Joshua 21:39

Hebrew (Westminster Leningrad Codex)

English Translation

Heshbon with its suburbs, Jazer with its suburbs; four cities in all.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Highlights

Septuagint runs longer here — compare

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יַעְזֵ֖ר

Yaʻăzêyr

H3270

“Jazer”

Noun, Proper

Appears 13× in the Hebrew Bible
First appears at Numbers 21:32

Full BDB Definition

Origin: from H5826

TWOT: None

Jazer or Jaazer = "helped" - a Levitical city east of the Jordan, in Gilead in the territory of Gad, formerly an Amorite city; site uncertain

About this verse

These counts appear in no published source. They are computed here, from the morphology-tagged text and Lemma’s own curated glosses. What Lemma adds →

11: words
7: distinct lemmas
Historical: section

Notable vocabulary

The rarest word here is יַעְזֵ֖ר Jazer H3270 — appearing just 13 times in the whole Hebrew Bible.

Shared distinctive vocabulary

יַעְזֵ֖ר Jazer H3270 occurs in 12 verses of the Hebrew Bible. Also found in:

Grammatical profile

6 nouns
1 adjective
4 particles

Repetition

A word recurs within this verse — often emphatic in Hebrew:

מִגְרָשֶׁ֔הָ common land H4054 ×2

Hebrew & Septuagint length

In English translation the verse runs 12 words from the Hebrew and 20 from the Septuagint (LXX English) — the Septuagint runs noticeably longer here. See the side-by-side →

A rough comparison of the two English renderings, which tokenize alike — not a word-level alignment.

Word counts can differ between the Hebrew and the Greek without any difference in meaning — e.g. the Hebrew direct-object marker אֵת has no separate Greek word, and Greek often adds the article ὁ.

In the original languages it is 11 Hebrew tokens and 18 Greek tokens — but the two are counted differently (Hebrew bundles its prefixes and suffixes into one token; the Greek is in lemma form), so that isn’t a like-for-like length.

Cross-references

Topical passages linked to Joshua 21:39 in the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge — connected by theme and wording, ordered by reader-vote popularity; previews shown in the World English Bible.

Numbers 21:26–30 For Heshbon was the city of Sihon the king of the Amorites, who had fought against the former king of Moab, and taken all his land out of his hand, even to the Arnon.
Numbers 32:1 Now the children of Reuben and the children of Gad had a very great multitude of cattle: and when they saw the land of Jazer, and the land of Gilead, that behold, the place was a place for cattle;
Numbers 32:3 Ataroth, and Dibon, and Jazer, and Nimrah, and Heshbon, and Elealeh, and Sebam, and Nebo, and Beon,
Numbers 32:35 and Atrothshophan, and Jazer, and Jogbehah,
Numbers 32:37 The children of Reuben built Heshbon, and Elealeh, and Kiriathaim,
Joshua 13:17 Heshbon, and all its cities that are in the plain; Dibon, and Bamoth Baal, and Beth Baal Meon,
Joshua 13:21 and all the cities of the plain, and all the kingdom of Sihon king of the Amorites, who reigned in Heshbon, whom Moses struck with the chiefs of Midian, Evi, and Rekem, and Zur, and Hur, and Reba, the princes of Sihon, who lived in the land.
1 Chronicles 6:81 and Heshbon with its suburbs, and Jazer with its suburbs.

Isaiah 16:8–9 For the fields of Heshbon languish, [and] the vine of Sibmah; the lords of the nations have broken down the choice branches of it, which reached even to Jazer, which wandered into the wilderness; its shoots were spread abroad, they passed over the sea.
Jeremiah 48:32 With more than the weeping of Jazer will I weep for you, vine of Sibmah: your branches passed over the sea, they reached even to the sea of Jazer: on your summer fruits and on your vintage the destroyer is fallen.

Cross-references courtesy of OpenBible.info (CC BY 4.0).

Hebrew and Greek witnesses Masoretic Hebrew ↔ Greek Septuagint

The same verse in the two great witnesses to the Old Testament, shown verse-for-verse.

Here the Septuagint runs noticeably longer than the Hebrew — LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) 20 words vs World English Bible 12. A rough length comparison of the two English translations, not a word-level alignment — read both below.

These are two independent witnesses, not word-aligned to each other, and the Septuagint is shown in lemma (dictionary) form.

Hebrew Joshua 21:39 Masoretic · Westminster Leningrad Codex

אֶת חֶשְׁבּוֹן֙ וְאֶת מִגְרָשֶׁ֔הָ אֶת יַעְזֵ֖ר וְאֶת מִגְרָשֶׁ֑הָ כָּל עָרִ֖ים אַרְבַּֽע

Heshbon with its suburbs, Jazer with its suburbs; four cities in all.

World English Bible · Public Domain

Greek LXX Joshua 21:39 Septuagint · lemma form

καί ὁ εσεβων καί ὁ περισπόριον αὐτός καί ὁ ιαζηρ καί ὁ περισπόριον αὐτός ὁ πᾶς πόλις τέσσαρες

All the cities of the Levites in the midst of the possession of the children of Israel, were forty-eight cities,

LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) · Public Domain

Hebrew: Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0). Greek: Septuagint (public domain); English from LXX2012 (modern English Septuagint) (Public Domain). How the Septuagint differs from the Hebrew →

Targum (Aramaic paraphrase)

The Targum is the ancient Jewish Aramaic paraphrase of the Hebrew Scriptures — an interpretive translation, not the Hebrew text itself. Onkelos (literal) and Pseudo-Jonathan (expansive) render the Torah, and Jonathan the Prophets. Coverage is partial: where no permissively-licensed English translation exists for a verse, only the Aramaic is shown. This is verse-level text, not a word-by-word alignment to the Hebrew.

Targum Jonathan Prophets (Joshua–Malachi)

יַת חֶשְׁבוֹן וְיַת רְוָחָהָא יַת יַעְזֵר וְיַת רְוָחָהָא כָּל קִרְוִין אַרְבַּע:

(no public-domain English translation for this verse)

Targum Jonathan — Aramaic: “Mikraot Gedolot” (public domain). English: “Sefaria Community Translation” (CC0 1.0 (public-domain dedication)); “London "Chaldee Paraphrase," 1871” (public domain). Text via Sefaria.

Commentary

Notes on Joshua 21:39 from classic Christian and Jewish commentators (each source and its license shown beneath its notes). The classic Christian expositions comment on the surrounding passage and are grouped to its opening verse, so a note may address several verses; the Jewish commentaries on the Tanakh (Rashi and others) are per-verse, so they appear only where the commentator wrote on this verse.

Lemma curates 59 commentaries, every one of them public domain or Creative Commons licensed, each selected and text-cleaned for this edition rather than reprinted as found. About our sources →

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne

39. Heshbon] ch. Jos_13:17; Jazer, see ch. Jos_13:25.

The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges (gen. ed. J. J. S. Perowne; Cambridge University Press, 1878–1918) — public domain. Text from a community e-Sword module.

John Gill's Exposition

Heshbon with her suburbs,.... Which was formerly the royal city of Sihon king of the Amorites, and was first given to and rebuilt by the Reubenites, but was upon the border of the tribe of Gad; and appears from hence to have been one of their cities, Num 21:26,

Jazer with her suburbs; sometimes called Jaazer, another city in the same country, and near Heshbon; see Num 21:32,

four cities in all: which were Ramothgilead, Mahanaim, Heshbon, and Jazer.

John Gill's Exposition of the Whole Bible (1746–1763) — public domain (CC PDM 1.0). Text via the HelloAO Bible API.

unfoldingWord translationNotes

Door43 World Missions Community

The clans of Merari were also given Heshbon

This can be stated in active form. AT: "The clans of Merari also received Heshbon" (See: Active or Passive)

Heshbon ... Jazer

These are names of cities. (See: How to Translate Names)

twelve cities in all

"12 cities in total" (See: Numbers)

twelve cities in all were given to them by the casting of lots

This can be stated in active form. AT: "they received these twelve cities by the casting of lots" (See: Active or Passive)

casting of lots

A random method of choosing to remove the choice from the leader's will, often done with the idea that God will decide the outcome. See how you translated this in Joshua 19:1.

translationWords

Levi

unfoldingWord translationNotes — © Distant Shores Media and the Door43 World Missions Community, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Source: git.door43.org/Door43/en_tn.

Lesson kit

Teaching starters — assembled from the data on this page, not authored interpretation. Every prompt links to the verse data it draws on. Edit before teaching.

Joshua, in the Historical, opens this verse with 11 words (7 distinct Hebrew lemmas). Its most distinctive word is Yaʻăzêyr (“Jazer”). The Greek Septuagint runs longer here. A historical commentator’s framing appears above. Read the whole chapter for the surrounding context.

Discussion questions

How does “Jazer” (Yaʻăzêyr) shape what this verse is saying?
How does Numbers 21:32, which shares the word «Jazer», read alongside this verse?
What does the repetition of “common land” (2× in this one verse) do in this verse?
The Septuagint runs longer here than the Hebrew. What might account for the difference?
These translations render this verse differently. What is at stake in choosing one wording over another?
Compare how The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges and John Gill's Exposition read this verse. Where do they agree or differ?

Things to notice

This verse counts 11 Hebrew ↔ 18 Greek words.
These translations choose different wording for 2 words in this verse.
“common land” occurs 2× in this single verse.
7 distinct Hebrew lemmas span 11 words in this verse.