Joshua 12:3

3. [ From the plain The from here as in the previous verse, is confusing. The sense and connexion will be better seen in the following literal rendering of the Hebrew: And ( Sihon ruled) the plain, as far as the sea of Chinneroth, eastward, and as far as the sea of the plain, the Salt Sea, eastward, on the way toward Beth-jeshimoth, and from the south under the ravines of Pisgah. The plain is the Jordan valley on the east side from the Dead Sea to the Sea of Galilee.] The Salt Sea is so called because of the exceeding saltness of its waters twenty-six pounds of salt to one hundred of water; and a whole mountain ridge on its southwest shore is composed of rock salt. It is commonly called the Dead Sea because no living thing abides in its waters. It is thirteen hundred feet below the Mediterranean, and has no outlet. The Sea of Chinneroth was afterwards called the Sea of Galilee, Sea of Tiberias, and Lake of Gennesaret. See notes and cut at Matthew 4:13. Beth-jeshimoth means house of desolations. It was a Moabite city in the desert at the northeastern extremity of the Dead Sea. Schwarz mentions a Beth-jisimuth as still existing in that locality, but the spot needs further examination.

Ashdoth-pisgah The ravines of Pisgah; the gorges at the foot or on the sides of the mountain through which the torrents flow. Comp. chap. Joshua 10:40, note, and Deuteronomy 3:17. The hill Pisgah was opposite Jericho, on the mountains of Abarim, but no traces of the name have been met with in modern times in that locality. See on Deuteronomy 34:1.