Parshat Masei

You can read the basics here.

• Why does the record of our ancestors' 40-year wanderings in the wilderness come so late in the story? (See Numbers 33:1-49.)
  
• Note that the Negev south of the Yam HaMelach (Salt Sea/Dead Sea) is not part of the original Promised Land. (See Numbers 34:3.) I had read that the farms there don't come under the rules of the Shmittah Year because this area is not part of the biblical Eretz Yisrael/Land of Israel.
  
• Did anyone ever figure out what Nachlah/Nachal Mitzraim (the Brook of Egypt) is? See Numbers 34:5 and here.)
  
• The Cities of Refuge were an excellent idea. (See Numbers, chapter 35.) It's also nice to see some provision being made for the Leviim/Levites to make a living outside of the sacred precincts.
  
• While it's true, and to the credit of biblical law, that the land of the deceased father who had no sons became the property of his daughters, it could also be argued that the daughters themselves became the "property" of their father's tribe. See Numbers, chapter 36.) You win some, you lose some.