Bible Commentaries
Joshua 16

Verses 1-10

Joshua 16 f. This section deals with the inheritance of the Joseph tribes, Ephraim and Manasseh. It is composite, but the different parts are easily separated. The old narrative speaks of the tribe of Joseph, the new, i.e. P, of Ephraim and Manasseh. The section begins with three verses ( Joshua 16:1-3) from the older source which give the dividing line of the lot of Joseph, i.e. the boundary between the N. and S.; the line goes from Jordan near Jericho, leaving Jericho on the S., and is drawn by Bethel, Bethhoron, and Gezer. One would naturally expect that this line would be the same as the southern border of Ephraim which P gives in the following verses ( Joshua 16:4-9). But for some reason, which we can only conjecture, the borders of Ephraim are confused and unintelligible. It has been suggested that as P was written after the Exile by a scribe in Judah, his knowledge of the northern part of Palestine would be very imperfect, hence the unsatisfactory nature of the account. Joshua 16:10, which states that the inhabitants of Gezer maintained their ground, is another fragment of the same kind, as Joshua 15:63, and like it, has a duplicate in Judges 1, viz. in 29.