The Philistines assembled themselves together to fight with Israel, thirty thousand chariots, and six thousand horsemen, and people as the sand which is on the sea-shore in multitude: and they came up, and encamped in Michmash, eastward of Beth Aven.
and they came up, and pitched in Michmash, eastward from Bethaven; where Saul, before he went to Gilgal, had his quarters, 1 Samuel 13:2. Bethaven was a place near Bethel, on the east of it, Joshua 7:2 though Bethel itself was afterwards so called when Jeroboam had set up the worship of the calves there, Hosea 4:15 it signifying the house of vanity or iniquity.