" when," nH in Dent. xi. 6; 1 Kings viii. 9. first month." Thus the date of the cross- Gcscniue would tmnslnte "if tho.t," o.nd Keil ing, which ie accurately fixed by a variety of would render by quod. circumstances, is clearly proved to corre- Ver. 23.-For. The origino.l here nga.in spond with the time of Jordan's overflow. is "l~~. with the meo.ning because. We next come to the measures taken to se- Ver. 24.-The band of the Lord, that lt Is cure the crossing. There ia likewise no mighty. " Thue the river, though dumb, mistake here. Not one single intimation iii was the beet of heralds, proclo.iming with a given of an endeavour to break in any way loud voice that heaven and earth are subject the force of the current, or to preserve the to the Lord God of Israel" (Calvin). That Israelites, either men, women, or children ye m1gbt fear. The construction here ie from the imminent risk they ran of death unusual. Instead of the imperfect or in- by drowning. Not only are no other expe- dients resorted to, but no animals seem to finitive with !l/!;)? we have the perfect. have been prepared to transport them over. Therefore Ewald, Maurer, and Knobel (who Nor, again, were any means used to elude says that the second member of the sentence the vi1-,<ilance of the inhabitants of Canaan. ought to correspond with the first) have Readers of Xenophon's • Anabasis' will not altered the pointing in order to bring this f~il to notice how often the passage of the passage into conformity with the supposed nvers was a matter of the utmost difficulty necessities of grammar. In so doing they to that expedition, and how fiercely attempts have robbed it of its picturesqueness' and ite at crossing were disputed by the half-savage meaning. For the object is clearly to show tribes of Asia Minor. How are we to ac- the lasting nature of the fear, " that ye count for the fact that no opposition was might recognise now the hand of the Lord, offered to Joshua's passage by the highly. that ye might have a thorough and lasting civilised nations of Palestine? According fear of his name." We may here remark to the narrative before us it was effected in on the necessarily miraculous character of the most leisurely and peaceful manner. the whole narrative of the crossing the What other explanation is possible than that Jordan. It admi~s of no explaining away. offered in the text, that when the feet of The account must either be accepted or the priests bearing the ark touched the rejected en bloc. First we have the specific waters, those waters were cut off by super- declaration of Rahab in chap. ii. 10, that natural power, and a way was miraculously Jehovah dried up the Red Sea, and that this made for the people of God through the proof of the peculiar protection of Israel by midst of Jordan ? The crossing was remark- the Most High had struck terror in to the able enough, we are told, to have been com- hearts of the inhabitants of Canaan. Next memorated by a double memorial (vers. 8, 9). we have the fact that Jordan had overflowed If it had taken place through an unusually its banks. The dangerous nature of the easy ford there would have been nothing crossing, even at ordinary times, has been remarkable about it. Therefore it is clear mentioned already. Lives are frequently that the whole narrative of the crossing is lost in the attempt, as recent travellers with either absolute fable or strictly and historic: one voice declare. At the time when the ally accurate. Let us conclude by summing waters were out such a crossing was pro.c- up the several reo.sons which make the tically impossible to a host like the host of former alternative il1admissible. The first Israel. Nor can there be any mistake about is the precision with which the elate is fixed, its being the period of the overflowing of and the fact that the co1Tectness of this d11te Jorclan, for the time of the crossing is men- 'is confirmed, as we have seen, by o. variety tioned. It was the time of harvest-that is, of corroborative evidence. The next is the of the barley harvest. This is confirmed by simplicity nnd artlessness of the narro.tive, the fact that the recently cut flax was nc;,w ancl its appeo.l to still-existing monuments lying on the roof of Rahab's house, and by as confirmo.tory of the facts recorded. The the fact that the barley and flax ripened third is that no account of o. battle at Jordan together, a coincidence which we have is even hinted at by the Hebrew or any other nlree.dy mentioned in the note on chap. ii. 6. historian, a bo.ttle which must infallibly The time ie yet further defined. It was the have taken place had the Israelites at- "tenth day of the first month." '\Ve learn, tempted to enter Palestine in any ordinary moreover, from Levit. xxiii. 9-15 andDeut. manner; for the supposilion that the waters xvi. 6 tho.t this wo.s the time when the first- of the ford o.t Jerioho were unusually low at fruits were offered, from which seven weeks this time is quite inadmissible for the rea- were reckoned to the beginning of wheo.t sons given nbove ; nor can it be supposed harvest (Exod. xxxiv. 2). Moreover, the that the Israelites crossed the river by any po.ssov~r was kept immediately nfterwards other ford without rejecting the whole his- (chnp. v. 10), on "the fourteenth clay of the tory of the conquest. The last reason is JOSHUA. F ()(\ THE BOOK OF JOSHUA. [en. 1v. 1--24.
t-be touch of detail given in the word ~i'N eubject~d to the severest cross-examination which seems to mark t,he tnnsition from the without shaking his testimony. And we o.ro soft adhesi,·e mud of the river to the firm- thus compelled to choose between accepting ness of the dry land be~·ond (for the word the literal correctness of the n1trrative as it translated "dry land·, in chap. iii. 17 ouly stands, or crediting the author with a skill means that it was land and not water. in constructing II work of fiction which itself Gesenius). Our witnP.ss, in fact, can be scarcely falls short of the miraculous. •