Deuteronomy 3 - Introduction

Defeat of -Ôg, King of Bashan

Israel advancing N. towards Bashan encountered -Ôg at Edre-î (1). Jehovah delivered him into their hands (2 f.); they took all his cities, 60 in Argob, his kingdom within Bashan, fenced cities, with also many unwalled towns (4 f.); and devoted them to Jehovah, reserving the cattle and spoil for themselves (6 f.).

Parallel are Numbers 21:33-35, attached to the JE narrative. Of these Numbers 21:33 f. agree verbally (except that the 3rd sing. is used for the 1st plur.) with Deuteronomy 3:1 f. of this section, while Numbers 21:35 summarises Deuteronomy 3:3. But while, as we have seen, D is usually based on JE (more particularly on E), the prevalence of deuteronomic phrases not used in JE supports the opinion (from Dillm. onwards) that Numbers 21:33-35 is an edirial addition to JE, borrowed from D. The campaign against -Ôg is found elsewhere in Hex. only in Deuteronomy 1:4; Deuteronomy 4:47; Deuteronomy 29:7, the deuteronomic Joshua 12:4, and Numbers 32:33; Joshua 9:10; Joshua 13:30 f., all of late date. Thus the campaign against -Ôg has not the same documentary evidence as that against Sîḥôn, and is questioned by many who accept the latter. Proof one way or the other is impossible. On the one hand -Ôg is associated with the mythical Repha-îm; a campaign in Bashan carries Israel away from their objective, the crossing of Jordan; and nothing is said of the conquest of the intervening Gile-ad at this time; though the phrase in Deuteronomy 2:36, unto Gile-ad, may be intended to cover all Gile-ad to the Yarmûk, this is not probable; and there are indications that Israel's conquest of Gile-ad took place from W. Palestine at a later date (see on Deuteronomy 3:14). On the other hand, -Ôg's defeat is bound up in Heb. tradition with that of Sîḥôn; it is hard to see how or why it can have been invented by the deuteronomists (-the tradition of the defeat of -Ôg at Edre-i is probably, predeuteronomic": Cheyne, E.B.). It is possible to argue that -Ôg's kingdom included Gile-ad N. of the Jabboḳ; there are no geographical or historical obstacles to a campaign by Israel in Bashan, but on the contrary it is as credible that Israel should have aimed at the conquest of all E. Palestine before crossing the Jordan as it is certain that Pompey so aimed, and that the first Moslem invaders so succeeded.