For only Og king of Bashan remained of the remnant of giants; behold, his bedstead was a bedstead of iron; is it not in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? nine cubits was the length thereof, and four cubits the breadth of it, after the cubit of a man. Only Og ... remained of the remnant of giants - literally, of Rephaim. He was not the last giant, but the only living remnant in the Transjordanic country (Joshua 15:14) of a certain gigantic race (the Rephaim), supposed to be the most ancient inhabitants of Palestine.
Behold, his bedstead ... of iron - х `eres (H6210) barzel (H1270)]. Although beds in the East are, with the common people, nothing more than a simple mattress, bedsteads are not unknown: they are in use among the great, who prefer them of iron or other metals, not only for strength and durability; but for the prevention of the troublesome insects which, in warm climates, commonly infest wood. Some writers, however, suppose that black basalt is meant-a species of stone with which the Hauran abounds, and which contains a large proportion of iron ore.
Taking the cubit at half a yard ("after the cubit of a man" - i:e., the common cubit = 18 inches, the Memphis measure; as Sir Isaac, Newton calls it, 'the profane and adventitious cubit'-a mode of reckoning used by the Jews only in coarse operations and inferior things), the bedstead of Og would measure 13 1/2 feet, so that, as beds are usually a little larger than the persons who occupy them, the stature of the Amorite king maybe estimated about 11 or 12 feet; or he might have caused his bed to be made much larger than was necessary, as Alexander the Great did for each of his foot soldiers, to impress the Indians with an idea of the extraordinary strength and stature of his men, (see other instances of gigantic stature, Josephus, 'Antiquities,' b. 18:, ch.
iv., sec. 5; 'Herodotus,' b. 1:, ch. 68:)
But how did Og's bedstead come to be in Rabbath of the children of Ammon? In answer to this question a variety of conjectures have been suggested-namely, that the Ammonites had carried it off as a trophy in some victory over Og; that Og had, on the eve of engagement, conveyed it to Rabbath for safety; or, upon his defeat, had fled to Rabbath, where he died and was buried in this coffin; or finally, that Moses, after capturing it, may have sold it to the Ammonites, who had kept it as an antiquarian curiosity, until their capital was sacked in the time of David (2 Samuel 12:26-31). This is a most unlikely supposition, and, besides, renders it necessary to consider the latter clause of this verse as an interpolation inserted long after the time of Moses.
To avoid this some eminent critics take the Hebrew word rendered "bedstead" to mean 'coffin,' 'bier,' or 'sarcophagus.' They think that the king of Bashan, having been wounded in battle, fled to Rabbath, where he died and was buried; hence, the dimensions of his 'coffin' are given (Dathe, Ros).
Rabbath of the children of Ammon. Rabbah, signifying 'multitude,' 'greatness,' was a name given to several Canaanite towns both in the east and west of Jordan. But it is chiefly applied in Scripture to the capitals of the Moabites and Ammonites. The metropolis of the latter is sometimes called by the simple designation of Rabbath, at other times as here, 'Rabbath of beni-Ammon.' It was originally in the possession of the Zuzim, a branch of the Rephaim; and on the extinction of that ancient race the Ammonites extended their territory to that eastern frontier. It stood embosomed amid hills, on a small stream, which is now known as Moiet-Amman (the Ammon Water), a small tributary of the Jabbok (Wady Zerka). Since Og's iron bedstead was in that city, the presumption is that it was included within his dominions, and, being but a recent acquisition, retained its former name, as "the plains of Moab" did, after it had fallen, by right of conquest, to Sihon.