This district, including the towns in "the wilderness," the scene of David's wanderings (1 Samuel 23:24; Psalm 63:1-11 title), and of the preaching of the Baptist Matthew 3:1, and perhaps of our Lord's temptation Matthew 4, extended from the northern limit of Judah along the Dead Sea to the Negeb; it was bounded on the west by that part of "the mountains" or highlands of Judah, which adjoined Bethlehem and Maon. It abounds in limestone rocks, perforated by numerous caverns, and often of fantastic shapes. It is badly supplied with water, and hence, is for the most part barren, though affording in many parts, now quite desolate, clear tokens of former cultivation. It contained only a thin population in the days of Joshua.

In the wilderness,.... The wilderness of Judea, which was not a desert and uninhabited but had many cities and villages in it, those that follow:

Betharabah; the first of these seems to be in the borders of Judah and Benjamin, and so is ascribed to both; see Joshua 15:6,

Middin, and Secacah; of the two last we read nowhere else, only in Judges 5:10; what we translate "ye that sit in judgment", Kimchi interprets, "ye that dwell by Middin", and says it is the name of a place in Joshua, and mentions this passage.

The towns in the desert of Judah, which ran along the Dead Sea from the northern border of Judah (Joshua 15:6, Joshua 15:7) to Wady Fikreh on the south, and reached to the districts of Maon, Ziph, Tekoah, and Bethlehem towards the west. This tract of land is for the most part a terrible desert, with a soil composed of chalk, marl, and limestone, and with bald mountains covered with flint and hornstone, and without the slightest trace of vegetation on the side bordering on the Dead Sea (see v. Schubert, Reise, iii. pp. 94, 96; Rob. ii. pp. 202, 475, 477). Yet wherever there are springs even this desert is covered with a luxuriant vegetation, as far as the influence of the water extends (Seetzen, ii. pp. 249, 258); and even in those parts which are now completely desolate, there are traces of the work of man of a very ancient date in all directions (Rob. ii. p. 187). Six towns are mentioned in the verses before us. Beth-arabah: see at Joshua 15:6. Middin and Secaca are unknown. According to Knobel, Middin is probably the ruins of Mird or Mardeh, to the west of the northern end of the Dead Sea (Rob. ii. p. 270).

In the wilderness, Betharabah, Middin, and Secacah,

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.