'Wilderness' in the Bible

The sons of [Jethro] the Kenite, Moses’ father-in-law, went up from the City of Palms (Jericho) with the sons of Judah, to the wilderness of Judah which is in the Negev (South country) near Arad; and they went and lived with the people.

Gideon said, “For that [response], when the Lord has handed over Zebah and Zalmunna to me, I will thrash your bodies with the thorns and briars of the wilderness.”

He took the elders of the city, and thorns of the wilderness and briars, and with them he punished the men of Succoth.

For when they came up from Egypt, Israel walked through the wilderness to the Red Sea and came to Kadesh;

Then they went through the wilderness and went around the land of Edom and the land of Moab, and came to the east side of the land of Moab, and they camped on the other side of the [river] Arnon; but they did not enter the territory of Moab, for the Arnon was the [northern] boundary of Moab.

They took possession of all the territory of the Amorites, from the Arnon as far as the Jabbok, and from the wilderness [westward] as far as the Jordan.

Therefore, they turned their backs before the men of Israel [and fled] toward the direction of the wilderness, but the battle followed and overtook them. As the [fighting men of the] sons of Benjamin ran among them, the Israelites of the cities came out and destroyed them.

The survivors [of Benjamin] turned and fled toward the wilderness to the rock of Rimmon, and Israel caught five thousand of them on the roads and overtook them at Gidom and killed two thousand of them.

But six hundred men turned and fled toward the wilderness to the rock of Rimmon and stayed at the rock of Rimmon for four months.