Deuteronomy 1:1

all lsrael A designation of the people characteristic of D and deuteronomic writers. See on Deuteronomy 4:44.

beyond Jordan As is clear from Deuteronomy 1:5 and elsewhere, the E. of Jordan is intended. The title was therefore written in W. Palestine. A.V. on this side Jordan, is an impossible rendering of the Hebrew.

in the wilderness Heb. midbar, properly pasture ground as distinct from arable; Jeremiah 2:1, land not sown. The word, hardly applicable to the scene of Moses's discourse in Moab, is the usual term both for the wilderness E. of Moab and Edom (Deuteronomy 2:8; Deuteronomy 2:26), and for the region of Israel's earlier wanderings before they crossed Edom (Deuteronomy 1:19; Deuteronomy 1:40; Deuteronomy 2:1; Deuteronomy 2:7). In the latter lay some, if not all, of the following localities.

in the Arabah Heb. -Arabah, dryor waste: (a) a synonym for midbar, both with the def. art. (Isaiah 40:3), as here, and without (Isaiah 35:1; Jeremiah 2:6 etc.). But with the art. it is usually the name of (b) the great depression extending from the Gulf of -Aḳabah northwards to the Lebanons, of which the Dead Sea, the Sea of the -Arabah(Deuteronomy 4:49), is the deepest portion; and again is more particularly applied both to (c) the stretch of the depression N. of that Sea, the Jordan valley (Deuteronomy 3:17; 2 Kings 25:4), cp. the Plur. - Arboth Moab, P's designation of Israel's last station before crossing Jordan, Deuteronomy 34:1 (cp. Arbatta, 1Ma 5:23); and (d) the stretch of the depression S. of the Dead Sea. Each of these four meanings is possible here. Those who take the names in 1 bas of places in the scene of Moses" discourse in the land of Moab point to (c) the application of the name -Arabah to the Jordan valley. As we shall see, however, those names indicate rather the region of Israel's earlier wanderings, before they crossed the S. of Edom, and this makes it more probable that -Arabah here = the S. stretch of the depression; so the Sam. Biḳ-a, trenchor valley. But (a) the general signification, synonymous with midbar, is not improbable here, and even more suitable to the localities in 1 bthan the other meanings are. To-day the name el -Arabahis confined to the stretch of the depression S. of a line of cliffs a few miles below the Dead Sea; while all to the N. is known as el-Ghôr.

Suph LXX -the Red Sea," but this in Heb. is always sea of Suph. Suph may have been a locality from which the Sea derived its name, the usual etymology which would render it sea of sedgebeing, though plausible, uncertain (see Enc. Bibl.-Red Sea"). Suph cannot be Suphah of Numbers 21:14 if as is probable this lay in S. Moab; while another modern place-name that has been proposed as identical, Naḳb eṣ-Ṣafa (on which see Musil Edomii. 29), S.W. of the Dead Sea, corresponds with Suph neither phonetically nor from its situation.

between Paran … and Di-zahab All these places are uncertain. -Parancannot be the extensive desert of that name corresponding to the modern et-Tîh, but only the place after which this desert was named, cp. 1 Kings 11:18 " (Dillm.). For Tophel, LXX Τοφὸλ, no modern place-name has been found: eṭ-Ṭafîleh on cultivated soil in the N. of Mt Se-îr corresponds to it in neither spelling nor situation. Though Laban(milkwhite) and Ḥaṣerôth(folds) are names of such general signification that each may have been attached to more than one site, it is natural to identify them with the Libnah and Ḥ a ṣerôth of Numbers 33:20; Numbers 33:17, stations on Israel's march between Ḥoreb and Ḳadesh. On the W. el Ḥadharah and the -Ain el Ḥadharah, see Burckhardt, Travels, 494 f.; Wilson, Lands of the Bible, i. 255 260; Robinson B. R.i. 223 f. Di-zahabhas been taken to be the modern Minet edh-Dhahab on the Gulf of -Aḳabah, but this is not on the line of Israel's march; the meaning, (place) of gold, LXX καταχρύσεα, is general enough for the name to have been applied to several places. Thus all that is certain in these names is that some, if not all, lay on the march towards Ḳadesh, and this is confirmed by the next verse. It is not possible to bring them, or that verse, into harmony with the repeated datum that the scene of Moses'discourse was in Moab, at the N.E. end of the Dead Sea.