Joshua 19:10

ZEBULUN

"And the third lot came out for the children of Zebulun according to their families. And the border of their inheritance was unto Sarid; and their border went up westward, even to Maralah, and reached to Dabbesheth; and it reached to the brook that is before Jokneam; and it turned from Sarid eastward toward the sunrising unto the border of Chisloth-tabor; and it went out to Daberath, and went up to Japhia; and from thence it passed along eastward to Gath-hepher, to Eth-kazin; and it went out at Rimmon which stretcheth unto Neah; and the border turned about it on the north to Hanna-thon; and the goings out thereof were at the valley of Iphtahel; and Kattah, and Nahalal, and Shimron, and Idalah, and Bethlehem: twelve cities with their villages. This is the inheritance of the children of Zebulun according to their families, these cities with their villages."

"This inheritance lay west of Nazareth and east of Accho."[3] Unger's more complete description is:

"This was the landlocked district in lower Galilee bordered by Asher on the west, Manasseh on the south, Issachar on the southeast, and Naphtali on the north and northeast. Zebulun was traversed by "the way of the sea" (Isaiah 9:1), a widely traveled road to the Mediterranean Sea."[4]

It is of interest that the birthplace of Jonah, Gath-hepher, lay within this territory. The Bethlehem mentioned here, however, was named by the Zebulunites after the one where Jesus was born.[5] The wisdom of the Lord has been pointed out in this placement of the children of Leah to the north of the Rachel tribes in order to procure a greater unity of the children of Israel. This objective "was accomplished for centuries."[6]