The Hebrew word midbar is used to describe three types of countryside: pastureland (Joel 2:22; Jer 23:1); uninhabited land (Job 38:26) and large, desolate, desert tracts (Exod 19:1-2; Joel 2:3).
There is a great deal of difference between the pasturelands which did not have enough water to grow crops, but still had enough grass to feed the animals, and the “great and terrible wilderness” of Sinai. Yet the same Hebrew word is used to describe both types of terrain. What links these two…
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