Verse 57
Jos 15:57Cain (Hakkain)is possibly the same as Jukin, on the south-east of Hebron (Rob. ii. p. 449). Gibeah cannot be the Gabatha near Bethlehem, mentioned in the Onom. (s. v. Gabathaon), or the Gibea mentioned by Robinson (ii. p. 327), i.e., the village of Jeba, on a hill in the Wady el Musurr, as this does not come within the limits of the present group; it must rather be one of the two places (Gebaa and Gebatha) described as viculi contra orientalem plagam Daromae, though their situation has not yet been discovered. Timnah, probably the place already mentioned in Gen 38:12., has not been discovered.
Verses 58-59
The fourth group of six towns, on the north of Hebron or of the last two groups. - Halhul, according to the Onom. (s. v. Elul) a place near Hebron named Alula, has been preserved in the ruins of Halhûl, an hour and a half to the north of Hebron (Rob. i. p. 319, ii. p. 186, and Bibl. Res. p. 281). Beth-zur, which was fortified by Rehoboam (2Ch 11:7), and is frequently mentioned in the time of the Maccabees as a border defence against the Idumaeans (1 Macc. 4:29, 61, etc.), was twenty (? fifteen) Roman miles from Jerusalem, according to the Onom. (s. v. Beth-zur), on the road to Hebron. It is the present heap of ruins called Beit-zur on the north-west of Halhûl (Rob. Bibl. Res. pp. 276-7; Ritter, Erdk. xvi. pp. 236, 267-8). Gedor, the ruins of Jedûr, an hour and a half to the north-west (Rob. ii. p. 338; Bibl. Res. pp. 282-3).
Verse 59
Jos 15:59Maarath and Eltekon have not yet been discovered. Beth-anoth (probably a contraction of Beth-ayanoth) has been discovered by Wolcott in the ruins of Beit-anum, on the east of Halhûl (Rob. Bibl. Res. p. 279; cf. Pal. ii. p. 186).
Between Jos 15:59 and Jos 15:60, the fifth group of towns given in the Septuagint is wanting in the Masoretic text. This group lay to the north of the fourth, and reached as far as Jerusalem, It comprised a district in which even now there are at least fifteen places and ruins, so that we have not an arbitrary interpolation made by the lxx, as Jerome assumed, but rather a gap in the Hebrew text, arising from the fact that an ancient copyist passed by mistake from the word וחצריהן in Jos 15:59 to the same word at the close of the missing section. In the Alexandrian version the section reads as follows in Cod. Al. and Vat.: Θεκώ καὶ Ἐφραθά, αὕτη ἐστὶ Βαιθλέεμ, καὶ Φαγώρ καὶ Αἰτὰν καὶ Καολὸν καὶ Τατὰμ καὶ Θωβἠς (Cod. Al. Σωρὴς) καὶ Καρέμ καὶ Γαλὲμ καὶ Θεθὴρ (Cod. Al. Βαιθῆρ) καὶ Μαμοχώ, πόλεις ἕνδεκα καὶ αἱ κῶμαι αὐτῶν. - Theko, the well-known Tekoah, the home of the wise woman and of the
