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Joshua 21:20

in Joshua 21

The remaining Kohathite clans of the Levites were allotted these cities:

BSB

The same verse in ASV and KJV

ASV

And the families of the children of Kohath, the Levites, even the rest of the children of Kohath, they had the cities of their lot out of the tribe of Ephraim.

KJV

And the families of the children of Kohath, the Levites which remained of the children of Kohath, even they had the cities of their lot out of the tribe of Ephraim.

This verse in Joshua 21

Commentary

4 notes on this verse
And the families of the children of Kohath, the Levites,.... Who were not priests: which remained of the children of Kohath; these are the children of Moses, as Jarchi says, and those that descended from Kohath in the lines of Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel: even they had the cities of their lot out of the tribe of Ephraim; and were as follow.

This site's exposition

the Levites which remained of

on Joshua 21:20-26

The Kohathites who were not priests are placed in Ephraim, Dan and half Manasseh, and three of their ten towns are places Israel never cleared. Gezer at verse 21 is where Joshua 16:10 says the Canaanites stayed and paid tribute, Aijalon at verse 24 is where Judges 1:35 says the Amorites would dwell, and Tanach at verse 25 appears as Taanach in Judges 1:27 among the towns Manasseh could not drive out. Shechem is the refuge city of this group, the place where Joseph's bones are buried at Joshua 24:32 and where Abimelech is crowned in Judges 9.

The record, by era

The Nineteenth Century2 voices

Of the cities of the non-priestly Kohathites, for Kibzaim we find Jokmeam in 1Ch 6:68. This is perhaps another name for the same place, since both names may be derived from roots having a similar meaning; and for Gath-rimmon in 1Ch 6:70, Bileam is given, and probably correctly; Gath-rimmon having apparently been repeated inadvertently from the preceding verse. Bileam is but another form of Ibleam Jos 17:11.

A commentator

Jamieson, Fausset & Brown

1802–1910

Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)

proposed

they gave . . . these cities which are here mentioned by name--It was overruled by the unerring providence of the Divine Lawgiver that the cities of the priests lay within the territories of Judah and Benjamin. This was a provision, the admirable wisdom and propriety of which were fully manifested on the schism that took place in the reign of Rehoboam.

quarantine:debris (2026-07-29) — starts-lowercase

The words behind it

12 Hebrew words

Every Hebrew word of this verse in the order it stands, with what it means and the door to its own study. The last column counts the times a word stands in the whole Bible: the rarer the word, the more the places it appears belong together.

  • וּלְמִשְׁפְּח֤וֹתand to [the] clans of

    ulemishpechotH4940303 times

  • בְּנֵֽי־[the] descendants of

    benei-H11214930 times

  • קְהָת֙Kohath

    kehatH695532 times

  • הַלְוִיִּ֔םthe Levites

    halviyimH3881291 times

  • הַנּוֹתָרִ֖יםwho remained

    hanotarimH3498106 times

  • מִבְּנֵ֣יof [the] descendants of

    mibeneiH11214930 times

  • קְהָ֑תKohath

    kehatH695532 times

  • וַֽיְהִי֙and it was

    vayhiH19613559 times

  • עָרֵ֣י[the] cities of

    ʾareiH58921090 times

  • גֽוֹרָלָ֔םlot their

    goralamH148678 times

  • מִמַּטֵּ֖הfrom [the] tribe of

    mimatehH4294252 times

  • אֶפְרָֽיִם׃Ephraim

    ʾefrayimH669180 times

A shaded row is a word that stands 400 times or fewer in the Bible.

The walk

5 stops

Each card is a verse this one points to, and under it the verses that one points to in turn. Where several paths arrive at the same place, that place is listed first: the text keeps returning to it.

  • Through

    Joshua 21:5

    The remaining descendants of Kohath received ten cities by lot from the tribes of Ephraim, Dan, and the half-tribe of Manasseh.

    it leads to

    • Joshua 21:20–26

      The remaining Kohathite clans of the Levites were allotted these cities:

      Reached by 2 separate paths from here.

    • Genesis 46:11

      The sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari.

    • 1 Chronicles 6:66–70

      And some of the clans of the Kohathites were given cities from the tribe of Ephraim for their territory:

    • Numbers 3:27

      From Kohath came the clans of the Amramites, the Izharites, the Hebronites, and the Uzzielites; these were the clans of the Kohathites.

    • 1 Chronicles 6:61

      To the rest of the Kohathites, ten cities were allotted from the half-tribe of Manasseh.

Where this verse is studied

On this page

About Joshua

The Walls of Jericho Fall Down, Gustave Doré, 1866. Public domain.
The Walls of Jericho Fall Down, Gustave Doré, 1866. Public domain.

This page draws on Albert Barnes, Notes, Explanatory and Practical, on the Old and New Testaments (1832-1869); Jamieson, Fausset & Brown, Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible; John Gill, Exposition of the Old Testament (1748-1763); Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament: Joshua, Judges, Ruth and Matthew Henry, Commentary on the Whole Bible.