Judges 1:34-35

The fortunes of Dan

34 .Dan, we may infer, attempted to settle in the N.W. corner of Judah, on the rich land (-the valley") between the hills and the coast. But the native population forced them back into the hills; in chs. 13, 16, 18 we find Danite settlements at Zorah and Eshtaol in the Valley of Sorek (Wadi eṣ-Ṣarâr), in Judges 1:34 the places which Dan tried to occupy are in the next valley to the N., that of Ayyâlôn (W. Selmân Merj ibn -Umar); these quarters, however, proved too strait for them, and, probably not long after the present period, a part of the tribe was driven to seek a home in the north (18), where they are settled in the time of Deborah (Judges 5:17). It is possible that the migration was due to pressure from the Philistines.

the Amorites Elsewhere in this chap., as always in J, the pre-Israelite inhabitants are called Canaanites, while Amoritesis the name used by E and D; the text of Judges 1:34 no doubt originally had -Canaanites." There is no sufficient reason to suppose that these verses come from a different document (cf. 34 with 19 -hill country … valley," 35 with 27b, 23, 30, 33).

forced The same Hebr. word as in Judges 4:3; Judges 10:12 -oppress"; Amos 6:14 -afflict."

After this verse it is probable that Joshua 19:47 (corrected), a verse which is clearly an insertion in its present context, followed in the original narrative of J: -and the border of their inheritance was too strait for them (cf. 2 Kings 6:1 in Hebr.), and the children of Dan went up and fought with Lesham (Laish, Judges 18:29) and took it, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and possessed it and dwelt in it; and they called Lesham, Dan, after the name of Dan their father." Perhaps this verse was struck out here, because the episode is narrated at length in the Appendix, ch. 18. At the beginning of Joshua 19:47 the LXX seem to have translated a text which commenced with -And the sons of Dan did not dispossess the Amorites …" If this sentence stood originally in the present document, it would conform Judges 1:34, which begins abruptly, with Judges 1:21; Judges 1:29ff.