Third group; towns in the south of the Shephelah. For Libnah see Joshua 10:29. Mareshah is believed to be near Beit-jibrin, the ancient "Eleutheropolis."

Libnah - See the note on Joshua 10:29.

Ether - From Joshua 19:7 we learn that this city was afterwards given to the tribe of Simeon.

Libnah,.... Here begins another division or list of the cities of Judah, in the valley or plain. Libnah is the same with Libnah, a royal city; see Joshua 10:29,

and Ether was given to the tribe of Simeon, Joshua 19:7; and under Ether of the lot of Simeon, Jerom writes (y), there is now a very large village called Jethira, in interior Daroma, near Malatha, twenty miles from Eleutheropolis:

and Ashan also was given to the tribe of Simeon, Joshua 19:7; and the above writer relates (z), that there was in his times a village called Bethasan, belonging to Aelia, or Jerusalem, fifteen miles from it.

(y) De loc. Heb. fol. 91. C. & 92. I.((z) De loc. Heb. fol. 88. G.

The third group, consisting of the towns in the southern half of the hilly region: nine towns.

Joshua 15:42

Libnah: see at Joshua 10:29. Ether and Ashan, which were afterwards given to the Simeonites (Joshua 19:7), and are probably to be sought for on the border of the Negeb, have not yet been discovered. The conjecture that Ether is connected with the ruins of Attrah (Rob. iii. App.) in the province of Gaza, is a very uncertain one. Ashan, probably the same as Kor-ashan (1 Samuel 30:30), became a priests' city afterwards (1 Chronicles 6:44; see at Joshua 21:16).

Libnah, and Ether, and Ashan,

15:20-63 Here is a list of the cities of Judah. But we do not here find Bethlehem, afterwards the city of David, and ennobled by the birth of our Lord Jesus in it. That city, which, at the best, was but little among the thousands of Judah, Mic 5:2, except that it was thus honoured, was now so little as not to be accounted one of the cities.