46111963 deuteronomy-3-commentary

DEUTERONOMY 3 COMMENTARY
Edited by Glenn Pease
PREFACE
This verse by verse commentary quotes the great old commentaries as well as some
contemporary authors. All of this information is available to anyone, but I have brought it
together in one place to save the Bible student time in research. If anyone I quote does not want
their wisdom shared in this way, they can let me know and I will remove it. My e-mail is
glenn_p86@yahoo.com
Defeat of Og King of Bashan
1 Next we turned and went up along the road toward
Bashan, and Og king of Bashan with his whole army
marched out to meet us in battle at Edrei.
1. Gill, “Then we turned and went up the way to Bashan,.... Which seems to have been higher
than the kingdom of Sihon: this was a fine country for pasturage, for the breeding of cattle,
larger and lesser, and was famous for its oaks: it is the same country which in Josephus and
others goes by the name of Batanea:
and Og the king of Bashan came out against us; got his forces together, and came out from
Ashteroth, the royal city where he dwelt:
he and all his people, to battle at Edrei; another city in his kingdom, about six miles from the
former; see Deu_1:4.
2. Jamison, “we turned, and went up the way to Bashan — Bashan (“fruitful” or “flat”), now El-
Bottein, lay situated to the north of Gilead and extended as far as Hermon. It was a rugged
mountainous country, valuable however for its rich and luxuriant pastures.
Og the king of Bashan came out against us — Without provocation, he rushed to attack the
Israelites, either disliking the presence of such dangerous neighbors, or burning to avenge the
overthrow of his friends and allies.
3. Henry, “Deu 3:1-11 - “We have here another brave country delivered into the hand of Israel,

that of Bashan; the conquest of Sihon is often mentioned together with that of Og, to the praise of
God, the rather because in these Israel's triumphs began, Psa_135:11; Psa_136:19, Psa_136:20.
See,
I. How they got the mastery of Og, a very formidable prince, 1. Very strong, for he was of the
remnant of the giants (Deu_3:11); his personal strength was extraordinary, a monument of which
was preserved by the Ammonites in his bedstead, which was shown as a rarity in their chief city.
You might guess at his weight by the materials of his bedstead; it was iron, as if a bedstead of
wood were too weak for him to trust to: and you might guess at his stature by the dimensions of
it; it was nine cubits long and four cubits broad, which, supposing a cubit to be but half a yard
(and some learned men have made it appear to be somewhat more), was four yards and a half
long, and two yards broad; and if we allow his bedstead to be two cubits longer than himself, and
that is as much as we need allow, he was three yards and a half high, double the stature of an
ordinary man, and every way proportionable, yet they smote him, Deu_3:3. Note, when God
pleads his people's cause he can deal with giants as with grasshoppers. No man's might can
secure him against the Almighty. The army of Og was very powerful, for he had the command of
sixty fortified cities, besides the unwalled towns, Deu_3:5. Yet all this was nothing before God's
Israel, when they came with commission to destroy him. 2. He was very bold and daring: He
came out against Israel to battle, Deu_3:1. It was wonderful that he did not take warning by the
ruin of Sihon, and send to desire conditions of peace; but he trusted to his own strength, and so
was hardened to his destruction. Note, Those that are not awakened by the judgments of God
upon others, but persist in their defiance of heaven, are ripening apace for the like judgments
upon themselves, Jer_3:8. God bade Moses not fear him, Deu_3:2. If Moses himself was so strong
in faith as not to need the caution, yet it is probable that the people needed it, and for them these
fresh assurances are designed; “I will deliver him into thy hand; not only deliver thee out of his
hand, that he shall not be thy ruin, but deliver him into thy hand, that thou shalt be his ruin, and
make him pay dearly for his attempt.” He adds, Thou shalt do to him as thou didst to Sihon,
intimating that they ought to be encouraged by their former victory to trust in God for another
victory, for he is God, and changeth not.
II. How they got possession of Bashan, a very desirable country. They took all the cities
(Deu_3:4), and all the spoil of them, Deu_3:7. They made them all their own, Deu_3:10. So that
now they had in their hands all that fruitful country which lay east of Jordan, from the river
Arnon unto Hermon, Deu_3:8. Their conquering and possessing these countries was intended, not
only for the encouragement of Israel in the wars of Canaan, but for the satisfaction of Moses
before his death. Since he must not live to see the completing of their victory and settlement, God
thus gives him a specimen of it. Thus the Spirit is given to those that believe as the earnest of their
inheritance, until the redemption of the purchased possession.
4. K&D, “Deu 3:1-9 - “The Help of God in the Conquest of the Kingdom of Og of Bashan. -
Deu_3:1. After the defeat of king Sihon and the conquest of his land, the Israelites were able to
advance to the Jordan. But as the powerful Amoritish king Og still held the northern half of
Gilead and all Bashan, they proceeded northwards at once and took the road to Bashan, that they
might also defeat this king, whom the Lord had likewise given into their hand, and conquer his
country (cf. Num_21:33-34). They smote him at Edrei, the modern Draà, without leaving him
even a remnant; and took all his towns, i.e., as is here more fully stated in Deu_3:4., “sixty towns,
the whole region of Argob, the kingdom of Og in Bashan.” These three definitions refer to one and
the same country. The whole region of Argob included the sixty towns which formed the kingdom
of Og in Bashan, i.e., all the towns of the land of Bashan, viz., (according to Deu_3:5) all the
fortified towns, besides the unfortified and open country towns of Bashan. , the chain for

measuring, then the land or country measured with the chain. The name “region of Argob,”
which is given to the country of Bashan here, and in Deu_3:4, Deu_3:13, Deu_3:14, and also in
1Ki_4:13, is probably derived from , stone-heaps, related to , a clump or clod of earth
(Job_21:33; Job_38:38). The Targumists have rendered it correctly
(Trachona), from

, a rough, uneven, stony district, so called from the basaltic hills of Hauran; just as the
plain to the east of Jebel Hauran, which resembles Hauran itself, is sometimes called Tellul, from
its tells or hills (Burckhardt, Syr. p. 173).
(Note: The derivation is a much more improbable one, “from the town of Argob,

, according to the Onomast., fifteen Roman miles to the west of
Gerasa, which is called

by Josephus (Ant. xiii. 15, 5).”)
This district has also received the name of Bashan, from the character of its soil; for !
signifies a soft and level soil. From the name given to it by the Arabic translators, the Greek name
#

, Batanaea, and possibly also the modern name of the country on the north-eastern
slope of Hauran at the back of Mount Hauran, viz., Bethenije, are derived.
The name Argob probably originated in the north-eastern part of the country of Bashan, viz.,
the modern Leja, with its stony soil covered with heaps of large blocks of stone (Burckhardt, p.
196), or rather in the extensive volcanic region to the east of Hauran, which was first of all
brought to distinct notice in Wetzstein's travels, and of which he says that the “southern portion,
bearing the name Harra, is thickly covered with loose volcanic stones, with a few conical hills
among them, that have been evidently caused by eruptions” (Wetzstein, p. 6). The central point of
the whole is Safa, “a mountain nearly seven hours' journey in length and about the same in
breadth,” in which “the black mass streaming from the craters piled itself up wave upon wave, so
that the centre attained to the height of a mountain, without acquiring the smoothness of form
observable in mountains generally,” - “the black flood of lava being full of innumerable streams
of stony waves, often of a bright red colour, bridged over with thin arches, which rolled down the
slopes out of the craters and across the high plateau” (Wetzstein, pp. 6 and 7). At a later period
this name was transferred to the whole of the district of Hauran (= Bashan), because not only is
the Jebel Hauran entirely of volcanic formation, but the plain consists throughout of a reddish
brown soil produced by the action of the weather upon volcanic stones, and even “the Leja plain
has been poured out from the craters of the Hauran mountains” (Wetzstein, p. 23). Through this
volcanic character of the soil, Hauran differs essentially from Balka, Jebel Ajlun, and the plain of
Jaulan, which is situated between the Sea of Galilee and the upper Jordan on the one side, and
the plain of Hauran on the other, and reaches up to the southern slope of the Hermon. In these
districts the limestone and chalk formations prevail, which present the same contrast to the
basaltic formation of the Hauran as white does to black (cf. v. Raumer, Pal. pp. 75ff.). - The land
of the limestone and chalk formation abounds in caves, which are not altogether wanting indeed
in Hauran (as v. Raumer supposes), though they are only found in eastern and south-eastern
Hauran, where most of the volcanic elevations have been perforated by troglodytes (see
Wetzstein, pp. 92 and 44ff.). But the true land of caves on the east of the Jordan is northern
Gilead, viz., Erbed and Suêt (Wetzst. p. 92). Here the troglodyte dwellings predominate, whereas
in Hauran you find for the most part towns and villages with houses of one or more stories built
above the surface of the ground, although even on the eastern slope of the Hauran mountains
there are hamlets to be seen, in which the style of building forms a transition from actual caves to
dwellings built upon the ground. An excavation is first of all made in the rocky plateau, of the
breadth and depth of a room, and this is afterwards arched over with a solid stone roof. The
dwellings made in this manner have all the appearance of cellars or tunnels. This style of
building, such as Wetzstein found in Hibbike for example, belongs to the most remote antiquity. In
some cases, hamlets of this kind were even surrounded by a wall. Those villages of Hauran which

are built above the surface of the ground, attract the eye and stimulate the imagination, when
seen from a distance, in various ways. “In the first place, the black colour of the building
materials present the greatest contrast to the green around them, and to the transparent
atmosphere also. In the second place, the height of the walls and the compactness of the houses,
which always form a connected whole, are very imposing. In the third place, they are surmounted
by strong towers. And in the fourth place, they are in such a good state of preservation, that you
involuntarily yield to the delusion that they must of necessity be inhabited, and expect to see
people going out and in” (Wetzstein, p. 49). The larger towns are surrounded by walls; but the
smaller ones as a rule have none: “the backs of the houses might serve as walls.” The material of
which the houses are built is a grey dolerite, impregnated with glittering particles of olivine. “The
stones are rarely cemented, but the fine and for the most part large squares lie one upon another
as if they were fused together.” “Most of the doors of the houses which lead into the streets or
open fields are so low, that it is impossible to enter them without stooping; but the large buildings
and the ends of the streets have lofty gateways, which are always tastefully constructed, and often
decorated with sculptures and Greek inscriptions.” The “larger gates have either simple or (what
are most common) double doors. They consist of a slab of dolerite. There are certainly no doors
of any other kind.” These stone doors turn upon pegs, deeply inserted into the threshold and
lintel. “Even a man can only shut and open doors of this kind, by pressing with the back or feet
against the wall, and pushing the door with both hands” (Wetzstein, pp. 50ff.; compare with this
the testimony of Buckingham, Burckhardt, Seetzen, and others, in v. Raumer's Palestine, pp. 78ff.).
Now, even if the existing ruins of Hauran date for the most part from a later period, and are
probably of a Nabataean origin belonging to the times of Trajan and the Antonines, yet
considering the stability of the East, and the peculiar nature of the soil of Hauran, they give a
tolerably correct idea of the sixty towns of the kingdom of Og of Bashan, all of which were
fortified with high walls, gates, and bars, or, as it is stated in 1Ki_4:13, “with walls and brazen
bars.”
(Note: It is also by no means impossible, that many of the oldest dwellings in the ruined
towers of Hauran date from a time anterior to the conquest of the land by the Israelites.
“Simple, built of heavy blocks of basalt roughly hewn, and as hard as iron, with very thick
walls, very strong stone gates and doors, many of which were about eighteen inches thick, and
were formerly fastened with immense bolts, and of which traces still remain; such houses as
these may have been the work of the old giant tribe of Rephaim, whose king, Og, was defeated
by the Israelites 3000 years ago” (C. v. Raumer, Pal. p. 80, after Porter's Five Years in
Damascus).)
The brazen bars were no doubt, like the gates themselves, of basalt or dolerite, which might easily
be mistaken for brass. Besides the sixty fortified towns, the Israelites took a very large number of
$( $%', “towns of the inhabitants of the flat country,” i.e., unfortified open hamlets and villages
in Bashan, and put them under the ban, like the towns of king Sihon (Deu_3:6, Deu_3:7; cf.
Deu_2:34-35). The infinitive, )', is to be construed as a gerund (cf. Ges. §131, 2; Ewald, §280,
a.). The expression, “kingdom of Og in Bashan,” implies that the kingdom of Og was not limited
to the land of Bashan, but included the northern half of Gilead as well. In Deu_3:8-11, Moses
takes a retrospective view of the whole of the land that had been taken on the other side of the
Jordan; first of all (Deu_3:9) in its whole extent from the Arnon to Hermon, then (Deu_3:10) in
its separate parts, to bring out in all its grandeur what the Lord had done for Israel. The notices
of the different names of Hermon (Deu_3:9), and of the bed of king Og (Deu_3:11), are also
subservient to this end. Hermon is the southernmost spur of Antilibanus, the present Jebel es
Sheikh, or Jebel et Telj. The Hebrew name is not connected with ), anathema, as Hengstenberg
supposes (Diss. pp. 197-8); nor was it first given by the Israelites to this mountain, which formed

part of the northern boundary of the land which they had taken; but it is to be traced to an
Arabic word signifying prominens montis vertex, and was a name which had long been current at
that time, for which the Israelites used the Hebrew name $* (Sion = $*, the high, eminent:
Deu_4:48), though this name did not supplant the traditional name of Hermon. The Sidonians
called it Siron, a modified form of 1) $!Sa_17:5), or $* (Jer_46:4), a “coat of mail;” the
Amorites called it Senir, probably a word with the same meaning. In Psa_29:6, Sirion is used
poetically for Hermon; and Ezekiel (Eze_27:4) uses Senir, in a mournful dirge over Tyre, as
synonymous with Lebanon; whilst Senir is mentioned in 1Ch_5:23, and Shenir in Son_4:8, in
connection with Hermon, as a part of Antilibanus, as it might very naturally happen that the
Amoritish name continued attached to one or other of the peaks of the mountain, just as we find
that even Arabian geographers, such as Abulfeda and Maraszid, call that portion of Antilibanus
which stretches from Baalbek to Emesa (Homs, Heliopolis) by the name of Sanir.
2 The LORD said to me, “Do not be afraid of him, for I
have delivered him into your hands, along with his whole
army and his land. Do to him what you did to Sihon king
of the Amorites, who reigned in Heshbon.”
1. Jamison, “Og’s gigantic appearance and the formidable array of forces he will bring to the
field, need not discourage you; for, belonging to a doomed race, he is destined to share the fate of
Sihon [Num_21:25].
2. Moody Bible Institute, “Generations of leaders have known that one of the best ways to
motivate the troops on the eve of a big battle is to remind them of their past victories.
Moses followed that tradition. He may even have helped to invent it! His retelling of Israel's
victories over Sihon and Og gave the people important encouragement as they faced their biggest
battle of all the conquest of Canaan.
King Og was worth only a few verses in Numbers 21 (vv. 33-35), but here in Deuteronomy Moses
devotes more space to the story. The extra detail was important for these Israelites to know
because the defeat of Og was another example of God's faithfulness.
'Do not be afraid of him,' God told His people concerning Og (Deuteronomy 3:2)Ñand they
weren't. What a difference it would have made if, about forty years earlier, the exodus generation
had moved out as confidently as this one in response to God's promise.
But to Israel's credit, the troops moved out here and enjoyed the victory God had already
prepared for them. It didn't hurt that the victory over Sihon was still very fresh on the people's
minds. God made sure they didn't forget by using Sihon as an encouragement to do the same in

Bashan.
Og and his people suffered annihilation, the same fate that befell their fellow Amorites. People
may debate the morality of God's command for the destruction of a people, but the reality of the
command is undeniable. Moses made this truth explicit in the case of the Canaanites (see
Deuteronomy 7). God's reasons were grounded in His holiness.
The summary of Israel's conquests in the Transjordan had to be another source of
encouragement. The extent of their land holdings in this region secured them from attack by
other enemies as they turned west to enter Canaan.
But Moses was not quite finished with this story. It turns out that Og was a Rephaite, the race of
giants we read about earlier. Israel's cousins, the Edomites and the Ammonites, had defeated
those giants with God's help. Now Israel too could point to victory over an intimidating enemy as
proof of God's blessing.”
3. Chuck Smith, “In other words, they had conquered sixty walled cities from Basham. Now
you're gonna go in and you got the reports and you remember the report that struck fear in the
hearts was that there are high-walled cities and giants. And that was just the thing that struck
terror and fear into their hearts that destroyed their faith, caused them to turn away. So now
Moses is pointing out, Look, it is nothing with God. You don't have to worry about the walled
cities. You don't have to worry about the giants. If God be for us, who can be against us?And
God has promised to go before you and to drive out your enemies, and thus, these things that
caused terror and fear in your hearts that destroyed your faith do not need to stop you now, go in.
And he's seeking to build up their faith in God. Venture out, let God have an opportunity to
work. And so he's careful to point out that they'd already conquered walled cities in the areas of
the giants.
3 So the LORD our God also gave into our hands Og king
of Bashan and all his army. We struck them down, leaving
no survivors.
1. Jamison, “Jamison, “Argob was the capital of a district in Bashan of the same name, which,
together with other fifty-nine cities in the same province, were conspicuous for their lofty and
fortified walls. It was a war of extermination. Houses and cities were razed to the ground; all
classes of people were put to the sword; and nothing was saved but the cattle, of which an
immense amount fell as spoil into the hands of the conquerors. Thus, the two Amorite kings and
the entire population of their dominions were extirpated. The whole country east of the Jordan -
first upland downs from the torrent of the Arnon on the south to that of the Jabbok on the north;
next the high mountain tract of Gilead and Bashan from the deep ravine of Jabbok - became the

possession of the Israelites.
4 At that time we took all his cities. There was not one of
the sixty cities that we did not take from them—the whole
region of Argob, Og’s kingdom in Bashan.
1. Gill, “And we took all his cities at that time,.... Not only Edrei where the battle was fought, and
Ashteroth his capital city, but all the rest in his kingdom:
there was not a city which we took not from them; not one stood out, but all surrendered on
summons; the number of which follows:
three score cities; which was a large number for so small a country, and shows it to be well
inhabited:
all the region of Argob; which was a small province of
the kingdom of Og in Bashan: Aben Ezra and Jarchi observe, that it was called after a man, i.e.
whose name was Argob; the Targum of Onkelos names it Tracona, and the Targum of Jonathan
Targona, the same with Trachonitis in Josephus and other authors; see Luk_3:1, Jerom relates
(h) that in his time, about Gerasa, a city of Arabia, fifteen miles from it to the west, there was a
village which was called Arga, which seems to carry in it some remains of the ancient name of
this country; and the Samaritan version, in all places where Argob is, calls it Rigobaah; and in
the Misnah (i) mention is made of a place called Ragab, beyond Jordan, famous for its being the
second place for the best oil.
2. Clarke, “All the region of Argob - col chebel Argob, all the cable or cord of Argob;
this expression, which is used in various other parts of Scripture, (see, in the original, Amo_7:17;
Mic_2:5; Deu_32:9; Psa_16:6), shows that anciently land was measured by lines or cords of a
certain length, in a similar way to that by the chain among us, and the schoenus or cord among
the Egyptians. Some think that it was the region of Argob that was afterwards called the region
of Trachonites.
3. Barnes, “Threescore cities - Probably the cities of Jair in Bashan described in Deu_3:14 as
Bashan-havoth-jair.
All the region of Argob - The Hebrew word here rendered “region,” means literally “rope” or
“cable”; and though undoubtedly used elsewhere in a general topographical sense for portion or
district (e. g. Jos_17:5), has a special propriety in reference to Argob (mod. Lejah). The name
Argob means “stone-heap,” and is paraphrased by the Targums, Trachonitis Luk_3:1, or “the
rough country;” titles designating the more striking features of the district. Its borders are
compared to a rugged shore-line; hence, its description in the text as “the girdle of the stony

country,” would seem especially appropriate. (Others identify Argob with the east quarter of the
Hauran.)
5 All these cities were fortified with high walls and with
gates and bars, and there were also a great many unwalled
villages.
1. Gill, “That is, all the cities in the kingdom of Bashan; and though they were, it hindered not
their falling into the hands of the Israelites; and this might serve to encourage them against those
fears they were possessed of by the spies, with respect to the cities in the land of Canaan; see
Num_13:28. besides unwalled towns a great many; small towns and villages adjacent to the
several cities, as is common.
2. Chuck Smith, “In other words, they had conquered sixty walled cities from Basham. Now
you're gonna go in and you got the reports and you remember the report that struck fear in the
hearts was that there are high-walled cities and giants. And that was just the thing that struck
terror and fear into their hearts that destroyed their faith, caused them to turn away. So now
Moses is pointing out, Look, it is nothing with God. You don't have to worry about the walled
cities. You don't have to worry about the giants. If God be for us, who can be against us?
And God has promised to go before you and to drive out your enemies, and thus, these things
that caused terror and fear in your hearts that destroyed your faith do not need to stop you now,
go in. And he's seeking to build up their faith in God. Venture out, let God have an opportunity to
work. And so he's careful to point out that they'd already conquered walled cities in the areas of
the giants.
3. Barnes, “Gates, and bars - literally, “Double gates and a bar.” The stone doors of Bashan, their
height pointing to a race of great stature, and the numerous cities (deserted) exist to illustrate the
statements of these verses.
6 We completely destroyed[a] them, as we had done with
Sihon king of Heshbon, destroying[b] every city—men,
women and children.
1. Gill, “ And we utterly destroyed them,.... Not the cities, but the inhabitants of them:

as we did to Sihon king of Heshbon; they did not destroy his cities, for they took them and dwelt
in them; but the people that lived there, as follows here:
utterly destroying the men, women, and children, of every city; see Deu_2:34.
7 But all the livestock and the plunder from their cities we
carried off for ourselves.
1. Gill, “But all the cattle, and the spoil of the cities,.... The oxen and sheep, camels and asses;
their gold and silver, and the furniture of their houses; their stores of corn, and of other fruits of
the earth, even all their substance of whatsoever kind:
we took for a prey to ourselves; made them their own property, and used them for their own
profit and service, whereby they became greatly enriched.
8 So at that time we took from these two kings of the
Amorites the territory east of the Jordan, from the Arnon
Gorge as far as Mount Hermon.
1. Gill, “And we took at that time out of the hands of the two kings of the Amorites,.... Sihon king
of Heshbon, and Og king of Bashan:
the land that was on this side Jordan; where Moses then was, being in the plains of Moab, and
was the country beyond Jordan, with respect to the land of Canaan, and when in that:
from the river of Arnon unto Mount Hermon; Arnon was a river which divided Moab and the
Amorites, Num_22:13 and Hermon was a mountain of Gilead, which ended where Lebanon
began, and was the northerly border of this country. It was remarkable for the dew that fell on it;
See Gill on Psa_133:3.
9 (Hermon is called Sirion by the Sidonians; the Amorites

call it Senir.)
1. Gill, “Which Hermon the Sidonians call Sirion,.... Which name it has in Psa_29:6 a name the
inhabitants of Sidon gave it, but for what reason it is not easy to say; however, that it was well
known to Tyre and Sidon, appears from snow in summer time being brought to the former, as
will be hereafter observed:
and the Amorites call it Shenir; in whose possession it was last. Bochart (k) thinks it had its name
from the multitude of wild cats in it, Shunar in the Chaldee tongue being the name of that
creature; but Jarchi says Shenir in the Canaanitish language signifies snow; so, in the Targums
of Onkelos and Jonathan, it is called the mountain of snow; and the Hebrew who read to Jerom,
and taught him, affirmed to him that this mountain hung over Paneas, from whence snow in
summer time was brought to Tyre for pleasure (l), and the same is confirmed by Abulfeda (m).
There is said to be upon the top of it a famous temple, which is used for worship by the Heathens,
over against Paneas and Lebanon (n); and it is highly probable there was one even at this time,
when it was possessed by the Amorites, since it is called Mount Baalhermon, Jdg_3:3, from the
worship of Baal, or some other idol upon it, as it should seem. Besides these, it had another name,
Mount Sion, Deu_4:48 but to be distinguished from Mount Zion near Jerusalem. The names of it
in this place are very differently interpreted by Hillerus (o); though he thinks it had them all on
account of the snow on it, which was as a net all over it; for Hermon, he observes, signifies a net,
a dragnet, and Shenir an apron, and Sirion a coat of mail, all from the covering of this mount
with snow.
2. Barnes, “Hermon, the southern and culminating point of the range of Lebanon, was also the
religious center of primaeval Syria. Its Baal sanctuaries not only existed but gave it a name
before the Exodus. Hence, the careful specification of the various names by which the mountain
was known. The Sidonian name of it might easily have become known to Moses through the
constant traffic which had gone on from the most ancient times between Sidon and Egypt.
3. Clarke, “Hermon the Sidonians call - Shenir - I suppose this verse to have been a marginal
remark, which afterwards got incorporated with the text, or an addition by Joshua or Ezra.
4. Jamison, “Hermon — now Jebel-Es-Sheick - the majestic hill on which the long and elevated
range of Anti-Lebanon terminates. Its summit and the ridges on its sides are almost constantly
covered with snow. It is not so much one high mountain as a whole cluster of mountain peaks, the
highest in Palestine. According to the survey taken by the English Government Engineers in
1840, they were about 9376 feet above the sea. Being a mountain chain, it is no wonder that it
should have received different names at different points from the different tribes which lay along
the base - all of them designating extraordinary height: Hermon, the lofty peak; “Sirion,” or in
an abbreviated form “Sion” (Deu_4:48), the upraised, glittering; “Shenir,” the glittering
breastplate of ice.

10 We took all the towns on the plateau, and all Gilead,
and all Bashan as far as Salekah and Edrei, towns of Og’s
kingdom in Bashan.
1. Gill, “All the cities of the plain,.... There was a plain by Medeba, and Heshbon and her cities
were in a plain, with some others given to the tribe of Reuben, Jos_13:16.
and all Gilead; Mount Gilead, and the cities belonging to it, a very fruitful country, half of which
fell to the share of the Reubenites, and the rest to the half tribe of Manasseh:
and all Bashan; of which Og was king, called Batanea, a very fertile country, as before observed:
unto Salcah and Edrei, cities of the kingdom of Og in Bashan; which seem to be frontier cities of
the latter: see Deu_1:4. The former, Adrichomius (p) says, was situated by the city Geshur and
Mount Hermon, and was the boundary of the country of Bashan to the north; and according to
Benjamin of Tudela (q), it was half a day's journey from Gilead: as Edrei seems to be its
boundary to the south.
2. Barnes, “Salchah - Compare Jos_12:5; 1Ch_5:11, where it is named as belonging to the tribe of
Gad. It lies seven hours’ journey to the southeast of Bostra or Bozrah of Moab. As the eastern
border city of the kingdom of Bashan it was no doubt strongly fortified.
Edrei - Compare Num_21:33 note.
3. KD, “The different portions of the conquered land were the following: !$+', the plain, i.e.,
the Amoritish table-land, stretching from the Arnon to Heshbon, and in a north-easterly direction
nearly as far as Rabbath-Ammon, with the towns of Heshbon, Bezer, Medeba, Jahza, and Dibon
(Deu_4:43; Jos_13:9, Jos_13:16-17, Jos_13:21; Jos_20:8; Jer_48:21.), which originally belonged
to the Moabites, and is therefore called “the field of Moab” in Num_21:20. “The whole of Gilead,”
i.e., the mountainous region on the southern and northern sides of the Jabbok, which was divided
into two halves by this river. The southern half, which reached to Heshbon, belonged to the
kingdom of Sihon (Jos_12:2), and was assigned by Moses to the Reubenites and Gadites
(Deu_3:12); whilst the northern half, which is called “the rest of Gilead” in Deu_3:13, the
modern Jebel Ajlun, extending as far as the land of Bashan (Hauran and Jaulan), belonged to the
kingdom of Og (Jos_12:5), and was assigned to the Manassite family of Machir (Deu_3:15, and
Jos_13:31; cf. v. Raumer, Pal. pp. 229, 230). “And all Bashan unto Salcah and Edrei.” All Bashan
included not only the country of Hauran (the plan and mountain), but unquestionably also the
district of Jedur and Jaulan, to the west of the sea of Galilee and the upper Jordan, or the ancient
Gaulonitis (Jos. Ant. xviii. 4, 6, etc.), as the kingdom of Og extended to the coasts of Geshuri and
Maachathi (see at Deu_3:14). Og had not conquered the whole of the land of Hauran, however,
but only the greater part of it. His territory extended eastwards to Salcah, i.e., the present
Szalchat or Szarchad, about six hours to the east of Bozrah, south of Jebel Hauran, a town with
800 houses, and a castle upon a basaltic rock, but uninhabited (cf. v. Raumer, Pal. p. 255); and

northwards to Edrei, i.e., the northern Edrei (see at Num_21:33), a considerable ruin on the
northwest of Bozrah, three or four English miles in extent, in the old buildings of which there are
200 families living at present (Turks, Druses, and Christians). By the Arabian geographers
(Abulfeda, Ibn Batuta) it is called Sora, by modern travellers Adra or Edra (v. Richter), or Oezraa
(Seetzen), or Ezra (Burckhardt), and Edhra (Robinson, App. 155). Consequently nearly the whole
of Jebel Hauran, and the northern portion of the plain, viz., the Leja, were outside the kingdom
of Og and the land of Bashan, of which the Israelites took possession, although Burckhardt
reckons Ezra as part of the Leja.
11 (Og king of Bashan was the last of the Rephaites. His
bed was decorated with iron and was more than nine
cubits long and four cubits wide.[c] It is still in Rabbah of
the Ammonites.)
1. Gill, “For only Og king of Bashan remained of the remnant of giants,.... The meaning seems to
be, either that he was the only one that was left of the race of the giants the Ammonites found
when they took possession of this country, Deu_2:20 or that was left when the Amorites took it
from the Ammonites; and who having by some means or other ingratiated himself into their
affections, because of his stature, strength, and courage, and other qualifications they might
discern in him, made him their king:
behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron: his body being so large and bulky, he might think it
most proper and safest for him to have a bedstead made of iron to lie upon, or to prevent noxious
insects harbouring in it; nor was it unusual to have bedsteads made of other materials than wood,
as of gold, silver, and ivory; See Gill on Amo_6:4. Some learned men (r) have been of opinion,
that the beds of Typho in Syria, made mention of by Homer (s), refer to this bedstead of Og:
is it not in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? which was the royal city of the Ammonites, in the
times of David, 2Sa_12:26, now called Philadelphia, as Jerom says (t). This bedstead might be
either sent thither by Og, before the battle at Edrei, for safety, or rather might be sold by the
Israelites to the inhabitants of Rabbath, who kept it, as a great curiosity:
nine cubits was the length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it, after the cubit of a man; a
common cubit, so that it was four yards and a half long, and two yards broad. Onkelos renders it,
after the king's cubit; and the king's cubit at Babylon, according to Herodotus (u), was larger by
three fingers than the common one; such as the cubit in Eze_40:5, which was a cubit and an
hand's breadth; and this makes the dimensions of the bedstead yet larger. And by this judgment
may be made of the tallness of Og's stature, though this is not always a sure rule to go by; for
Alexander, when in India, ordered his soldiers to make beds of five cubits long, to be left behind
them, that they might be thought to be larger men than they were, as Diodorus Siculus (w) and
Curtius (x) relate; but there is little reason to believe that Og's bedstead was made with such a
view. Maimonides observes (y), that a bed in common is a third part larger than a man; so that

Og, according to this way of reckoning, was six cubits high, and his stature doubly larger than a
common man's; but less than a third part may well be allowed to a bed, which will make him
taller still; the height of Og is reckoned by Wolfius (z) to be about thirteen feet eleven inches of
Paris measure.
2. Barnes, “Giants - Or Rephaim: see the marginal reference note.
A bedstead of iron - The “iron” was probably the black basalt of the country, which not only
contains a large proportion, about 20 percent, of iron, but was actually called “iron,” and is still
so regarded by the Arabians. Iron was indeed both known and used, principally for tools (see e. g.
Deu_19:5 and compare Gen_4:22 note), at the date in question by the Semitic people of Palestine
and the adjoining countries; but bronze was the ordinary metal of which weapons, articles of
furniture, etc., were made.
The word translated “bedstead” is derived from a root signifying “to unite” or “bind together,”
and so “to arch” or “cover with a vault.” The word may then certainly mean “bier,” and perhaps
does so in this passage. Modern travelers have discovered in the territories of Og sarcophagi as
well as many other articles made of the black basalt of the country.
Is it not in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? - Probably after the defeat and death of Og at
Edrei the remnant of his army fled into the territory of the friendly Ammonites, and carried with
them the corpse of the giant king.
After the cubit of a man - i. e. after the usual and ordinary cubit, counted as people are
accustomed to count. Taking 18 inches to the cubit, the bedstead or sarcophagus would thus be
from thirteen to fourteen feet long.
3. Clarke, “Og king of Bashan remained - Og was the last king of the Amorites; his kingdom
appears to have taken its name from the hill of Bashan; the country has been since called
Batanaea.
Remnant of giants - Of the Rephaim. See on Deu_2:10 (note), Deu_2:11 (note).
His bedstead was - of iron - Iron was probably used partly for its strength and durability, and
partly to prevent noxious vermin from harbouring in it.
Is it not in Rabbath, of the children of Ammon? - The bedstead was probably taken in some
battle between the Ammonites and Amorites, in which the former had gained the victory. The
bedstead was carried a trophy and placed in Rabbath, which appears, from 2Sa_12:26, to have
been the royal city of the children of Ammon.
Nine cubits was the length - four cubits the breadth - Allowing the bedstead to have been one
cubit longer than Og, which is certainly sufficient, and allowing the cubit to be about eighteen
inches long, for this is perhaps the average of the cubit of a man, then Og was twelve feet high.
This may be deemed extraordinary, and perhaps almost incredible, and therefore many
commentators have, according to their fancy, lengthened the bedstead and shortened the man,
making the former one-third longer than the person who lay on it, that they might reduce Og to
six cubits; but even in this way they make him at least nine feet high.
On this subject the rabbins have trifled most sinfully. I shall give one specimen. In the Targum
of Jonathan ben Uzziel on Num_21:33-35, it is said that “Og having observed that the camp of
the Israelites extended six miles, he went and tore up a mountain six miles in its base, and put it
on his head, and carried it towards the camp, that he might throw it on the Israelites and destroy
them; but the word of the Lord prepared a worm, which bored a hole in the mountain over his
head, so that it fell down upon his shoulders: at the same time his teeth growing out in all
directions, stuck into the mountain, so that he could not cast it off his head. Moses, (who was

himself ten cubits high), seeing Og thus entangled, took an axe ten cubits long, and having leaped
ten cubits in height, struck Og on the ankle bone, so that he fell and was slain.”
From this account the distance from the sole of Og’s foot to his ankle was thirty cubits in
length! I give this as a very slight specimen of rabbinical comment. I could quote places in the
Talmud in which Og is stated to be several miles high! This relation about Og I suppose to be also
an historical note added by a subsequent hand.
4.Jamison, “only Og king of Bashan remained of the remnant of giants — literally, “of
Rephaim.” He was not the last giant, but the only living remnant in the trans-jordanic country
(Jos_15:14), of a certain gigantic race, supposed to be the most ancient inhabitants of Palestine.
behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron — Although beds in the East are with the common
people nothing more than a simple mattress, bedsteads are not unknown. They are in use among
the great, who prefer them of iron or other metals, not only for strength and durability, but for
the prevention of the troublesome insects which in warm climates commonly infest wood. Taking
the cubit at half a yard, the bedstead of Og would measure thirteen and a half feet, so that as
beds are usually a little larger than the persons who occupy them, the stature of the Amorite king
may be estimated at about eleven or twelve feet; or he might have caused his bed to be made
much larger than was necessary, as Alexander the Great did for each of his foot soldiers, to
impress the Indians with an idea of the extraordinary strength and stature of his men [Le Clerc].
But how did Og’s bedstead come to be in Rabbath, of the children of Ammon? In answer to this
question, it has been said, that Og had, on the eve of engagement, conveyed it to Rabbath for
safety. Or it may be that Moses, after capturing it, may have sold it to the Ammonites, who had
kept it as an antiquarian curiosity till their capital was sacked in the time of David. This is a most
unlikely supposition, and besides renders it necessary to consider the latter clause of this verse as
an interpolation inserted long after the time of Moses. To avoid this, some eminent critics take the
Hebrew word rendered “bedstead” to mean “coffin.” They think that the king of Bashan having
been wounded in battle, fled to Rabbath, where he died and was buried; hence the dimensions of
his “coffin” are given [Dathe, Roos].
5. KD, “Even in Abraham's time, the giant tribe of Rephaim was living in Bashan (Gen_14:5).
But out of the remnant of these, king Og, whom the Israelites defeated and slew, was the only one
left. For the purpose of recalling the greatness of the grace of God that had been manifested in
that victory, and not merely to establish the credibility of the statements concerning the size of Og
(“just as things belonging to an age that has long passed away are shown to be credible by their
remains,” Spinoza, etc.), Moses points to the iron bed of this king, which was still in Rabbath-
Ammon, and was nine cubits long and four broad, “after the cubit of a man,” i.e., the ordinary
cubit in common use (see the analogous expression, “a man's pen,” Isa_8:1). '', for ',
synonymous with ','. There is nothing to amaze is in the size of the bed or bedstead given here.
The ordinary Hebrew cubit was only a foot and a half, probably only eighteen Dresden inches
(see my Archäologie, ii. p. 126, Anm. 4). Now a bed is always larger than the man who sleeps in it.
But in this case Clericus fancies that Og “intentionally exceeded the necessary size, in order that
posterity might be led to draw more magnificent conclusions from the size of the bed, as to the
stature of the man who was accustomed to sleep in it.” He also refers to the analogous case of
Alexander the Great, of whom Diod. Sic. (xvii. 95) affirms, that whenever he was obliged to halt
on his march to India, he made colossal arrangements of all kinds, causing, among other things,
two couches to be prepared in the tents for every foot-soldier, each five cubits long, and two stalls
for every horseman, twice as large as the ordinary size, “to represent a camp of heroes, and leave
striking memorials behind for the inhabitants of the land, of gigantic men and their supernatural

strength.” With a similar intention Og may also have left behind him a gigantic bed as a
memorial of his superhuman greatness, on the occasion of some expedition of his against the
Ammonites; and this bed may have been preserved in their capital as a proof of the greatness of
their foe.
(Note: “It will often be found, that very tall people are disposed to make themselves appear
even taller than they actually are” (Hengstenberg, Diss. ii. p. 201). Moreover, there are still
giants who are eight feet high and upwards. “According to the N. Preuss. Zeit. of 1857, there
came a man to Berlin 8 feet 4 inches high, and possibly still growing, as he was only twenty
years old; and he was said to have a great-uncle who was nine inches taller” (Schultz).)
Moses might then refer to this gigantic bed of Og, which was known to the Israelites; and there is
no reason for resorting to the improbable conjecture, that the Ammonites had taken possession of
a bed of king Og upon some expedition against the Amorites, and had carried it off as a trophy to
their capital.
(Note: There is still less probability in the conjecture of J. D. Michaelis, Vater, Winer, and
others, that Og's iron bed was a sarcophagus of basalt, such as are still frequently met with in
those regions, as much as 9 feet long and 3 1/2 feet broad, or even as much as 12 feet long and
6 feet in breadth and height (vid., Burckhardt, pp. 220, 246; Robinson, iii. p. 385; Seetzen, i.
pp. 355, 360); and the still further assumption, that the corpse of the fallen king was taken to
Rabbah, and there interred in a royal way, is altogether improbable.)
“Rabbath of the sons of Ammon,” or briefly Rabbah, i.e., the great (Jos_13:25; 2Sa_11:1), was the
capital of the Ammonites, afterwards called Philadelphia, probably from Ptolemaeus
Philadelphus; by Polybius,

-μ

; by Abulfeda, Ammân, which is the name still given to
the uninhabited ruins on the Nahr Ammân, i.e., the upper Jabbok (see Burckhardt, pp. 612ff. and
v. Raumer, Pal. p. 268).
Division of the Land
12 Of the land that we took over at that time, I gave the
Reubenites and the Gadites the territory north of Aroer
by the Arnon Gorge, including half the hill country of
Gilead, together with its towns.
1. Gill, “And this land, which we possessed at that time,.... Or took possession of, having
conquered it; for it still remained in their possession:
from Aroer, which is by the river Arnon: on the borders of Moab, from thence as far as Gilead
was the land which was taken from Sihon king of Heshbon, Deu_2:36.
and half Mount Gilead, and the cities thereof: which were taken from Og king of Bashan,

Deu_3:10.
gave I unto the Reubenites, and to the Gadites; at their request, on certain conditions to be
performed by them, afterwards repeated.
2. Moody Bible Institute, “Deuteronomy 3:12-20 'It's a truism in sports that a team's success is
more important than the statistics of individual players. Even the jargon of sports reflects this
thinking. Baseball has the sacrifice bunt. And a batter who deliberately makes an out to move a
runner along is said to 'give himself up.' This collective effort is called teamworkÑ nd few teams
win without it.
Teamwork was indispensable for the Israelites too. After the defeat of the Amorite kings who held
large portions of the Transjordan, Israel was in the position to invade Canaan. The goal of the
battle was victory so that every Israelite could enjoy rest in the land God had promised His
people.
But before Israel crossed the Jordan, Moses had to deal with a request by the tribes of Reuben
and Gad, along with half of Manasseh a tribe that was divided between those who worked the
land and those who raised livestock. It was the latter group that joined the other two tribes in
asking Moses for permission to settle east of the Jordan, land ideal for grazing their herds (Num.
32:1-5).
Moses was angry at first, since it appeared that these Israelites were content to settle in
comfortably and let their brothers fight the Canaanites. So Moses insisted that the armed men of
these tribes go with the rest of Israel into Canaan until the whole nation was at rest. The men
involved readily agreed to these terms (Num. 32:18).
What would be the blessing for these tribes' obedience to God in this matter? First, the families
and livestock they had left behind east of the Jordan would be safe while they were away.
Second, the land they claimed would also be held for them. Since God had given this land to them
as their possession they didn't need to worry about losing their homes while they were serving in
the Israelite army.
Someone has said that there is no safer place for anyone on earth than in the will of God. The
tribes who settled in the Transjordan certainly discovered that truth. When the time came to
sacrifice for their brothers, they left home as they had promised. Their families and herds were
never safer than when these warriors were helping their fellow Israelites enter into God's rest.”
3. Jamison, “Deu 3:12-13 - “this land, which we possessed at that time, from Aroer ... gave I unto
the Reubenites and to the Gadites — The whole territory occupied by Sihon was parceled out
among the pastoral tribes of Reuben and Gad. It extended from the north bank of the Arnon to
the south half of mount Gilead - a small mountain ridge, now called Djelaad, about six or seven
miles south of the Jabbok, and eight miles in length. The northern portion of Gilead and the rich
pasture lands of Bashan - a large province, consisting, with the exception of a few bleak and
rocky spots, of strong and fertile soil - was assigned to the half-tribe of Manasseh.

4. KD, “Deu 3:12-13 -
Review of the Distribution of the Conquered Land. - The land which the Israelites had taken
belonging to these two kingdoms was given by Moses to the two tribes and a half for their
possession, viz., the southern portion from Aroer in the Arnon valley (see at Num_32:34), and
half Gilead (as far as the Jabbok: see at Deu_3:10) with its towns, which are enumerated in
Jos_13:15-20 and Jos_13:24-28, to the Reubenites and Gadites; and the northern half of Gilead,
with the whole of Bashan (i.e., all the region of Argob: see at Deu_3:4, and Num_32:33), to the
half-tribe of Manasseh. !'/ , “as for all Bashan,” is in apposition to “all the region of Argob,”
and the simply serves to connect it; for “all the region of Argob” was not merely one portion of
Bashan, but was identical with “all Bashan,” so far as it belonged to the kingdom of Og (see at v.
4). All this region passed for a land of giants. 0', to be called, i.e., to be, and to be recognised as
being.
5. Henry, “Deu 3:12-20 -
Having shown how this country which they were now in was conquered, in these verses he
shows how it was settled upon the Reubenites, Gadites, and half the tribe of Manasseh, which we
had the story of before, Num. 32. Here is the rehearsal. 1. Moses specifies the particular parts of
the country that were allotted to each tribe, especially the distribution of the lot to the half tribe
of Manasseh, the subdividing of which tribe is observable. Joseph was divided into Ephraim and
Manasseh; Manasseh was divided into one half on the one side Jordan and the other half on the
other side: that on the east side Jordan was again divided into two great families, which had their
several allotments: Jair, Deu_3:14, Machir, Deu_3:15. And perhaps Jacob's prediction of the
smallness of that tribe was now accomplished in these divisions and subdivisions. Observe that
Bashan is here called the land of the giants, because it had been in their possession, but Og was
the last of them. These giants, it seems, had lost their country, and were rooted out of it sooner
than any of their neighbours; for those who, presuming upon their strength and stature, had their
hand against every man, had every man's hand against them, and went down slain to the pit,
though they were the terror of the mighty in the land of the living. 2. He repeats the condition of
the grant which they had already agreed to, Deu_3:18-20. That they should send a strong
detachment over Jordan to lead the van in the conquest of Canaan, who should not return to
their families, at least not to settle (though for a time they might retire thither into winter
quarters, at the end of a campaign), till they had seen their brethren in as full possession of their
respective allotments as they themselves were now in of theirs. They must hereby be taught not to
look at their own things only, but at the things of others, Phi_2:4. It ill becomes an Israelite to be
selfish, and to prefer any private interest before the public welfare. When we are rest we should
desire to see our brethren at rest too, and should be ready to do what we can towards it; for we
are not born for ourselves, but are members one of another. A good man cannot rejoice much in
the comforts of his family unless withal he sees peace upon Israel, Psa_128:6.
13 The rest of Gilead and also all of Bashan, the kingdom
of Og, I gave to the half-tribe of Manasseh. (The whole
region of Argob in Bashan used to be known as a land of
the Rephaites.

1. Gill, “And the rest of Gilead,.... The other half of the mount, with the cities belonging to it:
and all Bashan, being the kingdom of Og, gave I unto the half tribe of Manasseh; see Num_32:33.
all the region of Argob, with all Bashan; the region of Trachonitis, in Bashan; see Deu_3:4,
which was called the land of giants; or of Rephaim; this Jarchi says is the country of the Rephaim
given to Abraham, Gen_15:20.
14 Jair, a descendant of Manasseh, took the whole region
of Argob as far as the border of the Geshurites and the
Maakathites; it was named after him, so that to this day
Bashan is called Havvoth Jair.[d])
1. Gill, “Jair the son of Manasseh took all the country of Argob,.... Or Trachonitis; the small
towns belonging to Gilead, as in Num_32:41.
unto the coasts of Geshuri and Maachathi; these were little kingdoms in Syria, on which the
country of Argob bordered, and had kings over them in the time of David, and came not into the
possession of the Israelites; see Jos_13:13.
and called them after his own name, Bashanhavothjair, unto this day; see Num_32:41.
2. Jamison, “Jair the son of Manasseh took all the country of Argob — The original inhabitants
of the province north of Bashan, comprising sixty cities (Deu_3:4), not having been extirpated
along with Og, this people were afterwards brought into subjection by the energy of Jair. This
chief, of the tribe of Manasseh, in accordance with the pastoral habits of his people, called these
newly acquired towns by a name which signifies “Jair’s Bedouin Villages of Tents.”
unto this day — This remark must evidently have been introduced by Ezra, or some of the
pious men who arranged and collected the books of Moses.
3. Barnes, “These Geshurites held territory adjoining, if not included within, Bashan. They are
not to be confounded with those mentioned in Jos_13:2, who were neighbors of the Philistines
1Sa_17:8.
The exact position of Maachah like that of Geshur cannot be ascertained; but it was no doubt
among the fastnesses which lay between Bashan and the kingdom of Damascus, and on the skirts
of Mount Hermon.

Unto this day - This expression, like our “until now,” does not, as used in the Bible, necessarily
imply that the time spoken of as elapsed is long. It may here denote the duration to the time then
present of that which had been already some months accomplished.
4. KD, “The region of Argob, or the country of Bashan, was given to Jair (see Num_32:41), as
far as the territory of the Geshurites and Maachathites (cf. Jos_12:5; Jos_13:11). “Unto,” as far
as, is to be understood as inclusive. This is evident from the statement in Jos_13:13 : “The
children of Israel expelled not the Geshurites nor the Maachathites; but the Geshurites and the
Maachathites dwell among the Israelites until this day.” Consequently Moses allotted the territory
of these two tribes to the Manassites, because it formed part of the kingdom of Og. “Geshuri and
Maachathi” are the inhabitants of Geshur and Maachah, two provinces which formed small
independent kingdoms even in David's time (2Sa_3:3; 2Sa_13:37, and 2Sa_10:6). Geshur
bordered on Aram. The Geshurites and Aramaeans afterwards took from the Israelites the Jair-towns
and Kenath, with their daughter towns (1Ch_2:23). In David's time Geshur had a king
Thalmai, whose daughter David married. This daughter was the mother of Absalom; and it was
in Geshur that Absalom lived for a time in exile (2Sa_3:3; 2Sa_13:37; 2Sa_14:23; 2Sa_15:8). The
exact situation of Geshur has not yet been determined. It was certainly somewhere near Hermon,
on the eastern side of the upper Jordan, and by a bridge over the Jordan, as Geshur signifies
bridge in all the Semitic dialects. Maachah, which is referred to in 1Ch_19:6 as a kingdom under
the name of Aram-Maachah (Eng. V. Syria-Maachah), is probably to be sought for to the north-east
of Geshur. According to the Onomast. (s. v. 1
2
), it was in the neighbourhood of the
Hermon. “And he called them (the towns of the region of Argob) after his own name; Bashan (sc.,
he called) Havvoth Jair unto this day” (cf. Num_32:41). The word 34 (Havvoth), which only
occurs in connection with the Jair-towns, does not mean towns or camps of a particular kind, viz.,
tent villages, as some suppose, but is the plural of '4, life (Leben, a common German
termination, e.g., Eisleben), for which afterwards the word '5 was used (comp. 2Sa_23:13 with
1Ch_11:15). It applies to any kind of dwelling-place, being used in the passages just mentioned to
denote even a warlike encampment. The Jair's-lives (Jairsleben) were not a particular class of
towns, therefore, in the district of Argob, but Jair gave this collective name to all the sixty
fortified towns, as is perfectly evident from the verse before us when compared with Deu_3:5 and
Num_32:41, and expressly confirmed by Jos_13:30 and 1Ki_4:13, where the sixty fortified towns
of the district of Argob are called Havvoth Jair. - The statement in 1Ch_2:22-23, that “Jair had
twenty-three towns in Gilead (which is used here as in Deu_34:1; Jos_22:9; Jos_13:15; Jdg_5:17;
Jdg_20:1, to denote the whole of Palestine to the east of the Jordan), and Geshur and Aram took
the Havvoth Jair from them, (and) Kenath and its daughters, sixty towns (sc., in all),” is by no
means at variance with this, but, on the contrary, in the most perfect harmony with it. For it is
evident from this passage, that the twenty-three Havvoth Jair, with Kenath and its daughters,
formed sixty towns altogether. The distinction between the twenty-three Havvoth Jair and the
other thirty-seven towns, viz., Kenath and its daughters, is to be explained from the simple fact
that, according to Num_32:42, Nobah, no doubt a family of sons of Machir related to Jair,
conquered Kenath and its daughters, and called the conquered towns by his name, namely, when
they had been allotted to him by Moses. Consequently Bashan, or the region of Argob, with its
sixty fortified towns, was divided between two of the leading families of Machir the Manassite,
viz., the families of Jair and Nobah, each family receiving the districts which it had conquered,
together with their towns; namely, the family of Nobah, Kenath and its daughter towns, or the
eastern portion of Bashan; and the family of Jair, twenty-three towns in the west, which are
called Havvoth Jair in 1Ch_2:23, in harmony with Num_32:41, where Jair is said to have given
this name to the towns which were conquered by him. In the address before us, however, in which

Moses had no intention to enter into historical details, all the (sixty) towns of the whole district of
Argob, or the whole of Bashan, are comprehended under the name of Havvoth Jair, probably
because Nobah was a subordinate branch of the family of Jair, and the towns conquered by him
were under the supremacy of Jair. The expression “unto this day” certainly does not point to a
later period than the Mosaic age. This definition of time is simply a relative one. It does not
necessarily presuppose a very long duration, and here it merely serves to bring out the
marvellous change which was due to the divine grace, viz., that the sixty fortified towns of the
giant king Og of Bashan had now become Jair's lives.
(Note: The conquest of these towns, in fact, does not seem to have been of long duration,
and the possession of them by the Israelites was a very disputed one (cf. 1Ch_2:22-23). In the
time of the judges we find thirty in the possession of the judge Jair (Jdg_10:4), which caused
the old name Havvoth Jair to be revived.)
15 And I gave Gilead to Makir.
1. Gill, “And I gave Gilead unto Machir. The son of Manasseh; not to him personally, who cannot
be thought to have been living at this time, but to his posterity, to the Machirites; see Num_32:40.
2. KD, “Deu 3:15-20 - “Machir received Gilead (see Num_32:40). - In Deu_3:16 and Deu_3:17
the possession of the tribes of Reuben and Gad is described more fully according to its
boundaries. They received the land of Gilead (to the south of the Jabbok) as far as the brook
Arnon, the middle of the valley and its territory. 6 7 ,' is a more precise definition of ,
expressive of the fact that the territory of these tribes was not to reach merely to the northern
edge of the Arnon valley, but into the middle of it, viz., to the river Arnon, which flowed through
the middle of the valley; and 44 (and the border) is an explanatory apposition to what goes
before, as in Num_34:6, signifying, “viz., the border of the Arnon valley as far as the river.” On the
east, “even unto Jabbok the brook, the (western) border of the Ammonites” (i.e., as far as the upper
Jabbok, the Nahr Ammân: see at Num_21:24); and on the west “The Arabah (the Ghor: see
Deu_1:1) and the Jordan with territory” (i.e., with its eastern bank), “from Chinnereth” (i.e., the
town from which the Sea of Galilee received the name of Sea of Chinnereth: Num_34:11; see at
Jos_19:35) “to the sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea under the slopes of Pisgah (see at Num_21:15
and Num_27:12) eastward” (i.e., merely the eastern side of the Arabah and Jordan). - In
Deu_3:18-20 Moses reminds them of the conditions upon which he had given the two tribes and a
half the land referred to for their inheritance (cf. Num_32:20-32).
16 But to the Reubenites and the Gadites I gave the

territory extending from Gilead down to the Arnon Gorge
(the middle of the gorge being the border) and out to the
Jabbok River, which is the border of the Ammonites.
1. Gill, “And unto the Reubenites, and unto the Gadites,.... The tribes of Reuben and Gad:
I gave from Gilead even unto the river Arnon: see Deu_3:12.
half the valley and the border; or rather half the river, the river Arnon; and so it is rendered the
middle of the river, in Jos_12:2 and so here the middle of the torrent by the Vulgate Latin and
Septuagint versions, and by Onkelos:
even unto the river Jabbok, which is the border of the children of Ammon; beyond which the
land given to the tribes of Reuben and Gad reached not; see Deu_2:37.
2. Jamison, “from Gilead — that is, not the mountainous region, but the town Ramoth-gilead,
even unto the river Arnon half the valley — The word “valley” signifies a wady, either filled
with water or dry, as the Arnon is in summer, and thus the proper rendering of the passage will
be - “even to the half or middle of the river Arnon” (compare Jos_12:2). This prudent
arrangement of the boundaries was evidently made to prevent all disputes between the adjacent
tribes about the exclusive right to the water.
3. Barnes, “The sense is that the Reubenites and Gadites were to possess the district from the
Jabbok on the north to the Arnon on the south, including the middle part of the valley of the
Arnon, and the territory (“coast” or “border”) thereto pertaining.
17 Its western border was the Jordan in the Arabah, from
Kinnereth to the Sea of the Arabah (that is, the Dead Sea),
below the slopes of Pisgah.
1. Gill, “The plain also, and Jordan,.... The plain by Jordan, the plains of Moab on the side of it,
together with the river:
and the coast thereof; the country adjoining to it:
from Chinnereth even unto the sea of the plain, even the salt sea; that is, from Gennesaret, as the
Targums of Onkelos and Jonathan, called the land of Gennesaret, Mat_14:34, from thence to the

sea of Sodom, the sea of the plain, where the cities of the plain stood, Sodom, Gomorrah, c. and
the salt sea, so called from the salt and nitrous waters of it, the lake Asphaltites:
under Ashdothpisgah eastward; mentioned among the cities given to the tribe of Reuben,
Jos_13:20 rendered the springs of Pisgah, Deu_4:49, the word having the signification of
effusions, pourings out; so the Targums.
18 I commanded you at that time: “The LORD your God
has given you this land to take possession of it. But all
your able-bodied men, armed for battle, must cross over
ahead of the other Israelites.
1. Gill, “And I commanded you at that time,.... Not all Israel, but the tribes of Reuben and God,
and the half tribe of Manasseh; for what follows only concerns them:
saying, the Lord your God hath given you this land to possess it; the land before described, lately
in the hands of Sihon and Og; this at their request Moses gave them, by the direction of the Lord,
on the following condition:
you shall pass over armed before your brethren the children of Israel, all that are meet for the
war; that is, they should pass over Jordan with the rest of the tribes, being armed to assist them
in the conquest of Canaan: for this phrase, which we render before your brethren, does not
signify that they went in the forefront of them, only that they were present with them, and joined
them in their war against their enemies; see Num_32:29 and therefore should be rendered with
your brethren (a); even as many of them as were able to bear arms, at least as many as Joshua
would choose to take of them; for he did not take them all by a great many; see Jos_4:13.
19 However, your wives, your children and your livestock
(I know you have much livestock) may stay in the towns I
have given you,
1. Gill, “But your wives, and your little ones, and your cattle,.... These were to be left behind: for
I know that ye have much cattle; which made the countries of Gilead and Bashan, so famous for

pasturage, agreeable to them; see Num_32:1 these, under the care of servants, and also their
wives and children:
shall abide in your cities which I have given you; and which they rebuilt and repaired,
Num_32:34.
20 until the LORD gives rest to your fellow Israelites as he
has to you, and they too have taken over the land that the
LORD your God is giving them across the Jordan. After
that, each of you may go back to the possession I have
given you.”
1. Gill, “Until the Lord have given rest unto your brethren, as well as unto you,.... Rest from their
enemies, and habitations to dwell quietly in; so the land of Canaan is called a rest, Deu_12:9
typical of the rest which remains for the people of God:
and until they also possess the land which the Lord your God hath given them beyond Jordan;
for so Canaan was with respect to Moses and the people with him, who were then in the plains of
Moab; otherwise the country in which he was with respect to Canaan is usually called beyond
Jordan; this the Lord had given in promise to Israel, and they were just now ready to enter into
and possess it, by virtue of his gift, and which made it sure unto them:
and then shall ye return every man unto his possession, which I have given you; as accordingly
they did, Jos_22:1.
Moses Forbidden to Cross the Jordan
21 At that time I commanded Joshua: “You have seen
with your own eyes all that the LORD your God has done
to these two kings. The LORD will do the same to all the
kingdoms over there where you are going.
1. Gill, “And I commanded Joshua at that time,.... After the conquest of the two kings, and the

assignment of their countries to the above tribes; and after Moses had it made known to him that
he should quickly die, and Joshua should be his successor; then, by the direction of God, he gave
him the following charge:
saying, thine eyes have seen all that the Lord your God hath done unto these two kings; Sihon
and Og; how their kingdoms were taken from them, and given to Israel, and they slain with the
sword; this Joshua was an eyewitness of, and was, no doubt, greatly concerned in the battles with
them, being the general in the Israelitish armies; at least this was sometimes his post, and he
cannot be thought to have been unemployed in these wars:
so shall the Lord do unto all the kingdoms whither thou passest; all the kingdoms in the land of
Canaan, where there were many, thirty one at least; these would be all conquered and put into
the hands of the Israelites, and their kings slain.
2. Henry, “Deu 3:21-29 -
Here is I. The encouragement which Moses gave to Joshua, who was to succeed him in the
government, Deu_3:21, Deu_3:22. He commanded him not to fear. This those that are aged and
experienced in the service of God should do all they can to strengthen the hands of those that are
young, and setting out in religion. Two things he would have him consider for his encouragement:
- 1. What God has done. Joshua had seen what a total defeat God had given by the forces of
Israel to these two kings, and thence he might easily infer, so shall the Lord do to all the rest of the
kingdoms upon which we are to make war. He must not only infer thence that thus the Lord can
do with them all, for his arm is not shortened, but thus he will do, for his purpose is not changed;
he that has begun will finish; as for God, his work is perfect. Joshua had seen it with his own eyes.
And the more we have seen of the instances of divine wisdom, power, and goodness, the more
inexcusable we are if we fear what flesh can do unto us. 2. What God had promised. The Lord
your God he shall fight for you; and that cause cannot but be victorious which the Lord of hosts
fights for. If God be for us, who can be against us so as to prevail? We reproach our leader if we
follow him trembling.
II. The prayer which Moses made for himself, and the answer which God gave to that prayer.
1. His prayer was that, if it were God's will, he might go before Israel over Jordan into Canaan.
At that time, when he had been encouraging Joshua to fight Israel's battles, taking it for granted
that he must be their leader, he was touched with an earnest desire to go over himself, which
expresses itself not in any passionate and impatient complaints, or reflections upon the sentence
he was under, but in humble prayers to God for a gracious reversing of it. I besought the Lord.
Note, We should never allow any desires in our hearts which we cannot in faith offer up to God
by prayer; and what desires are innocent, let them be presented to God. We have not because we
ask not. Observe,
(1.) What he pleads here. Two things: - [1.] The great experience which he had had of God's
goodness to him in what he had done for Israel: “Thou hast begun to show thy servant thy
greatness. Lord, perfect what thou hast begun. Thou hast given me to see thy glory in the
conquest of these two kings, and the sight has affected me with wonder and thankfulness. O let
me see more of the outgoings of my God, my King! This great work, no doubt, will be carried on
and completed; let me have the satisfaction of seeing it.” Note, the more we see of God's glory in
his works the more we shall desire to see. The works of the Lord are great, and therefore are
sought out more and more of all those that have pleasure therein. [2.] The good impressions that
had been made upon his heart by what he had seen: For what God is there in heaven or earth that
can do according to thy works? The more we are affected with what we have seen of God, of his

wisdom, power, and goodness, the better we are prepared for further discoveries. Those shall see
the works of God that admire him in them. Moses had thus expressed himself concerning God
and his works long before (Exo_15:11), and he still continues of the same mind, that there are no
works worthy to be compared with God's works, Psa_86:8.
(2.) What he begs: I pray thee let me go over, Deu_3:25. God had said he should not go over; yet
he prays that he might, not knowing but that the threatening was conditional, for it was not
ratified with an oath, as that concerning the people was, that they should not enter. Thus
Hezekiah prayed for his own life, and David for the life of his child, after both had ben expressly
threatened; and the former prevailed, though the latter did not. Moses remembered the time
when he had by prayer prevailed with God to recede from the declarations which he had made of
his wrath against Israel, Exo_32:14. And why might he not hope in like manner to prevail for
himself? Let me go over and see the good land. Not, “Let me go over and be a prince and a ruler
there;” he seeks not his own honour, is content to resign the government to Joshua; but, “Let me
go to be a spectator of thy kindness to Israel, to see what I believe concerning the goodness of the
land of promise.” How pathetically does he speak of Canaan, that good land, that goodly
mountain! Note, Those may hope to obtain and enjoy God's favours that know how to value
them. What he means by that goodly mountain we may learn from Psa_78:54, where it is said of
God's Israel that he brought them to the border of his sanctuary, even to this mountain which his
right hand had purchased, where it is plainly to be understood of the whole land of Canaan, yet
with an eye to the sanctuary, the glory of it.
2. God's answer to this prayer had in it a mixture of mercy and judgment, that he might sing
unto God of both.
(1.) There was judgment in the denial of his request, and that in something of anger too: The
Lord was wroth with me for your sakes, Deu_3:26. God not only sees sin in his people, but is much
displeased with it; and even those that are delivered from the wrath to come may yet lie under the
tokens of God's wrath in this world, and may be denied some particular favour which their
hearts are much set upon. God is a gracious, tender, loving Father; but he is angry with his
children when they do amiss, and denies them many a thing that they desire and are ready to cry
for. But how was he wroth with Moses for the sake of Israel? Either, [1.] For that sin which they
provoked him to; see Psa_106:32, Psa_106:33. Or, [2.] The removal of Moses at that time, when
he could so ill be spared, was a rebuke to all Israel, and a punishment of their sin. Or, [3.] It was
for their sakes, that it might be a warning to them to take heed of offending God by passionate
and unbelieving speeches at any time, after the similitude of his transgression; for, if this were
done to such a green tree, what should be done to the dry? He acknowledges that God would not
hear him. God had often heard him for Israel, yet he would not hear him for himself. It was the
prerogative of Christ, the great Intercessor, to be heard always; yet of him his enemies said, He
saved others, himself he could not save, which the Jews would not have upbraided him with had
they considered that Moses, their great prophet, prevailed for others, but for himself he could not
prevail. Though Moses, being one of the wrestling seed of Jacob, did not seek in vain, yet he had
not the thing itself which he sought for. God may accept our prayers, and yet not grant us the
very thing we pray for.
(2.) Here is mercy mixed with this wrath in several things: - [1.] God quieted the spirit of Moses
under the decree that had gone forth by that word (Deu_3:26), Let it suffice thee. With this word,
no doubt, a divine power went to reconcile Moses to the will of God, and to bring him to
acquiesce in it. If God does not by his providence give us what we desire, yet, if by his grace he
makes us content without it, it comes much to one. “Let it suffice thee to have God for they father,
and heaven for thy portion, though thou hast not every thing thou wouldest have in this world.
Be satisfied with this, God is all-sufficient.” [2.] He put an honour upon his prayer in directing

him not to insist upon this request: Speak no more to me of this matter. It intimates that what God
does not think fit to grant we should not think fit to ask, and that God takes such a pleasure in
the prayer of the upright that it is no pleasure to him, no, not in any particular instance, to give a
denial to it. [3.] He promised him a sight of Canaan from the top of Pisgah, Deu_3:27. Though he
should not have the possession of it, he should have the prospect of it; not to tantalize him, but
such a sight of it as would yield him true satisfaction, and would enable him to form a very clear
and pleasing idea of that promised land. Probably Moses had not only his sight preserved for
other purposes, but greatly enlarged for this purpose; for, if he had not had such a sight of it as
others could not have from the same place, it would have been no particular favour to Moses, nor
the matter of a promise. Even great believers, in this present state, see heaven but at a distance.
[4.] He provided him a successor, one who should support the honour of Moses and carry on and
complete that glorious work which the heart of Moses was so much upon, the bringing of Israel
to Canaan, and settling them there (Deu_3:28): Charge Joshua and encourage him in this work.
Those to whom God gives a charge, he will be sure to give encouragement to. And it is a comfort
to the church's friends (when they are dying and going off) to see God's work likely to be carried
on by other hands, when they are silent in the dust.
3. KD, “Deu 3:21-29 -
Nomination of Joshua as his Successor. - This reminiscence also recalls the goodness of God in
the appointment of Joshua (Num_27:12.), which took place “at that time,” i.e., after the conquest
of the land on the east of the Jordan. In accordance with the object of his address, which was to
hold up to view what the Lord had done for Israel, he here relates how, at the very outset, he
pointed Joshua to the things which he had seen with his eyes (6$$( 3', thine eyes were seeing;
cf. Ewald, §335, b.), namely, to the defeat of the two kings of the Amorites, in which the pledge
was contained, that the faithful covenant God would complete the work He had begun, and
would do the same to all kingdoms whither Joshua would go over (i.e., across the Jordan).
Deu_3:22
For this reason they were not to be afraid; for Jehovah Himself would fight for them. “He” is
emphatic, and adds force to the subject.
Deu_3:23-24
Moses then describes how, notwithstanding his prayer, the Lord had refused him permission to
cross over into Canaan and see the glorious land. This prayer is not mentioned in the historical
account given in the fourth book; but it must have preceded the prayer for the appointment of a
shepherd over the congregation in Num_27:16, as the Lord directs him in His reply (Deu_3:28) to
appoint Joshua as the leader of the people. In his prayer, Moses appealed to the manifestations of
divine grace which he had already received. As the Lord had already begun to show him His
greatness and His mighty hand, so might He also show him the completion of His work. The
expression, “begun to show Thy greatness,” relates not so much to the mighty acts of the Lord in
Egypt and at the Red Sea (as in Exo_32:11-12, and Num_14:13.), as to the manifestation of the
divine omnipotence in the defeat of the Amorites, by which the Lord had begun to bring His
people into the possession of the promised land, and had made Himself known as God, to whom
there was no equal in heaven or on earth. ! before $8 (v. 24) is an explanatory and causal
relative: because (quod, quia), or for. “For what God is there in heaven and on earth,” etc. These
words recall Exo_15:11, and are echoed in many of the Psalms, - in Psa_86:8 almost verbatim.
The contrast drawn between Jehovah and other gods does not involve the reality of the heathen
deities, but simply presupposes a belief in the existence of other gods, without deciding as to the
truth of that belief. 349, manifestations of '49, mighty deeds.

Deu_3:25
“I pray Thee, let me go over.” ,/'(, a form of desire, used as a petition, as in Deu_2:27;
Num_21:22, etc. “That goodly mountain” is not one particular portion of the land of Canaan, such
as the mountains of Judah, or the temple mountain (according to Exo_15:17), but the whole of
Canaan regarded as a mountainous country, Lebanon being specially mentioned as the boundary
wall towards the north. As Moses stood on the lower level of the Arabah, the promised land
presented itself not only to his eyes, but also to his soul, as a long mountain range; and that no
merely as suggestive of the lower contrast, that “whereas the plains in the East are for the most
part sterile, on account of the want of springs or rain, the mountainous regions, which are well
watered by springs and streams, are very fertile and pleasant” (Rosenmüller), but also on a much
higher ground, viz., as a high and lofty land, which would stand by the side of Horeb, “where he
had spent the best and holiest days of his life, and where he had seen the commencement of the
covenant between God and His people” (Schultz).
Deu_3:26
But the Lord would not grant his request. “Let it suffice thee' (satis sit tibi, as in Deu_1:6),
substantially equivalent to 2Co_12:8, “My grace is sufficient for thee” (Schultz). : , to speak
about a thing (as in Deu_6:7; Deu_11:19, etc.).
Deu_3:27-28
Deu_3:27 is a rhetorical paraphrase of Num_27:12, where the mountains of Abarim are
mentioned in the place of Pisgah, which was the northern portion of Abarim. (On Deu_3:28, cf.
Deu_1:38 and Num_27:23.)
Deu_3:29
“So we abode in the valley over against Beth-peor,” i.e., in the Arboth Moab (Num_22:1), sc.,
where we still are. The pret. !, is used, because Moses fixes his eye upon the past, and looks
back upon the events already described in Num 28-34 as having taken place there. On Beth-Peor,
see at Num_23:28.
22 Do not be afraid of them; the LORD your God himself
will fight for you.”
1. Gill, “Ye shall not fear them,.... On account of the numbers, strength, courage, and gigantic
stature of the inhabitants, at least some of them; nor on account of their walled towns, and
fortified cities:
for the Lord your God he shall fight for you; as he did, particularly at Jericho, the walls of which
city fell at the sound of rams' horns; and at Gibeon, when he cast down hailstones on their
enemies, and more were slain by them than with the sword; and in all their battles it was he that
gave them success and victory.

2. Moody Bible Institute, “There is a definite note of sadness in today's story. Moses reminded the
people of God's judgment on his disobedience at Meribah (Num. 20:12, 13), which resulted in his
being banned from Canaan. Bible commentator Dr. Jack Deere says that Moses' conversation
with God 'reveals something of the intimacy of Moses' relationship with God. It also heightens
the feeling of tragedy in the experience of a man who devoted his life to fulfilling God's promise
for Israel but knew he would never see its completion.'
Yet despite his own deep disappointment and knowing that his life was drawing to a close, Moses
did not lose sight of the larger objective before Israel. The nation had conquered Sihon and Og,
two powerful Amorite kings, and was ready for greater conquests in Canaan. Joshua was at
Moses' side as God's appointed commander to lead the people into the Promised Land.
Look at the way Moses encouraged his young successor. Dt 3:21, 22 provide a classic biblical
formula for encouragement. Moses told Joshua, in effect: 'Look at all
that God has done for you in the past. There is nothing you will face in the future that He cannot
handle, because He is the same God today.'
Then Moses turned from speaking with Joshua to speaking with the Lord. It's not hard to
imagine the anguish in Moses' voice as he stood on the very doorstep of the land he had spent
forty years trying to reach. He must have been hopeful that God would relent and allow him to
enter Canaan.
The text indicates that Moses kept on asking God to change His mind. But God became angry
with Moses quite angry, according to the original language. He did allow Moses to go to the top of
a mountain called Pisgah from where he could view the Promised Land from a distance. But that
was the end of the issue.
Even though Moses had to stay in the Transjordan, he still had an important work to do. Joshua
would need all the strength and courage he could muster for the task ahead of him.
God was ready to supply Joshua's need, but He also wanted to make sure that Israel's new leader
had Moses's blessing. So Moses commissioned Joshua, signaling that Joshua was God's choice.
23 At that time I pleaded with the LORD:
1. Gill, “And I besought the Lord at that time,.... When he was told he should die, and Joshua
should succeed him; or when the two kings were slain, and their kingdoms conquered; this being
the beginning, pledge, and earnest of what God had promised to do for the people of Israel;
Moses was very desirous of living to see the work completed, and therefore sought the Lord by

prayer and supplication:
2. Our Daily Bread, “Deuteronomy 3:23-29
Dying For Encouragement
In Deuteronomy 3 we read that Moses encouraged Joshua as he was about to assume leadership
of the Israelites. No doubt Joshua was filled with fear and a feeling of inadequacy to fill Moses'
shoes. The Lord therefore told Moses to encourage Joshua.
All of us need a word of encouragement from time to time to spur us on when we are facing a
major new challenge. But we also need words of appreciation and commendation as we carry out
our daily responsibilities, whether at home or at work.
When a corporate accountant committed suicide, an effort was made to find out why. The
company's books were examined, but no shortage was found. Nothing could be uncovered that
gave any clue as to why he took his life—that is, until a note was discovered. It simply said: In
30 years I have never had one word of encouragement. I'm fed up!
Many people crave some small sign of approval. They need a word of recognition, a caring smile,
a warm handshake, and an honest expression of appreciation for the good we see in them or in
their work.
Every day let's determine to encourage (not flatter) at least one person. Let's do our part to help
those around us who are dying for encouragement. —Richard De Haan
It may seem insignificant
To say a word or two;
But when we give encouragement,
What wonders it can do! —K. De Haan
A word of encouragement can make the difference between giving up or going on.
24 “Sovereign LORD, you have begun to show to your
servant your greatness and your strong hand. For what
god is there in heaven or on earth who can do the deeds
and mighty works you do?

1. Gill, “O Lord God, thou hast begun to show thy servant thy greatness and thy mighty hand,....
To give a specimen of the greatness of his power in subduing the two kings and their kingdoms,
and delivering them up into the hands of the Israelites. Moses had seen instances of the mighty
power of God in Egypt, at the Red sea, and in the wilderness; but this was the beginning of his
power, in vanquishing the Canaanites, and putting their land into the possession of the Israelites,
as he had promised; of which the Amorites were a part, and a principal nation of them: and thus
God, when he begins a work of grace upon the soul of man, begins to show the exceeding
greatness of his power, and which is further exerted in carrying it on, and bringing it to
perfection:
for what God is there in heaven or in earth that can do according to thy works, and according to
thy might? here Moses speaks according to the notion of Heathens, who supposed there were
other gods in heaven and in earth besides the true God; and upon this supposition observes, let
there be as many as they will, or can be imagined, there is none of them like the Lord God of
Israel for power and might; or are able to do such works as he has done, in nature, in the creation
of all things out of nothing, in providence, in supporting what he has made, and in governing the
world; and in those amazing instances of his power, in bringing down judgments upon wicked
men, kings, and kingdoms; and in the deliverance of his own people from them, and putting them
and their kingdoms into the possession of them; which were the wondrous works of might Moses
had in view, and a sense of which was impressed on his mind at this time.
2. Clarke, “Deu 3:24-25 - “The prayer of Moses recorded in these two verses, and his own
reflections on it, Deu_3:26, are very affecting. He had suffered much both in body and mind in
bringing the people to the borders of the promised land; and it was natural enough for him to
wish to see them established in it, and to enjoy a portion of that inheritance himself, which he
knew was a type of the heavenly country. But notwithstanding his very earnest prayer, and God’s
especial favor towards him, he was not permitted to go over Jordan! He had grieved the Spirit of
God, and he passed a sentence against him of exclusion from the promised land. Yet he permitted
him to see it, and gave him the fullest assurances that the people whom he had brought out of
Egypt should possess it. Thus God may choose to deprive those of earthly possessions to whom he
is nevertheless determined to give a heavenly inheritance.
25 Let me go over and see the good land beyond the
Jordan—that fine hill country and Lebanon.”
1. Gill, “I pray thee, let me go over and see the good land that is beyond Jordan,.... The land of
Canaan, the land flowing with milk and honey; a land which he describes as a most excellent one,
Deu_8:7. To see this land, he was very desirous of going over the river Jordan, beyond which it
lay with respect to the place where he now was:
that goodly mountain, and Lebanon; or, that goodly mountain, even Lebanon; which lay to the

north of the land of Canaan, and was famous for cedar and odoriferous trees. But if two distinct
mountains are meant, the goodly mountain may design Mount Moriah, on which the temple was
afterwards built, and of which Moses might have a foresight; and some by Lebanon think that is
meant, which was built of the cedars of Lebanon, and therefore goes by that name, Zec_11:1 and
a foreview of this made the mountain so precious to Moses, and desirable to be seen by him. So
the Targum of Jonathan;that goodly mountain in which is built the city of Jerusalem, and
Mount Lebanon, in which the Shechinah shall dwell''to which agrees the note of Aben Ezra, who
interprets the goodly mountain of Jerusalem, and Lebanon of the house of the sanctuary. In the
Septuagint it is called Antilibanus. Mount Libanus had its name not from frankincense growing
upon it, as some have thought; for it does not appear that any did grow upon it, for that came
from Seba in Arabia Felix; but from the whiteness of it, through the continual snows that were on
it, just as the Alps have their name for the same reason; and so Jerom says (b) of Lebanon, that
the snow never leaves from the tops of it, or is ever so overcome by the heat of the sun as wholly
to melt; to the same purpose also Tacitus (c) says, and Mr. Maundrell (d), who was there in May,
speaks of deep snow on it, and represents the cedars as standing in snow.
2. Chuck Smith, “Oh Moses, though he was a hundred and twenty years old he was ready for it.
Lord, come on. Please let me go in. I've seen, Lord, you beginning to wipe out the enemies. Oh
this is exciting, Lord. I love this. And Lord I'd just love to see that land. I'd like to see the
mountains of Lebanon. I'd like to see this land that you promised. Lord, won't you let me go in?
And Moses here is praying, asking God to allow him to go in.
Now, when they had come in the wilderness and were needing water, they had said to Moses,
Give us water to drink. We're perishing. Moses went in before the Lord and said, Lord, these
people are ready to kill me, they want water. And God said, Go out and speak to the rock and
water will come forth. The first time God said smite the rock and water will come out. The
second time God said speak to the rock. But Moses was angry with the people and he went out
from before the Lord and he said, Must I smite this rock again to give you water? And he took
his rod and he smote the rock and water came out. But God said, Moses, come here son. Moses,
you blew it. You did not properly represent me before those people.
Now Moses was God's representative and God wasn't angry with them but Moses was. And
Moses, as God's representative, represented God as being angry with them and he did not
properly represent God before the people. And God said, Moses, that's a serious error and
because you have not properly represented me before the people, you cannot go in to the land.
3. Jamison, “I pray thee, let me go over, and see the good land that is beyond Jordan, that goodly
mountain, and Lebanon — The natural and very earnest wish of Moses to be allowed to cross the
Jordan was founded on the idea that the divine threatening might be conditional and revertible.
“That goodly mountain” is supposed by Jewish writers to have pointed to the hill on which the
temple was to be built (Deu_12:5; Exo_15:2). But biblical scholars now, generally, render the
words - “that goodly mountain, even Lebanon,” and consider it to be mentioned as typifying the
beauty of Palestine, of which hills and mountains were so prominent a feature.

26 But because of you the LORD was angry with me and
would not listen to me. “That is enough,” the LORD said.
“Do not speak to me anymore about this matter.
1. Gill, “But the Lord was wroth with me for your sakes,.... Not at this time, and for this prayer of
his, but on account of he and Aaron not sanctifying him at the waters of Meribah; or of some
expressions of unbelief, and unadvised words, which dropped from his lips through their
provocation of him; see Num_20:12.
and would not hear me; now, and grant the above request, having before declared that he and
Aaron should not bring the people of Israel into the land he had given them; and Moses with all
his entreaties could not prevail upon him to repeal the sentence:
and the Lord said unto me, let it suffice; that he had seen the conquest of the two kings, and the
delivery of their kingdoms into the hands of Israel; and that he had brought the people through
the wilderness to the borders of the land of Canaan, and that he should have a distant sight of the
land, as after directed:
speak no more unto me of this matter; intimating it would be in vain, and to no purpose, to solicit
such a favour, since it would never be granted; it was a determined point, and he would never
recede from it.
2. F. B. Meyer, “WE are to pray without ceasing; always praying, never fainting; asking, seeking,
knocking. But there are some subjects concerning which God says, Speak no more unto Me of
this. In some cases these topics have to do with others, but more often with ourselves, as in the
case of the Apostle Paul (2Cor 12:9-note).
It is an awful thing when God says of certain individuals, Ephraim is joined to idols, let him
alone; and when the conviction is wrought within us that the sin unto death is being committed,
concerning which even the Apostle John said, I do not say that he should pray for it. Such
times come comparatively rarely; and so long as you feel able to pray for another, so long as no
negative has been spoken, you may be sure that God waits to be entreated, and that your prayer
will assuredly be answered.
But have you not realized at times that God has said about some earthly boon you were
craving?-'' Child, do not ask Me more, leave it with Me. I know what you want, and what is best
for you. Seek first My kingdom, and all these things, literally or in their equivalent, shall be
added. It is well when we have been praying eagerly, to allow God's winnowing-fan to pass over
our petitions, to winnow away all that is not in His mind to give; so that only those desires may
remain which His Spirit has indicted, and which He is therefore pledged to bestow. If He does not
give the exact thing you ask, He will give the Pisgah view and more grace. He will say to you, as to
Paul, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness.
3. Clarke, “Let it suffice thee - 6 rab lach, there is an abundance to thee - thou hast had

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