Aggada -- Translations into English; Bible. Old Testament -- Legends; Jewish legends; Midrash -- Translations into English
At the end of seven years of warfare, (46) Joshua could at last venture
to parcel out the conquered land among the tribes. This was the way he
did it. The high priest Eleazar, attended by Joshua and all the people,
and arrayed in the Urim and Thummim, stood before two urns. One of the
urns contained the names of the tribes, the other the names of the
districts into which the land was divided. The holy spirit caused him
to exclaims "Zebulon." When he put his hand into the first urn, lo, he
drew forth the word Zebulon, and from the other came the word Accho,
meaning the district of Accho. Thus it happened with each tribe in
succession. (47) In order that the boundaries might remain fixed,
Joshua had had the Hazubah (48) planted between the districts. The
rootstock of this plant once established in a spot, it can be
extirpated only with the greatest difficulty. The plough may draw deep
furrows over it, yet it puts forth new shoots, and grows up again amid
the grain, still marking the old division lines. (49)
In connection with the allotment of the land Joshua issued ten
ordinances intended, in a measure, to restrict the rights in private
property: Pasturage in the woods was to be free to the public at large.
Any one was permitted to gather up bits of wood in the field. The same
permission to gather up all grasses, wherever they might grow, unless
they were in a field that had been sown with fenugreek, which needs
grass for protection. For grafting purposes twigs could be cut from any
plant except the olive-trees. Water springs belonged to the whole town.
It was lawful for any one to catch fish in the Sea of Tiberias,
provided navigation was not impeded. The area adjacent to the outer
side of a fence about a field might be used by any passer-by to ease
nature. From the close of the harvest until the seventeenth day of
Marheshwan fields could be crossed. A traveler who lost his way among
vineyards could not be held responsible for the damage done in the
effort to recover the right path. A dead body found in a field was to
be buried on the spot where it was found. (50)
The allotment of the land to the tribes and subdividing each district
among the tribesmen took as much time as the conquest of the land. (51)
When the two tribes and a half from the land beyond Jordan returned
home after an absence of fourteen years, they were not a little
astonished to hear that the boys who had been too young to go to the
wars with them had in the meantime shown themselves worthy of the
fathers. They had been successful in repulsing the Ishmaelitish tribes
who had taken advantage of the absence of the men capable of bearing
arms to assault their wives and children. (52)
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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