Joshua 3-5

Contemporary English Version

Israel Crosses the Jordan River

3 Early the next morning, Joshua and the Israelites packed up and left Acacia. They went to the Jordan River and camped there that night. ²Two days later^[a] their leaders went through the camp, ^3-4shouting, “When you see some of the priests^[b] carrying the sacred chest, you'll know it is time to cross to the other side. You've never been there before, and you won't know the way, unless you follow the chest. But don't get too close! Stay about a kilometer back.”

⁵Joshua told the people, “Make yourselves acceptable^[c] to worship the Lord, because he is going to do some amazing things for us.”

⁶Then Joshua turned to the priests and said, “Take the chest and cross the Jordan River ahead of us.” So the priests picked up the chest by its carrying poles and went on ahead.

⁷The Lord told Joshua, “Beginning today I will show the people that you are their leader, and they will know that I am helping you as I helped Moses. ⁸Now, tell the priests who are carrying the chest to go a little way into the river and stand there.”

⁹Joshua spoke to the people:

Come here and listen to what the Lord our God said he will do! ¹⁰The Canaanites, the Hittites, the Hivites, the Perizzites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, and the Jebusites control the land on the other side of the river. But the living God will be with you and will force them out of the land when you attack. And now, God is going to prove that he's powerful enough to force them out. ^11-13Just watch the sacred chest that belongs to the Lord, the ruler of the whole earth. As soon as the priests carrying the chest step into the Jordan, the water will stop flowing and pile up as if someone had built a dam across the river.

The Lord has also said that each of the twelve tribes should choose one man to represent it.

¹⁴The Israelites packed up and left camp. The priests carrying the chest walked in front, ¹⁵until they came to the Jordan River. The water in the river had risen over its banks, as it often does in springtime.^[d] But as soon as the feet of the priests touched the water, ^16-17the river stopped flowing, and the water started piling up at the town of Adam near Zarethan. No water flowed toward the Dead Sea, and the priests stood in the middle of the dry riverbed near Jericho while everyone else crossed over.

The People Set Up a Monument

4 After Israel had crossed the Jordan, the Lord said to Joshua:

^2-3Tell^[e] one man from each of the twelve tribes to pick up a large rock from where the priests are standing. Then tell the men to set up those rocks as a monument at the place where you camp tonight.

⁴Joshua chose twelve men; then he called them together ⁵and said:

Go to the middle of the riverbed where the sacred chest is, and pick up a large rock. Carry it on your shoulder to our camp. There are twelve of you, so there will be one rock for each tribe. ^6-7Someday your children will ask, “Why are these rocks here?” Then you can tell them how the water stopped flowing when the chest was being carried across the river. These rocks will always remind our people of what happened here today.

⁸The men followed the instructions that the Lord had given Joshua. They picked up twelve rocks, one for each tribe, and carried them to the camp, where they put them down.

⁹Joshua set up a monument next to the place where the priests were standing. This monument was also made of twelve large rocks, and it is still there in the middle of the river.

The People of Israel Set Up Camp at Gilgal

^10-13The army got ready for battle and crossed the Jordan with everyone else. They marched quickly past the sacred chest^[f] and into the desert near Jericho. Forty thousand soldiers from the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and East Manasseh^[g] led the way, as Moses had ordered.^[h]

The priests stayed right where they were until the people had followed the orders that the Lord had given Moses and Joshua. Then they watched as the priests carried the chest the rest of the way across.

^14-18“Joshua,” the Lord said, “tell the priests to come up from the Jordan and bring the chest with them.” So Joshua went over to the priests and told them what the Lord had said. And as soon as the priests carried the chest past the highest place that the floodwaters of the Jordan had reached, the river flooded its banks again.

That's how the Lord showed the Israelites that Joshua was their leader.^[i] For the rest of Joshua's life, they respected him as they had respected Moses.

¹⁹It was the tenth day of the first month^[j] of the year when Israel crossed the Jordan River. They set up camp at Gilgal, which was east of the land controlled by Jericho. ²⁰The men who had carried the twelve rocks from the Jordan brought them to Joshua, and they made them into a monument. ²¹Then Joshua told the people:

Years from now your children will ask you why these rocks are here. ^22-23Tell them, “The Lord our God dried up the Jordan River so we could walk across. He did the same thing here for us that he did for our people at the Red Sea,^[k] ²⁴because he wants everyone on earth to know how powerful he is. And he wants us to worship only him.”

5 The Amorite kings west of the Jordan River and the Canaanite kings along the Mediterranean Sea lost their courage and their will to fight, when they heard how the Lord had dried up the Jordan River to let Israel go across.

Israel Gets Ready To Celebrate Passover

²While Israel was camped at Gilgal, the Lord said, “Joshua, make some flint knives^[l] and circumcise the rest of the Israelite men and boys.”^[m]

³Joshua made the knives, then circumcised those men and boys at Haaraloth Hill.^[n] ^4-7^(A) This had to be done, because none of Israel's baby boys had been circumcised during the 40 years that Israel had wandered through the desert after leaving Egypt.

And why had they wandered for 40 years? It was because right after they left Egypt, the men in the army had disobeyed the Lord. And the Lord had said, “None of you men will ever live to see the land that I promised Israel. It is a land rich with milk and honey, and someday your children will live there, but not before you die here in the desert.”

⁸Everyone who had been circumcised needed time to heal, and they stayed in camp.

⁹The Lord told Joshua, “It was a disgrace for my people to be slaves in Egypt, but now I have taken away that disgrace.” So the Israelites named the place Gilgal,^[o] and it still has that name.

¹⁰^(B) Israel continued to camp at Gilgal in the desert near Jericho, and on the fourteenth day of the same month,^[p] they celebrated Passover.

^11-12^(C) The next day, God stopped sending the Israelites manna^[q] to eat each morning, and they started eating food grown in the land of Canaan. They ate roasted grain^[r] and thin bread^[s] made of the barley they had gathered from nearby fields.

Israel Captures Jericho

¹³One day, Joshua was near Jericho when he saw a man standing some distance in front of him. The man was holding a sword, so Joshua walked up to him and asked, “Are you on our side or on our enemies' side?”

¹⁴“Neither,” he answered. “I am here because I am the commander of the Lord's army.”

Joshua fell to his knees and bowed down to the ground. “I am your servant,” he said. “Tell me what to do.”

¹⁵“Take off your sandals,” the commander answered. “This is a holy place.”

So Joshua took off his sandals.

Footnotes

3.2 Two days later: The Hebrew text has “At the end of three days,” two days after they had set up camp.
3.3,4 the priests: The Hebrew text has “the priests, the Levites”; priests belonged to the tribe of Levi.
3.5 Make yourselves acceptable: People had to do certain things to make themselves acceptable to worship the Lord (see Leviticus 7.20,21; 15.2,33; 22.4-8; Deuteronomy 23.10,11).
3.15 springtime: Or “harvest time”; the grain harvest was in late spring.
4.1-3 Joshua … Tell: Or “Joshua, you and the other leaders must tell.”
4.10-13 the sacred chest: The Hebrew text has “the Lord.” The army was marching past the sacred chest, which was a symbol of God's throne on earth (see 1 Samuel 4.4 and Exodus 25.10-22; 37.1-9).
4.10-13 Forty thousand soldiers from the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and East Manasseh: Or “There were forty thousand soldiers altogether, and those from the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and East Manasseh.”
4.10-13 Moses … ordered: See Numbers 32.16-32; Joshua 1.12-16.
4.14-18 leader: See 3.7.
4.19 first month: Abib (also called Nisan), the first month of the Hebrew calendar, from about mid-March to mid-April.
4.22,23 Red Sea: See the note at 2.10.
5.2 flint knives: Flint is a stone that can be chipped until it forms a very sharp edge.
5.2 circumcise … men and boys: They could not celebrate Passover unless they were circumcised (see Exodus 12.43-49).
5.3 Haaraloth Hill: Or “Foreskin Hill.”
5.9 Gilgal: In Hebrew “Gilgal” sounds like “take away.”
5.10 the same month: See the note at 4.19.
5.11,12 manna: The special food that God provided for the Israelites while they were in the desert for 40 years. It was about the size of a small seed, and it appeared on the ground during the night, except on the Sabbath. It was gathered early in the morning, ground up, and then baked or boiled (see Exodus 16.13-36; Numbers 11.4-9).
5.11,12 roasted grain: Roasted grain was made by cooking the grain in a dry pan or on a flat rock, or by holding a bunch of grain stalks over a fire.
5.11,12 thin bread: Bread made without yeast. Israelites were not supposed to eat bread made with yeast for the week following Passover. That week is called the Festival of Thin Bread (see Exodus 12.14-20; 13.3-7).