Vers. 49-51. Conclusion of the Distribution of the Land. — Vers. 49, 50. When the land was distributed among the tribes according to its territories, the Israelites gave Joshua an inheritance in the midst of them, according to the command of Jehovah, namely the town of Timnath-serah, upon the mountains of Ephraim, for which he asked, and which he finished building; and there he dwelt until the time of his death (chap. xxiv. 30; Judg. ii. 9). " According to the word of the Lord" {lit. " at the mouth of Jehovah") does not refer to a divine oracle communicated through the high priest, but to a promise which Joshua had probably received from God at the same time as Caleb, viz. in Kadesh, but which, like the promise given to Caleb, is not mentioned in the Pentateuch (see at chap, xv. 13, xiv. 9). Timnath-serah, called Timnath-heres in Judg. ii. 9, must not be confounded with Timnah in the tribe of Dan (ver. 43, chap. xv. 10), as is the case in the Onom. It has been preserved in the present ruins and foundation walls of a place called Tibneh, which was once a large town, about seven hours to the north of Jerusalem, and two hours to the west of Jiljilia, standing upon two mountains, with many caverns that have been used as graves (see Eli Smith in Ritter, Erdk. xvi. pp. 562 sqq., and Rob. Bibl. Res. p. 141). — Ver. 51. Closing formula to the account of the distribution of the land, which refers primarily to chap, xviii. 1 sqq., as the expression " in Shiloh" shows, but which also includes chap. xiv.— xvii.
After the distribution of the land by lot among the tribes of Israel, six towns were set apart, in accordance with the Mosaic instructions in Num. xxxv., as places of refuge for unintentional manslayers. Before describing the appointment and setting apart of these towns, the writer repeats in vers. 1-6 the main points of the Mosaic law contained in Num. xxxv. 9-29 and Deut. xix. 1-13, with reference to the reception of the manslayers into these towns. D3P uri, " give to you" i.e. appoint for yourselves, " cities of refuge" etc. In ver. 6, the two regulations, " until he stand before the congregation for judgment " and u until the death of the high priest" are to be understood, in accordance with the clear explanation given in Num. xxxv. 24, 25, as meaning that the manslayer was to live in the town till the congregation had pronounced judgment upon the matter, and either given him up to the avenger of blood as a wilful murderer, or taken him back to the city of refuge as an unintentional manslayer, in which case he was to remain there till the death of the existing high priest. For further particulars, see at Num. xxxv. — Vers. 7-9. List of the cities: Levitical cities were chosen, for the reasons explained in the Commentary on the Pentateuch, iii. p. 262. — Ver. 7. In the land on this side (viz. Canaan) they sanctified the following cities. In the north, Kedesh (see at chap. xii. 22), in Galil, on the mountains of Naphtali. Galil (a circle) was a district in the northern part of the subsequent province of Galilee; it is called D^ian 77a, circle of the heathen, in Isa. viii. 23, because an unusually large number of heathen or Gentiles were living there. In the centre of the land, Shechem, upon the mountains of Ephraim (see at chap. xvii. 7). And in the south, Kirjatharba, i.e. Hebron, upon the mountains of Judah (see at chap. x. 3). — Ver. 8. The cities in the land on the other side had already been appointed by Moses (Deut. iv. 41-43). For the sake of completeness, they are mentioned here again: viz. Bezer, Ramoth in Gilead, and Golan (see at Deut. iv. 43). The subject is brought to a close in ver. 9. rnjftftn ^ty signifies neither urbes congregationis (Kimchi) nor urbes asyli (Gesenius), but cities of appointment, — those which received the appointment already given and repeated again in what follows.
Vers. 1-3. After the cities of refuge had been set apart, the towns were also selected, which the different tribes were to give up for the priests and Levites to dwell in according to the Mosaic instructions in Num. xxxv. 1-8, together with the necessary fields as pasturage for their cattle. The setting apart of the cities of refuse took place before the appointment of the Levitical towns, because the Lord had given commandment through Moses in Num. xxxv. 6 that they were to give to the Levites the six cities of refuge, and forty-two cities besides, i.e. forty-eight cities in all. From the introductory statement in vers. 1, 2, that the heads of the fathers (see Ex. vi. 14, 25) of the Levitical families reminded the distribution committee at Shiloh of the command of God that had been issued through Moses, that towns were to be given them to dwell in, we cannot infer, as Calvin has done, that the Levites had been forgotten, till they came and asserted their claims. All that is stated in these words is, " that when the business had reached that point, they approached the dividers of the land in the common name of the members of their tribe, to receive by lot the cities appointed for them. They simply expressed the commands of God, and said in so many words, that they had been deputed by the Levites generally to draw lots for those forty-eight cities with their suburbs, which had been appointed for that tribe" (Masius). The clause appended to Shiloh, " in the land of Canaan" points to the instructions in Num. xxxiv. 29 and xxxv. 10, to give the children of Israel their inheritance in the land of Canaan.
Vers. 4-8. Number of the cities which the different families of Levi received from each tribe. The tribe of Levi was divided into three branches, — the Gershonites, the Kohathites, and the Merarltes (see Num. iii. and Ex. vi. 16-19). The Kohathites again were divided into the four families of Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel (Ex. vi. 18); and the family of Amram into two lines, consisting of the descendants of Moses and Aaron (Ex. vi. 20). The priesthood was committed to the line of Aaron (Num. xviii. 1-7); but the other descendants of Amram, i.e. the descendants of Moses, were placed on a par with the other descendants of Levi, and numbered among the simple Levites (Num. iii.; 1 Chron. v. 27- vi. 34). The towns in which the different families of Levi were to dwell were determined by lot; but in all probability the towns which each tribe was to give up to them were selected first of all, so that the lot merely decided to which branch of the Levites each particular town was to belong. — Ver. 4. The first lot came out for the families of Kohath, and among these again for the sons of Aaron, i.e. the priests. They received thirteen towns from the tribes of Judah, Simeon, and Benjamin. " This did not happen by chance; but God, according to His wonderful counsel, placed them just in that situation which He had determined to select for His own temple" (Calvin). — Ver. 5. The rest of the Kohathites, i.e. the descendants of Moses, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel, received ten towns from Ephraim, Dan, and half Manasseh. — Ver. 6. The Gershonites received thirteen towns from Issachar, Asher, Naphtali, and half Manasseh in Bashan. — Ver. 7. The Merarites received twelve towns from Reuben, Gad, and Zebulun.
The number of towns thus assigned to the Levites will not appear too large, if we consider, (1) that judging from the number of towns in so small a land, the greater part of them cannot have been very large; (2) that the Levites were not the sole possessors of these towns, but simply received the number of dwelling-houses which they actually required, with meadow land for their cattle in the suburbs of the towns, whilst the rest of the space still belonged to the different tribes; and (3) that if the 23,000 males, the number of the Levites at the second census which wras taken in the steppes of Moab, were distributed among the thirty-five towns, it would give 657 males, or 1300 male and female Levites for every town. On the other hand, offence has been taken at the statement, that thirteen towns were given up to the priests; and under the idea that Aaron could hardly have had descendants enough in Joshua's time from his two sons who remained alive to fill even two towns, to say nothing of thirteen, the list has been set down as a document which was drawn up at a much later date (Maurer, etc.). But any one who takes this ground not only attributes to the distribution commission the enormous shortsightedness of setting apart towns for the priests merely to meet their existing wants, and without any regard to the subsequent increase which would take place in their numbers, but he also forms too large an estimate of the size of the towns, and too small an estimate of the number of the priests. Moreover, it was never intended that the towns should be filled with priests' families; and the number of priests alive at that time is not mentioned anywhere. But if we bear in mind that Aaron died in the fortieth year of the journeys of the Israelites, at the age of 123 years (Num. xxxiii. 38), ana therefore was eighty-three years old at the time of the exodus from Egypt, his descendants might have entered upon the fourth generation seven years after his death. Now his two sons had twenty-four male descendants, who were the founders of the twenty-four classes instituted by David (1 Chron. xxiv.). And if we only reckon six males to each of the next generations, there would be 144 in the third generation, who would be between the ages of twenty-five and thirty-five when the distribution of the land took place, and who might therefore have had 864 male children living at that time; so that the total number of males in the families of the priests might have amounted to more than 1000, that is to say, might have consisted of at least 200 families.
Vers. 9-42. Names of the Levitical Towns} — Vers. 9-19. The priests towns: (a) in Judah and Simeon (vers. 9-16); (b) in Benjamin (vers. 17—19). — Vers. 9 sqq. In the tribe of Judah the priests received Kirjath-arba, or Hebron, with the necessary pasturage round about the town (see Num. xxxv. 2), whilst the field of the town with the villages belonging to it remained in the hands of Caleb and his family as their possession (chap. xiv. 12 sqq.). — Ver. 13 contains a repetition of ver. 11, occasioned by the parenthetical remark in ver. 12. They also received Libnah in the lowland (see chap. xv. 42, x. 29); Jattir (chap. xv. 48), Eshtemoah
1 There is a similar list in 1 Chron. vi. 54-81, though in some respects differently arranged, and with many variations in the names, and corruptions of different kinds in the text, -which show that the author of the Chronicles has inserted an ancient document that was altogether independent of the book before us. Thus in the Chronicles there are only forty-two towns mentioned by name instead of forty-eight, although it is stated in vers. 45 sqq. that 13 -f- 10 + 13 + 12, i.e. forty-eight towns in all, were given up to the Levites. The names omitted are (1) Jutta in Judah; (2) Gibeon in Benjamin; (3 and 4) Ethekeh and Gibbethon in Dan; (5 and 6) and Jokneam and Nahalal in Zebulun (compare vers. 16, 17, 23, 34, and 35, with 1 Chron. vi. 59, 60, 68, 77. In some cases also the author of the Chronicles gives different names, though some of them indeed are only different forms of the same name, e.g. Hilen for Holon, Alemeth for Almon, Ashtaroth for Beeshterah, Mashal for Misheal, Hammon for Ilammoth-dor, Kirjathaim for Kartan (compare 1 Chron. vi. 58, 60, 71, 74, 76, with Josh. xxi. 15, 18, 27, 30, 32); or in some cases possibly different names of the same town, e.g. Jokmeam for Kibzaim, and Ramoth for Jarmuth, and Anem for En-gannim (1 Chron. vi. 68, 83, and Josh. xxi. 22, 29); whilst some evidently give the true reading, viz. Ashan for Ain, and Bileam for Gath-rimmon (1 Chron. vi. 59, 70; Josh. xxi. 16, 25). The majority, however, are faulty readings, viz. Aner for Tanach, Kedesh for Kishon, Hukok for Helkath, Rimmon and Tabor (compare 1 Chron. vi. 70, 72, 75, 77, with Josh, xxi 25, 28, 31, 34, 35)
(chap. xv. 50), Ilolon (chap. xv. 51), and Debir (chap. xv. 15, 49, x. 38) on the mountains of Judah; Ain, for which we should read Ashan (1 Chron. vi. 44; cf. chap. xv. 42), in the tribe of Simeon (chap. xix. 7); Juttah on the mountains (chap. xv. 55); and Bethshemesh in the lowland (chap. xv. 10). — Vers. 17 sqq. In the tribe of Benjamin they received Gibeon (see chap. ix. 3), Geba (chap, xviii. 24), also Anathoth and Ahnon, which are missing in the list of the towns of Benjamin (see at chap, xviii. 24). — Vers. 20-42. Towns of the Levites.— Vers. 20-26. The other Kohathite* received four towns from the tribe of Ephraim (vers. 21, 22), four from Dan (vers. 23, 24), and two from the half tribe of Manasseh on this side of the Jordan (ver. 25). From Ephraim they received Shechem (see chap. xvii. 7), Gezer (chap. x. 33), Kibzaim — for which we find Jockmeam in 1 Chron. vi. 68, possibly a different name for the same place, which has not yet been discovered — and Beth-horon, whether Upper or Lower is not stated (see chap. x. 10). From Dan they received Elthekeh and Gibbethon (chap. xix. 44), Ajalon and Gatli-rimmon (chap. xix. 42, 45). From half Manasseh they received Taanach (chap. xvii. 11, xii. 21) and Gath-rimmon — this is evidently a copyist's error, occasioned by the wandering of the eye to the previous verse, for Bileam (1 Chron. vi. 70), i.e. Jibleam (chap. xvii. 11). — Ver. 26. Thus they received ten towns in all. — Vers. 27-33. The Gershonites received two towns from eastern Manasseh: Golan (chap. xx. 8; Deut. iv. 43), and Beeshterah. Beeslderah (contracted from Beth-eshterah, the house of Astarte), called Ashtaroth in 1 Chron. vi. 56, may possibly have been the capital of king Og (Ashtaroth-karnaim, Gen. xiv. 5), if not one of the two villages named Astaroth, which are mentioned by Eusebius in the Onom. (s. v. Astharoth-karnaim), and are described by Jerome as duo castella in Batancea, novem inter se millibus separata inter Adaram et Abilam civitates, though Adara and Abila are too indefinite to determine the situation with any exactness. At any rate, the present Busra on the east of the Hauran cannot be thought of for a moment; for this was called Boaaopa or Boaoppd, i.e. i"1"^??, in ancient times, as it is at the present day (see 1 Mace. v. 26, and Joseph. Ant. xii. 8, 3), and was corrupted into Bostra by the Greeks and Romans. Nor can it be the present KuVat Bustra on the north of Banyas upon a shoulder of the Hermon, where there are the ruins of a magnificent building, probably a temple of ancient date (Burckhardt, Syr. pp. 93, 94; Rob. Bibl. Res. pp. 414-15), as Knobel supposes, since the territory of the Israelites did not reach so far north, the land conquered by Joshua merely extending to Baal-gad, i.e. Banyas, at the foot of the Hermon (see chap. xi. 17), and the land to the east of the Jordan, or Bashan, only to the Hermon itself, or more correctly, merely to the districts of Geshuri and Maacah at the south-eastern border of the Hermon (see at Deut. iii. 8, 14). — Vers. 28, 29. From Issachar they received four towns: Kishon (chap. xix. 20), Dabrath (chap. xix. 12), Jarmuth = Remeth (see chap. xix. 21), and En-gannim (chap. xix. 21, or Anem, 1 Chron. vi. 73). — Vers. 30, 31. From Asher they received four towns: Mishal or Masai (chap. xix. 2Q; cf. 1 Chron. vi. 74), Abdon (chap. xix. 28), Helkath (chap. xix. 25, called Hukok in 1 Chron. vi. 75, probably a copyist's error), and Rehob (chap. xix. 28). — Ver. 32. From Naphtali they received three towns: Kedesh (chap. xix. 37 and xii. 22), Hammoth-dor (called Hammath in chap. xix. 35, and Hammon in 1 Chron. vi. 76), and Kartan (contracted from Kartain for Kirjathaim, 1 Chron. vi. 76; like JDothan in 2 Kings vi. 13, from Dothain in Gen. xxxvii. 17). Kartan is not mentioned among the towns of Naphtali in chap. xix. 33 sqq.; according to Knobel it may possibly be Katanah, a place with ruins to the north-east of Safed (Van de Velde, Mem. p. 147). — Ver. 33. They received thirteen towns in all. — Vers. 34-40. The Merarites received twelve towns. From the tribe of Zebulun they received four: Jokneam (chap. xix. 11: see at chap. xii. 22), Kartah and Dimnah? which are not mentioned among the towns of Zebulun in chap. xix. 11 sqq., and are unknown, and Nahalal (chap. xix. 15). — Vers. 36, 37. From Reuben they received four: Bezer (chap. xx. 8: see Deut. iv. 43), Jahza, Kedemoth, and Mephaath (chap. xiii. 18).2 — Vers. 38, 39. From Gad they received four towns: Ramoth in Gilead, and Mahanaim (see at chap. xiii. 26), Heshbon (chap. xiii. 17) and Jaezer (chap. xiii. 25: see at Num. xxi. 32). — Ver. 40. They received
1 Many commentators identify Dimnah with Rimmono in 1 Chron. vi. 77, but without sufficient reason; for the text of the Chronicles is no doubt corrupt in this passage, as it has only two names, Rimmono and Tabor, instead of four.
2 R. Jacob ben Chajim has omitted vers. 36 and 37 from his Rabbinical Bible of the year 1525 as spurious, upon the authority of Kimchi and the larger Masora; but upon insufficient grounds, as these verses are to be found in many good MSS. and old editions of an earlier date than 1525, as well as in all the ancient versions, and could not possibly have been wanting from the very first, since the Merarites received twelve towns, which included the four that belonged to Reuben. In those MSS. in which they are wanting, the omission was, no doubt, a copyist's error, occasioned by the o/xotoTi'KtvTov (see de Rossi varix lectt. ad h. /., and /. //. Michaelis' Note to his Hebrev Bible).
twelve towns in all. — In vers. 41 and 42 the list of the Levitical towns is closed with a statement of their total number, and also with the repetition of the remark that " these cities were every one with their suburbs round about them." 'Dl *VJJ V?, city city, i.e. every city, with its pasture round about it.
Vers. 43-45 form the conclusion to the account of the division of the land in chap, xiii.-xxi., which not only points back to chap. xi. 23, but also to chap. i. 2-6, and connects the two halves of our book together. By the division of Canaan among the tribes of Israel, the promise which Joshua had received from God after the death of Moses was fulfilled (chap. i. 2 sqq.). The Lord had given Israel the whole land which He had sworn to the fathers (Gen. xii. 7, xv. 18, compared with Josh. i. 3, 4); and they had now taken possession of it to dwell therein. — Ver. 44. He had also procured them rest round about, as He had sworn to their fathers, inasmuch as not a man of all their enemies stood against them. The expression " gave them rest," etc., points back to Deut. xii. 9, 10, and refers to all the divine promises of the Pentateuch which assured the Israelites of the peaceable possession of Canaan, such as Ex. xxxiii. 14, Deut. iii. 20, etc. No enemy had been able to withstand them, as the Lord had promised Joshua (chap. i. 5). " The Lord delivered all their enemies into their hand" It is true the Canaanites were not all exterminated; but those who were left had become so powerless, that they could neither accomplish nor attempt anything against Israel, so long as the Israelites adhered faithfully to their God, or so long as Joshua and the elders who were his contemporaries were alive (Judg. ii. 6 sqq.), because the Lord had overwhelmed them with fear and terror before the Israelites.1 — Yer. 45. Of all the good words which the Lord had spoken to the house of Israel not one had fallen, i.e. remained unfulfilled (Num. vi. 12); all had come to pass (yid. chap, xxiii. 14). 2ten i:nrr73 relates to the gracious promises of God with regard to the peaceful possession of Canaan, which formed the basis of all the salvation promised to Israel, and the pledge of the fulfilment of all the further
1 " If any one should raise a question as to their actual peace, the solution is easy enough. The tribes of Canaan were so alarmed and broken down with their fear, that in their opinion nothing could serve their purpose better than to purchase peace from the children of Israel by the most obsequious servility. Clearly, therefore, the land was subdued and their home at peace, since no one disturbed them, or attempted anything against them; there were no threats, no snares, no violence, and no conspiracy." — Calvin
promises of God. Notwithstanding the fact that many a tract of country still remained in the hands of the Canaanites, the promise that the land of Canaan should be given to the house of Israel for a possession had been fulfilled; for God had not promised the immediate and total destruction of the Canaanites, but only their gradual extermination (Ex. xxiii. 29, 30; Deut. vii. 22). And even though the Israelites never came into undisputed possession of the whole of the promised land, to the full extent of the boundaries laid down in Num. xxxiv. 1-12, never conquering Tyre and Sidon for example, the promises of God were no more broken on that account than they were through the circumstance, that after the death of Joshua and the elders his contemporaries, Israel was sometimes hard pressed by the Canaanites; since the complete fulfilment of this promise was inseparably connected with the fidelity of Israel to the Lord.1
Vers. 1-8. After the conquest and division of the land, Joshua sent the auxiliaries of the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half Manasseh back to their homes, with a laudatory acknowledgment of the help they had given to their brethren, and a paternal admonition to adhere faithfully to the Lord and His law, and with a parting blessing (vers. 1-6). By the expression " then Joshua called" etc., the occurrence described in this chapter is placed in a general manner after the conquest and subjugation of Canaan, though not of necessity at the close of the distribution of the land. As the summons to these tribes to go with their brethren into Canaan, to assist them in the war, formed the commencement of Joshua's plans
1 With reference to this apparent discrepancy between the promises of God and the actual results, Calvin observes, that uin order to remove every appearance of discrepancy, it is right to distinguish well between the clear, unwavering, and certain fidelity of God in the fulfilment of His promises, and the weakness and indolence of the people, which caused the blessings of God to slip from their hands. Whatever war the people undertook, in whatever direction they carried their standards, there was victory ready to their hand; nor was there anything to retard or prevent the extermination of all their enemies except their own slothfulness. Consequently, although they did not destroy them all, so as to empty the land for their own possession, the truth of God stood out as distinctly as if they had; for there would have been no difficulty in their accomplishment of all that remained to be done, if they had only been disposed to grasp the victories that were ready to their hand. ' for the conquest of Canaan (chap. i. 12 sqq.), their dismission to their home very properly forms the conclusion to the history of the conquest of this land by the Israelites. We might therefore assume, without in any way contradicting the words of the text, that these auxiliaries had been dismissed immediately after the war was ended. Even in that case, the account of their dismission would stand in its proper place, " since it was only right that the history itself, which relates to the conquest and possession of the land, should be fully completed before any other narratives, or any casual occurrences which took place, were introduced to break the thread" (Lightfoot, App. i. p. 42). On the other hand, however, the circumstance that the two tribes and a half were dismissed from Shiloh, where the tribes assembled for the first time during the casting of the lots, favours the conclusion that the dismission did not take place till after the lots had been cast; that is to say, contemporaneously with the advance of the other tribes into their possessions.— Vers. 2, 3. Joshua acknowledged that they had done all that they were under any obligation to do towards Moses and himself (Num. xxxii. 20 sqq.; Josh. i. 16, 17). "Kept the charge of the commandment" i.e. observed what had to be observed in relation to the commandment of the Lord (see at Lev. viii. 35 and Gen. xxvi. 5). — Ver. 4 points back to chap. i. 15. " Unto your tents" for to your homes, — an antiquated form of expression, as in Deut. xvi. 7, Judg. vii. 8, etc. — Ver. 5. Remembering, however, the changeableness of the human heart, Joshua appends to the acknowledgment of their fidelity in the performance of their duty the pressing admonition, to continue still to observe the law of Moses faithfully, to walk in the ways of the Lord and serve Him with the whole heart, which was simply a repetition of what Moses had impressed in a fatherly way upon the hearts of the people (see Deut. iv. 4, 29, vi. 5, x. 12, xi. 13, etc.). — Ver. 6. Thus Joshua dismissed them with blessings. — In ver. 7, the writer, for the sake of clearness, refers again to the fact that only half of Manasseh had received its inheritance from Moses in Bashan, whereas the other had received its inheritance through Joshua on the west of the Jordan (cf. chap. xiv. 3, and xviii. 7). To us such repetitions appear superfluous; but they are closely connected with the copious breadth of the early historical style of the Hebrews, which abounded in repetitions. The verb jro (gave) wants its object, injriK 0r irpru, which may easily be supplied from the context. This interpolation involved a further repetition of the fact, that Joshua also dismissed them (the Manassites of the other side) with a blessing, in order that the words might be appended with which Joshua dismissed the two tribes and a half to their homes, namely, the admonition to share the rich booty which they had accumulated with their brethren at home, in accordance with the instructions which Moses had given them with reference to the war with the Midianites (Num. xxxi. 25 sqq.). Vers. 9-12. On the way home, when the two tribes and a half had reached the border of Canaan, they built a large conspicuous altar in the district of the Jordan, in the land of Canaan, i.e. on this side of the Jordan: " a great altar to see to," i.e. one which caught the eye on account of its size, since it was to serve for a memorial (vers. 24 sqq.). The definition appended to Shiloh, a in the land of Canaan" (ver. 9), serves to bring out the antithesis u into the land of Gilead," by which we are to understand the whole of the country to the east of the Jordan, as in Num. xxxii. 29, Deut. xxxiv. 1, Judg. v. 17, etc. tnx:? both in the form and meaning the same as in Num. xxxii. 30, made possessors, i.e. settled down. H)"1?? JN'r?, the circles of the Jordan, is synonymous with JT)*n 133 in Gen. xiii. 10, and signifies that portion of the Ghor which was upon the western side of the Jordan. — Vers. 11, 12. The Israelites (on this side) heard that the tribes in question had built the altar " opposite to the land of Canaan11 (lit. in the face or in front of the land of Canaan), *Ujr5>N, " at the opposite region of the children of Israel" (two descriptions which may be explained on the supposition that the name of Canaan is used in a restricted sense, the valley of the Jordan being expressly excepted, and Canaan considered as only extending to the valley of the Jordan). When they heard this, the whole congregation (in its heads and representatives) assembled at Shiloh, to go up, i.e. with the intention of going, to make war against them. The congregation supposed that the altar had been built as a place for sacrifice, and therefore regarded it as a wicked violation of the commandment of God with regard to the unity of the sacrificial altar (Lev. xvii. 8, 9; Deut. xii. 4 sqq.), which they ought to punish according to the law in Deut. xiii. 13 sqq. This zeal was perfectly justifiable, and even praiseworthy, as the altar, even if not erected as a place for sacrifice, might easily be abused to that purpose, and thus become an occasion of sin to the whole nation. In any case, the two tribes and a half ought not to have erected such a building without the consent of Joshua or of the high priest.1
1 " We know how sternly the law prohibited the use of two altars: because it was the will of God that His worship should be restricted to one place. When,
Vers. 13-20. The congregation therefore sent Phinehas, the son of the high priest and his presumptive successor in this office, witli ten princes, one from each tribe (not the tribe-princes, but a head of the fathers' houses of the families of Israel), to Gilead, to the two tribes and a half, to call them to account for building the altar. — Yer. 16. Assuming at the outset that the altar was intended for a second place of sacrifice in opposition to the command of God, the delegates, with Phinehas no doubt as their speaker, began by reproaching them for falling away from the Lord. " What faithlessness is this (<TO: see at Lev. v. 15) that ye have committed against the God of Israel, to turn away this day from Jehovah, in that ye have builded you an altar, that ye might rebel this day against Jehovah?" 1^0 (to rebel) is stronger than?VO, — Vers. 17 sqq. To show the greatness of the sin through apostasy from the Lord, the speaker reminds them of two previous acts of sin on the part of the nation, which had brought severe judgments upon the congregation. " Is there too little for us in the iniquity of Peor (i.e. with Peor, or through the worship of Peor, Num. xxv. 3), from which we have not cleansed ourselves till this day, and there came the plague upon the congregation of Jehovah?" \Wn$ is an accusative: see Ges. § 117, 2; Ewald, § 277, d. That plague, of which 24,000 Israelites died, was stayed through the zeal of Phinehas for the honour of the Lord (Num. xxv. 4-9, 11). The guilt connected with the worship of Peor had thereby been avenged upon the congregation, and the congregation itself had been saved from any further punishment in consequence of the sin. When Phinehas, therefore, affirmed that the congregation had not yet been cleansed from the crime, he did not mean that they were still bearing or suffering from the punishment of that crime, but that they were not yet cleansed from that sin, inasmuch as many of them were still attached to idolatry in their hearts, even if they had hitherto desisted from it outwardly from fear of the infliction of fresh judgments. — Ver. 18. " And
therefore, from the very appearance it could not fail to occur to the mind of any one that they were establishing a second altar, who would not have condemned them as guilty of sacrilege, for introducing rites and ceremonies at variance with the law of God? And since it might so naturally be regarded as a wicked deed, they ought certainly to have consulted their brethren in so grave and important a matter; and it was especially wrong to pass by the high priest, when the will of God might have been learned from his lips. They were deserving of blame, therefore, because they acted as if they had been alone in the world, and did not consider what offence might easily arise from the novelty of their proceedings."-— Calvin.
to-day ye turn away from the Lord again," and aie about to brine* His wrath upon the whole congregation again through a fresh rebellion. — Ver. 19. "And truly" the speaker continued, "if the land of your possession should be unclean" sc. so that you think it necessary to have an altar in the neighbourhood to expiate your sins and wipe away your uncleannesses, " pass over into the land of Jehovalis possession, where His dwelling-place stands, and settle in the midst of us (' settle/ as in Gen. xxxiv. 10); but do not rebel against Jehovah nor against us, by building an altar beside the (one) altar of Jehovah our God." TlO is construed first of all with 2, and then with the accusative; the only other place in which the latter occurs is Job xxiv. 13. — Ver. 20. He finally reminded them of the sin of Achan, how that had brought the wrath of God upon the whole congregation (chap, vii.); and, moreover, Achan was not the only man who had perished on account of the sin, but thirty-six men had fallen on account of it at the first attack upon Ai (chap, vii. 5). The allusion to this fact is to be understood as an argument a minori ad majus, as Masius has shown. " If Achan did not perish alone when he committed sacrilege, but God was angry with the whole congregation, what think ye will be the consequence if ye, so great a number, commit so grievous a sin against God?"
Vers. 21—29. In utter amazement at the suspicion expressed by the delegates of the congregation, the two tribes and a half affirm with a solemn oath, that it never entered into their minds to build an altar as a place of sacrifice, to fall away from Jehovah. The combination of the three names of God — El, the strong one; Elohlm, the Supreme Being to be feared; and Jehovah, the truly existing One, the covenant God (ver. 22) — serves to strengthen the invocation of God, as in Ps. 1. 1; and this is strengthened still further by the repetition of these three names. God knows, and let Israel also know, sc. what they intended, and what they have done. The EN which follows is the usual particle used in an oath. " Verily (it was) not in rebellion, nor in apostasy from Jehovah" sc. that this was done, or that we built the altar. " Mayst Thou not help us to-day," sc. if we did it in rebellion against God. An appeal addressed immediately to God in the heat of the statement, and introduced in the midst of the asseveration, which was meant to remove all doubt as to the truth of their declaration. The words which follow in ver. 23, " that we have built," etc., continue the oath: If we have done this, to build us an altar, to turn away from the Lord, or to offer thereon burnt-offering, meat-offering, or peaceoffering, may Jehovah himself require it (£*TJ, as in Deut. xviii. 19; cf. 1 Sam. xx. 16). Another earnest parenthetical adjuration, as the substance of the oath, is continued in ver. 24. " But truly (N? DK1, with an affirmative signification) from anxiety, for a reason {lit. on account of a thing) have we done this, thinking ("i0*O, since we thought) in time to come your sons might say to our sons, What have ye to do with Jehovah, the God of Israel V i.e. He does not concern you; He is our God. " Jehovah has made the Jordan a boundary between us and your sons; ye have no part in Jehovah. Thus your sons might make our sons cease to fear Jehovah," i.e. might make them desist from the worship of Jehovah (for the infinitive form Hi* instead of the abbreviated form tih? used in 1 Sam. xviii. 29, there are analogies in pf) in Ezek. xxiv. 3, and P^y, Eccl. v. 11, whereas nKT is the only form used in the Pentateuch). There was some reason for this anxiety. For, inasmuch as in all the promises and laws Canaan alone (the land on this side of the Jordan, Num. xxxiv. 1-12) is al frays mentioned as the land which Jehovah would give to His people for their inheritance, it was quite a possible thing that at some future time the false conclusion might be drawn from this, that only the tribes who dwelt in Canaan proper were the true people of Jehovah. — Vers. 26 sqq. " So we thought, we will make ourselves to build an altar (an expression derived from the language of ordinary life, for ' we will build ourselves an altar'), not for burnt-offerings and slain-offerings; but it shall be a witness between us and you, and between our generations after us, that we may perform the service of Jehovah before His face (i.e. before the tabernacle in which Jehovah was enthroned), with our burnt-offerings, slain-offerings, and peace-offerings," — in order, as they repeat in ver. 276 from vers. 24, 25, that they might not be denied a part in Jehovah in time to come. For if it should so happen in time to come, that this should be said to them and to their descendants, they would say (or reply), " Behold the copy of the altar of Jehovah, which our fathers made, not for burnt-offerings," etc. (ver. 286, as in vers. 266, 27a). For this reason they had built the altar according to the pattern of the altar before the tabernacle, and that not in their own land, but on the western side of the Jordan, where the dwelling-place of Jehovah was standing, as a witness that they worshipped one and the same God with the tribes on this side. — Ver. 29. The speakers conclude with an expression of horror at the thought of rebelling against Jehovah. *3DD W ^"pR, " far be it
Vers. 30-34. This explanation pleased the delegates of the congregation, so that Phinehas bore this testimony to the tribes on the east of the Jordan: " Now (to-day) we perceive that Jehovah is in the midst of us; because ("^K, quod, as in Gen. xxxi. 49, etc.) ye have not committed this unfaithfulness towards Jehovah, since (TK, then, if ye had only this intention) ye have saved the children of Israel out of the hand of Jehovah," i.e. preserved them from His judgments. — Vers. 32, 33. They then returned to Canaan and informed the congregation. And the thing pleased them, so that they praised the Lord, sc. for having kept their brethren on the other side from rebellion, and they thought no more of going to war against them, or laying waste the land of the tribes on the east of the Jordan. — Ver. 34. The Reubenites and Gadites (half Manasseh is omitted in vers. 33, 34, for the sake of brevity) called the altar " witness is it between us that Jehovah is God" (s3 introduces the words). This is at once a name and an explanation, namely in this sense: they gave the altar the name of " witness between us," because it was to be a witness that they also acknowledged and worshipped Jehovah as the true God.
After the division of the land among the tribes, Joshua had withdrawn to Timnath-serah, on the mountains of Ephraim (chap. xix. 50), to spend the last days of his life there in the quiet enjoyment of his own inheritance. But when the time of his departure from the earth was drawing near, remembering the call which he had received from the Lord (chap. i. 6-8), he felt constrained to gather the people together once more in the persons of their representatives, to warn them most earnestly of the dangers of apostasy from the Lord, and point out the evils that would follow (chap, xxiii.); and then after that, in a solemn assembly of the nation at Shechem, to review the abundant mercies which the Lord had conferred upon Israel from the calling of Abraham to that day, that he might call upon them to remain stedfast and faithful in the worship of their God, and then solemnly renew the covenant with the Lord.1
1 M The pious solicitude of Joshua furnishes an example worthy of imitation by all who have the charge of others. For just as a father would not be
Chap, xxiii. Exhortation to the Tribes of Israel to remain faithful to their calling. — Vers. 1, 2. The introduction to the discourse which follows is attached in its first part to chap. xxii. 3, 4, and thus also to chap. xxi. 43, 44, whilst in the second part it points back to chap. xiii. 1. The Lord had given the people rest from all their enemies round about, after the land had been subdued and divided by lot (chap. xxi. 43, 44). Joshua was already an old man at the termination of the war (chap. xiii. 1); but since then he had advanced still further in age, so that he may have noticed the signs of the near approach of death. He therefore called together the representatives of the people, either to Timnath-serah where he dwelt (chap. xix. 50), or to Shiloh to the tabernacle, the central sanctuary of the whole nation, as the most suitable place for his purpose. " All Israel" is still further defined by the apposition, " its elders, and its heads, and its judyes, and its officers" This is not to be understood, however, as referring to four different classes of rulers; but the term elders is the general term used to denote all the representatives of the people, who were divided into heads, judges, and officers. And the heads, again, were those who stood at the head of the tribes, families, and fathers' houses, and out of whose number the most suitable persons were chosen as judges and officers (Deut. i. 15; see my Bibl. Arch. ii. § 143). Joshua's address to the elders of all Israel consists of two parts, which run parallel to one another so far as the contents are concerned, vers. 25-13 and vers. 14-16. In both parts Joshua commences with a reference to his age and his approaching death, in consequence of which he felt constrained to remind the people once more of all the great things that the Lord had done for them, and to warn them against falling away from their gracious covenant God. Just as Joshua, in this the last act of his life, was merely treading in the footsteps of Moses, who had concluded his life with the fullest exhortations to the people to be faithful to the Lord (Deut. i. 30), so his address consists entirely of reminiscences from the Pentateuch, more especially from Deuteronomy, as he had
regarded as sufficiently careful if he merely thought of the interests of his children up to the time of his own death, and did not extend his thoughtfulness on their behalf still further, and as far as was in his power endeavour to provide for their welfare when he himself should be dead; so good rulers ought to look forward that they may not only leave behind them a well-organized state, but may also strengthen and secure its existence for a long time to come." — Calvin (with special reference to 2 Pet. i. 13-15).
nothing fresh to announce to the people, but could only impress the old truth upon their minds once more.
Vers. 26-13. Joshua commenced his address by reminding them of the greatest manifestations of grace which they had received from the Lord, namely, by referring to what the Lord had done to all these nations (the Canaanites) before them, when He fought for Israel, as Moses had promised them (Deut. i. 30 and iii. 22). — Ver. 3. "Before you" sc. smiting and driving them away. — Yer. 4. He (Joshua) had now divided by lot among the tribes of Israel as their inheritance these still remaining (Canaanitish) nations, as the Lord had commanded (chap. xiii. 6, 7), "from Jordan and further all the nations, which 1 have exterminated (i.e. which Joshua had destroyed when Canaan was taken), and the great sea (for i to the great sea') in the west." The breadth of the land of Canaan is here given in a peculiar manner, the terminus a quo being mentioned in the first clause, and the terminus ad quern (though without the preposition *W) in the second; and through the parallelism which exists between the clauses, each clause is left to be completed from the other. So that the whole sentence would read thus: "All these nations which remain... from Jordan to the great sea, also all the nations which I have cut off from Jordan, and to the great sea westward." — Ver. 5. For the Lord would drive all these still remaining nations before the Israelites, and cut them off, and give the Israelites their land for a possession, as He had promised (chap. xiii. 6; cf. Ex. xxiii. 23 sqq.). ^n, as in Deut. vi. 19, ix. 4; and the form BDirr, with Chateph-kametz, on account of the weakness of the n, as in Num. xxxv. 20. Brisrv, as in chap. i. 15. — Vers. 6 sqq. Only let them be strong, i.e. be brave, to keep the law of Moses without fail (cf. chap. i. 7), to enter into no fellowship with these remaining nations (&03, to enter into close intimacy with a person; see ver. 12), and not to pay reverence to their gods in any way, but to adhere stedfastly to the Lord their God as they had hitherto done. To make mention of the names of the idols (Ex. xxiii. 13), to swear by them, to serve them (by sacrifices), and to bow down to them (to invoke them in prayer), are the four outward forms of divine worship (see Deut. vi. 13, x. 20). The concluding words, "as ye have done unto this day" which express a reason for persevering in the attachment they had hitherto shown to Jehovah, " do not affirm that the Israelites had hitherto done all these things fully and perfectly; for who does not know how few mortals there are who devote themselves to God with all the piety and love which He justly demands? But because the nation as a whole had kept the laws delivered to them by Moses, during the time that the government had been in the hands of Joshua, the sins of individual men were left out of sight on this occasion" (Masius). — Vers. 9, 10. For this reason the Lord had driven out great and strong nations before the Israelites, so that no one was able to stand before them. The first hemistich points to the fulfilment of Deut. iv. 38, vii. 1, ix. 1, xi. 23; the second to that of Deut. vii. 24, xi. 25. &£M is placed at the beginning absolutely. — In ver. 10a, the blessing of fidelity to the law which Israel had hitherto experienced, is described, as in Deut. xxxii. 30, upon the basis of the promise in Lev. xxvi. 7, 8, and Deut. xxviii. 7, and in ver. 10b the thought of ver. 3b is repeated. To this there is attached, in vers. 11-13, the admonition to take heed for the sake of their souls (cf. Deut. iv. 15), to love the Lord their God (on the love of God as the sum of the fulfilment of the law, see Deut. vi. 5, x. 12, xi. 13). For if they turned, i.e. gave up the faithfulness they had hitherto displayed towards Jehovah, and attached themselves to the remnant of these nations, made marriages with them, and entered into fellowship with them, which the Lord had expressly forbidden (Ex. xxxiv. 12-16; Deut. vii. 3j, let them know that the Lord their God would not cut off these nations before them any more, but that they would be a snare and destruction to them. This threat is founded upon such passages of the law as Ex. xxiii. 33, Deut. vii. 16, and more especially Num. xxxiii. 55. The figure of a trap, which is employed here (see Ex. x. 7), is still further strengthened by nQ? a snare (cf. Isa. viii. 14, 15). Shotet, a whip or scourge, an emphatic form of the word derived from the poel of LW, only occurs here. " Scourges in your sides, and thorns in your eyes" (see Num. xxxiii. 55). Joshua crowds his figures together to depict the misery and oppression which would be sure to result from fellowship with the Canaanites, because, from his knowledge of the fickleness of the people, and the wickedness of the human heart in its natural state, he could foresee that the apostasy of the nation from the Lord, which Moses had foretold, would take place but too quickly; as it actually did, according to Judg. ii. 3 sqq., in the very next generation. The words " until ye perish" etc., resume the threat held out by Moses in Deut. xi. 17 (cf. chap, xxviii. 21 sqq.).
Vers. 14-16. In the second part of his address, Joshua sums up briefly and concisely the leading thoughts of the first part, giving greater prominence, however, to the curse which would follow apostasy from the Lord. — Ver. 14. Now that Joshua was going the way of all the earth (all the inhabitants of the earth), i.e. going to die (1 Kings ii. 2), the Israelites knew with all the heart and all the soul, i.e. were fully convinced, that of all the good words (gracious promises) of God not one had failed, but all had come to pass (vid. chap. xxi. 45). But it was just as certain that the Lord would bring upon them every evil word that He spake through Moses (Lev. xxvi. 14-33; Deut. xxviii. 15—68, and xxix. 14—28), if they transgressed His covenant. " The evil word" is the curse of rejection (Deut. xxx. 1, 15). u Until He have destroyed:" see Deut. vii. 24, and xxviii. 48. The other words as in ver. 135. If they went after other gods and served them, the wrath of the Lord would burn against them, and they would be quickly destroyed from the good land which He had given them {vid. Deut. xi. 17).
Chap. xxiv. 1-28. Kenewal of the Covenant at the national Assembly in Shechem. — Ver. 1. Joshua brought his public ministry to a close, as Moses had done before him, with a solemn renewal of the covenant with the Lord. For this solemn act he did not choose Shiloh, the site of the national sanctuary, as some mss. of the LXX. read, but Shechem, a place which was sanctified as no other was for such a purpose as this by the most sacred reminiscences from the times of the patriarchs. He therefore summoned all the tribes of Israel, in their representatives (their elders, etc., as in chap, xxiii. 2), to Shechem, not merely because it was at Shechem, i.e. on Gerizim and Ebal, that the solemn establishment of the law in the land of Canaan, to which the renewal of the covenant, as a repetition of the essential kernel of that solemn ceremony, was now to be appended, had first taken place, but still more because it was here that Abraham received the first promise from God after his migration into Canaan, and built an altar at the time (Gen. xii. 6, 7); and most of all, as Ilengstenherg has pointed out (Diss. ii. p. 12), because Jacob settled here on his return from Mesopotamia, and it was here that he purified his house from the strange gods, burying all their idols under the oak (Gen. xxxiii. 19, xxxv. 2, 4). As Jacob selected Shechem for the sanctification of his house, because this place was already consecrated by Abraham as a sanctuary of God, so Joshua chose the same place for the renewal of the covenant, because this act involved a practical renunciation on the part of Israel of all idolatry. Joshua expressly states this in ver. 23, and reference is also made to it in the account in ver. 26. u The exhortation to be faithful to the Lord, and to purify themselves from all idolatry, could not fail to make a deep impression, in the place where the honoured patriarch had done the very same things to which his descendants were exhorted here. The example preached more loudly in this spot than in any other" {Hengstenberg). u And they placed themselves before God." From the expression " before God," it by no means follows that the ark had been brought to Shechem, or, as Knobel supposes, that an altar was erected there, any more than from the statement in ver. 26 that it was " by the sanctuary of the Lord." For, in the first place, " before God " (Elohim) is not to be identified with " before Jehovah," which is used in chap, xviii. 6 and xix. 51 to denote the presence of the Lord above the ark of the covenant; and secondly, even " before Jehovah" does not always presuppose the presence of the ark of the covenant, as Hengstenberg has clearly shown. " Before God" simply denotes in a general sense the religious character of an act, or shows that the act was undertaken with a distinct reference to the omnipresent God; and in the case before us it may be attributed to the fact that Joshua delivered his exhortation to the people in the name of Jehovah, and commenced his address with the words, " Thus saith Jehovah." x
Vers. 2-15. Joshua's address contains an expansion of two thoughts. He first of all recalls to the recollection of the whole nation, whom he is addressing in the persons of its representatives, all the proofs of His mercy which the Lord had given, from the calling of Abraham to that day (vers. 2-13); and then because of these divine acts he calls upon the people to renounce all idolatry, and to serve God the Lord alone (vers. 14, 15). Jehovah is described as the " God of Israel" both at the commencement (ver. 2) and also at the close of the whole transaction, in perfect accordance with the substance and object of the address, which is occupied throughout with the goodness conferred by God upon the race of
1 " It is stated that they all stood before God, in order that the sanctity and religious character of the assembly may be the more distinctly shown. And there can be no doubt that the name of God was solemnly invoked by Joshua, and that he addressed the people as in the sight of God, so that each one might feel for himself that God was presiding over all that was transacted there, and that they were not engaged in any merely private affair, but were entering into a sacred and inviolable compact with God himself." — Calvin.
Israel. The first practical proof of the grace of God towards Israel, was the calling of Abraham from his idolatrous associations, and his introduction to the land of Canaan, where the Lord so multiplied his seed, that Esau received the mountains of Seir for his family, whilst Jacob went into Egypt with his sons.1 The ancestors of Israel dwelt "from eternity" i.e. from time immemorial, on the other side of the stream (the Euphrates), viz. in Ur of the Chaldees, and then at Haran in Mesopotamia (Gen. xi. 28, 31), namely Terah, the father of Abraham and Nahor. Of Terah's three sons (Gen. xi. 27), Nahor is mentioned as well as Abraham, because llebekah, and her nieces Leah and Rachel, the tribe-mothers of Israel, were descended from him (Gen. xxii. 23, xxix. 10, 16 sqq.). And they (your fathers, Terah and his family) served other gods than Jehovah, who revealed himself to Abraham, and brought him from his father's house to Canaan. Nothing definite can be gathered from the expression u other gods," with reference to the gods worshipped by Terah and his family; nor is there anything further to be found respecting them throughout the whole of the Old Testament. We simply learn from Gen. xxxi. 19, 34, that Laban had teraphim, i.e. penates, or household and oracular gods.2 The question also, whether Abraham was an idolater before his call, which has been answered in different ways, cannot be determined with certainty. We may conjecture, however, that he was not deeply sunk in idolatry, though he had not remained entirely free from it in his father's house; and therefore that his call is not to be regarded as a reward for his righteousness before God, but as an act of free unmerited grace. — Vers. 3, 4. After his
1 "He commences with their gratuitous training, by which God had precluded them from the possibility of boasting of any pre-eminence or merit. For God had bound them to himself by a closer bond, because when they were on an equality with others, He drew them to himself to be His own peculiar people, for no other reason than His own good pleasure. Moreover, in order that it may be clearly seen that they have nothing whereof to glory, he leads them back to their earliest origin, and relates how their fathers had dwelt in Chaldaea, worshipping idols in common with the rest, and with nothing to distinguish them from the crowd." — Calvin.
2 According to one tradition, Abraham was brought up in Sabaeisra in his father's house (see Hottinger, Histor. Orient, p. 246, and Philo, in several passages of his works); and according to another, in the Targum Jono.than on Gen. xi. 23, and in the later Kabbins, Abraham had to suffer persecution on account of his dislike to idolatry, and was obliged to leave his native land in consequence. But these traditions are both of them nothing more than conjectures by the later Rabbins.
call, God conducted Abraham through all the land of Canaan (see Gen. xii.), protecting and shielding him, and multiplied his seed, giving him Isaac, and giving to Isaac Jacob and Esau, the ancestors of two nations. To the latter He gave the mountains of Seir for a possession (Gen. xxxvi. 6 sqq.), that Jacob might receive Canaan for his descendants as a sole possession. But instead of mentioning this, Joshua took for granted that his hearers were well acquainted with the history of the patriarchs, and satisfied himself with mentioning the migration of Jacob and his sons to Egypt, that he might pass at once to the second great practical proof of the mercy of God in the guidance of Israel, the miraculous deliverance of Israel out of the bondage and oppression of Egypt. — Vers. 5-7. Of this also he merely mentions the leading points, viz. first of all, the sending of Moses and Aaron (Ex. iii. 10 sqq., iv. 14 sqq.), and then the plagues inflicted upon Egypt. " i" smote Egypt" i.e. both land and people. *]J3 is used in Ex. vii. 27 and xii. 23, 27, in connection with the plague of frogs and the slaying of the first-born in Egypt. The words which follow, " according to that which I did among them, and afterward I brought you out" point back to Ex. iii. 20, and show that the Lord had fulfilled the promise given to Moses at his call. He then refers (vers. 6, 7) to the miraculous deliverance of the Israelites, as they came out of Egypt, from Pharaoh who pursued them with his army, giving especial prominence to the crying of the Israelites to the Lord in their distress (Ex. xiv. 10), and the relief of that distress by the angel of the Lord (Ex. xiv. 19, 20). And lastly, he notices their dwelling in the wilderness " many days" i.e. forty years (Num. xiv. 33). — Vers. 8-10. The third great act of God for Israel was his giving up the Amorites into the hands of the Israelites, so that they were able to conquer their land (Num. xxi. 21-35), and the frustration of the attack made by Balak king of the Moabites, through the instrumentality of Balaam, when the Lord did not allow him to curse Israel, but compelled him to bless (Num. xxii.-xxiv.). Balak " warred against Israel" not with the sword, but with the weapons of the curse, or animo et voluntate (VatabL). " I would not hearken unto Balaam" i.e. would not comply with his wish, but compelled him to submit to my will, and to bless you; " and delivered you out of his (Balak's) hand" when he sought to destroy Israel through the medium of Balaam (Num. xxii. 6, 11). — Vers. 11-13. The last and greatest benefit which the Lord conferred upon the Israelites, was His leading them by miracles of His omnipotence across the Jordan into Canaan, delivering the u lords (or possessors) of Jericho" not " the rulers, i.e. the king and his heroes," as Knobel maintains (see 2 Sam. xxi. 12; 1 Sam. xxiii. 11, 12; and the commentary on Judg. ix. 6), " and all the tribes of Canaan into their hand" and sending hornets before them, so that they were able to drive out the Canaanites, particularly the two kings of the Amorites, Sihon and Og, though " not with their sword and their bow" (yid. Ps. xliv. 4); i.e. it was not with the weapons at their command that they were able to take the lands of these two kings. On the sending of hornets, as a figure used to represent peculiarly effective terrors, see at Ex. xxiii. 28, Deut. vii. 20. In this way the Lord gave the land to the Israelites, with its towns and its rich productions (vineyards -and olive trees), without any trouble on their part of wearisome cultivation or planting, as Moses himself had promised them (Deut. vi. 10, 11). — Vers. 14, 15. These overwhelming manifestations of grace on the part of the Lord laid Israel under obligations to serve the Lord with gratitude and sincerity. u.Now therefore fear the Lord (Wi* for **H*, pointed like a verb n'$, as in 1 Sam. xii. 24, Ps. xxxiv. 10), and serve Him in sincerity and in truth" i.e. without hypocrisy, or the show of piety, in simplicity and truth of heart (yid. Judg. ix. 16, 19). " Put away the gods {Elohim = the strange gods in ver. 23) which your fathers served on the other side of the Euphrates and in Egypt." This appeal does not presuppose any gross idolatry on the part of the existing generation, which would have been at variance with the rest of the book, in which Israel is represented as only serving Jehovah during the lifetime of Joshua. If the people had been in possession of idols, they would have given them up to Joshua to be destroyed, as they promised to comply with his demand (vers. 16 sqq.). But even if the Israelites were not addicted to gross idolatry in the worship of idols, they were not altogether free from idolatry either in Egypt or in the desert. As their fathers were possessed of teraphim in Mesopotamia (see at ver. 2), so the Israelites had not kept themselves entirely free from heathen and idolatrous ways, more especially the demon-worship of Egypt (comp. Lev. xvii. 7 with Ezek. xx. 7 sqq., xxiii. 3, 8, and Amos v. 26); and even in the time of Joshua their worship of Jehovah may have been corrupted by idolatrous elements. This admixture of the pure and genuine worship of Jehovah with idolatrous or heathen elements, which is condemned in Lev. xvii. 7 as the worship of Seirim, and by Ezekiel (I. c.) as the idolatrous worship of the people in Egypt, had its roots in the corruption of the natural heart, through which it is at all times led to make to itself idols of mammon, worldly lusts, and other impure thoughts and desires, to which it cleaves, without being able to tear itself entirely away from them. This more refined idolatry might degenerate in the ease of many persons into the grosser worship of idols, so that Joshua had ample ground for admonishing the people to put away the strange gods, and serve the Lord. — Ver. 15. But as the true worship of the living God must have its roots in the heart, and spring from the heart, and therefore cannot be forced by prohibitions and commands, Joshua concluded by calling upon the representatives of the nation, in case they were not inclined (" if it seem evil unto you") to serve Jehovah, to choose now this day the gods whom they would serve, whether the gods of their fathers in Mesopotamia, or the gods of the Amorites in whose land they were now dwelling, though he and his house would serve the Lord. There is no necessity to adduce any special proofs that this appeal was not intended to release them from the obligation to serve Jehovah, but rather contained the strongest admonition to remain faithful to the Lord.
Vers. 16-25. The people responded to this appeal by declaring, with an expression of horror at idolatry, their hearty resolution to serve the Lord, who was their God, and had showrn them such great mercies. The words, u that brought us up and our fathers out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage" call to mind the words appended to the first commandment (Ex. xx. 2; Deut. v. 6), which they hereby promise to observe. With the clause which follows, " who did those great signs in our sight" etc., they declare their assent to all that Joshua had called to their mind in vers. 3-13. " We also" (ver. 18), as well as thou and thy house (ver. 15). — Vers. 19-21. But in order to place most vividly before the minds of the people to what it was that they bound themselves by this declaration, that they might not inconsiderately vow what they wrould not afterwards observe, Joshua adds, " Ye cannot serve Jehovah" sc. in the state of mind in which ye are at present, or " by your own resolution only, and without the assistance of divine grace, without solid and serious conversion from all idols, and without true repentance and faith" (J. H. Michaelis). For Jehovah is " a holy God" etc. Elohim, used to denote the Supreme Being (see at Gen. ii. 4), is construed with the predicate in the plural. On the holiness of God, see the exposition of Ex. xix. 6. On the expression " a jealous God," see Ex. xx. 5; and on ymb KfeO, Ex. xxiii. 21. The only other place in which the form Nfej? is used for NJP is Nah. i. 2. " If ye forsake the Lord and serve strange gods, He will turn (i.e. assume a different attitude towards you) and do you hurt, after He has done you good," i.e. He will not spare you, in spite of the blessings which He has conferred upon you.)nn is used to denote the judgments threatened in the law against transgressors. — Yer. 21. The people adhered to their resolution, tib, minime, as in chap. v. 14, i.e. we will not serve other gods, but Jehovah. — Vers. 22, 23. Upon this repeated declaration Joshua says to them, u ye are witnesses against yourselves" i.e. ye will condemn yourselves by this your own testimony if ye should now forsake the Lord, u for ye yourselves have chosen you Jehovah to serve Him;" whereupon they answer B'HV, " witnesses are we against ourselves" signifying thereby, " we profess and ratify once more all that we have said" (Rosenmuller). Joshua then repeated his demand that they should put away the strange gods from within them, and incline their hearts (entirely) to Jehovah the God of Israel. D35npa **&* *3H *£•! might mean the foreign gods which are in the midst of you, i.e, among you, and imply the existence of idols, and the grosser forms of idolatrous worship in the nation; but i?.p2 also signifies " within," or "in the heart," in which case the words refer to idols of the heart. That the latter is the sense in which the words are to be understood is evident from the fact, that although the people expressed their willingness to renounce all idolatry, they did not bring any idols to Joshua to be destroyed, as was done in other similar cases, viz. Gen. xxxv. 4, and 1 Sam. vii. 4. Even if the people had carried idols about with them in the desert, as the prophet Amos stated to his contemporaries (Amos v. 26; cf. Acts vii. 43), the grosser forms of idolatry had disappeared from Israel with the dying out of the generation that was condemned at Kadesh. The new generation, which had been received afresh into covenant with the Lord by the circumcision at Gilgal, and had set up this covenant at Ebal, and was now assembled around Joshua, the dying servant of God, to renew the covenant once more, had no idols of wood, stone, or metal, but only the " figments of false gods," as Calvin calls them, the idols of the heart, which it was to put away, that it might give its heart entirely to the Lord, who is not content with divided affections, but requires the whole heart (Deut. vi. 5, 6). — Vers. 24, 25. On the repeated and decided declaration of the people, " the Lard our God will we serve, and to His voice will we hearken" Joshua completed the covenant with them that day. This conclusion of a covenant was really a solemn renewal of the covenant made at Sinai, like that which took place under Moses in the steppes of Moab (Deut. xxviii. G9). " And set them a statute and right at Shechem" sc. through the renewal of the covenant. These words recall Ex. xv. 25, where the guidance of Israel to bitter water, and the sweetening of that water by the means which the Lord pointed out to Moses, are described as setting a statute and right for Israel, and then explained by the promise, that if they would hearken to the voice of Jehovah, He would keep them from all the diseases of Egypt. And in accordance with this, by the renewal of the covenant at Shechem, there were set for Israel a ph, i.e. a statute, which bound the people to a renewed and conscientious maintenance of the covenant, and a BQB^p, or right, by virtue of which they might expect on this condition the fulfilment of all the covenant mercies of the Lord.
Vers. 26-28. All these things (^n Dnrnn are not merely the words spoken on both sides, but the whole ceremony of renewing the covenant) Joshua wrote in the law-book of God, i.e. he wrote them in a document which he placed in the law-book of Moses, and then set up a large stone, as a permanent memorial of what had taken place, on the spot where the meeting had been held, " under the oak that was in the sanctuary of Jehovah." As £*Ji?E2 neither means " at the sanctuary," nor near the sanctuary, nor " in the place where the sanctuary was set up;" the " sanctuary of Jehovah" cannot signify " the ark of the covenant, which had been brought from the tabernacle to Shechem, for the ceremony of renewing the covenant." Still less can we understand it as signifying the tabernacle itself, since this was not removed from place to place for particular sacred ceremonies; nor can it mean an altar, in which an oak could not possibly be said to stand; nor some other illegal sanctuary of Jehovah, since there were none in Israel at that time. The sanctuary of Jehovah under the oak at Shechem was nothing else than the holy place under the oak, where Abraham had formerly built an altar and worshipped the Lord, and where Jacob had purified his house from the strange gods, which he buried under this oak, or rather terebinth tree (Gen. xii. 6, 7, xxxv. 2, 4). This is the explanation adopted by Masius, J. D. Michaelis, and Hengstenberg (Diss. ii. p. 12), In ver. 27 Joshua explains to the people the meaning of the stone which he had set up. The stone would be a witness against the people if they should deny their God. As a memorial of what had taken place, the stone had heard all the words which the Lord had addressed to Israel, and could bear witness against the people, that they might not deny their God. " Deny your God" viz. in feeling, word, or deed. — Ver. 28. Joshua then dismissed the people, each one to his inheritance. He had done all that was in his power to establish the people in fidelity to the Lord.
Vers. 29-33. Death and Burial of Joshua and Eleazar — With the renewal of the covenant Joshua had ended his vocation. He did not formally lay down his office, because there was no immediate successor wTho had been appointed by God. The ordinary rulers of the congregation were enough, when once they were settled in Canaan, viz. the elders as heads and judges of the nation, together with the high priest, who represented the nation in its relation to God, and could obtain for it the revelation of the will of God through the right of the Urim and Thummim. In order therefore to bring the history of Joshua and his times to a close, nothing further remained than to give an account of his death, with a short reference to the fruit of his labours, and to add certain other notices for which no suitable place had hitherto presented itself. — Vers. 29, 30. Soon after these events (vers. 1-28) Joshua died, at the age of 110, like his ancestor Joseph (Gen. 1. 26), and was buried in his hereditary possessions at Timnath-serah, upon the mountains of Ephraim, to the north of Mount Gaash. Timnath-serah is still in existence (see at chap. xix. 50). Mount Gaash, however, has not been discovered. — Yer. 31. Joshua's labours had not remained without effect. During his own lifetime, and that of the elders who outlived him, and who had seen all that the Lord did for Israel, all Israel served the Lord. " The elders" are the rulers and leaders of the nation. The account of the burial of Joseph's bones, which the Israelites had brought with them from Egypt to Canaan (Ex. xiii. 19), is placed after the account of Joshua's death, because it could not have been introduced before without interrupting the connected account of the labours of Joshua; and it would not do to pass it over without notice altogether, not only because the fact of their bringing the bones with them had been mentioned in the book of Exodus, but also because the Israelites thereby fulfilled the promise given by their fathers to Joseph when be died. The burial of Joseph in the piece of field which Jacob had purchased at Shechem (via1. Gen. xxxiii. 19) had no doubt taken place immediately after the division of the land, when Joseph's descendants received Shechem and the field there for an inheritance. This piece of field, however, they chose for a burial-place for Joseph's bones, not only because Jacob had purchased it, but in all probability chiefly because Jacob had sanctified it for his descendants by building an altar there (Gen. xxxiii. 20). The death and burial of Eleazar, who stood by Joshua's side in the guidance of the nation, are mentioned last of all (ver. 33). When Eleazar died, whether shortly before or shortly after Joshua, cannot be determined. He was buried at Gibeah of Phinehas, the place which was given to him upon the mountains of Ephraim, i.e. as his inheritance. Gibeath Phinehas, i.e. hill of Phinehas, is apparently a proper name, like Gibeah of Saul (1 Sam. xv. 34, etc.). The situation, however, is uncertain. According to Eusebius (Onom. s. v. Tafiad*;), it was upon the mountains of Ephraim, in the tribe of Benjamin, and was at that time a place named Gabatha, the name also given to it by Josephus (Ant. v. 1, 29), about twelve Roman miles from Eleutheropolis. This statement is certainly founded upon an error, at least so far as the number twelve is concerned. It is a much more probable supposition, that it is the Levitical town Geba of Benjamin, on the north-east of Ramah (chap, xviii. 24), and the name Gibeah of Phinehas might be explained on the ground that this place had become the hereditary property of Phinehas, which would be perfectly reconcilable with its selection as one of the priests' cities. As the priests, for example, were not the sole possessors of the towns ceded to them in the possessions of the different tribes, the Israelites might have presented Phinehas with that portion of the city which was not occupied by the priests, and also with the field, as a reward for the services he had rendered to the congregation (Num. xxv. 7 sqq.), just as Caleb and Joshua had been specially considered; in which case Phinehas might dwell in his own hereditary possessions in a priests' city. The situation, "upon the mountains of Ephraim," is not at variance with this view, as these mountains extended, according to Judg. iv. 5, etc., far into the territory of Benjamin (see at chap. xi. 21). The majority of commentators, down to Knobel, have thought the place intended to be a Gibeah in the tribe of Ephraim, namely the present Jeeb or Jibia, by the Wady Jib, on the north of Guphna, towards Neapolis (Sichem: see Bob. Pal. iii. p. 80), though there is nothing whatever to favour this except the name.
With the death of Eleazar the high priest, the contemporary of Joshua, the times of Joshua came to a close, so that the account of
Eleazar's death formed a very fitting termination to the book. In some MSS. and editions of the Septuagint, there is an additional clause relating to the high priest Phinehas and the apostasy of the Israelites after Joshua's death; but this is merely taken from Judg. ii. 6, 11 sqq. and iii. 1, 12 sqq., and arbitrarily appended to the book of Joshua.