Joshua 19:1

This chapter details the territories assigned to the remaining six tribes. The first of these remaining six was Simeon.

SIMEON

"And the second lot came out for Simeon, even for the tribe of the children of Simeon according to their families: and their inheritance was in the midst of the inheritance of the children of Judah. And they had for their inheritance Beer-sheba, or Sheba, and Moladah, and Hazar-shual, and Balah, and Ezem, and Eltolad, and Bethul, and Hormah, and Ziklag, and Beth-marcaboth, and Hazar-susah, and Beth-lebaoth, and Sharuhen; thirteen cities and their villages: Ain, Rimmon, and Ether, and Ashan: and all the villages that were round about these cities to Baalath-beer, Ramah of the South. This is the inheritance of the tribe of the children of Simeon according to their families. Out of the part of the inheritance of the children of Judah was this inheritance of Simeon; for the portion of the children of Judah was too much for them: therefore the children of Simeon had inheritance in the midst of their inheritance."

"And the second lot came out for Simeon ..." This was the second lot of this group of the final seven. "Most of these towns are in the Negeb; however, two of them, Ether and Ashan, are in the Shephelah."[1] This was according to the prophecy in Deuteronomy 33:6. Notice that no boundaries at all are listed here, just these seventeen cities. The general area in which this inheritance lay was described by Dummelow: "It was in the Negeb, or south country, that slopes away from the Hebron range toward the desert, bounded on the west by the Mediterranean, and on the east by the Dead Sea and the Valley of Edom.[2] The tribe of Simeon was a diminishing factor in Israel, the same being, of course, a fulfillment of the prophecies concerning Simeon.