1 Samuel 9:4

4. Mount Ephraim See note on Judges 17:1. There is great uncertainty in respect to this route of Saul after his father’s asses. He undoubtedly started from Gibeah, where was his home, (1 Samuel 10:26,) and, passing through or over ( עבר ) mount Ephraim, he must have gone in a northwesterly direction. In the absence of any evidence to the contrary, we naturally understand the land of Shalisha to be the country around Baal-shalisha, mentioned 2 Kings 4:42, and which, according to Eusebius and Jerome, was situated fifteen Roman miles north of Lydda, or Diospolis the modern Ludd. Near this spot three water-courses unite in one large stream known as the Wady Kurawa, and hence, perhaps, the name Shalisha land of three. From this point we can trace their course only by conjecture, for the land of Shalim is unknown, and the land of the Benjamites is literally the land of Yemini, and may, perhaps, have lain outside of the territory of Benjamin. If, however, the land of Yemini here means the territory of Benjamin, then the most probable conjecture is, that from the neighbourhood of Ludd they fetched a circuitous course, first easterly and then south, passing through the land of Benjamin somewhere east of Gibeah.