Numbers 33:16-37

And they removed from the desert of Sinai, and pitched at Kibroth-hatta'avah. Kibroth-hattaavah - the graves of lust (see the notes at Numbers 9:4). The route, on breaking up the encampment at Sinai, led down Wady Sheikh, then, crossing Jebel-et-Tyh, which intersected the peninsula, they descended into Wady Zalaka, pitching successively at two brief though memorable stations (Deuteronomy 9:22).

And encamped at Hazeroth - unwalled villages, supposed to be at Ain-Hudera (Numbers 11:35).

Verse 18. Rithmah - the place of the broom, a station possibly in some wady extending westward of the Ghor (Num. 10:40).

Verse 19. Rimmon-parez - or Rimmon, a city of Judah and Simeon (Joshua 15:32).

Verse 20. Libnah - so called from its white poplars (Joshua 10:29); or, as some think, a white hill between Kadesh and Gaza (Joshua 10:29).

Verse 21. Rissah - El-arish.

Verse 23. Mount Shapher - Casius.

Verse 30. Moseroth - adjacent to mount Hor, in Wady Mousa.

Verse 35. Ezion-gaber - near Akaba, a sea-port on the western shore of the Elamitic gulf.

Verse 36. Wilderness of Zin - on the east side of the peninsula of Sinai.

Verse 37. Kadesh - or Kadesh-barnea-is supposed to be the great valley of the Ghor, and the city Kadesh to have been situated on the border of this valley (Burckhardt, Robinson: but see the notes at Numbers 13:26; Numbers 14:29; Numbers 20:1; Genesis 14:7; Deuteronomy 2:14 for another site assigned to Kadesh by Williams). But as there are no less than 18 stations inserted between Hazeroth and Kadesh, and only eleven days were spent in performing that journey (Deuteronomy 1:2), it is evident that the intermediate stations here recorded belong to another and totally different visit to Kadesh. The first was when they left Sinai in the second month (Numbers 1:11; Numbers 13:20), and were in Kadesh in August (Deuteronomy 1:45), and "abode many days" in it, and complaining at the report of the spies, were commanded to return into the desert "by the way of the Red Sea." The arrival at Kadesh, mentioned in this catalogue, corresponds to the second sojourn at that place, being the first month, or April (Numbers 20:1). Between the two visits there intervened a period of 38 years, during which they wandered here and there through all the region of Et-Tyh (wanderings), often returning to the same spots as the pastoral necessities of their flocks required; and there is the strongest reason for believing that the stations named between Hazeroth (Numbers 33:8) and Kadesh (Numbers 33:36) belong to the long interval of wandering.

No certainty has yet been attained in ascertaining the locale of many of these stations, and there must have been more than what are recorded; because it is probable that those only are noted where they remained some time, where the tabernacle was pitched, and where Moses and the elders encamped, the people being scattered for pasture in various directions. From Ezion-gaber, for instance, which stood at the head of the gulf of Akaba, to Kadesh, could not be much less than the whole length of the great valley of the Ghor, a distance of not less than 100 miles, whatever might be the exact situation of Kadesh; and, of course there must have been several intervening stations, though none are mentioned. The incidents and stages of the rest of the journey to the plains of Moab are sufficiently explicit from the preceding chapters.