Canaan

The land of Canaan is the territory between the river of Egypt and the Euphrates that is promised to Abraham and his seed, sojourned in by the patriarchs, refused by the Exodus generation at Kadesh, conquered under Joshua, allotted by lot to the twelve tribes, lost to Assyria and to Babylon for the cult-practices of its prior occupants, returned to under Cyrus, reclaimed by the Maccabees, and held up in Hebrews as the type of a Sabbath rest still open. Across the canon the same land carries seven names — Sanctuary, Palestine, the land of Israel, the land of the Hebrews, the land of promise, the holy land, Yahweh's land, Immanuel's land, Beulah — and is twice called by its proper name "the land of Canaan."

The Promise to Abraham

The promise begins with a call out of Mesopotamia. Terah's company aims at it but stops short: "he had them go out from Ur of the Chaldees, to go into the land of Canaan; and they came to Haran, and dwelt there" (Gen 11:31). The land that Terah does not reach is the land Abram is summoned to: "Now Yahweh said to Abram, Get out of your country, and from your kindred, and from your father's house, to the land that I will show you" (Gen 12:1). The same call wraps Abram in a sevenfold blessing: "I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great; and you will be a blessing; and I will bless those who bless you, and him who curses you I will curse: and in you will all the families of the earth be blessed" (Gen 12:2-3).

Abram goes. "They went forth to go into the land of Canaan; and into the land of Canaan they came" (Gen 12:5). At Shechem the first land-pledge is spoken: "And Abram passed through the land to the place of Shechem, to the oak of Moreh. And the Canaanite was then in the land. And [the Speech of] Yahweh appeared to Abram, and said, To your seed I will give this land: and there he built an altar to [the Speech of] Yahweh, who appeared to him" (Gen 12:6-7). The Canaanite-then-in-the-land clause is the standing notice: the territory is occupied at the moment of pledge. From his vantage above Bethel after Lot's departure the pledge is widened: "Abram dwelt in the land of Canaan, and Lot dwelt in the cities of the Plain, and moved his tent as far as Sodom" (Gen 13:12), and Yahweh adds, "for all the land which you see, to you I will give it, and to your seed forever" (Gen 13:15).

Genesis 15 fixes the extent. "I am Yahweh who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give you this land to inherit it" (Gen 15:7) is followed by "In that day Yahweh made a covenant with Abram, saying, To your seed I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates" (Gen 15:18). Genesis 17 fixes the tenure. "I will give to you, and to your seed after you, the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and [by my Speech] I will be their God" (Gen 17:8). The land is named — the land of Canaan — the extent is named — Egypt-to-Euphrates — and the duration is named — everlasting.

The same promise is renewed to Isaac: "Sojourn in this land, and [my Speech] will be with you, and will bless you. For to you, and to your seed, I will give all these lands, and I will establish the oath which I swore to Abraham your father" (Gen 26:3). The Psalter and the Chronicler together preserve the patriarch-addressed line: "Saying, To you I will give the land of Canaan, The lot of your⁺ inheritance" (1 Chr 16:18; the same words at Ps 105:11).

Patriarchal Sojourn

Hebrews 11 names the patriarchs' tenure-mode in the very land they are promised: "By faith he became a sojourner in the land of promise, as in a [land] not his own" (Heb 11:9). Genesis matches the description. After ten years in the country Abram is still called a dweller, not an owner: "after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to Abram her husband to be his wife" (Gen 16:3). When Sarah dies the not-his-own becomes literal. "And Sarah died in Kiriath-arba (the same is Hebron), in the land of Canaan. And Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to weep for her. And Abraham rose up from before his dead, and spoke to the sons of Heth, saying, I am a stranger and a sojourner with you⁺. Give me a possession of a burying-place with you⁺, that I may bury my dead out of my sight" (Gen 23:2-4). After the negotiation: "And after this, Abraham buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah before Mamre (that is Hebron), in the land of Canaan. And the field, and the cave that is in it, were made sure to Abraham for a possession of a burying-place by the sons of Heth" (Gen 23:19-20). The first parcel of the promised land that the patriarchs hold is a tomb. Jacob remembers it on his deathbed and binds his sons to bury him in it: "in the cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which is before Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought with the field from Ephron the Hittite for a possession of a burying-place" (Gen 49:30).

The sojourner-status is later given a statutory frame: "And the land will not be sold in perpetuity; for the land is mine: for you⁺ are strangers and sojourners with me" (Lev 25:23). Even after the conquest, the people's tenancy in the land is held under Yahweh's ownership.

Joseph's Bones

Famine drives the patriarchs out: "the sons of Israel came to buy among those who came: for the famine was in the land of Canaan" (Gen 42:5). Joseph speaks his country's name from an Egyptian dungeon: "I was stolen away out of the land of the Hebrews" (Gen 40:15). At his death he holds the brothers to the future return: "God will surely visit you⁺, and bring you⁺ up out of this land to the land which he swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob" (Gen 50:24). And he makes them swear to carry his body home: "And Joseph took an oath of the sons of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you⁺, and you⁺ will carry up my bones from here" (Gen 50:25). The patriarchs' bodies anticipate the inheritance their lifetimes did not reach.

The Spies

At the southern border the next generation is asked to take what was sworn. Twelve men are sent in. The first report concedes the produce: "surely it flows with milk and honey; and this is the fruit of it" (Num 13:27). The party then divides. "And Caleb stilled the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it. But the men who went up with him said, We are not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we. And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had spied out to the sons of Israel, saying, The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that eats up its inhabitants; and all the people who we saw in it are men of great stature. And there we saw the Nephilim, the sons of Anak, who come of the Nephilim: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight" (Num 13:30-33).

The congregation breaks. "And all the congregation lifted up their voice, and cried; and the people wept that night. And all the sons of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron: and the whole congregation said to them, Oh that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or that we had died in this wilderness! And why does Yahweh bring us to this land, to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will be a prey: Isn't it better for us to return into Egypt? And they said one to another, Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt" (Num 14:1-4). Joshua and Caleb plead the opposite: "he will bring us into this land, and give it to us; a land which flows with milk and honey" (Num 14:8). The verdict swears that generation out of the inheritance: "Surely not a man of these men of this evil generation will see the good land, which I swore to give to your⁺ fathers" (Deut 1:35); "surely they will not see the land which I swore to their fathers, neither will any of those who despised me see it" (Num 14:23); "surely you⁺ will not come into the land, concerning which I swore that I would make it so that you⁺ stay in it, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun" (Num 14:30); "Surely none of the men who came up out of Egypt, from twenty years old and upward, will see the land which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob; because they have not wholly followed me" (Num 32:11). Numbers closes the count: "For Yahweh had said of them, They will surely die in the wilderness. And there was not left a man of those, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun" (Num 26:65). Ezekiel later puts the same swearing-out in Yahweh's own first person: "Moreover I also swore to them in the wilderness, that I would not bring them into the land which I had given them, flowing with milk and honey, which is the glory of all lands" (Ezek 20:15). Joshua's own retrospect matches: "For the sons of Israel walked forty years in the wilderness, until all the nation, even the men of war who came forth out of Egypt, was consumed, because they didn't listen to [the Speech of] Yahweh: to whom Yahweh swore that he would not let them see the land which Yahweh swore to their fathers that he would give us, a land flowing with milk and honey" (Josh 5:6).

Description of the Land

What the second generation enters Moses describes in two registers. The terrain: "the land, where you⁺ go over to possess it, is a land of hills and valleys, [and] drinks water of the rain of heaven" (Deut 11:11). The water: "Yahweh your God brings you into a good land, a land of brooks of water, of fountains and springs, flowing forth in valleys and hills" (Deut 8:7). The produce: "a land of wheat and barley, and vines and fig trees and pomegranates; a land of olive trees and honey" (Deut 8:8). The standard formula recurs across the books: "to a land good and large, to a land flowing with milk and honey; to the place of the Canaanite, and the Hittite, and the Amorite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite" (Ex 3:8); "You⁺ will inherit their land, and I will give it to you⁺ to possess it, a land flowing with milk and honey" (Lev 20:24); "the land, which Yahweh swore to your⁺ fathers to give to them and to their seed, a land flowing with milk and honey" (Deut 11:9); "when I will have brought them into the land which I swore to their fathers, flowing with milk and honey" (Deut 31:20). Jeremiah remembers the gift before he names the breach: "And-I-brought-you⁺-into-a-plentiful-land / to-eat-its-fruit-and-its-goodness" — "to eat its fruit and its goodness" (Jer 2:7). The Plain of the Jordan, before Sodom is overthrown, is sketched in the same register: "all the Plain of the Jordan, that it was well watered everywhere, before [the Speech of] Yahweh destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah, like the garden of Yahweh, like the land of Egypt, as you go to Zoar" (Gen 13:10).

The Conquest under Joshua

Yahweh commissions Joshua at the same border: "Moses my slave is dead; now therefore arise, go over this Jordan, you, and all this people, to the land which I am giving to them, even to the sons of Israel. Every place that the sole of your⁺ foot will tread on, to you⁺ I have given it, as I spoke to Moses. From the wilderness, and this Lebanon, even to the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, and to the great sea toward the going down of the sun, will be your⁺ border" (Josh 1:2-4). On entry the wilderness food ends: "they ate of the fruit of the land of Canaan that year" (Josh 5:12).

The conquest is read out as Yahweh's act. "Yahweh your God will bring you into the land where you go to possess it, and will cast out many nations before you, the Hittite, and the Girgashite, and the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, seven nations greater and mightier than you" (Deut 7:1). "Yahweh your God will deliver them up before you, and you will strike them; then you will completely destroy them: you will make no covenant with them, nor show mercy to them" (Deut 7:2). The motive is not Israel's worth: "to thrust out all your enemies from before you, as Yahweh has spoken" (Deut 6:19), and the prior nations' own iniquity is the listed cause. The command-roster recurs at Deut 20:17 — "you will completely destroy them: the Hittite, and the Amorite, the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite; as Yahweh your God has commanded you." Even the trans-Jordan tribes are bound: "We will pass over armed before Yahweh into the land of Canaan, and the possession of our inheritance [will remain] with us beyond the Jordan" (Num 32:32).

The result is a king-list. "And these are the kings of the land whom Joshua and the sons of Israel struck beyond the Jordan westward, from Baal-gad in the valley of Lebanon even to mount Halak, that goes up to Seir; and Joshua gave it to the tribes of Israel for a possession according to their divisions; in the hill-country, and in the lowland, and in the Arabah, and in the slopes, and in the wilderness, and in the South; the Hittite, the Amorite, and the Canaanite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite" (Josh 12:7-8). Trans-Jordan is folded into the same campaign: "all the kingdom of Og in Bashan, who reigned in Ashtaroth and in Edrei (the same was left of the remnant of the Rephaim); for these Moses struck, and drove them out" (Josh 13:12). Already in song the same casting-out is recited: "He drove out the nations also before them, And allotted them for an inheritance by line, And caused the tribes of Israel to stay in their tents" (Ps 78:55), and again: "You brought a vine out of Egypt: You drove out the nations, and planted it" (Ps 80:8). At the Red Sea the song forecasts the same panic that meets the Exodus-news at the border: "The peoples have heard, they tremble: Pangs have taken hold on the inhabitants of Philistia" (Ex 15:14); "All the inhabitants of Canaan are melted away" (Ex 15:15).

Allotment to the Tribes

The dividing is by lot. "Notwithstanding, the land will be divided by lot: according to the names of the tribes of their fathers they will inherit. According to the lot will their inheritance be divided between the more and the fewer" (Num 26:55-56). The allotment is carried out under named officers: "And these are the inheritances which the sons of Israel took in the land of Canaan, which Eleazar the priest, and Joshua the son of Nun, and the heads of the fathers' [houses] of the tribes of the sons of Israel, distributed to them, by the lot of their inheritance, as Yahweh commanded by Moses, for the nine tribes, and for the half-tribe" (Josh 14:1-2). The capstone gathers gift and rest into one verdict: "So Yahweh gave to Israel all the land which he swore to give to their fathers; and they possessed it, and dwelt in it. And Yahweh gave them rest round about, according to all that he swore to their fathers: and there didn't stand a man of all their enemies before them; Yahweh delivered all their enemies into their hand. There did not fail anything of any good thing which Yahweh had spoken to the house of Israel; all came to pass" (Josh 21:43-45). Joshua's farewell sums the gift as unearned: "And I gave you⁺ a land on which you had not labored, and cities which you⁺ did not build, and you⁺ dwell in them; of vineyards and oliveyards which you⁺ did not plant, you⁺ are eating" (Josh 24:13).

The Rest That Remained

The same Joshua narrative also concedes that the inheritance is not yet fully held. "Now Joshua was old and well stricken in years; and Yahweh said to him, You are old and well stricken in years, and there remains yet very much land to be possessed" (Josh 13:1). Yahweh promises to finish the casting-out himself, and meanwhile commands the allotment to proceed: "all the inhabitants of the hill-country from Lebanon to Misrephoth-maim, even all the Sidonians; I [by my Speech] will drive them out from before the sons of Israel: only allot it to Israel for an inheritance, as I have commanded you. Now therefore divide this land for an inheritance to the nine tribes and the half-tribe of Manasseh; from the Jordan as far as the great sea in the west, you will give it--the great sea and its border" (Josh 13:6-7). Moses had already coupled the inheritance with rest: "for you⁺ have not as yet come to the rest and to the inheritance, which Yahweh your God gives you. But when you⁺ go over the Jordan, and dwell in the land which Yahweh your⁺ God causes you⁺ to inherit, and he gives you⁺ rest from all your⁺ enemies round about, so that you⁺ dwell in safety" (Deut 12:9-10).

The Land Holy and Defiled

The same Yahweh who brings Israel in makes the land's holiness depend on conduct. "you will not defile the land which you⁺ inhabit, in the midst of which I stay: for I, Yahweh, stay in the midst of the sons of Israel" (Num 35:34). The prior nations are cast out for defilement: "in all these the nations have been defiled which I am casting out from before you⁺" (Lev 18:24); "the land is defiled: therefore I visit its iniquity on it, and the land vomits out her inhabitants" (Lev 18:25); "the nation, which I am casting out before you⁺: for they did all these things, and therefore [my Speech] abhorred them" (Lev 20:23). The principle binds Israel as it bound the prior occupants. Jeremiah turns the gift-language back as charge: "but-when-you⁺-entered / you⁺-defiled-my-land / and-made-my-heritage-disgusting" — the entry that should have been thanksgiving became defilement (Jer 2:7). At the bare heights: "you-have-polluted-the-land-with-your-whoring-and-with-your-wickedness" (Jer 3:2). Of the idol-corpses: "because-they-have-polluted-my-land-with-the-carcasses-of-their-detestable-things / and-have-filled-my-inheritance-with-their-disgusting-things" (Jer 16:18). The Psalter speaks the same charge against child-sacrifice: "And shed innocent blood, Even the blood of their sons and of their daughters, Whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan; And the land was polluted with blood" (Ps 106:38). Micah pronounces the eviction-pivot: "Arise⁺, and depart; for this is not your⁺ resting-place; because of uncleanness that destroys, even with a grievous destruction" (Mic 2:10). The pattern is exactly the heathen-cast-out pattern of the conquest, now turned against Israel. Of Ahaz: "according to the disgusting behaviors of the nations, whom Yahweh cast out from before the sons of Israel" (2 Kgs 16:3); 2 Chronicles repeats the verdict at 2 Chr 28:3 and at 2 Chr 33:2. Of the northern kingdom at the eve of Assyrian deportation: "walked in the statutes of the nations, whom Yahweh cast out from before the sons of Israel; and [walked in the statutes] which the kings of Israel made" (2 Kgs 17:8). Of Manasseh: "he did that which was evil in the sight of Yahweh, after the disgusting behaviors of the nations whom Yahweh cast out before the sons of Israel" (2 Kgs 21:2). Even the apostate-Israelite city is placed under the same sword-stroke: "you will surely strike the inhabitants of that city with the edge of the sword, destroying it completely, and all that is in it and its cattle, with the edge of the sword" (Deut 13:15). Isaiah generalizes the principle to the whole earth: laws transgressed, statutes violated, the everlasting covenant broken, with the polluted ground bearing the residue of covenant-breach (Isa 24:5).

Solomon at Full Extent

For one short reign the land touches its promised borders. "And Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms from the River to the land of the Philistines, and to the border of Egypt: they brought tribute, and served Solomon all the days of his life" (1 Kgs 4:21). "For he had dominion over all [the region] on this side the River, from Tiphsah even to Gaza, over all the kings on this side the River: and he had peace on all sides round about him. And Judah and Israel dwelt safely, every man under his vine and under his fig tree, from Dan even to Beer-sheba, all the days of Solomon" (1 Kgs 4:24-25). At the temple's dedication Solomon names the gift in rest-language: "Blessed be Yahweh, who has given rest to his people Israel, according to all that he promised: not one word has failed of all his good promise, which he promised by Moses his slave" (1 Kgs 8:56). Administratively the land is partitioned for royal-table support: "Solomon had twelve officers over all Israel, who provided victuals for the king and his household: each man had to make provision for a month in the year" (1 Kgs 4:7). Then the kingdom is divided. "I will take the kingdom out of his son's hand, and will give it to you, even ten tribes" (1 Kgs 11:35).

Eviction and Return

Hosea names the property-claim that grounds the eviction-oracles: "They-will-not-dwell-in-Yahweh's-land / but-Ephraim-will-return-to-Egypt / and-they-will-eat-unclean-food-in-Assyria" (Hos 9:3) — Yahweh's land, not Israel's. Isaiah calls the same land "Immanuel's" in his Assyrian-flood oracle: the wing-spread of the invader fills "the width of your land, O Immanuel" (Isa 8:8). Judges had already remembered the long-broken bond: "I made you⁺ to go up out of Egypt, and have brought you⁺ to the land which I swore to your⁺ fathers" (Judg 2:1). The northern kingdom goes first under that broken oath, and then Judah: "And the king of Babylon struck them, and put them to death at Riblah in the land of Hamath. So Judah was carried away captive out of his land" (2 Kgs 25:21). At first sight the Philistine-period had already exhibited a disarmed land — "there was no blacksmith found throughout all the land of Israel" (1 Sam 13:19) — and this final captivity is its endpoint.

The return is announced before it happens. Ezekiel reopens the inheritance-clause: "Thus says the Sovereign Yahweh: This will be the border, by which you⁺ will divide the land for inheritance according to the twelve tribes of Israel: Joseph [will have two] portions. And you⁺ will inherit it, one as well as another; for I swore [by my Speech] to give it to your⁺ fathers: and this land will fall to you for inheritance" (Ezek 47:13-14). The same oracle widens the inheritance: "So you⁺ will divide this land to you⁺ according to the tribes of Israel. And it will come to pass, that you⁺ will divide it by lot for an inheritance to you⁺ and to the strangers who sojourn among you⁺, who will beget sons among you⁺; and they will be to you⁺ as the home-born among the sons of Israel; they will have inheritance with you⁺ among the tribes of Israel. And it will come to pass, that in what tribe the stranger sojourns, there you⁺ will give him his inheritance, says the Sovereign Yahweh" (Ezek 47:21-23). The decree of Cyrus opens the historical return: "Thus says Cyrus king of Persia, All the kingdoms of the earth has Yahweh, the God of heaven, given me; and he has charged me to build him a house in Jerusalem, which is in Judah" (Ezr 1:2). Zechariah names what is held now: "And-Yahweh-will-inherit-Judah-as-his-portion / in-the-holy-land / and-will-yet-choose-Jerusalem" — Yahweh's portion, the holy land, the yet-chosen Jerusalem (Zech 2:12). And the renaming-oracle at Isaiah 62 closes the eviction-vocabulary: "neither-will-your-land-anymore-be-termed-Desolate / and-your-land-Beulah / for-Yahweh-delights-in-you / and-your-land-will-be-married" (Isa 62:4). Beulah replaces Desolate.

Maccabean Reclamation

After the return the land is fought over again. The little horn of Daniel waxes "toward-the-glorious-[land]" — the prized, named-land destination of the southward-eastward conquest (Dan 8:9). The Maccabees gather under the ancestral banner. "And they said every man to his fellow man: Let's raise up the low condition of our people, and let's fight for our people, and our sanctuary" (1 Macc 3:43). The sanctuary is retaken: "Then Judas, and his brothers said: Look our enemies are discomfited: let us go up now to cleanse the holy places and to repair them. And all the army assembled together, and they went up into Mount Zion" (1 Macc 4:36-37). Under Simon the settled-land formula recurs and explicitly echoes the Solomonic peace: "And every man tilled his land with peace: and the land yielded her increase, and the trees of the fields their fruit. The old men sat in the streets, and spoke together of the good things, and the young men put on glory, and the robes of war. And he provided food for the cities, and appointed that they should be furnished with weapons of defense, so that the fame of his glory was renowned even to the end of the earth. He made peace in the land, and Israel rejoiced with great joy. And every man sat under his vine, and under his fig tree: and there was none to make them afraid" (1 Macc 14:8-12). The under-vine-and-fig phrase is the Solomon phrase.

The Land in the First Century

By the time of Luke the land that Solomon had ruled to the Euphrates is partitioned among four jurisdictions with Roman titles — Judea under a governor, Galilee as a tetrarchy, Ituraea and Trachonitis as a second tetrarchy, Abilene as a third (Lk 3:1). The Gentile-named land of the Solomonic account has become a set of imperial provinces.

The Rest That Remains

Hebrews argues that the Joshua-allotment was not the final rest. Israel's wilderness-exclusion is read as a parable: "Therefore I swore in my wrath, That they should not enter into my rest" (Ps 95:11). The author of Hebrews picks up the same oath. Of the Exodus generation: "And we see that they were not able to enter in because of unbelief" (Heb 3:19). The promise is therefore still open: "Let us fear therefore, lest perhaps, a promise being left of entering into his rest, any one of you⁺ should seem to have come short of it" (Heb 4:1). The "good news" of the first crossing is an old promise renewed: "Seeing therefore it remains that some should enter into it, and they to whom the good news was formerly preached failed to enter in because of disobedience" (Heb 4:6). The believing now do enter: "For we who have believed do enter into that rest; even as he has said, As I swore in my wrath, They will not enter into my rest: although the works were finished from the foundation of the world" (Heb 4:3). The proof that Joshua's rest was provisional is that the Psalter, written long after the conquest, still speaks of an open Today: "For if Joshua had given them rest, he would not have spoken afterward of another day. There remains therefore a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For he who has entered into his rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from his" (Heb 4:8-10).

Eschatological Inheritance

Hebrews 11 reads the patriarchs back into the same not-yet: the land they trod they held "as in a [land] not his own" — by faith, not by deed. "By faith he became a sojourner in the land of promise, as in a [land] not his own" (Heb 11:9). The Sea-song already calls the destination by a sanctuary-name: "You will bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of your inheritance, The place, O Yahweh, which you have made for you to dwell in, The sanctuary, O Lord, which your hands have established" (Ex 15:17). The same one territory is named "the land of the Hebrews" by Joseph (Gen 40:15), "the land of promise" by Hebrews (Heb 11:9), "Yahweh's land" by Hosea (Hos 9:3), "Immanuel's land" by Isaiah (Isa 8:8), "the holy land" by Zechariah (Zech 2:12), and "Beulah" by Isaiah at the renaming-oracle (Isa 62:4). What is promised to Abraham — Egypt-to-Euphrates, everlasting, given by oath — is held in the canon at three depths: by patriarch as sojourner, by tribe as allotment, and by faith as a Sabbath rest still to be entered. The land-and-rest pair Moses set down at Deut 12:9-10 is the same pair Hebrews leaves open at Heb 4:9: the inheritance is given, the rest remains.