Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Joshua 9:4
They did work wilily, and went and made as if they had been ambassadors, and took old sacks upon their asses, and wine bottles, old, and rent, and bound up;
4. they did work wilily ] Rather, they also did work wilily. They had heard what Joshua had done in the case of Jericho and Ai, and the stratagems he had em ployed, and now they also resolved to do something and to meet craft with craft. “Thei thouten felli,” Wyclif.
made as if they had been ] Or, as the Ancient Versions with the change of a single consonant, reading here as in Jos 9:12, render, provided themselves with victuals.
old sacks upon their asses ] These were probably the same as “the large bags, usually of hair, in which the Orientals pack up, for convenient transport on the backs of animals, all the baggage and commodities required for the journey. Beds, boxes, provisions, pots, packages of goods, all are carried in such bags, slung over the back of the animal, one hanging at each side. Being a good deal knocked about and exposed to the weather, these saddle-bags, as one might call them but for their size, suffer in a long journey; and hence the Gibeonites took old bags, to convey the impression that a long journey had been made. Kitto’s Bible Illustrations, 11. p. 286.
wine bottles ] i.e. skin bottles, of which classical antiquity has afforded many representations. In the East the wine was preserved not in casks but in earthen jars and leathern bottles, made of the skins of goats, oxen, and buffaloes, turned inside out, washed, and rubbed over with warm mineral tar or naphtha. The wine is drawn out at one of the feet, by opening or closing the cord with which it is tied. This explains how the bottles could be “old,” “rent,” and “bound up,” and also the caution of our Lord against pouring new wine into old bottles, lest they should be burst by the wine (Mar 2:22).
Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges
They did work wilily – literally, they also, or they too, did work, etc. The also serves, apparently, to connect the stratagem of the Gibeonites with that employed by the Israelites before Ai. It hints that the Gibeonites resolved to meet craft with craft.
Rent and bound up – i. e. the wine skins were torn and roughly repaired by tying up the edges of the tear. The more thorough and careful way, hardly feasible in a hasty journey, would have been to insert a patch.
Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible
Verse 4. They did work wilily] Finesse of this kind is allowed by the conduct of all nations; and stratagems in war are all considered as legal. Nine tenths of the victories gained are attributable to stratagem; all sides practise them, and therefore none can condemn them. Much time and labour have been lost in the inquiry, “Did not the Gibeonites tell lies?” Certainly they did, and what is that to us? Does the word of God commend them for it? It does not. Are they held up to us as examples! Surely no. They did what any other nation would have done in their circumstances, and we have nothing to do with their example. Had they come to the Israelites, and simply submitted themselves without opposition and without fraud, they had certainly fared much better. Lying and hypocrisy always defeat their own purpose, and at best can succeed only for a short season. Truth and honesty never wear out.
Old sacks-and wine bottles, old, &c.] They pretended to have come from a very distant country, and that their sacks and the goat-skins that served them for carrying their wine and water in, were worn out by the length of the journey.
Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible
Ambassadors, sent from a far country, as they say, Jos 9:6.
Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole
4. They did work wililyTheyacted with dexterous policy, seeking the means of self-preservation,not by force, which they were convinced would be unavailing, but byartful diplomacy.
took old sacks upon theirassesTravellers in the East transport their luggage on beastsof burden; the poorer sort stow all their necessaries, food, clothes,utensils together, in a woollen or hair-cloth sack, laid across theshoulders of the beast they ride upon.
wine bottles, old, and rent,and bound upGoat-skins, which are better adapted for carryingliquor of any kind fresh and good, than either earthenware, which isporous, or metallic vessels, which are soon heated by the sun. Theseskin bottles are liable to be rent when old and much used; and thereare various ways of mending themby inserting a new piece ofleather, or by gathering together the edges of the rent and sewingthem in the form of a purse, or by putting a round flat splinter ofwood into the hole.
Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
And they did work wilily,…. Acted craftily, dealt in much cunning and subtlety; our version leaves out a very emphatic word, “also”; they also, as well as other nations, acted a cunning part, but in a different way; they did not enter into consultations and alliances with others, how to defend themselves, but made use of a stratagem to make peace, and enter into a league with Israel; or also as the Israelites had done, either as Simeon and Levi had dealt craftily with the Shechemites, who were Hivites, Ge 34:2; so now the Gibeonites, who also were Hivites, Jos 9:7; wrought in a wily and crafty manner with them, so Jarchi; or as the Israelites had lately done in the affair of Ai:
and went and made as if they had been ambassadors: from some states in a foreign country, sent on an embassy to the people of Israel, to compliment them on their successes, and to enter into alliance with them, which they thought would be pleasing and acceptable to them; the Targum is,
“they prepared food,”
which they took with them for their journey; and so the Septuagint, Vulgate Latin, Syriac, and Arabic versions:
and took old sacks upon their asses: in which they put, their provisions:
and wine bottles, old, and rent, and bound up: not made of glass, as ours usually are, but of the skins of beasts, as the bottles in the eastern countries commonly were; which in time grew old, and were rent and burst, and they were obliged to mend them, and bind them up, that they might hold together, and retain the liquor put into them, see Mt 9:17.
Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible
(4) They did work wilily.Literally, and they also dealt with subtilty. The stratagem does not seem a very profound one, or one that would have been difficult to detect. But we may remember a fact of Israels experience which puts it in a somewhat different light. The Israelites themselves had come from a far country, but their raiment had not waxed old upon them, nor did their feet swell, these forty years. Of bread they had no need, when there was manna, and God gave them water for their thirst. Of worn garments and stale provisions they had no experience, and therefore, when the Gibeonites presented themselves in this extraordinary garb and guise, it is not unnatural that they were not detected by the eyes of Israel.
They . . . made as if they had been ambassadors.The verb thus translated does not occur elsewhere in the Hebrew Bible. By the alteration of a letter, the Targum, LXX., and some other versions make it mean, they gat them provision.
Fuente: Ellicott’s Commentary for English Readers (Old and New Testaments)
4. [
They did work wilily Literally, Then did also they by stratagem. The also seems to refer here most naturally to what Joshua had done to Ai. As he used cunning and strategy in the capture of that city, so did also they practice strategy in making a league with Israel. Others, we think less correctly, take also ( ) as an adversative here, expressing the contrast between the action of the Gibeonites and the other Canaanites.]
As if ambassadors Suing for peace. The more distant cities think only of war; the nearest, on whom the next blow must fall, seek for peace; perhaps their popular form of government also influenced them toward a pacific policy. [The Hebrew word translated, made as if they had been ambassadors, (Hithpael of ,) occurs nowhere else; but Keil and others defend this meaning, given in the English version. Others, however, with Gesenius, argue that “since no other trace of this form or signification exists in Hebrew or Aramaean, it is better to read, with six MSS., they provided themselves with food for the journey, as in Jos 9:12; which is also expressed by the ancient versions.”]
Old sacks The traveller’s equipage in Syria, anciently and at the present day, comprises food and drink, kitchen utensils, tents, bedding, etc., all stowed away in sacks and transported on the backs of asses. Old sacks would give the impression of a long journey.
Wine bottles These were goat-skins, nearly whole, cured in a peculiar manner. When worn through, a temporary expedient for mending them was to gather up the skin about the hole and tie it like the mouth of a bag. By this means the mending becomes very manifest.
Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments
I pass over the historical relation of the Gibeonites conduct, to direct the Reader to the spiritual gospel sense of the passage. Are not those Gibeonites a picture of the Gentile Church, coming to our Almighty Joshua, in all the poverty of the tattered garments of a ruined nature, and from having heard of the wonders wrought by the God of Israel in a covenant way, earnest to seek the redemption of their life, in any manner, and upon any terms, the Lord shall think proper? Reader, bring the subject nearer home. Are not we ourselves by nature like the men of Gibeon, being Gentiles and aliens to the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers to the covenants of promise? And as such, until introduced into the privilege of the church of Jesus, and brought nigh by his blood, may it not be said of us, that we are from a far country? For who so far from salvation by Jesus, as those who sit under his gospel, and yet to whom it is the savour of death unto death? Eph 2:11-13 ; 2Co 2:16 .
Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
Jos 9:4 They did work wilily, and went and made as if they had been ambassadors, and took old sacks upon their asses, and wine bottles, old, and rent, and bound up;
Ver. 4. They did work wilily. ] They exercised a serpentine subtilty, and dealt fraudulently, as Gen 3:1 ; but where was their columbine simplicity? Mat 10:16 They strain hard to save their lives. But a man should rather die than lie.
Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)
They They too.
made as if they had been ambassadors. Some codices, with Aramaean, Septuagint, Syriac, and Vulgate, read “furnished themselves with provisions”, as in Jos 9:11 and Jos 9:12.
bottles = skins i.e. wine-skins.
Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics
work wilily: Gen 34:13, 1Ki 20:31-33, Mat 10:16, Luk 16:8
ambassadors: The word tzir, an ambassador, properly denotes a hinge; because an ambassador is a person upon whom the business turns as upon a hinge. So the Latin Cardinalis, from cardo, a hinge, was the title of the prime minister of the emperor Theodosius, though now applied only to the Pope’s electors and counsellors.
wine bottles: These bottles being made of skin, were consequently liable to be rent, and capable of being mended; which is done, according to Chardin, by putting in a piece, or by gathering up the wounded piece in the manner of a purse; and sometimes by inserting a flat piece of wood. Psa 119:83, Mat 9:17, Mar 2:22, Luk 5:37, Luk 5:38
Reciprocal: Jos 9:12 – our bread
Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge
9:4 They did work wilily, and went and made as if they had been ambassadors, and took old sacks upon their asses, and wine bottles, old, and rent, and {c} bound up;
(c) Because they were all worn.