What Does Joshua 15:21 Mean in the King James?
And the uttermost cities of the tribe of the children of Judah toward the coast of Edom southward were Kabzeel, and Eder, and Jagur,
The analysis reads the King James wording.
King James Version The King James Version, first published in 1611. Selah Verse shows the standard text.
THE KEY
Judah’s southern edge is not blank distance: it is marked by named places.
THE MEANING
This verse makes belonging concrete: Judah’s southern edge lies toward Edom, and its farthest towns have names. The boundary is not blank distance; it is a landscape of particular places and neighbors.
THE ROOT
הַקְּצֹת
haqqetsot
GROWS FROM
קצה
q-ts-h
To reach an end or mark an edge.
“Uttermost” can sound like a vague faraway limit; the Hebrew names the extremities of a territory. This root also carries the sense of ending or cutting off, so the verse locates Judah’s inheritance where its span ends, among specific towns rather than empty distance.
ALSO GROWS
qātseh: The edge or end of something.
קָצֶה
This singular form makes clear that “uttermost” is the territory’s actual edge.
qātsāh: To bring something to an end or cut it off.
קָצָה
This verb shows the boundary as the point where a span ends, not merely a distant place.
קַבְצְאֵל
Qabtsēʾēl
GROWS FROM
קבץ
q-b-ts
To gather, collect, or bring together.
Kabzeel’s name joins the gathering-root to “God” and is commonly understood as “God gathers.” A town at Judah’s far edge bears a name of gathering, so the boundary is made of inhabited places with names that carry their own meaning.
ALSO GROWS
qāvaṣ: To gather or assemble.
קָבַץ
This verb supplies the gathering action carried in Kabzeel’s name.
qibbūṣ: A gathering or collection.
קִבּוּץ
This noun shows the same root describing what has been brought together.
THE PATTERN
Inheritance becomes concrete where its edges and places are named.
Then your south quarter shall be from the wilderness of Zin along by the coast of Edom, and your south border shall be the outmost coast of the salt sea eastward:The lines are fallen unto me in pleasant places; yea, I have a goodly heritage.And hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation;THE THREAD
And as for the people, he removed them to cities from one end of the borders of Egypt even to the other end thereof.Joshua’s “uttermost” and Genesis’s “end” share קצה (q-ts-h, “edge, end”): here it marks Judah’s southern towns, while there it measures the land from one end to the other. The shared root makes the boundary a real extent that can be inhabited and traversed.
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