SIL Translator’s Notes on Joshua 10:37

10:37a

They captured it: The clause captured it indicates that the Israelites captured the town.

put to the sword: The clause put to the sword indicates that the Israelite army killed the people in Hebron. This is a Hebrew idiom that was used in 10:28, and it is recommended that you translate it the same way in both places.

10:37b

its king, all its villages, and all the people: The phrase its king, all its villages refers to the king of Hebron and the surrounding villages that were under the control of Hebron. All the people in Hebron and its villages were killed.

10:37c

Joshua left no survivors: The Hebrew clause that the Berean Standard Bible translates as Joshua left no survivors is more literally “not a survivor remained.” This indicates that the Israelite army killed every person in Hebron and its surrounding towns.

just as he had done at Eglon: The clause just as he had done at Eglon is similar to the clause in verse 10:35c. It is recommended that you translate it in a similar way.

he devoted to destruction Hebron and everyone in it: The clause he devoted to destruction Hebron and everyone in it is similar to verse 10:35b. The verb devoted to destruction refers to the action of destroying people and things that Yahweh had claimed and could not be bought back by any means.

General Comment on verse 10:37

It may be more natural in some languages to reorder the parts of 10:37.

Here is another way to translate this verse:

and captured it. They killed the king and everyone else in the city as well as in the nearby towns. Joshua condemned the city to total destruction, just as he had done to Eglon. No one in it was left alive. (Good News Translation)

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All Scripture quotations in this publication, unless otherwise indicated, are from The Holy Bible, Berean Standard Bible.
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