JOURNEY

The word “journey” is often used in the Bible to designate a general distance covered. (Ge 31:23; Ex 3:18; Nu 10:33; 33:8) The distance covered in a day depended on the means of transport used and the conditions and terrain encountered by the traveler. An average day’s journey on land was perhaps 32 km (20 mi) or more. But a “sabbath day’s journey” was far less. (Mt 24:20) Acts 1:12 indicates that a “sabbath day’s journey” separated Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives. Probably because of reckoning from two different starting points, Josephus gives this distance once as five furlongs (925 m; 3,034 ft) and another time as six furlongs (1,110 m; 3,640 ft). Rabbinic sources, on the basis of Joshua 3:4, indicate a “sabbath day’s journey” to be 2,000 cubits (890 m; 2,920 ft).