Komentaryong Sumisipi para sa Mga Bilang 33:36

ויבאו בני ישראל, “The Children of Israel arrived, etc.;” the arrival of which the Torah speaks were was during the fortieth year of their wanderings. Their lengthy detour around the territory of Edom who had denied them passage and whom G-d had not allowed them to harass in any way, had now been completed. It had commenced at Kadesh Barnea, and was concluded in the desert of Tzin. The Torah summarises this period here although it comprised 18 separate moves during which the Tabernacle had been erected and taken apart each time. In Numbers 33, 1936, the details of these moves have been recorded for posterity. The first encampment was at a place called Ritmah, the last at the edge of the desert of Tzin. Concerning that period we read Moses recalling in Deuteronomy 2,5: ונפן ונסע המדברה דרך ים סוף ונסב את הר שעיר ימים רבים, “we turned around and journeyed toward the desert in the region of the sea of reeds and marched around Mount Seir, for many years.” That period concluded there in verse 8 with: “we detoured our brethren the children of Esau that dwell in Seir, from the way of the Aravah from Eilat to Etzion Gaver.” From there they arrived at Kadesh, boundary of the Kingdom of Edom, as stated in Numbers 33, 36: “they journeyed from Etzion Gaver and encamped at the desert of Tzin, at Kadesh. What is missing here is only G-d’s warning not to harass the people of Edom (Compare Deuteronomy 2,5).

וישב העם בקדש, ‘the people settled in Kadesh.” Kadesh is the name of a town. The desert Tzin mentioned in our verse is also referred to in the list of all the points where the Israelites made camp in Parshat Massey. (33,36). The “Kadesh” mentioned here is not the same as the “Kadesh-Barneiah” mentioned there. We must not confuse the desert of Tzin with the desert Sin, a word spelled with the letter ס. That wilderness is situated between Eylim and Mount Sinai. Psalms 29,8 mentions יחיל ה' מדבר קדש, “the Lord convulses the wilderness of Kadesh.” Numbers 33,11-15 enumerates 5 way stations between the desert of Sin and the desert of Sinai.

THE WILDERNESS OF SIN WHICH IS BETWEEN ELIM AND SINAI. The reason for this [geographic description] is to distinguish between this wilderness of Sin and the other wilderness, Tzin, written with the letter tzade, where the Israelites came in the fortieth year [of their stay in the wilderness] and Miriam died there.²⁸²Numbers 20:1. This is why Scripture mentions there, And they pitched in the wilderness of Tzin — the same is Kadesh,²⁸³Ibid., 33:36. in order to differentiate it [from the wilderness of Sin mentioned here].