Ulangan 2:4

2:4 Instruct ¹  these people as follows: ‘You are about to cross the border of your relatives ²  the descendants of Esau, ³  who inhabit Seir. They will be afraid of you, so watch yourselves carefully.

Ulangan 2:8

2:8 So we turned away from our relatives ⁴  the descendants of Esau, the inhabitants of Seir, turning from the desert route, ⁵  from Elat ⁶  and Ezion Geber, ⁷  and traveling the way of the Moab wastelands.

Ulangan 2:13-14

2:13 Now, get up and cross the Wadi Zered.” ⁸  So we did so. ⁹  2:14 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.

Ulangan 2:18

2:18 “Today you are going to cross the border of Moab, that is, of Ar. ¹⁰ 

Ulangan 2:24

2:24 Get up, make your way across Wadi Arnon. Look! I have already delivered over to you Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, ¹¹  and his land. Go ahead! Take it! Engage him in war!

Ulangan 2:27-30

2:27 “Let me pass through your land; I will keep strictly to the roadway. ¹²  I will not turn aside to the right or the left. 2:28 Sell me food for cash ¹³  so that I can eat and sell me water to drink. ¹⁴  Just allow me to go through on foot, 2:29 just as the descendants of Esau who live at Seir and the Moabites who live in Ar did for me, until I cross the Jordan to the land the Lord our God is giving us.” 2:30 But King Sihon of Heshbon was unwilling to allow us to pass near him because the Lord our ¹⁵  God had made him obstinate ¹⁶  and stubborn ¹⁷  so that he might deliver him over to you ¹⁸  this very day.

[2:4]  ¹ tn Heb “command” (so KJV, NASB); NRSV “charge the people as follows.”

[2:4]  ² tn Heb “brothers”; NAB “your kinsmen.”

[2:4]  ³ sn The descendants of Esau (Heb “sons of Esau”; the phrase also occurs in 2:8, 12, 22, 29). These are the inhabitants of the land otherwise known as Edom, south and east of the Dead Sea. Jacob’s brother Esau had settled there after his bitter strife with Jacob (Gen 36:1-8). “Edom” means “reddish,” probably because of the red sandstone of the region, but also by popular etymology because Esau, at birth, was reddish (Gen 25:25).

[2:8]  ⁴ tn Or “brothers”; NRSV “our kin.”

[2:8]  ⁵ tn Heb “the way of the Arabah” (so ASV); NASB, NIV “the Arabah road.”

[2:8]  ⁶ sn Elat was a port city at the head of the eastern arm of the Red Sea, that is, the Gulf of Aqaba (or Gulf of Eilat). Solomon (1 Kgs 9:28), Uzziah (2 Kgs 14:22), and Ahaz (2 Kgs 16:5-6) used it as a port but eventually it became permanently part of Edom. It may be what is known today as Tell el-Kheleifeh. Modern Eilat is located further west along the northern coast. See G. Pratico, “Nelson Glueck’s 1938-1940 Excavations at Tell el-Kheleifeh: A Reappraisal,” BASOR 259 (1985): 1-32.

[2:8]  ⁷ sn Ezion Geber. A place near the Gulf of Aqaba, Ezion-geber must be distinguished from Elat (cf. 1 Kgs 9:26-28; 2 Chr 8:17-18). It was, however, also a port city (1 Kgs 22:48-49). It may be the same as the modern site Gezirat al-Fauran, 15 mi (24 km) south-southwest from Tell el-Kheleifah.

[2:13]  ⁸ sn Wadi Zered. Now known as Wadi el-H£esa, this valley marked the boundary between Moab to the north and Edom to the south.

[2:13]  ⁹ tn Heb “we crossed the Wadi Zered.” This has been translated as “we did so” for stylistic reasons, to avoid redundancy.

[2:18]  ¹⁰ sn Ar. See note on this word in Deut 2:9.

[2:24]  ¹¹ sn Heshbon is the name of a prominent site (now Tell Hesba„n, about 7.5 mi [12 km] south southwest of Amman, Jordan). Sihon made it his capital after having driven Moab from the area and forced them south to the Arnon (Num 21:26-30). Heshbon is also mentioned in Deut 1:4.

[2:27]  ¹² tn Heb “in the way in the way” (בַּדֶּרֶךְ בַּדֶּרֶךְ, baderekh baderekh). The repetition lays great stress on the idea of resolute determination to stick to the path. IBHS 116 §7.2.3c.

[2:28]  ¹³ tn Heb “silver.”

[2:28]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “and water for silver give to me so that I may drink.”

[2:30]  ¹⁵ tc The translation follows the LXX in reading the first person pronoun. The MT, followed by many English versions, has a second person masculine singular pronoun, “your.”

[2:30]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “hardened his spirit” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV); NIV “made his spirit stubborn.”

[2:30]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “made his heart obstinate” (so KJV, NASB); NRSV “made his heart defiant.”

[2:30]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “into your hand.”