Study Desk

However, they did not drive out the Canaanites who lived in Gezer. So the Canaanites still live in Ephraim today, but they are forced laborers.

So the allotment was for the rest of Manasseh’s descendants by their clans, for the sons of Abiezer, Helek, Asriel, Shechem, Hepher, and Shemida. These are the male descendants of Manasseh son of Joseph, by their clans.

They came before the priest Eleazar, Joshua son of Nun, and the leaders, saying, “The Lord commanded Moses to give us an inheritance among our male relatives.” So they gave them an inheritance among their father’s brothers, in keeping with the Lord’s instruction.

“If you have so many people,” Joshua replied to them, “go to the forest and clear an area for yourselves there in the land of the Perizzites and the Rephaim, because Ephraim’s hill country is too small for you.”

So Joshua replied to Joseph’s family (that is, Ephraim and Manasseh), “You have many people and great strength. You will not have just one allotment,

So Joshua asked the Israelites, “How long will you delay going out to take possession of the land that the Lord, the God of your fathers, gave you?

So the men left, went through the land, and described it by towns in a document of seven sections. They returned to Joshua at the camp in Shiloh.

The inheritance of Simeon’s descendants was within the territory of Judah’s descendants, because the share for Judah’s descendants was too large. So Simeon’s descendants received an inheritance within Judah’s portion.

When the territory of the descendants of Dan slipped out of their control, they went up and fought against Leshem, captured it, and struck it down with the sword. So they took possession of it, lived there, and renamed Leshem after their ancestor Dan.

These were the portions that the priest Eleazar, Joshua son of Nun, and the family heads distributed to the Israelite tribes by lot at Shiloh in the Lord’s presence at the entrance to the tent of meeting. So they finished dividing up the land.

so that a person who kills someone unintentionally or accidentally may flee there. These will be your refuge from the avenger of blood.

So they designated Kedesh in the hill country of Naphtali in Galilee, Shechem in the hill country of Ephraim, and Kiriath-arba (that is, Hebron) in the hill country of Judah.

These are the cities appointed for all the Israelites and the aliens residing among them, so that anyone who kills a person unintentionally may flee there and not die at the hand of the avenger of blood until he stands before the assembly.

So the Israelites, by the Lord’s command, gave the Levites these cities with their pasturelands from their inheritance.

So the Lord gave Israel all the land he had sworn to give their fathers, and they took possession of it and settled there.

“This is what the Lord’s entire community says: ‘What is this treachery you have committed today against the God of Israel by turning away from the Lord and building an altar for yourselves, so that you are in rebellion against the Lord today?

For the Lord has made the Jordan a border between us and you descendants of Reuben and Gad. You have no share in the Lord!’ So your descendants may cause our descendants to stop fearing the Lord.

Instead, it is to be a witness between us and you, and between the generations after us, so that we may carry out the worship of the Lord in his presence with our burnt offerings, sacrifices, and fellowship offerings. Then in the future, your descendants will not be able to say to our descendants, ‘You have no share in the Lord!’

So the Reubenites and Gadites named the altar: It is a witness between us that the Lord is God.

So Joshua summoned all Israel, including its elders, leaders, judges, and officers, and said to them, “I am old, advanced in age,