Joshua 1-2

New English Translation

Footnotes

1. Joshua 1:2 tn Heb “Get up!”
2. Joshua 1:2 tn Heb “this Jordan”; the word “River” has been supplied in the translation for clarity (likewise in v. 11).
3. Joshua 1:2 tc Heb “Cross over this Jordan, you and all these people, to the land that I am giving to them, to the children of Israel.” The final phrase, “to the children of Israel,” is probably a later scribal addition specifying the identity of “these people/them.”
4. Joshua 1:3 tn Heb “Every place on which the sole of your foot walks, to you I have given it, as I said to Moses.” The second person pronouns in vv. 3-4 are plural, indicating that all the people are addressed here. The verbal form נְתַתִּיו (n^etattiv, “I have given it”) is probably a perfect of certitude, emphasizing the certainty of the action. Another option is to translate, “I have already assigned it.” In this case the verb would probably refer to the Lord’s decree to Abraham that he would give this land to his descendants.
5. Joshua 1:4 tn A מִדְבָּר (midbar, “wilderness, desert”) refers to a dry region which is characterized by receiving less than twelve inches of rain per year. It therefore cannot support trees, yet may have sparse vegetation if it receives more than six inches of rain. If it receives less than six inches, then “desert” is an appropriate term (usually not a sandy desert). Most cases of the term are rendered as “wilderness” in NET. Here it refers to the southern border of the nation which stretches down into Sinai.
6. Joshua 1:4 tn Heb “all the land of the Hittites.” The expression “the land of the Hittites” does not refer to Anatolia (modern Turkey), where the ancient Hittite kingdom of the second millennium b.c. was located, but rather to Syria, the “Hatti land” mentioned in inscriptions of the first millennium b.c. (see HALOT 363-64 s.v. חִתִּי). The phrase is omitted in the LXX and may be a scribal addition.
7. Joshua 1:4 tn Heb “the Great Sea,” the typical designation for the Mediterranean Sea.
8. Joshua 1:4 tn Heb “From the wilderness and this Lebanon even to the great river, the River Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, even to the great sea [at] the place where the sun sets, your territory will be.”
9. Joshua 1:5 tn Heb “A man will not stand before you.” The second person pronouns in this verse are singular, indicating Joshua is the addressee.
10. Joshua 1:6 tn Heb “For you will cause these people to inherit the land that I swore to their fathers to give to them.” The pronoun “them” at the end of the verse refers to either the people or to the fathers.
11. Joshua 1:7 tn Or “Only be.”
12. Joshua 1:7 tn Heb “so you can be careful to do.” The use of the infinitive לִשְׁמֹר (lishmor, “to keep”) after the imperatives suggests that strength and bravery will be necessary for obedience. Another option is to take the form לִשְׁמֹר as a vocative lamed (ל) with imperative (see Isa 38:20 for an example of this construction), which could be translated, “Indeed, be careful!”
13. Joshua 1:7 tn Heb “commanded you.”
14. Joshua 1:7 tn Heb “be wise,” but the word can mean “be successful” by metonymy.
15. Joshua 1:7 tn Heb “in all which you go.”
16. Joshua 1:8 tn Heb “mouth.”sn This law scroll must not leave your lips. The ancient practice of reading aloud to oneself as an aid to memorization is in view here.
17. Joshua 1:8 tn Heb “read it in undertones,” or “recite it quietly” (see HALOT 237 s.v. I הגה).
18. Joshua 1:8 tn Heb “be careful to do.”
19. Joshua 1:8 tn Heb “you will make your way prosperous.”
20. Joshua 1:8 tn Heb “and be wise,” but the word can mean “be successful” by metonymy.
21. Joshua 1:9 tn Heb “Have I not commanded you?” The rhetorical question emphasizes the importance of the following command by reminding the listener that it is being repeated.
22. Joshua 1:9 tn Or perhaps, “don’t get discouraged!”
23. Joshua 1:9 tn Heb “in all which you go.”
24. Joshua 1:10 tn Or “commanded.”
25. Joshua 1:11 tn Heb “to enter to possess the land which the Lord your God is giving to you to possess it.”
26. Joshua 1:13 tn Heb “remember the word which Moses, the Lord’s servant, commanded you.”sn This command can be found in Deut 3:18-20. In vv. 13-15 Joshua paraphrases the command, as the third person reference to Moses in v. 14 indicates.
27. Joshua 1:13 tn Heb “is providing rest for you and is giving to you this land.”sn “This land” refers to the trans-Jordanian lands allotted to these tribes.
28. Joshua 1:14 tn Heb “But you must cross over armed for battle before your brothers, all [you] mighty men of strength.”
29. Joshua 1:15 tn Heb “Then you may return to the land of your possession and possess it, that which Moses, the Lord’s servant, gave to you beyond the Jordan toward the rising of the sun.”
30. Joshua 1:17 tn Heb “listened to.”
31. Joshua 1:17 tn Or “Only.” Here and in v. 18 this word qualifies what precedes (see also v. 7).
32. Joshua 1:18 tn Heb “any man who rebels against your mouth and does not listen to your words, to all which you command us, will be put to death.”
33. Joshua 1:18 tn Or “Only.” Here and in v. 17 this word qualifies what precedes (see also v. 7).
34. Joshua 2:1 tn Heb “Joshua, son of Nun, sent from Shittim two men, spies, secretly, saying.”
35. Joshua 2:1 tn Heb “go, see the land, and Jericho.”
36. Joshua 2:1 tn Heb “they went and entered the house of a woman, a prostitute, and her name was Rahab, and they slept there.”
37. Joshua 2:2 tn Or “look.”
38. Joshua 2:2 tn Heb “men have come here tonight from the sons of Israel.”
39. Joshua 2:3 tn Heb “and the king of Jericho sent to Rahab, saying.”
40. Joshua 2:3 tn Heb “bring out.”
41. Joshua 2:3 tn The idiom “come to” (בוֹא אֶל, boʾ ʾel) probably has sexual connotations here, as it often does elsewhere when a man “comes to” a woman. If so, the phrase could be translated “your clients.” The instructions reflect Rahab’s perspective as to the identity of the men.
42. Joshua 2:3 tn The words “the ones who came to your house” (Heb “who came to your house”) may be a euphemistic scribal addition designed to blur the sexual connotation of the preceding words.
43. Joshua 2:4 tn Heb “The woman took the two men and hid him.” The third masculine singular pronominal suffix on “hid” has to be a scribal error (see GKC §135.p).
44. Joshua 2:4 tn Heb “the men came to me.” See the note on this phrase in v. 3.
45. Joshua 2:5 tn Heb “And the gate was to be shut in the darkness and the men went out.”
46. Joshua 2:6 tn Heb “arranged in rows by her.”
47. Joshua 2:7 tn Another way to translate vv. 6-7 would be, “While she took them up to the roof and hid them…, the king’s men tried to find them….” Both of the main clauses have the subject prior to the predicate, perhaps indicating simultaneous action. (On the grammatical point, see R. J. Williams, Hebrew Syntax, 42, §235.) In this case Rahab moves the Israelite spies from the hiding place referred to in v. 4 to a safer and less accessible hiding place.
48. Joshua 2:7 tn The word “River” is not in the Hebrew text, but is supplied for clarity.
49. Joshua 2:7 tn Heb “And the men chased after them [on] the road [leading to] the Jordan to the fords.” The text is written from the perspective of the king’s men. As far as they were concerned, they were chasing the spies.
50. Joshua 2:7 tn Heb “And they shut the gate after—as soon as the ones chasing after them went out.” The expressions “after” and “as soon as” may represent a conflation of alternate readings.
51. Joshua 2:8 tn Heb “they.”
52. Joshua 2:8 tn Heb “she”; the referent (Rahab) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
53. Joshua 2:8 tn The Hebrew text adds, “to them.” This is somewhat redundant in English and has not been translated.
54. Joshua 2:9 tn Heb “has given the land to you.” Rahab’s statement uses the Hebrew perfect, suggesting certitude.
55. Joshua 2:9 tn Heb “terror of you has fallen upon us.”
56. Joshua 2:9 tn Or “melting away because of.”
57. Joshua 2:9 tn Both of these statements are actually subordinated to “I know” in the Hebrew text, which reads, “I know that the Lord…and that terror of you…and that all the inhabitants….”
58. Joshua 2:10 tn Heb “and what you did to the two Amorite kings who were beyond the Jordan, Sihon and Og, how you annihilated them.”
59. Joshua 2:11 tn Heb “And we heard and our heart[s] melted and there remained no longer breath in a man because of you.”
60. Joshua 2:12 tn Heb “Now, swear to me by the Lord.”sn To swear an oath in the Lord’s name would make the Lord the witness and guarantor of the promise attached to the oath. If the person making the oath should go back on the promise, the Lord would judge him for breaking the contract.
61. Joshua 2:12 tn Heb “with the house of my father.”
62. Joshua 2:12 tn Heb “true sign,” that is, “an inviolable token or pledge.”
63. Joshua 2:13 tn Or “our lives.”
64. Joshua 2:14 tn The second person pronoun is masculine plural, indicating that Rahab’s entire family is in view.
65. Joshua 2:14 tn Heb “Our lives in return for you to die.” If the lives of Rahab’s family are not spared, then the spies will pay for the broken vow with their own lives.
66. Joshua 2:14 tn Heb “If you do not report this matter of ours.”
67. Joshua 2:14 tn Heb “allegiance and faithfulness.” These virtual synonyms are joined in the translation as “unswerving allegiance” to emphasize the degree of promised loyalty.
68. Joshua 2:14 tn The second person pronoun is feminine singular, referring specifically to Rahab.
69. Joshua 2:15 tn Heb “she”; the referent (Rahab) has been specified in the translation for clarity.
70. Joshua 2:15 tc The phrase “by a rope” is omitted in the LXX. It may be a later clarifying addition. If original, the omission in the LXX is likely due to an error of homoioarcton. A scribe’s or translator’s eye could have jumped from the initial ב (bet) in the phrase בַּחֶבֶל (bakhevel, “with a rope”) to the initial ב on the immediately following בְּעַד (b^eʿad, “through”) and accidentally omitted the intervening letters.
71. Joshua 2:15 tn Heb “For her house.”
72. Joshua 2:15 tc These explanatory statements are omitted in the LXX and probably represent a later scribal addition.
73. Joshua 2:16 tn Heb “Go.”
74. Joshua 2:16 tn Heb “so that the pursuers might not meet you.”
75. Joshua 2:16 tn Heb “the pursuers.” The object (“you”) is not in the Hebrew text but is implied.
76. Joshua 2:17 tn Heb “We are free from this oath of yours which you made us swear.” The words “unless the following conditions are met” are not in the Hebrew text, but are added for clarification.
77. Joshua 2:18 tn Heb “Look! We are about to enter the land.”
78. Joshua 2:18 tn Heb “the cord of this red thread.”
79. Joshua 2:18 tn Heb “and your father and your mother and your brothers and all the house of your father gather to yourself to the house.”
80. Joshua 2:19 tn Heb “Anyone who goes out from the doors of your house to the outside, his blood is on his head. We are innocent.”
81. Joshua 2:19 tn Heb “But anyone who is with you in the house, his blood is on our head if a hand should be on him.”
82. Joshua 2:20 tn Heb “and if you report this matter of ours.”
83. Joshua 2:21 tn Heb “According to your words, so it [will be].”
84. Joshua 2:21 tn Heb “she sent them away and they went.”
85. Joshua 2:22 tn Heb “they went and came.”
86. Joshua 2:22 tn Heb “the pursuers.” The object (“them”) is added for clarification.
87. Joshua 2:22 tn Heb “the ones chasing them.” This has been rendered as “their pursuers” in the translation to avoid redundancy with the preceding clause.
88. Joshua 2:22 tn Heb “The pursuers looked in all the way and did not find [them].”
89. Joshua 2:23 tn The words “the river,” though not in the Hebrew text, are added for clarification.
90. Joshua 2:24 tn Heb “Surely the Lord has given into our hand all the land.” The report by the spies uses the Hebrew perfect, suggesting certitude.
91. Joshua 2:24 tn Heb “are melting away because of us.”