Joshua16chapter 16

Joshua 16:1-4

Joseph draws one lot for two tribes, and verse 4 names them Manasseh and Ephraim in birth order while the description that follows gives Ephraim his portion first and leaves Manasseh to chapter 17. Genesis 48:14 and 48:19 stand behind that order, where Jacob crossed his hands over the two boys and said the younger brother would be the greater. Verse 2 treats Bethel and Luz as two points on the line, though Genesis 28:19 has Jacob give the old city of Luz the name Bethel; Clarke and Gill both read the sanctuary ground as lying beside the town rather than inside it. Only the southern border is traced here, and the northern side is given at 17:10.

Joshua 16:5-9

Ephraim's line is drawn according to their families, so the register reaches below the tribe to the households inside it. It runs over ground the book has already fought on, since Bethhoron the nether at verse 3 and Bethhoron the upper at verse 5 sit on the descent where the Amorites fled and the great stones fell from heaven at Joshua 10:10-11. Verse 6 names Taanath-shiloh, and Shiloh itself lies in this territory, where the tabernacle is set up at 18:1 and stands until the ark is taken in 1 Samuel 4. Verse 9 gives Ephraim towns inside Manasseh's inheritance and 17:9 records the same arrangement from the other side; the text gives no reason for it, and Barnes says the reason can only be conjectured.

Joshua 16:10

The chapter ends on a town that was not taken, and Judges 1:29 repeats the sentence of the same tribe and the same city. The Canaanites stay and serve under tribute, which is an arrangement rather than a conquest, and Judges 1:28 and 1:30 show the same terms spreading through the other tribes. Gezer is cleared at last by a foreign king, since 1 Kings 9:16 says Pharaoh went up and took it, burnt it with fire, slew the Canaanites in it, and gave it as a present to his daughter, Solomon's wife. Joshua 21:45 says there failed not ought of any good thing which the LORD had spoken, and this verse sits in the same book without either being corrected.