Numbers 21:1 - Exposition

And when king Arad the Canaanite, which dwelt in the south, heard tell. Rather, "And the Canaanite, the king of Arad, which dwelt in the Negeb, heard tell." It is possible that Arad was the name of the king (it occurs as the name of a man, 1 Chronicles 8:15 ), but it was almost certainly the name of his place. The "king of Arad, is mentioned in Joshua 12:14 , and "the Negeb of Arad" in 1:16 . From the context of these passages it is evident that it was situated in the southernmost district of what was afterwards the territory of Judah. According to Eusebius, it stood twenty Roman miles to the south of Hebron, and its site has been found by modern travelers at Tel-Arad, a low hill in this direction. On the Negeb see note on Numbers 13:17 . By the way of the spies. דֶּרֶךְ הָאַתָרִים . Septuagint, ὀδὸν αθαρείν . The translation is very uncertain; atharim may be a proper name, as the Septuagint seems to suppose, or it may be an unusual plural formed from תוּר , equivalent to הַתָּרִים , "spies," as the Chaldee, Samaritan, and most of the versions take it; or it may be simply the plural from אַתַר , a place, used with some local meaning which made it practically a proper name. If the rendering of the A.V. be correct, "the way of the spies" must have been the route by which they ascended to Hebron through the Negeb ( Numbers 13:17 , Numbers 13:22 ), and the king of Arid must have anticipated an invasion in that direction, and sought to forestall it. And took some of them prisoners. This would seem to show that he fell upon them unawares, and cut off some detached parties. Nothing is said of any disobedience on the part of Israel to account for defeat in battle.