The Pulpit Commentary — Joshua — Section 286

" Aowing- with milk and honey," and with the obvious coherence of the whole ne.rrn." all the produce of a southem sky. The tive. areR of land assigned to e1teh of the Le- Ver. 7.-Forty yea.re old. The Hebrew Yitical cities wos definitely marked out (see expression is " the son of forty years." Jlium. xxxv. 4, 5), and subdivided, as the Compare the expressions "son of man," hints in the narrative seem to imply that " sons of Belia!," " son of the perverse re, all the land was. into as many sections as bellious woman." As lt was 1n my hea.rt. there were " mark-families " - that is, Literally, according as with 111y heart, i.e., families of freemen cxcl usi.e of the servile in agreement with what I saw and felt. The olasses in the town. LXX. reads "according to his mind," i.e., ,er. 6.-In Gilgal (sec ob. ix. 6). caleb that of Moses. Houbigant and Le Clerc the son of Jephlllllleh the Kenezlte. Or, approve of this reading, but it seems quite descendant of Kc11az, as was his kinsman out of keeping with the character of Caleb. Otlmicl. As far as we can make out from He did not endeavour to accommodate his the genealogy in 1 Chron. ii, Caleb and report to the wishes of any man, but gave Kenaz were family names, for the Caleb ~what be himself believed to be a true and or Calubi (1 Chron. ii. 9) the sou of Hezrou faithful account of what he had seen and (1 Chron. ii. 18), the Caleb the son of Hur heard (see Nnm. xiii. 30; xiv. 7-9; Dent. (1 Chron. ii. 50), and Caleb the son of Je- i. 36). phunneh (1 Chron. iv. 15), could not have Ver. 8.-But I wholly followed. Literally,· been the same persons. And Caleb was a "I - f1tlfiUed after." That is to say, be Kcnezite, or descendant of Kene.z ; he had a rendered a full obedience to the precepts of grandson, apparently, of that name (so-the the Most High. So also in the next verse. LXX. and Vulge.te translate, 1 Chron. iv. 15), Ver. 9.-And Moses swa.re on tha.t day and a brother, according to the most prob- (cf. Nnm. xiv. 21-24; Dent. i. 35, 36). able rendering of the Hebrew of both eh. xv. Keil raises the di.tliculty that in the above 17 and Jndg. i. 9. See also 1 Chron. iv. 13. passage not Moses, but God is said to have For Caleb was the son of Jephunneh, not sworn, and that no special inheritance is of Kene.z. Hitzig, 'Geschichte des Volkes promised to Caleb, but only that he shall Israel,' i. 105, thinks that Caleb was a de- enter the promised land. But this is not scendant of the Kene.z mentioned in Gen. the fact, as a comparison of this passage xxxn. 11; or, see 15. Some think he was with Dent. i. 36 will show. That either a Kenizzite (sec Gen. xv. 19). The Bishop passage gives the ipsissima verba of Moses is of Bath and Wells, in his article in Smith's unlikely, The main sense of the promise ' Dictionary of the Bible,' thinks that the is given in each. And there is no im- new that Le was not of Jewish origin agrees propriety in speaking of the proclamation best with the Scripture narrative, and re- by Moses of God's decree as an oath pro- moves many difficulties regarding the nounced by Moses himself. number of the children of Israel at the Ver. 10.-Forty and five years. This Exodus. It certainly serves to explain why marks the date of the present conversation the tribe of Judah came with Caleb, when as occurring seven years after the invasion. he preferred his request, and the statement Caleb was forty years of age when he went in eh. xv. 13, which seems to imply that to spy the land of Canaan. For thirty- Caleb was not one of the tribe of Judah by eight years the Israelites wandered in the birth, but one of the "mixed multitude" wilderness. And Caleb was now eighty-five that went up with the Israelites (E:rod. xii. years old. This remark has been made as 38), and acqnired afterwards by circumcision far back as the time of Theodoret. Doubt- the rights of Israelites. If this be the case, less the apportionment of the land, and its it is an illustration of the truth declared in occupation by the Israelites, was a long and Rom. ii. 28, 29 ; iv. 12 ; Gal. iii. 7. By his tedious business (see also eh. xiii. 1). Even faithfulness to God he had well earned the since. Literally, from the time when. reward which he now sought. Concerning Ver. 11.-As yet am I as strong this day. me and thee. And yet Knobel asserts that, A vigorous and respected old age is or- according to vers. 8 and 12, Joshua was not dinarily, by Nature's own law, the decreed one of the spies ! He accordingly sees the reward for a virtuous youth o.nd a temperate hand of the " J ehovist " here. So accurate manhood. Caleb's devotion to God's service is_ the criticism which pretends to be able to bad preserved him from the sins as '!ell e.s dismtegrate ihe narratives in the Hebrew from the faithlessness and murmurmg of Scriptures, and to assign each part to its the Israelites. And thus, with a bo~y not separate author (see Num. xiv. 24). As enfeebled by indulgence, he presents himself ~ell might we conclude that this verse before Joshua with undiminished strength, m Num. xiv. is by a different hand to vers. at a time when most men a.re sinking under 80 and 38 in the same chapter, in spite of the weight of their infirmities, and is ready CH, XIV, 1-15.] TlIE BOOK OF JOSHUA. 281