‘The ascent of Akrabbim’ — SCORPION PASS. Aqrab is a scorpion, and ma’aleh aqrabbim is the scorpions’ climb: a steep road up out of the rift, on the southern line of Canaan at Numbers 34:4. ⚠ The shelf splits nine to four. Nine transliterate and the sting survives only in a note (KJV and ASV 'the ascent of Akrabbim', RV60 'la subida de Acrabim', and the Geneva going furthest with 'Maaleh Akrabbim', transliterating even the word for the ascent). ⭐ Four translate it, and three of those four are the shelf's most freely-rendering versions: the NIV and the Living Bible both print 'Scorpion Pass' and the NVI 'la cuesta de los Escorpiones'. The fourth, the Douay-Rheims, is there for a different reason — it renders the Vulgate closely, and the Vulgate had already translated the name: ascensum Scorpionis, 'the ascent of the Scorpion', singular where the Hebrew is plural. This project had already decided the same way at Judges 1:36, where it prints ‘the Ascent of Scorpions’ (beside ‘the Rock’ for Sela), and Numbers 34 follows that precedent. ⭐ The two verses put the same pass to opposite work: in Numbers 34 it is a corner of the land Israel is being given, fixed in a deed; in Judges 1:36 it is the last place named in a chapter about how much of that land Israel never took, marking how far the AMORITE’s territory reached. ⚠ It is usually placed at Naqb es-Safa south-west of the Dead Sea, but that identification rests on the general fit of the route rather than on anything excavated, and the coordinates here are marked approximate accordingly. Joshua 15:3 names it again (not yet on these pages).