Commentaire de citation sur Les Juges 15:9

And the war spread. And the war spread. Similar to, "and behold they were spread out [נְטוּשִׁים] across the face of the entire land"³ Below 30:16. and to "and they were spread out [וַיִנָּטְשׁוּ] at Lehi."⁴Shoftim 15:9.

ויעל משם באר שבע. This was not far away from Gerar as we already explained. As to the reason for the expression ויעל, “he went up,” the reason for this is that the part of the Land of Israel which is known as the traditional Land of Israel was on a spiritually higher level than the part occupied by the Philistines. This is also why we find the expression ויעלו פלשתים in Judges 15,9 (against Shimshon) as well as the phrase uttered by King Sha-ul in Samuel I 14,36 נרדה אחרי פלשתים, “Let us pursue the Philistines by descending.” This expression occurs again and again. [this seems unnecessary as any student of the topography of Eretz Yisrael knows that the Philistines lived in the coastal strip, i.e. the topographically lowest region of the country, so that considerations distinguishing between areas of higher sanctity and lesser sanctity are hardly needed to help us understand the wording of the Torah here. Ed.] All these stories about the digging of the wells and the names they were called by were intended to inform us that in the part of Eretz Yisrael traditionally promised to Avraham, his son Yitzchok was digging according to his undisputed right. In those areas he also did not encounter opposition when naming these wells. All of this was an indication to them of which parts of Eretz Yisrael G’d had meant for them to plant seed in, i.e. the part of the land that G’d would give to the Israelites in the first instance. (under Joshua).The regions in which the Philistines dwelled did not really come under full control of the Israelites until many hundreds of years later. This accounts for the ongoing wars at intervals between the Israelites and the Philistines. These skirmishes were basically border-wars, neither side planning to conquer the territory of the other permanently. [according to the author the problem would be permanently settled only in Messianic times. Ed.] It is an outstanding issue similar to the territory of three Canaanite tribes, the Kenite, Knizite and Kadmoni, which formed part of G’d’s promise to Avraham in chapter 15 at the covenant between the pieces but has never yet been under Jewish sovereignty.