What Does Joshua 21:25 Mean?
And out of the half tribe of Manasseh, Taanach with her pastures, and Gathrimmon with her pastures; two cities.
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 out of the half tribe of Manasseh, Tanach with her suburbs, and Gath-rimmon with her suburbs; two cities.THE KEY
The surrounding open land is counted as part of the city’s inheritance, not as space outside the gift.
THE MEANING
The verse names Tanach and Gath-rimmon as two cities in the half-tribe of Manasseh’s allotment, each with surrounding open land. The assigned place includes ground around the inhabited center, not only the center itself.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
It undoes the idea that provision consists only of the inhabited center; the surrounding ground counts too.
THE ROOT
מִגְרָשׁ
migrash
GROWS FROM
גרש
To drive out, expel, or send away.
“pastures” in this verse is migrash. The KJV’s “suburbs” translates מִגְרָשׁ (migrash), the open land around a city. Its root גרש (garash), “drive out” or “expel,” echoes the land’s place beyond the inhabited center; the verse includes that outer space in what is allotted.
ALSO GROWS
garash: To drive out or expel.
גָּרַשׁ
This verb carries the root’s outward movement, echoed in the open land around the cities named here.
gerushah: A divorced woman; one sent away.
גְּרוּשָׁה
This branch also carries the sense of separation or being sent away, resonating with the open ground set beyond the city’s inhabited center.
THE PATTERN
An assigned dwelling includes measured space around its center, and that outer space has a practical purpose.
The cities shall be theirs to settle in, and the pasturelands shall be for their cattle, for their goods, and for all their beasts.Of this there shall be for the sanctuary five hundred in length, and five hundred in breadth, square all around. And fifty cubits all around for its pasturelands.THE THREAD
Command the children of Israel to give the Levites cities to settle in from the inheritance of their holding, and you shall also give the Levites pasturelands for the cities round about them.This verse uses the same Hebrew word for the open land around a city and states that it is given along with the cities. It makes Joshua’s brief phrase “with her suburbs” concrete: the allotment includes both the dwelling place and its surrounding land.
Read the SDV Bible.
Every verse has a Deep Dive in the app.
The iPhone Bible app with the Selah Decoded Version.
Does something in this reading look wrong? Tell us