John Gill Commentary Joshua 15

This then was the lot of the tribe of the children of Judah by their families The land of Canaan was divided by lot to the several tribes, and the tribe of Judah had its lot first; of the manner of casting lots, (See Gill on Numbers 26:55); It seems as if the lot was first cast for the tribes of Judah and Joseph, when the former had the southern, and the latter the northern part of the land for their portion, which was done in Gilgal; after this lots were cast in Shiloh for the other seven tribes, who had the land divided among them, which lay between Judah and Joseph, or between the southern and northern parts of the land, see (Joshua 18:1) and it seems that not only the land was divided to the tribes by lot, but that the portion of land which belonged to each tribe was divided in the same way to the several families and households belonging thereunto; as is here suggested, with respect to the tribe of Judah, whose lot reached

[even] to the border of Edom ; or Idumea, which lay to the south of the land of Canaan:

the wilderness of Zin southward [was] the uttermost part of the south coast ; the same with Kadesh, and lay upon the borders of Edom; see (Numbers 33:36) (34:3) .

And their south border was from the shore of the salt sea
Sometimes called the dead sea, the sea of Sodom, and the lake Asphaltites, which, as Jarchi observes, was southeast of the land of Israel:

from the bay that looketh southward ;
or the "tongue", as the Hebrew, which the Targum and Kimchi interpret of a rock or promontory, the point that ran out into the sea, looking to the southeast.

And it went out to the south side of Maalehacrabbim
Or the ascent of Akrabbim, as it is called, (See Gill on Numbers 34:4):

and passed along to Zin, and ascended upon the south side unto
Kadeshbarnea ;
which perfectly agrees with the southern border of the land, as described in (Numbers 34:4) ;

and passed along to Hezron, and went up to Adar ;
which two places being near to one another, as is very likely, are put together, as if one place, and called Hazaraddar, (Numbers 34:4) ; and mention is made of Hezron, which is Hazor, (Joshua 15:25) ; but not of Adar:

and fetched a compass to Karkaa ;
which Jerom ^F23 calls Acchara, a village in the wilderness; and if the same with Carcaria, it was according to him a day's journey from Petra in Idumea; but that is not likely; see (Judges 8:10) .

FOOTNOTES:

• F23: De loc. Heb. fol. 88. E. 90. C.

[From thence] it passed towards Azmon, and went out unto the
river of Egypt
In like manner is this coast described, (Numbers 34:5) ; it is called by Jerom ^F24 Asemona, and said to be a city in the desert, to the south of Judah, dividing Egypt, and the lot of the tribe of Judah, leading to the sea:

and the outgoings of that coast were at the sea ;
the Mediterranean sea; or to the west, as the Targum; this was the utmost border of the tribe of Judah this way:

this shall be your south coast ;
of the lot that fell to the tribe of Judah.

FOOTNOTES:

• F24: De loc. Heb. fol. 87. K.

And the east border [was] the salt sea, [even] unto the end of
Jordan
To the place where Jordan fell into it; so that this border was the whole length of the salt sea, which Josephus says ^F25 was five hundred eighty furlongs; and, according to Pliny ^F26 , an hundred miles:

and [their] border in the north quarter [was] from the bay of the sea ,
at the uttermost part of Jordan ;
this northern border began where the eastern ended, at the bay or creek of the sea, where Jordan fell into it.

FOOTNOTES:

• F25: De Bello Jud. l. 4. c. 8. sect. 4.
• F26: Nat. Hist. l. 5. c. 16.