8 The town of Tappuah was on Manasseh's border with Ephraim. Although the land around Tappuah belonged to Manasseh, the town itself belonged to Ephraim.
9-10 Then the border went west to the Kanah Gorge and ran along the northern edge of the gorge to the Mediterranean Sea. The land south of the gorge belonged to Ephraim. And even though there were a few towns that belonged to Ephraim north of the gorge, the land north of the gorge belonged to Manasseh.The western border of Manasseh was the Mediterranean Sea, and the tribe shared a border with the Asher tribe on the north-west and with the Issachar tribe on the north-east.
11 Manasseh was supposed to have the following towns with their surrounding villages inside the borders of Issachar's and Asher's tribal lands:Beth-Shan, Ibleam, Endor, Taanach, Megiddo, and Dor, which is also called Naphath.
12 But the people of Manasseh could not capture these towns, so the Canaanites kept on living in them.
13 When the Israelites grew stronger, they made the Canaanites in these towns work as their slaves, though they never did force them to leave.
14 One day the Joseph tribes came to Joshua and asked, “Why didn't you give us more land? The Lord has always been kind to us, and we have too many people for this small region.”
15 Joshua replied, “If you have so many people that you don't have enough room in the hill country of Ephraim, then go into the forest that belonged to the Perizzites and the Rephaim. Clear out the trees and make more room for yourselves there.”