Deuteronomy 2:11-15
New English Translation
11 These people, as well as the Anakites, are also considered Rephaites;[a] the Moabites call them Emites. 12 Previously the Horites[b] lived in Seir, but the descendants of Esau dispossessed and destroyed them and settled in their place, just as Israel did to the land it came to possess, the land the Lord gave them.)[c] 13 Now, get up and cross the Wadi Zered.”[d] So we did so.[e] 14 Now the length of time it took for us to go from Kadesh Barnea to the crossing of Wadi Zered was thirty-eight years, time for all the military men of that generation to die, just as the Lord had vowed to them. 15 Indeed, it was the very hand of the Lord that eliminated them from within[f] the camp until they were all gone.
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- Deuteronomy 2:11 sn Rephaites. The earliest reference to this infamous giant race is, again, in the story of the invasion of the eastern kings (Gen 14:5). They lived around Ashteroth Karnaim, probably modern Tel Ashtarah (cf. Deut 1:4), in the Bashan plateau east of the Sea of Galilee. Og, king of Bashan, was a Rephaite (Deut 3:11; Josh 12:4; 13:12). Other texts speak of them or their kinfolk in both Transjordan (Deut 2:20; 3:13) and Canaan (Josh 11:21-22; 14:12, 15; 15:13-14; Judg 1:20; 1 Sam 17:4; 1 Chr 20:4-8). They also appear in extra-biblical literature, especially in connection with the city state of Ugarit. See C. L’Heureux, “Ugaritic and Biblical Rephaim,” HTR 67 (1974): 265-74.
- Deuteronomy 2:12 sn Horites. Most likely these are the same as the well-known people of ancient Near Eastern texts described as Hurrians. They were geographically widespread and probably non-Semitic. Genesis speaks of them as the indigenous peoples of Edom that Esau expelled (Gen 36:8-19, 31-43) and also as among those who confronted the kings of the east (Gen 14:6).
- Deuteronomy 2:12 tn Most modern English versions, beginning with the ASV (1901), regard vv. 10-12 as parenthetical to the narrative.
- Deuteronomy 2:13 sn Wadi Zered. Now known as Wadi el-Ḥesa, this valley marked the boundary between Moab to the north and Edom to the south.
- Deuteronomy 2:13 tn Heb “we crossed the Wadi Zered.” This has been translated as “we did so” for stylistic reasons, to avoid redundancy.
- Deuteronomy 2:15 tn Heb “from the middle of.” Although many recent English versions leave this expression untranslated, the point seems to be that these soldiers did not die in battle but “within the camp.”
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