Joshua
14
- Now these are the areas the Israelites received
as an inheritance in the land of Canaan, which Eleazar the priest, Joshua
son of Nun and the heads of the tribal clans of Israel allotted to them.
- Their inheritances were assigned by lot
to the nine-and-a-half tribes, as the LORD had commanded through Moses.
- Moses had granted the two-and-a-half tribes
their inheritance east of the Jordan but had not granted the Levites an inheritance
among the rest,
- for the sons of Joseph had become two tribes
-- Manasseh and Ephraim. The Levites received no share of the land but only
towns to live in, with pasturelands for their flocks and herds.
- So the Israelites divided the land, just
as the LORD had commanded Moses.
- Now the men of Judah approached Joshua at
Gilgal, and Caleb son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite said to him, "You know
what the LORD said to Moses the man of God at Kadesh Barnea about you and
me.
- I was forty years old when Moses the servant
of the LORD sent me from Kadesh Barnea to explore the land. And I brought
him back a report according to my convictions,
- but my brothers who went up with me made
the hearts of the people melt with fear. I, however, followed the LORD my
God wholeheartedly.
- So on that day Moses swore to me, 'The land
on which your feet have walked will be your inheritance and that of your children
forever, because you have followed the LORD my God wholeheartedly.'
- "Now then, just as the LORD promised,
he has kept me alive for forty-five years since the time he said this to Moses,
while Israel moved about in the desert. So here I am today, eighty-five years
old !
- I am still as strong today as the day Moses
sent me out; I'm just as vigorous to go out to battle now as I was then.
- Now give me this hill country that the LORD
promised me that day. You yourself heard then that the Anakites were there
and their cities were large and fortified, but, the LORD helping me, I will
drive them out just as he said."
- Then Joshua blessed Caleb son of Jephunneh
and gave him Hebron as his inheritance.
- So Hebron has belonged to Caleb son of Jephunneh
the Kenizzite ever since, because he followed the LORD, the God of Israel,
wholeheartedly.
- (Hebron used to be called Kiriath Arba after
Arba, who was the greatest man among the Anakites.) Then the land had rest
from war.
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