Joshua 22

22 1 THEN Joshua called the Reubenites, and the Gadites, and the half tribe of Manasseh, 2 and said unto them, Ye have kept all that Moses the servant of the LORD commanded you, and 3 have hearkened unto my voice in all that I commanded you : ye have not left your brethren these many days unto this day, but have kept the charge of the commandment of the LORD 4 your God. And now the LORD your God hath given rest unto your brethren, as he spake unto them : therefore now turn ye, and get you unto your tents, unto the land of your possession, 5 which Moses the servant of the LORD gave you beyond Jordan. Only take diligent heed to do the commandment and the law, which Moses the servant of the LORD commanded you, to love the LORD your God, and to walk in all his ways, and to keep his commandments, and to cleave 6 unto him, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul. So Joshua blessed them, and sent them away : and they went unto their tents. 7 Now to the one half tribe of Manasseh Moses had given inheritance in Bashan : but unto the other half gave Joshua among their brethren beyond Jordan westward. Moreover when 8 Joshua sent them away unto their tents, he blessed them, and spake unto them, saying, Re- turn with much wealth unto your tents, and with very much cattle, with silver, and with gold, and with brass, and with iron, and with very much raiment : divide the spoil of your enemies with your brethren. 9 And the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh re- turned, and departed from the children of Israel out of Shiloh, which is in the land of Canaan, to go unto the land of Gilead, to the land of their possession, whereof they were possessed, 10 according to the commandment of the LORD by the hand of Moses. And when they came unto the region about Jordan, that is in the land of Canaan, the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh built there an altar by Jordan, a great altar to see to, 11 And the children of Israel heard say, Behold, the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh have built an altar in the forefront of the land of Canaan, in 12 the region about Jordan, on the side that pertaineth to the children of Israel. And when the children of Israel heard of it, the whole congregation of the children of Israel gathered them- selves together at Shiloh, to go up against them to war. 13 And the children of Israel sent unto the children of Reuben, and to the children of Gad, 14 and to the half tribe of Manasseh, into the land of Gilead, Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest ; and with him ten princes, one prince of a fathers’ house for each of the tribes of Israel ; and they were every one of them head of their fathers’ houses among the thousands of 15 Israel. And they came unto the children of Reuben, and to the children of Gad, and to the 16 half tribe of Manasseh, unto the land of Gilead, and they spake with them, saying, Thus saith the whole congregation of the LORD, What trespass is this that ye have committed against the God of Israel, to turn away this day from following the LORD, in that ye have builded you an 17 altar, to rebel this day against the LORD ? Is the iniquity of Peor too little for us, from which we have not cleansed ourselves unto this day, although there came a plague upon the congre- 18 gation of the LORD, that ye must turn away this day from following the LORD ? and it will be, seeing ye rebel to-day against the LORD, that to-morrow he will be wroth with the whole 19 congregation of Israel. Howbeit, if the land of your possession be unclean, then pass ye over unto the land of the possession of the LORD, wherein the LORD’s tabernacle dwelleth, and take possession among us : but rebel not against the LORD, nor rebel against us, in building you an 20 altar besides the altar of the LORD our God. Did not Achan the son of Zerah commit a tres- pass in the devoted thing, and wrath fell upon all the congregation of Israel ? and that man perished not alone in his iniquity. 21 Then the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh an- 22 swered, and spake unto the heads of the thousands of Israel, The LORD, the God of gods, the LORD, the God of gods, he knoweth, and Israel he shall know ; if it be in rebellion, or if in

23 trespass against the LORD (save thou us not this day), that we have built us an altar to turn away from following the LORD; or if to offer thereon burnt offering or meal offering, or if to offer sacrifices of peace offerings thereon, let the LORD himself require it; and if we have not rather out of carefulness done this, and of purpose, saying, In time to come your children might speak unto our children, saying, What have ye to do with the LORD, the God of Israel? for the LORD hath made Jordan a border between us and you, ye children of Reuben and children of Gad; ye have no portion in the LORD: so shall your children make our children cease from fearing the LORD. Therefore we said, Let us now prepare to build us an altar, not for burnt offering, nor for sacrifice: but it shall be a witness between us and you, and between our generations after us, that we may do the service of the LORD before him with our burnt offerings, and with our sacrifices, and with our peace offerings; that your children may not say to our children in time to come, Ye have no portion in the LORD. Therefore said we, It shall be, when they so say to us or to our generations in time to come, that we shall say, Behold the pattern of the altar of the LORD, which our fathers made, not for burnt offering, nor for sacrifice; but it is a witness between us and you. God forbid that we should rebel against the LORD, and turn away this day from following the LORD, to build an altar for burnt offering, for meal offering, or for sacrifice, besides the altar of the LORD our God that is before his tabernacle. And when Phinehas the priest, and the princes of the congregation, even the heads of the thousands of Israel which were with him, heard the words that the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the children of Manasseh spake, it pleased them well. And Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest said unto the children of Reuben, and to the children of Gad, and to the children of Manasseh, This day we know that the LORD is in the midst of us, because ye have not committed this trespass against the LORD: now have ye delivered the children of Israel out of the hand of the LORD. And Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest, and the princes, returned from the children of Reuben, and from the children of Gad, out of the land of Gilead, unto the land of Canaan, to the children of Israel, and brought them word again. And the thing pleased the children of Israel; and the children of Israel blessed God, and spake no more of going up against them to war, to destroy the land wherein the children of Reuben and the children of Gad dwelt. And the children of Reuben and the children of Gad called the altar Ed: For, said they, it is a witness between us that the LORD is God.

Since the distribution of the land is now completed, the Reubenites, Gadites, and Manassites of the trans-Jordanic region, who had faithfully for seven years continued with their brethren in the subjugation of the western country, are dismissed by Joshua to their homes. As this return gave rise to a remarkable incident, which evinced the faithfulness of Israel, its details are carefully recorded in this chapter. Crosby.

I-6. The two and a half tribes did not go of their own accord even when their work was finished; but Joshua “called” them and dismissed them with a blessing, now that God had given their brethren rest. A E.—Forty thousand fighting men, of the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and the half of Manasseh, had willingly helped in the conquest, leaving their own newly-won homes on the eastern side of Jordan, and for seven long years taking their share in the hardships and dangers of their brethren. It was no small tax which they had thus cheerfully paid for the sake of brotherly unity. Their aid had not only been valuable as strengthening

Joshua’s force, but still more so as a witness of the unbroken oneness of the nation, and of the sympathy which the tribes already settled bore to the others. Politically, it was wise to associate the whole people in the whole conquest; for nothing welds a nation together like the glories of common victories and the remembrance of common dangers survived. The separation of the trans-Jordanic tribes by the rapid river, and by their pastoral life, was a possible source of weakness, and would, no doubt, have led to more complete severance, if it had not been for the uniting power of the campaign. Even as it was, the eastern tribes drifted somewhat away from the western; but the disintegration would have been still more complete if no memories of the war, when all Israel stood side by side, had lived on among them. Their share in the conquest was not only a piece of policy,—it was the natural expression of the national brotherhood. The law for us is the same as for these warriors. In the family, the city, the nation, the church, and the world, union with others binds us to help them in their conflicts, and that especially if we are blessed with secure possessions, while they have to struggle for theirs. We are tempted to selfish lives of indulgence in our quiet peace, and sometimes think it hard that we should be expected to buckle on our armor and leave our leisurely repose, because our brethren ask the help of our arms. If we did as Reuben and Gad did, would there be so many who never stir a finger to relieve poverty, so many whose religion is much more selfish than beneficent? Would so many souls be left to toil without help, to struggle without allies, to weep without comforters, to wander in the dark without a guide? All God’s gifts in providence and in the Gospel are given that we may have somewhat wherewith to bless our less happy brethren. “The service of man” is not the substitute for, but the expression of Christianity. Are we not kept here, on this side Jordan, away for a time from our inheritance, for the very same reason that these men were separated from theirs, —that we may strike some strokes for God and our fellows in the great war? Would that the church of to-day, with infinitely deeper and sacreder ties knitting it to suffering, struggling humanity, had a tithe of the willing relinquishment of legitimate possessions and patient participation in the long campaign for God which kept these rude soldiers faithful to their flag and forgetful of home and ease till their general gave them their discharge! A. M.

It is well to take with us, as did they of the two and a half tribes, the testimony of earlier duties well performed. They will find good resting places in active life who come to it from Shiloh after having well discharged their obligations in the position in which duty placed them. On the other hand, there was also full and generous acknowledgment on the part of Joshua. We are perhaps sometimes too niggardly in that respect, or else our acknowledgment is not put on the right basis. In this case it was faithfulness to their engagements to Moses, submission to Joshua, patient endurance, and steady adherence to the will of God as made known to them. A roll of humble achievements, some may say; but all the more difficult for their humbleness. A. E.

5. Take diligent heed.** Joshua thinks it not enough merely to dismiss them with the commendations which their zeal and fidelity had so richly merited, but in the spirit of a true servant of God, adds his counsels. The expressions are remarkably varied and accumulated, to show in the most forcible manner the importance of a life of devoted obedience. They were to give the most diligent heed that the love of God, as the great ruling principle of action, was deeply seated in their hearts; this must be evinced by the universality of their obedience, extending to every divine precept, and still further illustrated by the constancy, humility, resolution, and affection which were to characterize their walk. Counsel like this can never be unseasonable or superfluous. Even the most established Christian, as long as he abides in the flesh, needs to be “put in remembrance of these things.” Especially does he need these kindly monitions when settled down in a state of peace and prosperity; for such a state is one of peculiar danger to his spiritual interests. These disbanded soldiers of Israel were now returning to their families, and the peaceful prosecution of their worldly business. They needed, therefore, to be reminded of the danger, of which Moses had long before warned them, of forgetting the Lord their God while enjoying “houses which they built not, wells which they digged not, and vineyards which they planted not.” A constant mindfulness of God accordingly was the great object of Joshua’s solicitude for his departing brethren. Bush.

Joshua bids them henceforth in their own homes fight that other warfare, in which victory means to love the Lord, to walk in his ways, to keep his commandments, to cleave to him, and to serve him with heart and soul. It was the old and yet the new commandment. Assuredly, there could not be better evidence of the spiritual character of the Old Testament than that its obligations and contents could be summed up in these three words: love, service, and obedience. A. E. —It is a rule of God’s dominion that he shall be loved. Nor is it to be merely a vague good-will that we are bound to give him. Nothing general, impersonal or impassionate will satisfy him. It is vivid, impetuous, enthusiastic personal love that he orders us to feel for him; love without limit, love without reserve, love without a rival, love without an end, this is his rule, the law of his state. H. S. Holland.

He sends them away with one commandment, the imperative stringency of which is expressed by the accumulation of expressions in verse 5. They are to give diligent heed to the law of Moses. Their obedience is to be based on love to God, who is their God no less than the God of the other tribes. It is to be comprehensive, —walking in all his ways; it is to be resolute, —cleaving to him; it is to be whole-hearted and whole-souled service, that will be the true bond between the separated parts of the whole. Independence so limited will be harmless; and, however wide apart the paths may lie, Israel will be one. In like manner the bond that knits all divisions of God’s people together, however different their modes of life and thought, however unlike their homes and their work, is the similarity of relation to God. They are one in a common faith, a common love, a common obedience. Wider waters than Jordan part them. Graver differences of tasks and outlooks than separated these two sections of Israel part them. But all are one who love and obey the one Lord. The closer we cleave to him, the nearer we shall be to all his tribes. A. M.

8. Joshua blessed them. He bade them take the cattle, the precious and useful metals, and the raiment, which had been amassed as their share of the spoil of their enemies during their seven years of hardship and conflict. And he enjoins upon them to divide the spoil with their brethren who had remained in charge of their newly occupied inheritance over the Jordan. B.

Witness-Allar Erected on the West Side of Jordan by the Returning Tribes (verses 9, 10).

10. Built there a great altar to see to. The Hebrew word includes the idea of a view; and “an altar visible from a great distance,” is probably the correct translation. It was intended as a landmark and a beacon to be seen from the eastern side, and there can be no doubt that some prominent natural object, conspicuous from the eastern plateau, is the natural site to be looked for. Like most altars, it would be placed on a hill-top, and on one easily distinguishable in the range of the chalk peaks above the Jordan valley. It was a “great altar;” no mere pile of stones put up in a single night. The fighting men of two and a half tribes were concerned in its erection, and the fame of their work spread throughout the country. As a monument it may well have consisted of hewn stones, and in this it would have resembled the ancient beacons to be found in other conspicuous points throughout Palestine. From the internal evidence we are able to point with tolerable accuracy to the approximate position and character of the great Witness Altar. It must be near and above Jordan, on some hill-top west of the river, between the modern village of Seilún (Shiloh) and the ford of the Damieh, placed in a conspicuous position, and possibly giving ruins of some magnitude. In addition to which we should hope to find remains of the name in some modern Arabic word. There is but one spot in Palestine which will fulfil these requirements, and that spot is perhaps the most conspicuous in the country. From the heights of Ebal a sharp cone stands out against the white valley; from the castle of Kaukab el Hawa, near Gennesaret, it is visible at a distance of thirty miles;

from the shores of the Dead Sea and the plains of Jericho it stands forth prominently as a great bastion closing the Jordan valley; from the eastern highlands it is no less conspicuous, and from the Judean watershed it is visible at a great distance. The place in question is the high cone of the Kurn Surtabeh, the Surtabeh of the Talmud, and one of the most important of our trigonometrical stations on the eastern border of the survey. The Kurn Surtabeh is the culminating summit of an almost isolated block of hill which closes in the broader part of the Jordan valley on the north. From the summit the whole valley of Jordan is spread out like a map. On the south lie the black groves round Elisha’s fountain, the sharp peaks and shining waters and distant blue ranges round the Dead Sea. Nearer is the white cone, which rises, a miniature of the Kurn itself, against the sharp rocky precipices of the Mountain of Temptation, and which I have endeavored to show is the “rock Oreb” of the Book of Judges. Dark ranges close in to the watershed, shutting out the view of the first beacon station of the Rabbis on Olivet. On the east the great mountain wall stretches away north, broken only by the outline of the famous castle Kala’at el Rabed. At the foot of the mountain, 2000 feet below, lies a green plain. Beyond the plain are rugged hills, with steep slopes, the valley here becoming a mere gorge, and in the far distance are the hills of Gilboa, Tabor, and Kaukab, with the narrow thread of the Sea of Galilee, and the white crest of Hermon beyond all. Standing thus centrally as regards the eastern and western possessions of the tribes, the Kurn is very difficult of approach. The peculiarity of its summit consists in a cone or tell, about 270 feet high on the west, where it joins a narrow plateau. On other sides the slope is sheer to the base of the mountain, 2000 feet below. Upon the summit is a great platform 18 feet high, consisting of ten courses of stones beautifully cut, and averaging three or four feet in length, with a broad marginal draft. The platform is long and narrow, apparently solid, and of a most puzzling character. It was at once evident that it was either Jewish, or at the latest Roman work, and intended as a gigantic altar or beacon. The name may be still traced in the neighborhood. On the north side I find marked on our map as a valley name Tal’at Abu ‘Ayd. The ascent of the father of ‘Ayd. Between the Arabic ‘Ayd and the Hebrew Ed, no scholar can fail to see the identity. Conder.

11. The law, to repress all danger of that plurality of worship which was the bane of all ancient religions, as well as to preserve the unity of the tribes, had decreed that there should be but one altar—that at the tabernacle—for all the people. The act of the returning warriors was therefore open to the suspicion that they meant, if not to adopt another worship, at least to set up another and independent establishment for worship, which, besides the obvious tendency to idolatry, could not fail in the event to destroy the connection by which the tribes were linked together. The obligation of all the Israelites to resort three times in the year, for worship, to the sole altar of the people, was admirably suited to retain them as one people, by continually keeping before their minds their common origin and common obligations; but if a separate establishment were allowed to exist they would cease to put themselves to the trouble of visiting the parent establishment in Canaan, and would, in no long time, come to regard themselves as a separate people. This was precisely the view of the case which struck the minds of the people. Their holy jealousy on this occasion for the glory of God and for the honor of the institutions he had given them, gives us a favorable opinion of the character of this generation. The sequel bears out this impression. Ki’.

12. The whole congregation—gathered themselves together. Not perhaps in their own persons, but by their representatives the elders, who transacted all affairs of this nature in the name and behalf of the people. To go up to war against them. The case was one that laid a just ground for suspicion. Having no conception of an altar being erected for any purpose but that of sacrifice, the other tribes naturally regarded it as an act of rebellion against God, and determined instantly to go and punish the supposed apostates. Bush.

Shiloh was the place of their rendezvous, because it was in defence of the divine charter lately granted to that place that they now appeared; their resolution was as became a kingdom of priests, who being devoted to God and his service did not acknowledge their brethren nor know their own children (De. 33 : 9). They would immediately go up to war against them, if it appeared they were revolted from God and in rebellion against him: though they were bone of their bone, had been serviceable to them in the wars of Canaan; yet if they turn to serve other gods they will treat them as enemies, not as sons of Israel, for so God had appointed (De. 13 : 12). They had but lately sheathed their swords and retired from the perils and fatigues of war to the rest God had given them, and yet they are willing to begin a new war rather than be any way wanting in their duty to restrain, repress, and revenge idolatry and every step toward it. H.

Phinehas, the Priest, and Ten Princes sent on a Mission of Inquiry into the Two and a Half Tribes. Their Spirited Reproach and Generous Proposal. Reply of the Two and a Half Tribes, showing a Misapprehension of their Purpose in Erecting the Altar. Satisfaction and Delight of the Ten Tribes (verses 13-34).

Their prudence is no less commendable. God had appointed them in cases of this nature to inquire and make search (De. 13 : 14), that they might not wrong their brethren under pretence of righting their religion; accordingly they resolve here not to send forth their armies to wage war till they had first sent their ambassadors to inquire into the merits of the cause, men of the first rank, one out of each tribe, and Phinehas at the head to be their spokesman (verses 13, 14). Thus was their zeal for God tempered, guided, and governed by the weekness of wisdom. He that knows all things and hates all evil things would not punish the worst of criminals, but he would first go down and see (Gen. 18 : 21). Many an unhappy strife would be prevented or soon taken up by an impartial and favorable inquiry into that which is the matter of the offence. The rectifying of mistakes and misunderstandings and the setting of misconstrued words and actions in a true light, would be the most effectual way to accommodate both private and public quarrels, and bring them to a happy period. H.

They send ere they go, and consult ere they execute. Phinehas the son of Eleazar the priest, and ten princes, are addressed both to inquire and dissuade; to inquire of the purpose of the fact; to dissuade from that which they imagined was purposed. Not only wisdom but charity moved them to this message; for, grant they had been guilty, must they perish unwarned? Peaceable means must first be used to recall them, ere violence be sent to persecute them. Bp. H.

19. The proposal displayed a generous and disinterested spirit, a willingness to make sacrifices in order to preserve purity, and consequently peace. Rather than they should set up a separate altar from a groundless dissatisfaction with their inheritance, they would cheerfully welcome them back to the other side of the Jordan, “where the Lord’s tabernacle dwelt,” though they should straiten themselves by so doing. Bush.—They were willing to part with a considerable share of the land which God himself had by the lot assigned them, to comcomprehend them and take them in among them. This was the spirit of Israelites indeed. H.

21-29. On hearing to what constructions they had laid themselves open and how the transaction had been viewed, the two and a half tribes were overwhelmed with grief and astonishment; they disclaimed the injurious imputation and declared the views on which they had really acted. They commenced by invoking God himself to witness the innocency of their intentions. The form in which they did this is the most emphatic that language can express, and such as can scarcely be represented in a translation. There are the three principal names of God in Hebrew—El, Elohim, Jehovah,—and all three are used together by them, and repeated twice. “El, Elohim, Jehovah—El, Elohim, Jehovah,"—he knoweth, etc. If translated at all, it might be perhaps thus:—“Almighty God, Elohim, Jehovah,” etc.; for the first term involves the idea of might or strength. They proceed to declare that their object was in all respects the very reverse of that imputed to them. Instead of meaning a separation, they had set up their altar as a monument to future ages of the connection between the tribes separated by the river; so that if, at any time to come, their descendants should attempt to cast off the connection and assert their own independence, or if the Israelites should hereafter attempt to disown their union and declare that the people beyond the river had “no part in the Lord,” this monument might be pointed to in evidence of the fact. Kit.

26-29. Having this copy of the altar in their custody, it might be produced as an evidence of their right to the privileges of the original. Every one that saw this altar, and observed it was never used for sacrifice and offering, would inquire what was the meaning of it, and this answer would be given to that inquiry, that it was built by those separate tribes, in token of their communion with their brethren, and their joint interest with them in the altar of the Lord. H.—Since therefore we may not either remove God’s altar to us or remove our patrimony to the altar, the pattern of the altar shall go with us, not for sacrifice but for memorial; that both the posterity of the other Israelites may know we are no less derived from them than this altar from theirs, and that our posterity may know they pertain to that altar whereof this is the resemblance. Bp. H.

29. God forbid that we should rebel against the Lord.** We cannot have a stronger proof of the zeal of the whole nation for the observance of the Divine law than this transaction between the two tribes and a half, and the remaining tribes. The impression was, indeed, most deep which the judgments of God had made on the whole nation, that they were animated with the most watchful anxiety to fulfil the Law and to avoid the wrath of Jehovah, at once their Sovereign and their God. Graves.

30-34. We have here the good issue of this controversy, which, if there had not been on both sides a disposition to peace, as there was on both sides a zeal for God, might have been of ill consequence; for quarrels about religion, for want of wisdom and love, often prove the most fierce and most difficult to be taken up. But these contending parties, when the matter was fairly stated and argued, were so happy as to understand one another very well, and so the difference was presently compromised. H.—We behold very much to admire in both. When the accusers found themselves mistaken, they did not shift their ground, and condemn their brethren for imprudence; nor when the accused had evinced their innocence, did they upbraid their accusers with hasty, rash, or unjust surmises. Aware that the measure was easily susceptible of the interpretation their brethren had put upon it, they took their reproofs, severe as they were, in good part, and instead of angry retorts or recriminations, gave them the soft answer which turneth away wrath, and by a candid and honest declaration of their real intentions at once set themselves right in the opinion of their brethren. Bush.

Leaving Egypt while yet young or wilderness born; mostly uncontaminated with her idolatries and pollutions of moral life, looking upon the scenes of the Exodus and of Sinai with young eyes and susceptible souls; trained under Moses forty years; taking the ritual of religious worship in its freshness, with hearts tender to its first strong impressions—they give us certainly the best fruits of this wonderful moral and religious training. So many fearers of God—so large a host imbued with the spirit of obedience to God’s authority—the world had never seen before. They were prepared of God for the conquest of Canaan. They are living witnesses that the discipline of those desert wanderings was not in vain. H. C.

The revulsion of popular feeling at once rendered the monument one of the most favorite sites in the country—a bond of union between the divided tribes. “The thing pleased the children of Israel. And the children of Reuben and the children of Gad called the altar Ed: for it shall be a witness between us that the Lord is

God.” Conder.—It was a witness of the relation they stood in to God and Israel, and of their concurrence with the rest of the tribes in the same common faith, that Jehovah he is God, he and no other. It was a witness to posterity of their care to transmit their religion pure and entire to them, and would be a witness against them if ever they should forsake God, and turn from following after him. H.

Two noble lessons stand out conspicuously in this record touching the two and a half tribes. First, it teaches specially the same great truth which is illustrated in the history of the whole people. The great mission of the Hebrew people was to establish nationally, in order to its later establishment universally, the worship and service of the true God. Their occupation of the promised land got all its great importance as being a means to that end and a reward of that effort and achievement. Their ultimate and pre-eminent quest, as the old knights called it, was the kingdom of God. The two and a half tribes recognized this—vaguely, maybe, yet genuinely—when, proposing to settle east of Jordan, they nevertheless placed their own material fortunes second, in time and value, to the completion of the conquest of Canaan. It was an exhibition of their faith in the precept of Christ, “Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and his righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you.” They made that search and effort first in order of time; and Joshua commends them and dismisses them to the enjoyment of their reward. But at the same time he warns them that this dismissal does not dismiss; that to make this effort first, once, in time, is not all; they must keep it first in their desires, efforts, and valuations. “Take diligent heed to do the commandment and the law, . . . to love the Lord . . . and to serve him.” The other lesson is the brotherhood of all God’s children, and the duty of conforming religion—life—not two things but one in two aspects—to this idea. Our religion must be controllingly unselfish. These two and a half tribes actually consecrated their lives during the time of the conquest, put them in all the jeopardies of frequent, bloody battle, for the establishment of their brethren in the kingdom of God. They laid down their lives for the brethren. Whoever seeks the kingdom of heaven for himself alone may win it, so great is God’s mercy and compassion; but he cannot even keep it, much less enlarge and extend his entrance into it, unless he widens out his solicitude and effort until it includes the bringing of that kingdom to his brother man, and him into it. Cable.

The work given Israel to do was emphatically a work of God, bearing on it the impress alike of His greatness and His holiness. And both a living faith and a sanctified heart were needed, on the part of Israel, to fulfil what was required of them. On this account special supports were given to faith in the miracles wrought by God at the commencement of the work, in the separation of the waters of the river and the falling of the walls of Jericho, as afterward in the extraordinary prolongation of the day at the request of Joshua; showing it was God’s work rather than their own they were accomplishing, and that His power was singularly exerted in their behalf. And not only in the charges given to Joshua regarding his careful meditation of the law of God, and punctual observance of all that was commanded in it; but also, and more particularly, in the discomfiture appointed on account of the sin of Achan, was the necessity forcibly impressed upon the people of the maintenance of holiness; they were made to feel the inseparable connection between being themselves faithful to God, and having power to prevail. It served also impressively to teach them their unity as a people and how the holiness which they were bound collectively to maintain, must be individual, in order that it might be national. Nor was the instruction disregarded by the immediate agents in the work of judgment. They cast out from among them the sin that was discovered in Achan; and, at a later period, their jealousy regarding the tribes on the other side of Jordan, lest they would separate themselves from the one altar and commonwealth of Israel, and the protestations of allegiance to God which Joshua made before his death, and they again to him, clearly showed that much of the spirit of faith and holiness rested upon that generation. In them the covenant found, in no small degree, a faithful representation, as well in regard to its requirements of duty, as to its promises of grace and blessing. Fairbairn.

PARTING ADDRESSES OF JOSHUA. ISRAEL’S RENEWAL OF COVENANT WITH JEHOVAH DEATH AND CHARACTER OF JOSHUA. BURIAL OF THE BONES OF JOSEPH. DEATH OF ELEAZAR.