‘ And the border went out to the sloping hillside of Ekron northward, and the border was drawn to Shikkeron, and passed along to Mount Baalah, and went out at Jabneel, and the goings out of the border were at the sea.'
The border then continued north westward to the northern side of Ekron, which was later one of the five-city confederation, with their towns, of the Philistines. If it is to be identified with Khirbet al-Muqanna‘ surface excavations suggest that it was occupied in the early bronze age and then not again until the early iron age (when the Philistines arrived) at which point the walled city covered forty acres, and was characterised by Philistine pottery Thus at the time of allocation it was not at a high level of occupation although prominent enough to be a border marker and have villages connected with it (Joshua 15:45). It was twice captured by the Israelites (Judges 1:18; 1 Samuel 7:14) but not permanently retained (1 Samuel 5:10; 1 Samuel 17:52).
“And the border was drawn to Shikkeron, and passed along to Mount Baalah, and went out at Jabneel, and the goings out of the border were at the sea.” Shikkeron is possibly Tell el-Ful. Mount Baalah is probably the ridge of el-Mughar. Jabne-el (‘God causes to build') is probably to be connected later with the Philistine city Jabneh (2 Chronicles 26:6), later Jamnia where the Sanhedrin was reformed after the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD. Its modern name is Yebneh.
“And the goings out of the border were at the sea.” Compare Joshua 15:4; Joshua 15:7. The phrase indicates the point where a line ends, in this case at the Great Sea.
So the northern border of Judah turned north west from the shore of the Dead Sea, passed south of Jericho and Wadi Qelt, skirted the southern edge of Jerusalem with a foothold in Jerusalem and possession of the fields to the south, went past Kiriath-jearim and descended via the forested slopes of the Judean hills to Bethshemesh from where it followed the Sorek valley to the sea.