What Does Joshua 15:3 Mean?
And it went out to the south side to Maaleh-acrabbim, and passed along to Zin, and climbed on the south side to Kadesh-barnea, and passed along to Hezron, and climbed to Adar, and circled round to Karkaa.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And it went out to the south side to Maaleh-acrabbim, and passed along to Zin, and ascended up on the south side unto Kadesh-barnea, and passed along to Hezron, and went up to Adar, and fetched a compass to Karkaa:THE KEY
“Fetched a compass” carries the older sense “went around”: the border is revealed as a turning route.
THE MEANING
You can follow the southern edge as a sequence of motion: it goes out, passes, ascends, and turns toward Karkaa. Its first named landmark, מַעֲלֵה עַקְרַבִּים (Maʿaleh-ʿAqrabbim, “ascent of scorpions”), carries the same language of rising that the boundary itself performs.
THE ROOT
וְנָסַב
ve-nasav
GROWS FROM
סבב
s-b-b
to turn, go around, encircle
“circled round” in this verse is ve-nasav. The KJV’s “fetched a compass” carries the older sense “went around”; Hebrew וְנָסַב (ve-nasav, “and it turned/went around”) names a turning motion in the boundary itself. סָבִיב (saviv, “around/all around”) and סְבִיבָה (sevivah, “surroundings/circuit”) preserve the same root’s movement and the space it encloses.
ALSO GROWS
saviv: around; all around
סָבִיב
This form makes the surrounding course of the border audible in the root’s wider word family.
sevivah: surroundings; circuit
סְבִיבָה
The same turning root can name the area encircled by the boundary.
וְעָלָה
veʿalah
GROWS FROM
עלה
ʿ-l-h
to rise, go up, ascend
“climbed” in this verse is veʿalah. The boundary rises at two points, and its first landmark, מַעֲלֵה עַקְרַבִּים (Maʿaleh-ʿAqrabbim, “ascent of scorpions”), begins with the same root as “ascended.” The place-name carries the route’s vertical movement in its own name.
ALSO GROWS
maʿaleh: ascent; going up
מַעֲלֵה
This is the first element in Maaleh-acrabbim, linking the landmark’s name with the boundary’s ascent.
ʿolah: that which rises; burnt offering
עֹלָה
The offering’s name preserves the root’s sense of something rising.
וְיָצָא
ve-yatsa
GROWS FROM
יצא
y-ts-ʾ
to go out, emerge
וְיָצָא (ve-yatsa, “and it went out”) gives the line an outward movement, while מוֹצָא (motsa, “outlet/going out”) can name where something emerges. Read beside the turns and ascents, the border is traced through its departures as well as its landmarks.
ALSO GROWS
motsa: outlet; going out
מוֹצָא
The border is located by where its course goes out as well as by the places it passes.
yotse: one going out; emerging
יוֹצֵא
This form keeps the root’s movement in view as the boundary leaves one point for the next.
THE PATTERN
Scripture makes a place legible through the course of its boundary and the bounds that mark its portion.
And your border shall turn about from the south to the ascent of Akrabbim, and cross over to Zin. And its goings out shall be from the south to Kadeshbarnea, and shall go out to Hazaraddar, and cross over to Azmon.The cords fall to me in sweet places; indeed, my inheritance is beautiful.And he made from one blood every nation of humankind to settle upon all the face of the earth, marking out their fitted seasons and setting the boundary stones of their dwelling.THE THREAD
And the border turned from there, and went around the edge of the sea southward, from the hill that lies before Bethhoron southward. And its goings out were at Kirjathbaal, which is Kirjathjearim, a city of the children of Judah. This quarter was the west side.Joshua 18:14 uses the same turning root in “compassed,” tracing a border around a landmark. It then names the border’s “goings out,” letting the current verse’s turns and departures read as parts of one continuous course.
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