Comentario sobre Josué 14:15

The greatest man among the giants. The father of Achimon, Sheishai, and Talmai was Arba.⁷Chevron was the home of these four famous giants, the three brothers and their father. Another explanation: [It was called Kiryas-arba, the city of four]⁸There are other interpretations regarding what the “four” refers to. Some say it refers to the burial place of four great men and their wives: Odom and Chava, Avrohom and Soroh, Yitzchok and Rivkoh, and Yaakov and Leah. because of the father and the three sons, for they are referred to as the offspring of the “Anak,” [the giant].⁹See Bamidbar 13:22.

And the land had respite from war. This refers back to the previous subject.¹⁰See above 11:23. The conclusion of the verse does not seem connected to the subject matter of Caleiv’s receiving Chevron as his inheritance. Rashi, therefore comments that indeed, it refers to the earlier topic discussed in the previous chapter. After the seven years of conquest, the Emorites were humbled and they no longer gathered for war against them. Therefore they began to be occupied in the division of the land [among the tribes] the Midrash Aggadah comments that the greatest man among giants refers to our father, Avrohom. Because of him, the land [of the Canaanite people,] had respite from war during the forty years [that Bnei Yisroel] lingered in the wilderness. They were so rewarded because they honored the Patriarch in Kiryas-arba, when they said to him, “You are a prince of God in our midst.”¹¹Bereishis 23:6.