translation_id: net-engnet

book_id: DEU

label: NET study note

text: This place is otherwise unattested and its location is unknown. Perhaps it is Khirbet Sufah, 4 mi (6 km) SSE of Madaba, Jordan.


text: Paran is the well-known desert area between Mount Sinai and Kadesh Barnea (cf. Num 10:12; 12:16 ).


text: Tophel refers possibly to et£-T£afîleh , 15 mi (25 km) SE of the Dead Sea, or to Da‚bîlu , another name for Paran. See H. Cazelles, “Tophel ( Deut. 1:1 ),” VT 9 (1959): 412-15.


text: Laban . Perhaps this refers to Libnah ( Num 33:20 ).


text: Hazeroth . This probably refers to àAin Khadra . See Y. Aharoni, The Land of the Bible , 199-200.


text: An eleven-day journey was about 140 mi (233 km).


text: Horeb is another name for Sinai. “Horeb” occurs 9 times in the Book of Deuteronomy and “Sinai” only once ( 33:2 ). “Sinai” occurs 13 times in the Book of Exodus and “Horeb” only 3 times.


text: Kadesh Barnea . Possibly this refers to àAin Qudeis , about 50 mi (80 km) southwest of Beer Sheba, but more likely to àAin Qudeirat , 5 mi (8 km) NW of àAin Qudeis . See R. Cohen, “Did I Excavate Kadesh-Barnea?” BAR 7 (1981): 20-33.


text: Mount Seir is synonymous with Edom. “By way of Mount Seir” refers to the route from Horeb that ended up in Edom Cf. CEV “by way of the Mount Seir Road”; TEV “by way of the hill country of Edom.”


text: The eleventh month is Shebat in the Hebrew calendar, January/February in the modern (Gregorian) calendar.


text: The fortieth year would be 1406 b.c. according to the “early” date of the exodus. See E. H. Merrill, Kingdom of Priests , 66-75.


text: See Deut 2:26 – 3:22 .


text: Heshbon is probably modern Tell Hesban , about 7.5 mi (12 km) south southwest of Amman, Jordan.


text: Ashtaroth is probably Tell àAshtarah , about 22 mi (35 km) due east of the Sea of Galilee.


text: Edrei is probably modern Deràa , 60 mi (95 km) south of Damascus (see Num 21:33 ; Josh 12:4; 13:12, 31 ).


text: Caleb had, with Joshua, brought back to Israel a minority report from Canaan urging a conquest of the land, for he was confident of the Lord ’s power ( Num 13:6, 8, 16, 30; 14:30, 38 ).


text: Do not know good from bad . This is a figure of speech called a merism (suggesting a whole by referring to its extreme opposites). Other examples are the tree of “the knowledge of good and evil” ( Gen 2:9 ), the boy who knows enough “to reject the wrong and choose the right” ( Isa 7:16; 8:4 ), and those who “cannot tell their right hand from their left” ( Jonah 4:11 ). A young child is characterized by lack of knowledge.


text: Hormah is probably Khirbet el-Meshash, 5.5 mi (9 km) west of Arad and 7.5 mi (12 km) SE of Beer Sheba. Its name is a derivative of the verb חָרָם ( kharam , “to ban; to exterminate”). See Num 21:3 .