And the people journeyed from Kibrothhattaavah unto Hazeroth,.... After having stayed there a month or more, as is gathered from Numbers 11:20,

and abode at Hazeroth; at least seven days, as appears from Numbers 12:15; which, according to Bunting (g), was eight miles from Kibrothhattaavah, or Taberah, which were the same place.

(g) Travels, p. 82.

From the graves of greediness the people removed to Hazeroth, and there they remained (היה as in Exodus 24:12). The situation of these two places of encampment is altogether unknown. Hazeroth, it is true, has been regarded by many since Burckhardt (Syr. p. 808) as identical with the modern Hadhra (in Robinson's Pal. Ain el Hudhera), eighteen hours to the north-east of Sinai, partly because of the resemblance in the name, and partly because there are not only low palm-trees and bushes there, but also a spring, of which Robinson says (Pal. i. p. 223) that it is the only spring in the neighbourhood, and yields tolerably good water, though somewhat brackish, the whole year round. But Hadhra does not answer to the Hebrew חצר, to shut in, from which Hazeroth (enclosures) is derived; and there are springs in many other places in the desert of et Tih with both drinkable and brackish water. Moreover, the situation of this well does not point to Hadhra, which is only two days' journey from Sinai, so that the Israelites might at any rate have pitched their tents by this well after their first journey of three days (Numbers 10:33), whereas they took three days to reach the graves of lust, and then marched from thence to Hazeroth. Consequently they would only have come to Hadhra on the supposition that they had been about to take the road to the sea, and intended to march along the coast to the Arabah, and so on through the Arabah to the Dead Sea (Robinson, p. 223); in which case, however, they would not have arrived at Kadesh. The conjecture that Kibroth-hattaavah is the same as Di-Sahab (Deuteronomy 1:1), the modern Dahab (Mersa Dahab, Minna el Dahab), to the east of Sinai, on the Elanitic Gulf, is still more untenable. For what end could be answered by such a circuitous route, which, instead of bringing the Israelites nearer to the end of their journey, would have taken them to Mecca rather than to Canaan? As the Israelites proceeded from Hazeroth to Kadesh in the desert of Paran (Numbers 13:3 and Numbers 13:26), they must have marched from Sinai to Canaan by the most direct route, through the midst of the great desert of et Tih, most probably by the desert road which leads from the Wady es Sheikh into the Wady ez-Zuranuk, which breaks through the southern border mountains of et Tih, and passes on through the Wady ez-Zalakah over el Ain to Bir-et-Themmed, and then due north past Jebel Araif to the Hebron road. By this route they could go from Horeb to Kadesh Barnea in eleven days (Deuteronomy 1:2), and it is here that we are to seek for the two stations in question. Hazeroth is probably to be found, as Fries and Kurtz suppose, in Bir-et-Themmed, and Kibroth-hattaavah in the neighbourhood of the southern border mountains of et Tih.

And the people journeyed from Kibrothhattaavah unto Hazeroth; and abode at Hazeroth.

abode at: Heb. they were in

Margin Kibroth-hattaavah

i.e. graves of lust. Num 33:17

35. Hazeroth-The extreme southern station of this route was a watering-place in a spacious plain, now Ain-Haderah.

11:31-35 God performed his promise to the people, in giving them flesh. How much more diligent men are in collecting the meat that perishes, than in labouring for meat which endures to everlasting life! We are quick-sighted in the affairs of time; but stupidity blinds us as to the concerns of eternity. To pursue worldly advantages, we need no arguments; but when we are to secure the true riches, then we are all forgetfulness. Those who are under the power of a carnal mind, will have their lusts fulfilled, though it be to the certain damage and ruin of their precious souls. They paid dearly for their feasts. God often grants the desires of sinners in wrath, while he denies the desires of his own people in love. What we unduly desire, if we obtain it, we have reason to fear, will be some way or other a grief and cross to us. And what multitudes there are in all places, who shorten their lives by excess of one kind or other! Let us seek for those pleasures which satisfy, but never surfeit; and which will endure for evermore.