Joshua 3: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

Israel breaks camp at Shittim and moves to the edge of the Jordan River, where the officers tell the people to follow the ark of the covenant at a distance of about two thousand cubits. Joshua tells the people to set themselves apart, and says the LORD will show he is with them by cutting off the river, and that he will drive out the seven nations of Canaan. When the priests carrying the ark step into the flooded Jordan, the water upstream stops and piles up near the city of Adam, and the water downstream drains away. The priests stand on dry ground in the middle of the riverbed until the whole nation has crossed over, opposite Jericho.

Claim by Claim

1. 3:1
   • Joshua rose early in the morning.
   • Joshua and all the children of Israel set out from Shittim.
   • They came as far as the Jordan.
   • They lodged at the Jordan before they crossed over.
2. 3:2
   • At the end of three days the officers went through the middle of the camp.
3. 3:3
   • The officers commanded the people.
   • The officers said the people would see the ark of the covenant of the LORD their God.
   • The officers said the priests, the Levites, would be carrying the ark.
   • The officers said that when the people saw this, they were to set out from their place.
   • The officers said the people were to go after the ark.
4. 3:4
   • The officers said there was to be a distance of about two thousand cubits by measure between the people and the ark.
   • The officers said the people were not to come near the ark.
   • The officers gave as the reason that the people would know the way they must go.
   • The officers said the people had not passed this way before.
5. 3:5
   • Joshua said to the people to consecrate themselves.
   • Joshua said that tomorrow the LORD would do wonders among them.
6. 3:6
   • Joshua spoke to the priests.
   • Joshua told the priests to take up the ark of the covenant.
   • Joshua told the priests to cross over ahead of the people.
   • The priests took up the ark of the covenant.
   • The priests went ahead of the people.
7. 3:7
   • The LORD spoke to Joshua.
   • The LORD said that on this day he would begin to make Joshua great in the sight of all Israel.
   • The LORD said this was so that Israel would know that as he had been with Moses, so he would be with Joshua.
8. 3:8
   • The LORD told Joshua to command the priests who carry the ark of the covenant.
   • The LORD said the priests were to be told that when they came to the edge of the waters of the Jordan, they were to stand still in the Jordan.
9. 3:9
   • Joshua spoke to the children of Israel.
   • Joshua told them to come near.
   • Joshua told them to hear the words of the LORD their God.
10. 3:10
    • Joshua said that by this they would know that the living God was among them.
    • Joshua said that God would without fail drive out from before them the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Hivites, the Perizzites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, and the Jebusites.
11. 3:11
    • Joshua said the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth was crossing over ahead of them into the Jordan.
12. 3:12
    • Joshua told them to take twelve men from the tribes of Israel.
    • Joshua said the twelve were to be one man from each tribe.
13. 3:13
    • Joshua said the priests carrying the ark of the LORD, the Lord of all the earth, would set the soles of their feet in the waters of the Jordan.
    • Joshua said that when this happened the waters of the Jordan would be cut off.
    • Joshua said the waters coming down from above would stand in one heap.
14. 3:14
    • The people set out from their tents to cross the Jordan.
    • The priests carrying the ark of the covenant went before the people.
15. 3:15
    • Those carrying the ark came to the Jordan.
    • The feet of the priests carrying the ark were dipped in the edge of the water.
    • The Jordan overflows all its banks throughout the days of harvest.
16. 3:16
    • The waters coming down from above stood still.
    • Those waters rose up in one heap.
    • The heap was very far away, at Adam, the city beside Zarethan.
    • The waters going down toward the sea of the Arabah, the Salt Sea, were completely cut off.
    • The people crossed over opposite Jericho.
17. 3:17
    • The priests carrying the ark of the covenant of the LORD stood firm on dry ground in the middle of the Jordan.
    • All Israel crossed over on dry ground.
    • They crossed until the entire nation had finished crossing the Jordan.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

3:1

Shittim (the name means "acacia trees") was Israel's camp on the plains of Moab, on the east side of the Jordan, roughly seven or eight miles from the river. The Jordan here is not a wide river, normally only about a hundred feet across, but it runs fast in a deep, tangled channel.

3:2

"Officers" translates a Hebrew word for subordinate officials who kept records and passed orders down through the ranks, closer to clerks or marshals than to army commanders.

3:3

The ark of the covenant was a gold-covered wooden chest, carried on poles, holding the stone tablets of the agreement (covenant) made between God and Israel at Sinai. A covenant is a formal, binding agreement between two parties, with obligations on each side. Only members of the tribe of Levi, from which the priests came, were permitted to carry it.

3:4

A cubit was about eighteen inches, roughly the length of a forearm, so two thousand cubits is about three thousand feet, a little over half a mile. The gap keeps the ark visible to everyone in a column of that size, and keeps the people from crowding it.

3:5

"Sanctify yourselves" means to go through the rituals that made a person fit to come near holy things: washing the body, washing clothing, and abstaining from sex for a set period. It is a matter of ritual preparation, not of moral improvement.

3:7

"Magnify thee" is older English for raising someone's public standing, making him visibly great in others' eyes. It is about reputation and authority, not size.

3:10

These seven names are the standard list of the peoples living in Canaan before Israel's arrival. The Canaanites were the general population of the land; the Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites were smaller groups or city-based populations within it. The Jebusites held Jerusalem.

3:11

"The LORD of all the earth" is a deliberate claim. In the ancient Near East gods were normally tied to a particular territory or nation, so a god who ruled only his own land would have no power on the far side of a river. This title says the opposite, which is the whole argument for why the crossing will work.

3:12

The reason for choosing these twelve men is not given here; their task, carrying twelve stones out of the riverbed, is described in the next chapter.

3:13

"Stand in a heap" translates a Hebrew word used of water piled up and held in place, the same word used of the sea in the song at the Red Sea crossing in Exodus 15. It pictures water banked up like a mound rather than merely stopping.

3:15

The harvest meant here is the barley harvest, in spring (roughly March–April), which is exactly when snowmelt from Mount Hermon in the north swells the Jordan and pushes it over its banks. The crossing is described as happening at the river's worst season, not its easiest.

3:16

Adam is usually identified with a site about eighteen miles (thirty kilometres) upstream from the crossing point opposite Jericho; Zaretan was a nearby landmark. The "Sea of the Arabah" is the lake at the southern end of the Jordan rift valley, called the Salt Sea because of its extreme salinity, known today as the Dead Sea. So the water backed up far to the north, while everything downstream simply drained away.

3:17

In the King James wording, "passed clean over" does not mean cleanly but completely, every last person was across.