The idea that the Israelites conquered the country north of Arnon as early as the days of Moses must be given up as unhistorical. It is derived from an uncritical application of Numbers ii. From this chapter the inference is usually drawn that an Amorite invasion of Moab had taken place shortly before the time of Moses. They are supposed to have conquered all the northern half of Moab and the farther side of Jordan and then to have been defeated and destroyed by Moses. The groundwork of the passage in Numbers xxi. is a narrative taken from the Elohistic text xxi. 4-9, 12-18, 21-25, 27, 30. According to this, there existed in the time of Moses a kingdom of the Amorites (_i.e._ Canaanites) under a king named Sihon, to the north of Arnon, between that river and the Jabbok, and bordered on the east by the land of the Ammonites. Verse 26 is warrant that this king Sihon had taken his country from the Moabites. But this verse is an interpolation which interrupts the continuity of vv. 25 and 27, and is intended to bring the view of the Elohistic text into line with that which prevailed elsewhere, and according to which these districts belonged to Moab. In support of the opinion that this district was invested from the Moabites in the time of Moses, the Elohistic text refers to an ancient song, probably taken from the Book of the Wars of Jehovah. In vv. 27-30 he says, “wherefore they that speak in proverbs say: ‘Come into Heshbon, let the city of Sihon be built and prepared: For there is a fire gone out of Heshbon, a flame from the city of Sihon: It hath consumed Ar of Moab, and the lords of the high places of Arnon. Woe to thee, Moab! thou art undone, O people of Chemosh: He hath given his sons that escaped, and his daughters into captivity, (unto Sihon, king of the Amorites.) We have shot at them; Heshbon is perished even unto Dibon.’” But this song contradicts at all points the statement which the Elohistic text brings it forward to verify. King Sihon, who was conquered according to the song, is rather a king of the Moabites, and his conquerors, who in the introduction are invited to settle in conquered cities, are obviously Israelites, since the invitation comes in an Israelite song. The “Sihon, king of the Amorites” put in brackets above, is proved by its incompatibility with the whole tenor of the song to be a gloss, interpolated for the purpose of bringing it into harmony with the presuppositions of v. 26. The song is a poem, composed on the occasion of such an inroad from the north into Moabite territory north of the Arnon, as the inscription of Mesha describes.