Introduction
THE ALLOTMENT OF EASTERN PALESTINE.
The tribes of Reuben and Gad, after the conquest of the promised land east of the Jordan, presented what seemed to Moses and Eleazar a selfish and schismatic petition for its immediate allotment to them alone, contravening the command to divide the land by lot, (Numbers 26:55,) apparently distrusting the conquest of Canaan, evincing little national feeling, and establishing a mischievous precedent in the case of future conquests. After an earnest remonstrance on the part of Moses, showing the bad effects of such a procedure in disintegrating and weakening the nation on the eve of its great conflict with the Canaanites, a compromise is agreed upon by which the two tribes obtain their request without diminishing the military power of Israel. Moses also insists that the half tribe of Manasseh should also have a portion of the land in the conquest of which they had been peculiarly zealous and active. Knobel, to gratify his critical sense, cuts this chapter into pieces, assigning the fragments respectively to the Elohist and to the Jehovist, on the flimsiest possible grounds. See Introduction, pages 216-218.
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