Biblical places
Hormah
Where Israel was defeated by an Amalekite-Canaanite coalition after a rash advance following the failed spy mission (Numbers 14:45), and later where Israel made a vow and won a victory that gave the place its name (Numbers 21:3). Its exact location among several Negev tells east of Beersheba remains unsettled among scholars.
Sources and location confidence
- Location confidence
- Disputed
- Tel Masos (Khirbet el-Meshash), disputed
- 31.2131, 34.9667
Aharoni proposed Tel Masos as Hormah, but Finkelstein and others reject this, viewing it instead as an Amalekite/Philistine settlement — the exact location remains disputed.
Related Bible passages
These are selected indexed references, not an exhaustive list of every mention in the Bible.
Numbers 14:45
Then the Amalekites came down, and the Canaanites which dwelt in that hill, and smote them, and discomfited them, even unto Hormah.
Deuteronomy 1:44
And the Amorites, which dwelt in that mountain, came out against you, and chased you, as bees do, and destroyed you in Seir, even unto Hormah.
Joshua 12:14
The king of Hormah, one; the king of Arad, one;
Judges 1:17
And Judah went with Simeon his brother, and they slew the Canaanites that inhabited Zephath, and utterly destroyed it. And the name of the city was called Hormah.
1 Samuel 30:30
And to them which were in Hormah, and to them which were in Chorashan, and to them which were in Athach,
1 Chronicles 4:30
And at Bethuel, and at Hormah, and at Ziklag,
Numbers 21:3
And the LORD hearkened to the voice of Israel, and delivered up the Canaanites; and they utterly destroyed them and their cities: and he called the name of the place Hormah.
Joshua 15:30
And Eltolad, and Chesil, and Hormah,