḥā·reḇ wə·’eṯ- šil·lê·ḥū hā·’îš wə·’eṯ- kāl- miš·paḥ·tōw
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-he-showed-them the-way-in-of the-city, and-they-struck the-city to-the-mouth-of-sword; and-the-man and-all-his-clan they-sent-away.
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whereupon they took the town and smote it without quarter, according to the law in Deuteronomy 20:16-17 , letting none but the man and his family go.
who had returned to it, encouraged by the promise made him, and for the sake of saving of his familyGill's two alternatives — that the man either renounced heathenism or departed to another country — are his own reconstruction; the text supplies only the departure, which v. 26 records.
We can have no fellowship with the enemies of God within us or around us, but to our hurt; therefore our only wisdom is to maintain unceasing war against them.Henry's application is drawn from the whole section (vv. 21-36), not this verse alone, and reads the surviving Canaanites morally rather than ethnically — as the standing enemies of the believer's soul.
26And the man went to the land of the Hittites, built a city, and called it Luz, which is its name to this day.
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Hebrew — tap a word ↓
hā·’îš way·yê·leḵ ’e·reṣ ha·ḥit·tîm way·yi·ḇen ‘îr way·yiq·rā šə·māh lūz hū šə·māh ‘aḏ haz·zeh hay·yō·wm
Literal — word-for-word from the original
And-went the-man to-the-land-of the-Hittites, and-he-built a-city, and-he-called her-name Luz — that is her-name unto this day.
Where the English smooths the original
It was not uncommon in ancient days for the fugitives from a city to build another city elsewhere of the same name.
The man went and built a city — Which is an argument that the children of Ephraim dismissed him and his family, with all their goods and estate.
The tradition of its origin reminds us of the story of the northern DanCambridge's comparison is to Judges 18, where Danites migrate north and rename a captured city after their ancestor — the mirror image of this verse, and a pointer to how the book will end.
The verse-by-verse work is done. What follows gathers the whole unit. All three layers below are machine-generated (⚙). Weigh them; they have no authority.
AI synthesis — woven from the public-domain voices above and the original text; generated and fallible.
⚙ The unit opens on a conquest the rest of the book will quietly unsay. Judah וַיִּלָּחֲמוּ (lâcham, H3898, Nifal) against Jerusalem, וַיִּלְכְּדוּ (lâkad, H3920) it, struck it לְפִי־חָרֶב — literally to the mouth of the sword — and שִׁלְּחוּ the city into the fire. Ellicott gives the idiom flatly: “Literally, with the mouth of the sword… It seems to mean that no quarter was given,” and of the burning, “Literally, sent the city into fire… The phrase does not occur elsewhere.” Barnes and K&D both record that this exact fire-phrase recurs only at Judges 20:48, 2 Kings 8:12 and Psalm 74:7 — three verses, all of them about a city under judgment.
The voices then split, and the split is not hidden. K&D harmonises: “Joshua had already slain the king of Jerusalem and his four allies after the battle at Gibeon… but had not conquered Jerusalem, his capital.” Poole records the alternative openly (“Though some think Jerusalem was twice taken”), and Gill reports the rabbis divided — Kimchi and Ben Gersom for Joshua's day, Jarchi and Abarbinel for this one. Cambridge refuses the harmony altogether: “Jerusalem was not taken till the time of David; this verse contradicts Jdg 1:21 and the known course of history… We have here a late insertion.” ⚙ The Bible itself supplies the tension thirteen verses later: v. 21 says the Jebusite sits in Jerusalem עַד הַיּוֹם הַזֶּה, unto this day. Whatever was burned in v. 8 did not stay burned.
⚙ The war narrows from tribes to a family. Hebron falls — Ellicott: “Hebron is midway between Jerusalem and Beersheba, and twenty miles from either” — and with it Sheshai, Ahiman and Talmai, three names the Verifier finds in only three, four and six verses of the whole Hebrew Bible. Cambridge argues the editor's hand here, that “the whole of Jdg 1:10, except the names of the giants, is due to the editor,” and that v. 20 has been displaced from its proper place before v. 10. ⚙ The names, however, are not editorial furniture: they are the exact names the spies brought back from this exact city in Numbers 13:22, and they are the reason a generation died in the wilderness.
Then קִרְיַת־סֵפֶר, Book-town. Ellicott is charmed by it — “the city of the book… Perhaps, therefore, we may consider that it was a famous centre of Canaanite culture and worship” — and Cambridge is not: “Such fancies are spun out of a dubious etymology.” ⚙ We record both and claim neither. What the Hebrew does say is that a city of writing is won by a sword, and its prize is a bride.
And then the text goes strange and domestic. Achsah וַתְּסִיתֵהוּ (çûwth, H5496 — to prick, goad) her husband, then וַתִּצְנַח off the donkey — a verb found in only three verses. Ellicott: “Not merely in sign of reverence… but ‘leaped off’ with eager impetuosity.” Pulpit reads the marriage shrewdly: her husband was “brave in storming a city, but timid in asking a favour,” so “she, with the tenacious will of a woman, sprang off the ass herself, and successfully preferred her request.” Her word for what she wants is בְּרָכָה, blessing — which Ellicott and Cambridge both gloss as a present. Cambridge supplies the hard fact under the charm: “land in Palestine is valueless without springs.” ⚙ In a chapter about land not taken, the one person who gets everything she asks for is a woman who asks for water.
⚙ Verse 16 breaks the war for a migration. The sons of Moses' חֹתֵן (father-in-law) go up from the City of Palms into the wilderness — outsiders moving in while insiders stall. Ellicott: “The Kenites were the elder branch of the tribe of Midianites. They lived in the rocky district on the shores of the gulf of Akabah.” Benson places them in “a most pleasant, fruitful, and safe place” at Jericho; Poole offers, among several motives, that they left “to avoid temptations to luxury, and exercise themselves in self-denial and contempt of the present evil world, and the lusts thereof.” K&D notes they had “accompanied the Israelites to Canaan at the request of Moses… without taking any part in the wars of Joshua.” ⚙ A people with no claim to the land takes a share in it by walking with Judah; two verses later, Judah cannot hold the coast it conquered.
Between the two stands Zephath, וַיַּחֲרִימוּ — put under the ban — and renamed חָרְמָה, from the same root. Ellicott: “The name Chormah is derived from Cherem… the verb rendered ‘utterly destroyed’ means ‘executed the ban upon it.” Cambridge supplies the comparative frame, that the banned thing “was something separated from common use, secluded, wholly made over to the deity and therefore inviolable,” and records the Moabite Stone: King Mesha devoted 7000 Israelite prisoners to Ashtar-Chemosh. ⚙ The practice is not uniquely Israelite; the theology attached to it is, and the honest reader of this verse should feel the weight of both facts at once.
⚙ Verse 19 is the hinge of the whole book, and it is built out of one verb used twice. וַיֹּרֶשׁ and לְהוֹרִישׁ are both yârash (H3423); K&D separates the senses precisely: “to seize upon a possession which has been vacated,” and “to drive or exterminate them out of their possessions.” Judah did the first in the hills and could not do the second in the plain. Ellicott notices the Hebrew declines even to say could not: “The Hebrew seems purposely to avoid this expression, and says ‘there was no driving out.”
The stated reason is metallurgical: רֶכֶב בַּרְזֶל. The commentators unanimously refuse to let it stand as a reason. Henry: “The Canaanites had iron chariots; but Israel had God on their side, whose chariots are thousands of angels, Ps 68:17. Yet they suffered their fears to prevail against their faith.” JFB: “It was distrust, the want of a simple and firm reliance on the promise of God, that made them afraid of the iron chariots.” Benson and Poole say the same in nearly the same words, and Gill records the Targum's harder gloss — “after they had sinned, they could not drive out the inhabitants of the valley.” Cambridge, alone and usefully, reads the clause as a textual symptom rather than a moral one: comparing the parallels, “we note a tendency to obliterate the impotence of Israel… the cause of the tribes' failure was not their inability to match the Canaanites, but their unfaithfulness (so Targum here).” ⚙ Both readings can be held: the text as we have it names the chariots, and the tradition that transmitted it insists the chariots were never the problem.
⚙ The last movement is the unit's quietest and strangest. The house of Joseph goes up, “and YHWH was with them” — the same clause given to Judah in v. 19, and here it works. Cambridge judges this passage the oldest thing in the chapter: the Bethel account “has all the marks of antiquity… as this ancient version of the history shews, the two were independent of one another.”
The scouts are הַשֹּׁמְרִים, the watchers; they see one man leaving the city and offer him חָסֶד — covenant kindness — for the מְבוֹא, the way in. He takes it. The city is put to the mouth of the sword; the man and all his מִשְׁפַּחְתּוֹ are שִׁלֵּחוּ — sent away. That verb is the unit's own bitter echo: in v. 8 Judah sent a city into fire; in v. 25 Joseph sends a household out of one. Four of the named voices reach for Rahab. K&D: they took the town “letting none but the man and his family go,” cross-referring to Joshua 2:12-13; Cambridge: “As Rahab and her kindred were spared”; Pulpit compares “the saving of Rahab alive, with all her house”; Gill says the man may have been promised safety “as was in the case of Rahab.” JFB is the most uneasy, and hedges accordingly: “we may assume the promise was suspended on his embracing the true religion, or quitting the country, as he did.”
⚙ But the text will not give us Rahab. Rahab confessed YHWH and was grafted in. This man builds another Luz in the land of the Hittites and keeps the old name — Ellicott: “It was not uncommon in ancient days for the fugitives from a city to build another city elsewhere of the same name.” Benson infers he left with everything: “Which is an argument that the children of Ephraim dismissed him and his family, with all their goods and estate.” He is spared, enriched, and gone. The chapter that could not finish its conquest ends by founding a Canaanite city somewhere else, with the same name, standing עַד הַיּוֹם הַזֶּה.
⚙ Read straight through, Judges 1:8–26 is not a victory list with blemishes; it is a ledger, and the ledger is kept honestly by the writer himself. Twice he writes unto this day (vv. 21, 26), and both times the thing still standing is something Israel failed to remove: a Jebusite in Jerusalem, and a Luz rebuilt in Hittite country. Between those two markers the text records exactly one unqualified success — Achsah's — and it is won by asking rather than by the sword. The Scripture's own diagnosis is given in v. 19 with unbearable economy: YHWH was with Judah, and he possessed the hill country; for there was no driving out the inhabitants of the valley, because they had chariots of iron. The clause that is supposed to explain the failure sits immediately after the clause that makes the failure inexplicable. Henry, JFB, Benson, Poole and Gill all press the same point and none of them invented it; the sentence itself sets God's presence and the enemy's ironwork side by side and lets the reader see they cannot both be the operative cause. Cambridge's textual reading — that a later hand shifted the blame from weakness to unfaithfulness — does not remove the tension; it shows that ancient readers felt it too. ⚙ My fallible reading, offered to be tested against the text: what begins to be lost here is not territory but discrimination. The same Hebrew verb shâlach sends a city into fire in v. 8 and sends a Canaanite household out free in v. 25, and the book never tells us which was the obedience. A people who are not sure what they were told to destroy will end by destroying what they were told to keep — which is the plot of Judges from here to its last chapter.
The chariots were never the reason; they were the excuse the text was honest enough to record. (⚙ synthesis, not Scripture.)
AI-generated connections. Each carries a verification badge with a recorded basis; contested links are flagged.
Judges 1:11–15 and Joshua 15:15–19 narrate Caleb's offer, Othniel's capture, Achsah's goading and the upper and lower springs in nearly identical Hebrew. The Verifier's bases carry the rare names that make the identification certain rather than thematic: קִרְיַת סַנָּה / קִרְיַת סֵפֶר (H7158, in only 5 verses), עַכְסָה (H5915, 5 verses), and עִלִּי (H5942, 2 verses). K&D states it plainly: this “has already been related in Joshua 15:14-19,” and notes the two forms are singular here against the plural there. Gill reports the resulting chronological problem without softening it — Caleb “cannot well be thought to have a young daughter at this time undisposed of in marriage.” Cambridge holds that Joshua preserves the original form and that Judges has rearranged it. ⚙ We record the doublet as a doublet and do not adjudicate which telling is prior.
Joshua 15:15 · Joshua 15:16 · Joshua 15:17 · Joshua 15:18 · Joshua 15:19
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H7158 Qiryath Çannâh (in 5 vv), H5915 ʻAkçâh (in 5 vv), H5942 ʻillîy (in 2 vv), H1688 Dᵉbîyr (in 12 vv), H3612 Kâlêb (in 35 vv), H3920 lâkad (in 112 vv), H5496 çûwth (in 18 vv). Multiple very rare lexemes clustered across one continuous narrative: this is textual dependence, not a shared motif. No claim is made about direction of dependence.
The three Anakite names struck down at Hebron in Judges 1:10 are the same three the spies reported from Hebron in Numbers 13:22, immediately before the congregation refused the land. The Verifier's basis is about as tight as Hebrew allows: שֵׁשַׁי (H8344) occurs in three verses in the whole Bible, אֲחִימַן (H289) in four. Ellicott records the tradition that these are “possibly the names of three clans of the Anakim,” connected with the Nephilim; Cambridge adds that the article in הָעֲנָק (v. 20) “shews that the noun is to be taken as a collective.” ⚙ The narrative point is structural and the commentators do not make it for us: the terror that cost Israel forty years is dispatched in half a verse, and the tribe that does it still cannot take the valley.
Numbers 13:22 · Joshua 15:14
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H8344 Shêshay (in 3 vv), H289 ʼĂchîyman (in 4 vv), H8526 Talmay (in 6 vv); also H5045 negeb (in 98 vv) with Numbers 13:22. Three proper names each occurring in fewer than seven verses canon-wide — a genuine verbal link, though not a quotation formula.
צָנַח (tsânach, H6795) occurs in only three verses. Two of them are in Judges: Achsah alights from her donkey to ask her father for springs (1:14), and Jael drives down the peg through Sisera's temple (4:21). Ellicott notes the same overlap from the other side: “The Hebrew verb tsanach here used occurs in Judges 4:21, where it is rendered ‘fastened,’ i.e., ‘drove it firmly by a blow.” Cambridge admits the sense is recovered from context only: “The meaning of the verb lighted, descended… is inferred from the context.” ⚙ The link is lexical and real; the reading built on it — that Judges twice gives its decisive motion to a woman while the men hesitate — is our own and is offered as inference, not as sourced fact.
Judges 4:21
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexeme H6795 tsânach (in 3 vv) — one of the rarest verbs in the unit, and the only other Judges occurrence. A rare-word link, explicitly not a quotation; the thematic reading drawn from it is ⚙ synthesis and is flagged as such in the body.
Judges 1:23 glosses Bethel with its older name Luz, exactly as Genesis 28:19 and Genesis 35:6 do, and v. 26 has the spared Canaanite plant the discarded name in Hittite territory. The Verifier's basis is the shared pair לוּז (H3870, 7 verses) and בֵּית־אֵל (H1008, 64 verses). Pulpit draws the historical inference: the Canaanites would not have used Jacob's name, so “as soon… as the Ephraimites conquered it, they reimposed the name, in memory of their father Jacob.” Cambridge records a competing etymology — Winckler's ‘asylum’ — and the possibility that “Luz may have been a sanctuary before it became famous under the name of Beth-el.” ⚙ We tier this thematic rather than verbal: the shared lexemes are a place-name gloss recurring across books, which is weaker evidence of dependence than a shared rare verb or a citation formula.
Genesis 28:19 · Genesis 35:6 · Joshua 16:2
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H3870 Lûwz (in 7 vv) and H1008 Bêyth-ʼÊl (in 64 vv), with H1366 gᵉbûwl (in 196 vv) at Joshua 16:2. Deliberately under-claimed: a recurring place-name gloss establishes a shared subject, not textual quotation.
The Othniel introduced here as Caleb's kinsman and Achsah's husband is the man raised up as Israel's first deliverer in Judges 3:9, where he is again identified as “the son of Kenaz, Caleb's younger brother.” The shared lexemes are עָתְנִיאֵל (H6274, 6 verses), כָּלֵב (H3612) and קָטֹן (H6996). Cambridge reads the epithet as a narrative repair: Othniel is called the younger brother “to account for his being of an age to marry Caleb's daughter, as in Jdg 3:9 to explain how he outlived Caleb so long,” and holds that Othniel and Caleb “were really clans” of the Kenizzite tribe. Ellicott records the rabbinic identification of Othniel with Jabez of 1 Chronicles 4:9-10. ⚙ Structural rather than verbal: apart from the name itself the overlap is ordinary vocabulary, and the connection is one of person and plot.
Judges 3:9 · 1 Chronicles 2:49
basis: Verifier: shared Hebrew lexemes H6274 ʻOthnîyʼêl (in 6 vv), H3612 Kâlêb (in 35 vv), H6996 qâṭân (in 100 vv); with 1 Chronicles 2:49, H5915 ʻAkçâh (in 5 vv). The rare name establishes shared reference; there is no verbal quotation between the passages.
Both narratives run the same sequence: scouts enter a doomed city, a single inhabitant trades information for the lives of his or her household, the city falls under the sword, the household walks out alive. Cambridge notes it in one line — “As Rahab and her kindred were spared, Joshua 6:25” — and Pulpit and K&D both cross-refer to Joshua 2:12-13, the passage where the Hebrew word here, חֶסֶד (H2617), is likewise the currency of the bargain. Hebrews 11:31 and James 2:25 name Rahab's side of it as faith and as works; no New Testament text mentions the man of Luz. ⚙ That silence is the point of the comparison, not an objection to it: Rahab confessed and stayed, and the man of Luz took his goods and built his old city again in Hittite country.
Joshua 2:12 · Joshua 6:25 · Hebrews 11:31
basis: Hebrew↔Hebrew portion (Joshua 2:12; 6:25): shared narrative pattern plus the shared lexeme H2617 chêçêd, recorded by Cambridge, Pulpit and K&D as a cross-reference — a motif link, no quotation claimed. The Hebrews 11:31 leg is cross-Testament (Greek↔Hebrew): shared Strong's numbers are impossible there, so it is carried on the shared subject (Rahab) alone and is tiered thematic, never verbal.
Judges 1:8 says Judah burned Jerusalem; Judges 1:21 says the Jebusite still lives there; Joshua 15:63 says the same of Judah; Judges 19:11-12 calls it a foreign city; 2 Samuel 5:6-9 has David take it. The named voices do not agree and we will not pretend they do. K&D harmonises by sequence — taken, burned, reoccupied, finally wrested by David. Poole reports both options and prefers the copartnership reading. Gill sets Kimchi and Ben Gersom against Jarchi and Abarbinel. Barnes concludes Jerusalem “was only taken once, namely, at the time here described… but that the children of Judah did not occupy it in sufficient force.” Cambridge rejects the verse as “a late insertion, founded on a misunderstanding of Jdg 1:7b.” ⚙ We flag rather than tier this: the connection between these passages is certain, but what it proves is exactly what is disputed, and no lexical computation can settle it.
Joshua 15:63 · Judges 19:11 · 2 Samuel 5:6
basis: The passages are linked by shared subject (Jerusalem / the Jebusite) and by the near-identical wording of Judges 1:21 and Joshua 15:63, which differ chiefly in reading Benjamin for Judah — Barnes and Cambridge both suspect deliberate alteration. No Verifier-computed lexeme basis was supplied for the 2 Samuel leg. The historical claim is contested among the named commentators (K&D, Barnes, Poole, Gill harmonising; Cambridge denying), so the link is recorded and the conclusion is left open.
AI-generated reading; weigh it against the text.
⚙ The unit is framed by a divine assignment the reader is expected to remember: Judah first (1:2), and here “YHWH was with Judah” (1:19), the same clause repeated over the house of Joseph at Bethel (1:22). Henry draws the principle from the sourced text — “Judah was first in dignity, and must be first in duty” — and Gill records the Targum's paraphrase of the presence-clause as “the Word of the Lord was for the help of the house of Judah,” a reading Ellicott also notes (“The Targum here has ‘The Word of the Lord’”). Jacob's blessing had already named Judah the lion's whelp holding the sceptre until Shiloh comes; the New Testament names the Lion of the tribe of Judah who prevails to open the scroll, and Matthew's genealogy runs the line of this chapter's Judah down to Christ. ⚙ That Judah leads and that Judah's leadership is finally vindicated in one descendant is the oldest and most widely held Christian reading of the tribe, and this chapter supplies its shadow side: Judah goes first, and Judah stops at the iron chariots.
Genesis 49:8-10 · Revelation 5:5 · Matthew 1:2-3
⚙ In 1:12-15 a father promises his daughter to the man who takes the city, the man takes the city, and the bride's first act is to ask for water and receive both upper and lower springs. Ellicott records the pattern as an ancient heroic motif, comparing 1 Samuel 17:25 and the Messenian Aristomenes; Cambridge reads it tribally, as “an alliance between the Othniel clan and an off-shoot of Caleb.” ⚙ Neither of them makes it typological, and neither should be cited as doing so. Our own reading, offered to be tested: the New Testament's settled grammar is that the Bridegroom wins His bride by conquest and then gives her living water — Ephesians 5:25-27, John 4:14, Revelation 22:17 — and Judges gives that grammar an early narrative shape in which the victory and the springs come to the same woman from the same hand. We mark this novel. It is a figural reading of a passage the named commentators read historically, and it must not be pressed as though the text asserted it.
Ephesians 5:25-27 · John 4:14 · Revelation 22:17
⚙ Two words dominate this unit's treatment of Canaanite life. חֵרֶם, the ban — Cambridge: “wholly made over to the deity and therefore inviolable” — and חֶסֶד, covenant kindness, which is what the scouts of Bethel offer a man at the city gate (1:24). K&D: they took the town “letting none but the man and his family go.” The canonical precedent is Rahab, whom the New Testament twice names among the faithful, and whom Matthew places in the genealogy of Christ. ⚙ The redemptive-historical shape is that even in the severest chapters of the conquest the narrative preserves an exception, and the exceptions are the ones the gospel later claims. But the honest limit is this: Rahab confessed the God of Israel and remained; the man of Luz is never said to confess anything, and he leaves to rebuild his old city under its old name. JFB alone guesses at a conversion — “we may assume the promise was suspended on his embracing the true religion” — and marks it as an assumption. We mark our reading novel for the same reason: the figure of mercy breaking through judgment is genuinely here, and the text withholds the one fact that would let us close it.
Joshua 6:25 · Matthew 1:5 · Hebrews 11:31
The biblical text is the Berean Standard Bible (BSB), public domain (CC0). Hebrew/Greek text, transliteration, morphology and Strong’s are transcribed from the Berean interlinear (CC0) + Strong’s lexicons (PD); the literal renderings, divergence notes, word notes and all synthesis are this tool’s own work (⚙) — fallible; verify them.
Named voices, quoted verbatim from public-domain works:
Text. Scripture quoted is the Berean Standard Bible (CC0); the Hebrew, transliteration, glosses, Strong's numbers and parses are the Berean interlinear as supplied in the brief. A mechanical caution about word indices. The interlinear rows in this unit are ordered to follow the English gloss, not the Hebrew, in several verses: at 1:8 the subject בְנֵי־יְהוּדָה is listed before the verb וַיִּלָּחֲמוּ that precedes it in the Hebrew; at 1:15 גֻּלֹּת appears at indices 11, 19 and again at 21; at 1:18, 1:20 and 1:21 the object marker rows are similarly displaced. Our note keys follow the supplied indices exactly, but readers should not infer Hebrew word order from them.
What is genuinely uncertain here. (1) Whether v. 8 records a conquest at all: K&D, Barnes, Poole and Gill harmonise it with Joshua 10 and 15 in four different ways, and Cambridge calls it a late insertion. We have flagged the thread rather than choose. (2) Whether vv. 10 and 20 stand in their original order: Cambridge argues v. 20 belonged before v. 10 and that the Joshua parallel preserves the earlier text. (3) Whether Achsah moved Othniel or Othniel moved Achsah at 1:14: the Masoretic Hebrew reads the former, the LXX and Vulgate the latter, and Cambridge, while preferring the versions' sense, concedes “their evidence as to the original reading is not very decisive.” (4) The meaning of גֻּלֹּת — Ellicott's “bubblings,” Cambridge's blunt “the rendering ‘springs’ is conjectural.” (5) The etymologies of Kiriath-sepher, Debir and Luz, where Ellicott and Cambridge flatly disagree; both are given, neither is adopted. (6) The location of the second Luz and of the land of the Hittites: K&D says the situation “is altogether unknown,” and we have not improved on that.
On the ban. Judges 1:17 records חֵרֶם executed on a city. We have reported the sourced lexical and comparative data (Cambridge's Arabic and Moabite parallels, Ellicott's link to the vow of Numbers 21:2-3, K&D's argument that this is that vow finally discharged) and have not offered a theodicy. Readers should notice that the commentary tradition represented here is unanimous on the philology and silent on the moral question.
Provenance discipline. Every ✦ excerpt is a verbatim contiguous substring of the named public-domain commentary, selected by anchor and copied by machine, not retyped. Everything marked ⚙ is this tool's fallible synthesis and carries no authority.
✦ = human, public-domain source, quoted and named. ⚙ = machine synthesis, to be verified. Flagged cross-references are left visible on purpose — the verifier working in the open. “Search the Scriptures daily, whether those things were so.” (Acts 17:11)