Joshua 3:4

3:4 But stay about three thousand feet behind it. ¹  Keep your distance ²  so you can see ³  which way you should go, for you have not traveled this way before.”

Joshua 5:9

5:9 The Lord said to Joshua, “Today I have taken away ⁴  the disgrace ⁵  of Egypt from you.” So that place is called Gilgal ⁶  even to this day.

Joshua 6:4

6:4 Have seven priests carry seven rams’ horns ⁷  in front of the ark. On the seventh day march around the city seven times, while the priests blow the horns.

Joshua 8:6

8:6 They will attack ⁸  us until we have lured them from the city, for they will say, ‘They are retreating from us like before.’ We will retreat from them.

Joshua 23:4

23:4 See, I have parceled out to your tribes these remaining nations, ⁹  from the Jordan to the Mediterranean Sea ¹⁰  in the west, including all the nations I defeated. ¹¹ 

Joshua 24:22

24:22 Joshua said to the people, “Do you agree to be witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen to worship the Lord?” ¹²  They replied, “We are witnesses!” ¹³ 

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¹ tn Heb “But there should be a distance between you and it, about two thousand cubits in measurement.”

sn The precise distance is uncertain, but the measurement designated אַמָּה (’ammah, “cubit”) was probably equivalent to approximately eighteen inches (one and one-half feet, or 45 cm) in length.

² tn Heb “do not approach it.”

³ tn Heb “know.”

⁴ tn Heb “rolled away.”

⁵ sn One might take the disgrace of Egypt as a reference to their uncircumcised condition (see Gen 34:14), but the generation that left Egypt was circumcised (see v. 5). It more likely refers to the disgrace they experienced in Egyptian slavery. When this new generation reached the promised land and renewed their covenantal commitment to the Lord by submitting to the rite of circumcision, the Lord’s deliverance of his people from slavery, which had begun with the plagues and the crossing of the Red Sea, reached its climax. See T. C. Butler, Joshua (WBC), 59.

⁶ sn The name Gilgal sounds like the Hebrew verb “roll away” (גַּלַל, galal).

⁷ tn Heb “rams’ horns, trumpets.”

⁸ tn Heb “come out after.”

⁹ tn Heb “I have assigned by lots to you these remaining nations as an inheritance for your tribes.”

¹⁰ tn Heb “the Great Sea,” the typical designation for the Mediterranean Sea.

¹¹ tn Heb “from the Jordan and all the nations which I cut off and the Great Sea [at] the place where the sun sets.” The relationship of the second half of the verse, which mentions nations already conquered, to the first half, which speaks of “remaining nations,” is difficult to understand.

¹² tn Heb “You are witnesses against yourselves that you have chosen for yourselves the Lord to serve him.”

¹³ sn Like witnesses in a court of law, Israel’s solemn vow to worship the Lord will testify against them in the divine court if the nation ever violates its commitment.