Suburbs

The suburbs are the open belts of land surrounding the Levitical cities — pasture and grazing ground attached to each town the Levites received in place of a tribal inheritance. The term names a fixed allotment with measured dimensions, set aside for the Levites' livestock and personal property.

The Levitical Allotment

When the Levites are to be given cities to live in, those cities come bound up with their suburbs. The cattle and movable property of the Levites are to be sustained on this open ground: "the cities they will have to dwell in; and their suburbs will be for their cattle, and for their substance, and for all their beasts" (Nu 35:3). The suburbs are not an afterthought but part of what makes the Levitical city a workable inheritance for a tribe with no agricultural territory of its own.

The Measured Belt

The suburbs are dimensioned precisely. From the wall of each Levitical city outward, a belt of a thousand cubits is to be measured round about (Nu 35:4). The full square is then defined by two thousand cubits on each of the four sides — east, south, west, north — with the city itself in the middle: "And you⁺ will measure outside the city for the east side two thousand cubits, and for the south side two thousand cubits, and for the west side two thousand cubits, and for the north side two thousand cubits, the city being in the midst. This will be to them the suburbs of the cities" (Nu 35:5).

Implementation at the Conquest

When the land is divided in the days of Joshua, the suburbs are carried over from the Mosaic instruction into the actual allotment. Joseph having become two tribes (Manasseh and Ephraim), the Levites receive no territorial portion — only cities, and with each city its surrounding suburbs: "they gave no portion to the Levites in the land, except cities to dwell in, with its suburbs for their cattle and for their substance" (Jos 14:4). The category established in Numbers becomes a feature of the settled tribal map.