Numbers 34:3

WEB

then your south quarter shall be from the wilderness of Zin along by the side of Edom, and your south border shall be from the end of the Salt Sea eastward;

KJV

Then your south quarter shall be from the wilderness of Zin along by the coast of Edom, and your south border shall be the outmost coast of the salt sea eastward:

Commentary

Then your south quarter,.... Or border of the land; which, as Jarchi observes, was from east to west: shall be from the wilderness of Zin; which is Kadesh, where Miriam died, Num 20:1 , and if this Kadesh was Kadeshbarnea, as Dr. Lightfoot seems to have proved (h), from whence the spies were sent, that was clearly on the s outh of the land of Canaan, for they were bid to go up their way southward, Num 13:17 , and so Kadeshbarnea is hereafter mentioned, as being in the southern border: the Targum of Jonathan paraphrases it,"from the wilderness of the palm trees of the mountain of iron;''there is a smaller palm tree, which by Jewish writers is called Zin, of which there were great quantities on a mountain famous for iron mines, in this wilderness, from whence it is thought it had its name; hence we read (i) of palm trees of the mountain of iron, as fit to make the bunch of branches of trees, called the "lulab", carried in the hand on the feast of tabernacles: along by the coast of Edom; the land of Canaan, to the south, bordered on three countries, Egypt, Edom, and Moab; according to Jarchi, some part of Egypt, the whole land of Edom, and the whole land of Moab; the part of the land of Egypt was in the south west corner of it; the land of Edom by it to the east; and the land of Moab by the land of Edom, at the end of the south to the east: and your south border shall be the outmost coast of the salt sea eastward; the same that is sometimes called the Dead sea, the sea of Sodom, or the lake Asphaltites, as Heathen writers generally call it. (h) Works, vol. 2. p. 8, 9. (i) Misn. Succah. c. 3. sect. 1.