And as for the western border, ye shall even have the great sea for a border: this shall be your west border.
| Word | Hebrew | Strong’s | Meaning |
|---|---|---|---|
| western | יָ֔ם Yam | H3220 | a sea (as breaking in noisy surf) or large body of water · noun, common masculine singular absolute |
| border | וּגְב֣וּל u.ge.Vul | H1366 | properly · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular construct |
| great | הַגָּד֖וֹל ha.ga.Dol | H1419 | great (in any sense) · definite article + adjective, masculine singular absolute |
| sea | הַיָּ֥ם hai.Yam | H3220 | a sea (as breaking in noisy surf) or large body of water · definite article + noun, common masculine singular absolute |
| border | וּגְב֑וּל u.ge.Vul | H1366 | properly · conjunction + noun, common masculine singular absolute |
| west | יָֽם Yam | H3220 | a sea (as breaking in noisy surf) or large body of water · noun, common masculine singular absolute |
| border | גְּב֥וּל ge.Vul | H1366 | properly · noun, common masculine singular construct |
Strong's Exhaustive Concordance (James Strong, 1890/1894), public domain; digitized by Open Scriptures (CC BY-SA). KJV word tagging: eBible.org (public domain). Original-language text, parsing and brief lexicon: STEPBible.org data from Tyndale House, Cambridge (CC BY 4.0).
Cross-references from OpenBible.info (CC BY), in the lineage of the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge (public domain).
the western border--There is no uncertainty about this boundary, as it is universally allowed to be the Mediterranean, which is called "the great sea" in comparison with the small inland seas or lakes known to the Hebrews.
And as for the western border,.... Of the land of Canaan: you shall even have the great sea for a border; and no other, meaning the Mediterranean sea, which lies west of the land of Judea; Aben Ezra calls it the Spanish sea: it has the name of "great", in comparison of some in the land of Canaan, as the salt sea, and the sea of Tiberias: this shall be your west border; namely, the Mediterranean sea.
And the Lord spake unto Moses. God here undertakes the office of a prudent and careful father of a family, in fixing the boundaries of the land on every side, lest their right to posses it should ever be called in question. He begins on the southern side, where it must be observed that the district of Bashan is included in it, and all that the Israelites had acquired before their passage of the Jordan, so that this addition was approved of by God. He extends this part as far as the wilderness of Sin, and the borders of Edom, and brings it round from Kadesh-barnea to Addar, and the passage of Azmon, and, finally, to the stream which washes [228] the city of Rhinocorura, in the immediate vicin…
Read the whole note in the consoleThe western boundary was to be "the great sea and its territory," i.e., the Mediterranean Sea with its territory or coast (cf. Deu 3:16-17; Jos 13:23, Jos 13:27; Jos 15:47).
The natural western boundary of Canaan was the Mediterranean coast (34:6). The northern boundary began at the Mediterranean and ran eastward to Mount Hor somewhere in the Lebanon range (not the place of Aaron’s death, 20:22-29). • Lebo-hamath: Cp. 13:21; 1 Kgs 8:65; Amos 6:14.
Dictionary: Easton's (1897) and Smith's (1863), public domain. Topics: Nave's Topical Bible (1896) and Torrey's Topical Textbook (1897), public domain. Both as parsed by NEUU (CC BY 4.0).
ים וגבול These words (apparently unconnected with what follows) mean: AND THE WESTERN BOUNDARY, what forms that? והיה לכם הים הגדול THE GREAT SEA SHALL BE UNTO YOU for the boundary. וגבול AND THE BOUNDARY — the נסין which are in the sea also belong to the boundary; they are what are called isles in O. F. (Gittin 8a).
Henry, Jamieson-Fausset-Brown, Clarke, Gill, Calvin and Keil & Delitzsch are in the public domain; Tyndale Open Study Notes © Tyndale House Publishers, CC BY-SA 4.0 — all from the Free Use Bible API (bible.helloao.org). Rashi: the Rosenbaum & Silbermann Pentateuch (public domain) and the Judaica Press and Metsudah Tanakh (CC BY), via Sefaria. Spurgeon's Treasury of David: public domain (lyteword's markdown edition, CC0).
