Genesis 50:10

10. The threshing-floor of Atad Or, the threshing-floor of the thorn . The words may be taken as the proper name of a place, Goren-haatadh . It was beyond Jordan, that is, on the east of Jordan, for such is the natural meaning of this phrase . Accordingly, it appears that this vast procession took a circuitous route, went round the Dead Sea, and entered Canaan on the east . Why they should have taken such a journey does not appear in this narrative, and some have regarded it as so improbable that they have discarded the natural meaning of the language here employed, and have explained beyond Jordan as meaning west of the Jordan . According to Jerome it was called in his time Beth-agla, and some have sought to identify it with the modern Ain Hadjla, the Beth-hoglah of the tribe of Judah, (Joshua 15:6,) situated at the northern end of the Dead Sea, about two miles west of the Jordan . One writing at the east of the Jordan, as the author of this passage is supposed to have done, would have spoken of this place as beyond Jordan. But this identification with Beth-hoglah is of no sufficient authority, and why any writer should have designated a place west of the Jordan as beyond Jordan is inexplicable, if this funeral procession did not go anywhere in the vicinity of the Jordan. Better, therefore, to suppose that this round-about journey was taken to avoid conflict with hostile tribes then occupying the country on the direct road to Hebron. For a similar reason the whole house of Israel at a later day compassed the land of Edom and entered Canaan from the east. At this place, perhaps nothing but a threshing-floor surrounded by thornbushes, but affording a suitable place for the purpose, they mourned with a great and very sore lamentation for the space of seven days. Thus to the seventy days of mourning in Egypt, (Genesis 50:3,) they now added a full week at the borders of Canaan.