Deuteronomy 1:28

Whither shall we go up?.... What way can we go up into the land? where is there any access for us?

And ye came near unto me every one of you, and said, We will send men before us, and they shall search us out the land, and bring us word again by what way we must go up, and into what cities we shall come.

The people is greater, in number and strength and valour. Up to heaven, i.e. to a great height. A common hyperbole, as . The Anakims; the children of Anak or Enak. See ,20.

(28) Whither shall we go up? our brethren have discouraged our heart.—So Caleb says in Joshua 14:8, “My brethren made the heart of the people melt.” For the rest of the verse see Numbers 13:28.

Verse 28. Cities - walled up to heaven] That is, with very high walls which could not be easily scaled. High walls around houses, c., in these parts of Arabia are still deemed a sufficient defence against the Arabs, who scarcely ever attempt any thing in the way of plunder but on horseback. The monastery on Mount Sinai is surrounded with very high walls without any gate in the upper part of the wall there is a sort of window, or opening, from which a basket is suspended by a pulley, by which both persons and goods are received into and sent from the place. It is the same with the convent of St. Anthony, in Egypt; and this sort of wall is deemed a sufficient defence against the Arabs, who, as we have already observed, scarcely ever like to alight from their horses.

28. Whither are we going up?] That is, to what kind of a land or a fate? In the Hex. the Heb. prep is used only of place by JE and D, only of time by P. made our heart to melt] In the Hex. the phrase either thus or with the intrans. form of the verb is found only here, Deuteronomy 20:8, and in the deuteronomic Joshua 2:11; Joshua 5:1. greater and taller] Sam. and LXX greater and more numerous, J, Numbers 13:28; Numbers 13:31, strong … stronger than we; E id. 33, we were in our own sight as grasshoppers; P, id. 32, men of great stature. cities] So Sam.; LXX and cities. great and fenced up to heaven] So Deuteronomy 9:1; J, Numbers 13:28, fenced, very great. The presumably pre-Israelite walls of two cities have been excavated: Lachish (Bliss, A Mound of Many Cities, 27 ff.) and Gezer (Macalister, Bible Side Lights from … Gezer, 141 ff.). Each is about 14 ft thick; the latter (a little later than 1450 b.c.) still in parts from 10 to 14 ft. high ‘can hardly be regarded as much more than the underground foundations.’ If, as is usually reckoned, the thickness was from ⅓ ? to ⅔ ? of the height this wall was from 21 to 42 ft, its impressive-ness increased by the scarps and slopes from which it rose and by the towers that crowned it. Sellin has laid bare in Jericho a ‘cyclopean’ outer stone wall 5 m. (16.4 ft), crowned by a brick wall 2 m. thick and 6 or 8 m. (19½ to 26Ό ft) high. So that up to heaven, the height at which birds fly, is hardly an exaggeration. Emerging from the desert, Israel were startled by two facts which still startle the tent-dwelling nomads—the walls of cities and the stature of the settled inhabitants. No Arab enters without fear a walled city for the first time, nor willingly passes the night there. Egyptian bas-reliefs and paintings distinguish the ampler figures of settled Syrians from the lean and meagre desert Arabs. To-day, as the present writer has frequently noticed, the same difference of average stature is obvious between the two classes. Cp. Burton (Pilgrimage to Al-Medinah and Mecca, ii. 83, mem. ed.) on the short stature of the Arabs of the Hiǧ ?az. The cause of this is the difference in nutriment (Doughty, Ar. Des. passim, Musil, Ar. Petr. iii.). That early Israel felt these two impressions is one of many indications that they belonged to the nomad or Arab type of Semite. So far we are in the region of fact. sons of the Anakim] Heb. without the art. as in Deuteronomy 9:2 a; but sons of the ‘A. Deuteronomy 2:11; sons of ‘Anak, Deuteronomy 9:2 b; J, Numbers 13:28, children of (yelξdκ, Scot. ‘bairns’) the ‘Anak; cp. 22, 33. Both forms in Joshua 15:14. The Ar. ‘anaḳ ?a is ‘to overtop,’ ‘unḳ ?, ‘neck,’ and in plur. ‘outstanding men,’ a‘naḳ ?, ‘long-necked,’ ‘tall’ (‘anḳ ?a, a mythical beast, Wellh.

28. Our brethren have discouraged our heart — The report of the men sent to explore the land had doubtless magnified the size of the cities and the stature of the inhabitants.