What Does Joshua 18:14 Mean?
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.
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 the border was drawn thence, and compassed the corner of the sea southward, from the hill that lieth before Beth-horon southward; and the goings out thereof were at Kirjath-baal, which is Kirjath-jearim, a city of the children of Judah: this was the west quarter.THE KEY
The endpoint holds two place-natures, קִרְיַת בַּעַל (Qiryat-Baʿal, “city of Baal”) and קִרְיַת יְעָרִים (Qiryat-Yeʿarim, “city of forests”), so geography itself carries layered identity.
THE MEANING
The western edge becomes legible through the terrain it follows and the town where it ends. That endpoint is identified both by its two names and as a city of Judah.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
The idea that a boundary is only an abstract line, detached from nearby land and communities, gives way to an edge traced through a hill, a sea-facing turn, and a named town.
THE ROOT
תֹּצְאֹתָיו
totsa'otav
GROWS FROM
יצא
y-ts-ʾ
go out, emerge, depart
The word names the border’s “goings out,” preserving the motion of יצא (yatsaʾ, “go out”) inside what can sound like a fixed endpoint. Related forms name an outlet or what comes out as a result, so the western edge reads as a course reaching a point of emergence.
ALSO GROWS
motsaʾ: outlet, exit, point of emergence
מוֹצָא
This related noun names a place of going out, echoing the point where the border’s course emerges.
hotsiʾ: bring out, lead out
הוֹצִיא
This causative form makes the movement active, revealing the outward motion still present in the border’s “goings out.”
THE PATTERN
A place becomes legible through the boundaries and landmarks that locate it.
And the border was stretched from the head of the mountain to the spring of the waters of Nephtoah, and went out to the cities of mount Ephron; and the border was stretched to Baalah, which is Kirjathjearim.As for the western border, the great sea shall be your border. This shall be your western border.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 was stretched from the head of the mountain to the spring of the waters of Nephtoah, and went out to the cities of mount Ephron; and the border was stretched to Baalah, which is Kirjathjearim.Joshua 15:9 also uses יצא (yatsaʾ, “go out”) as the border goes out toward the cities before reaching Kirjath-jearim. The shared root and shared endpoint make the adjoining edges read as courses moving through named places.
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