King James Version · Egypt and Sinai
Deuteronomy 3
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Then we turned, and went up to : and the king of came out against us, he and all his people, to battle at . And said unto me, Fear him not: for I will him, and all his people, and his land, into thy hand; and thou shalt do unto him as thou didst unto king of the , which dwelt at . So our into our hands also, the king of , and all his people: and we smote him until none was left to him remaining. And we took all his cities at that time, there was not a city which we took not from them, threescore cities, all the region of , of in . All these cities were fenced with high walls, , and bars; beside unwalled towns a great many. And we them, as we did unto king of , utterly destroying the men, women, and children, of every city. But all the cattle, and the spoil of the cities, we took for a prey to ourselves. And we took at that time out of the hand of the two kings of the the land that was on this side Jordan, from the river of unto ; (Which Hermon the call Sirion; and the call it Shenir;) All the cities of the plain, and all , and all , unto Salchah and , cities of of in . For only king of remained of of giants; behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron; is it not in Rabbath of ? nine was the length thereof, and four the breadth of it, after the of a man. And this land, which we at that time, from , which is by the river , and half mount , and the cities thereof, gave I unto the and to the . And the rest of , and all , being of , gave I unto the half tribe of ; all the region of , with all , which was called the land of giants. the son of took all the country of unto the coasts of Geshuri and Maachathi; and called them after his own name, –havoth–jair, unto this day. And I gave unto . And unto the and unto the I gave from even unto the river half the valley, and the border even unto the river , which is the border of ; The plain also, and Jordan, and the coast thereof, from even unto the sea of the plain, even the salt sea, under Ashdoth–pisgah eastward. And I commanded you at that time, saying, your hath given you this land to possess it: ye shall pass over armed before your brethren the , all that are meet for the war. 19But your wives, and your little ones, and your cattle, (for I know that ye have much cattle,) shall in your cities which I have given you; Until have given rest unto your brethren, as well as unto you, and until they also possess the land which your hath given them beyond Jordan: and then shall ye return every man unto his possession, which I have given you. And I commanded at that time, saying, Thine eyes have seen all that your hath done unto these two kings: so shall do unto all the kingdoms whither thou passest. Ye shall not fear them: for your he shall fight for you. And I besought at that time, saying, O , thou hast begun to shew thy servant thy greatness, and thy mighty hand: for what is there in or in earth, that can do according to thy works, and according to thy might? I thee, let me go over, and see the good land that is beyond Jordan, that goodly mountain, and . But was wroth with me for your sakes, and would not hear me: and said unto me, Let it suffice thee; speak no more unto me of this matter. Get thee up into the top of , and lift up thine eyes westward, and northward, and southward, and eastward, and behold it with thine eyes: for thou shalt not go over this Jordan. But charge , and encourage him, and strengthen him: for he shall go over before this people, and he shall cause them to the land which thou shalt see. So we abode in the valley over against Beth–peor.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Egypt and Sinai, 1450 BC to 1200 BC ›
Israel in and then out of Egypt, at a period when Egypt was an imperial power that also controlled Canaan. The nation is formed as a people with a law before it has any land.
- Egypt
- The New Kingdom at its imperial peak, with a professional army, a chariot corps, and control reaching up through Canaan. Ramesses II reigns for sixty-six years and covers the country in monuments to himself. Egyptian power in this period is the reason Canaan is garrisoned rather than free.
- The Hittites
- The other superpower, in what is now Turkey, and Egypt's rival for the Levant. The two fight the largest chariot battle of the ancient world at Kadesh, then sign a treaty whose text survives from both sides. Hittite treaty form, with its historical prologue, stipulations, witnesses, blessings, and curses, is the shape the Sinai covenant takes, which is one of the stronger arguments for the antiquity of that material.
- The Aegean
- Mycenaean Greece: warrior kings in stone citadels at Mycenae and Pylos, keeping palace accounts in Linear B. The world of the Trojan War stories, whatever lies behind them.
- Further afield
- The Shang dynasty in China is casting extraordinary bronzes and writing questions to its ancestors on ox bones. In Mesoamerica the Olmec are beginning the first civilisation of the Americas.