“ While Israel dwelt in Heshbon and her towns, and in Aroer and her towns, and in all the cities that are along by the side of Arnon for three hundred years, why did you not recover them within that time?”
Indeed since then Israel had occupied the cities of the area, even those on the very borders of Moab, for ‘three hundred years'. And there had been no attempt at any time to claim even those cities along the border of the Arnon as theirs, never mind the capital Heshbon itself. Why, if these towns really belonged to Chemosh and Moab, had they not recovered them previously? Thus they had clearly not seen it in the way the king of Ammon did now.
The ‘three hundred years' means a long period of time going back into the distant past. Three indicates completeness and the hundreds indicate a long period. It is doubtful if it was intended literally. It was a generalisation. No one would have kept a record of the number of years. We know of no official recorder in Israel until the time of David.
But even if taken literally, by ancient reckoning it need represent only about one hundred and fifty years, each ‘century' being dated from one well known occurrence to another, for a part of one hundred would have been treated as ‘one hundred'. We must remember that there was no continual, carefully worked out calendar. Years were dated backward or forward from outstanding events (e.g. Amos 1:1) or from the accession of kings.
“Heshbon.” Tel Hesban, which has been mooted as Heshbon, had no remains dating back as far as the time of Sihon, although there are remains dating back to this time. Sihon's Heshbon was thus probably one of the nearby mounds yet to be excavated. ‘Aroer.' This is probably modern ‘Ara‘ir overlooking the deep gorge of the River Arnon (compare Numbers 32:34). It was later fortified by Mesha, king of Moab as witnessed on the Moabite stone, ‘he built Aroer and made the road by the Arnon'.