Joshua 17

¹ A portion was awarded by lot to Manasseh, because he was Joseph’s first-born son. To Machir, Manasseh’s eldest son and father of Gilead, there fell, as was right for a fighting man, the country of Gilead and Bashan.

² And portions were also given to Manasseh’s other sons, according to their clans: to the sons of Abiezer, the sons of Helek, the sons of Asriel, the sons of Shechem, the sons of Hepher, the sons of Shemida: these were the clans of the male children of Manasseh son of Joseph.

³ Zelophehad son of Hepher, son of Gilead, son of Machir, son of Manasseh, had no sons, only daughters, whose names are these: Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milcah and Tirzah.

⁴ These came to the priest Eleazar and to Joshua the son of Nun and to the leaders, and said, ‘Yahweh ordered Moses to give us an inheritance among our brothers’. According to Yahweh’s order, therefore, they were given an inheritance among the brothers of their father.

⁵ In this way there fell to Manasseh ten portions besides the country of Gilead and Bashan which lies across the Jordan,

⁶ since Manasseh’s daughters received an inheritance as well as his sons. The country of Gilead itself belonged to Manasseh’s other sons.

⁷ The boundary of Manasseh was, on the side of Asher, Michmethath, which is opposite Shechem, and thence continued

⁸ to the right to Jashib at the spring of Tappuah. The territory of Tappuah belonged to Manasseh, but Tappuah on Manasseh’s border belonged to the sons of Ephraim.

⁹ The boundary passed down to the wadi Kanah (south of the wadi were the Ephraimite towns, besides those which Ephraim had among the towns of Manasseh, the territory of Manasseh being north of the wadi), and it ended at the sea.

¹⁰ Southwards Ephraim, northwards Manasseh, both bounded by the sea; they touched Asher to the north and Issachar to the east.

¹¹ In Issachar and in Asher; Manasseh had Beth-shean and its dependent towns, Ibleam and its dependent towns, the inhabitants of Dor and En-dor and their dependent towns, the inhabitants of Taanach and Megiddo and their dependent towns, and a third of the Nepheth.

¹² But because the sons of Manasseh could not take possession of these towns, the Canaanites managed to hold their own in the country.

¹³ However, when the Israelites became stronger, they put the Canaanites to forced labour, though they never drove them out.

¹⁴ The House of Joseph spoke thus to Joshua, ‘Why have you given me for inheritance only one share, only one portion, when my people are many because Yahweh has so blessed me?’

¹⁵ Joshua answered, ‘If your people are so many, go up to the woodland region and clear yourselves the forest of the country of the Perizzites and the Rephaim, since the highlands of Ephraim are too small for you’.

¹⁶ The sons of Joseph answered, ‘The highlands are not enough for us, and what is more, all the Canaanites living in the plain have iron chariots, and so have those in Beth-shean and its dependent towns, and those in the plain of Jezreel’.

¹⁷ Joshua said to the House of Joseph, to Ephraim and Manasseh, ‘You are a large population and one of great strength; you shall not have one share only

¹⁸ but a mountain shall be yours; it is covered with woods, but you must clear it, and its boundaries shall be yours, since you cannot drive out the Canaanite because of his iron chariots and his superior strength’.