Exegetical and Hermeneutical Commentary of Joshua 10:12

Then spoke Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.

12. Then spake Joshua to the Lord ] The quotation probably commences with the 12th verse and extends to the end of the 15th. It begins as follows:

“Then spake Joshua unto Jehovah,

In the day Jehovah delivered up the Amorites before the sons of Israel.”

Then ] The crisis of the battle had now arrived. The day had far advanced since Joshua had emerged after his night-march through the passes of Ai. It was noon, and the sun stood high in the midst of heaven above the hills which hid Gibeon from his sight. “In front, over the western vale of Ajalon, was the faint figure of the crescent moon visible above the hailstorm (Jos. Ant. 5:1. 17), which was fast driving up from the sea in the valleys below.” Beneath him was the Amorite host rushing in wild confusion down the western passes. The furious storm was obscuring the light of day, and the work was but half accomplished. Was the foe to make good his escape? Was the speed, with which he had “come up quickly, and saved, and helped” the defenceless Gibeonites, to be robbed of half its reward? Oh that the sun would burst forth once more from amidst the gloom that had obscured it! Oh that the day, all too short for his great undertaking, could be prolonged “until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies”! See Stanley’s Sin. and Pal. p. 210; Edersheim’s Israel in Canaan, pp. 81, 82.

spake Joshua ] Then it was, standing on the lofty eminence above Gibeon, “doubtless with outstretched hand and spear,” that Joshua burst forth into that ecstatic prayer of faith, which has been here incorporated into the text from the “Book of Jasher.”

and he said in the sight of Israel ] literally, before the eyes of Israel, in the sight or presence of Israel, who were witnesses of his words,

Sun, stand thou still ] Literally, as in the margin, “ be silent,” comp. Lev 10:3, “And Aaron held his peace.” The word denotes (i) to be dumb with astonishment; (ii) to be silent; (iii) to rest, or, be quiet. Comp. 1Sa 14:9, “If they say thus unto us, Tarry (or be still as in marg.) until we come to you;” Job 31:34, “Did I fear a great multitude, or did the contempt of families terrify me, that I kept silence?” Keil would translate it “ wait.” The Vulgate renders it, “ Sol contra Gabaon ne movearis et luna contra vallem Ajalon;” Wyclif thus, “Sunne , Aens Gabaon be thow not meued, and mone, aens the valey of Haylon.”

Gibeon Ajalon ] These spots are named as stations of the sun and moon “because Joshua, when he engaged in the battle, was probably west of Gibeon, in a place where he saw the sun shining in the east over that city, and the moon in the far west over Ajalon.” The hour of utterance contemplated was probably still in the forenoon.

in the valley of Ajalon ] i.e. “the valley of the gazelles.” It is represented by the modern Merj Ibn Omeir, “a broad and beautiful valley” running in a westerly direction from the mountains towards the great western plain. The town of Ajalon was afterwards, the conquest being concluded, in the territory of Dan (Jos 19:42), and was assigned to the Levites (Jos 21:24; 1Ch 6:69). Here the Philistines were routed by Saul and Jonathan (1Sa 14:31), and the place is often mentioned in the wars with that people (1Ch 8:13; 2Ch 28:18).

Fuente: The Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

These four verses seem to be a fragment or extract taken from some other and independent source and inserted into the thread of the narrative after it had been completed, and inserted most probably by another hand than that of the author of the Book of Joshua.

It is probable that Jos 10:12 and the first half of Jos 10:13 alone belong to the Book of Jasher and are poetical, and that the rest of this passage is prose.

The writer of this fragment seems to have understood the words of the ancient song literally, and believed that an astronomical miracle really took place, by which the motion of the heavenly bodies was for some hours suspended. (Compare also Ecclesiasticus 46:4.) So likewise believed the older Jewish authorities generally, the Christian fathers, and many commentators ancient and modern.

It must be allowed, indeed, that some of the objections which have been urged against this view on scientific grounds are easily answered. The interference, if such there were, with the earths motion was not an act of blind power ab extra and nothing more. The Agent here concerned is omnipotent and omniscient, and could, of course, as well arrest the regular consequences of such a suspension of natures ordinary working as He could suspend that working itself. It is, however, obvious, that any such stupendous phenomenon would affect the chronological calculations of all races of men over the whole earth and do so in a similarly striking and very intelligible manner. Yet no record of any such perturbation is anywhere to be found, and no marked and unquestionable reference is made to such a miracle by any of the subsequent writers in the Old or New Testament. For reasons like these, many commentators have explained the miracle as merely optical.

The various explanations show how strongly the difficulties which arise out of the passage have been felt. Accordingly, stress has been laid by recent commentators on the admitted fact that the words out of which the difficulty springs are an extract from a poetical book. They must consequently, it is argued, be taken in a popular and poetical, and not in a literal sense. Joshua feared lest the sun should set before the people had fully avenged themselves of their enemies. In his anxiety he prayed to God, and God hearkened to him. This is boldly and strikingly expressed in the words of the ancient book, which describes Joshua as praying that the day might be prolonged, or, in poetical diction, that the sun might be stayed until the work was done. Similarly, Jdg 5:20 and Psa 18:9-15 are passages which no one construes as describing actual occurrences: they set forth only internal, although most sincere and, in a spiritual sense, real and true convictions. This explanation is now adopted by theologians whose orthodoxy upon the plenary inspiration and authority of holy Scripture is well known and undoubted.

Jos 10:12

In the sight of Israel – literally, before the eyes of Israel, i. e. in the sight or presence of Israel, so that the people were witnesses of his words. (Compare Deu 31:7.)

Sun, stand thou still – literally, as margin, be silent (compare Lev 10:3); or rather, perhaps, tarry, as in 1Sa 14:9.

Thou, moon – The words addressed to the moon as well as to the sun, indicate that both were visible as Joshua spoke. Below and before him, westward, was the valley of Ajalon; behind him, eastward, were the hills around Gibeon. Some hours had passed, since in the early dawn he had fallen upon the host of the enemy, and the expression in the midst of heaven Jos 10:13 seems to import that it was now drawing toward mid-day, though the moon was still faintly visible in the west. If the time had been near sunset, Joshua would have seen the sun, not, as he did, eastward of him, but westward, sinking in the sea.

The valley of Ajalon – i. e. the valley of the gazelles. This is the modern Merj Ibn Omeir, described by Robinson, a broad and beautiful valley running in a westerly direction from the mountains toward the great western plain. The ancient name is still preserved in Yalo, a village situated on the hill which skirts the south side of the valley.

Jos 10:13

Book of Jasher – i. e. as margin, of the upright or righteous, a poetical appellation of the covenant-people (compare Jeshurun in Deu 32:15, and note; and compare Num 23:10, Num 23:21; Psa 111:1). This book was probably a collection of national odes celebrating the heroes of the theocracy and their achievements, and is referred to again (marginal reference) as containing the dirge composed by David over Saul and Jonathan.

About a whole day – i. e. about twelve hours; the average space between sunrise and sunset.

Jos 10:15

Joshuas return (compare Jos 10:43) to Gilgal was not until after he had, by the storm and capture of the principal cities of south Canaan, completed the conquest of which the victory at Gibeon was only the beginning.

This verse is evidently the close of the extract from an older work, which connected the rescue of Gibeon immediately with the return to Gilgal, and omitted the encampment at Makkedah Jos 10:21, and also the details given in Jos 10:28-42.

Fuente: Albert Barnes’ Notes on the Bible

Jos 10:12

The sun stood still, and the moon stayed.

The battle of Bethhoron

In some respects this victory had a special significance. In the first place, it had a most important bearing on the success of the whole enterprise; its suddenness, its completeness, its manifold grandeur being admirably fitted to paralyse the enemy in other parts of the country, and open the whole region to Joshua. By some it has been compared to the battle of Marathon, not only on account of the suddenness with which the decisive blow was struck, but also on account of the importance of the interests involved. It was a battle for freedom, for purity, for true religion, in opposition to tyranny, idolatry, and abominable sensuality; for all that is wholesome in human life, in opposition to all that is corrupt; for all that makes for peaceful progress, in opposition to all that entails degradation and misery. The prospects of the whole world were brighter after that victory of Bethhoron. The relation of heaven to earth was more auspicious, and more full of promise for the days to come. In the next place the tokens of Divine aid were very impressive. After the experience which Joshua had had of the consequences of failing to ask God for direction when first the Gibeonites came to him, we may be very sure that on the present occasion he would be peculiarly careful to seek Divine counsel. And he was well rewarded. Then as to the miracle of the sun and the moon standing still. It is well known that this was one of the passages brought forward by the Church of Rome to condemn Galileo, when he affirmed that the earth and the moon revolved round the sun, and that it was not the motion of the sun round the earth, but the rotation of the earth on her own axis that produced the change of day and night. No one would dream now of making use of this passage for any such purpose. Whatever theory of inspiration men may hold, it is admitted universally that the inspired writers used the popular language of the day in matters of science, and did not anticipate discoveries which were not made till many centuries later. A far more serious question has been raised as to whether this miracle ever occurred, or could have occurred. To those who believe in the possibility of miracles, it can be no conclusive argument that it could not have occurred without producing injurious consequences the end of which can hardly be conceived. For if the rotation of the earth on its axis was suddenly arrested, all human beings on its surface, and all loose objects whatever must have been flung forward with prodigious violence; just as, on a small scale, on the sudden stoppage of a carriage, we find ourselves thrown forward, the motion of the carriage having been communicated to our bodies. But really this is a paltry objection; for surely the Divine power that can control the rotation of the earth is abundantly able to obviate such effects as these. We can understand the objection that God, having adjusted all the forces of nature, leaves them to operate by themselves in a uniform way without disturbance or interference; but we can hardly comprehend the reasonableness of the position that if it is His pleasure miraculously to modify one arrangement, He is unable to adjust all relative arrangements, and make all conspire harmoniously to the end desired. But was it a miracle? The narrative, as we have it, implies not only that it was, but that there was something in it stupendous and unprecedented. It comes in as a part of that supernatural process in which God has been engaged ever since the deliverance of His people from Egypt, and which was to go on till they should be finally settled in the land. It naturally joins on to the miraculous division of the Jordan, and the miraculous fall of the walls of Jericho. We must remember that the work in which God was now engaged was one of peculiar spiritual importance and significance. He was not merely finding a home for His covenant people; He was making arrangements for advancing the highest interests of humanity; He was guarding against the extinction on earth of the Divine light which alone can guide man in safety through the life that now is, and in preparation for that which is to come. Who will take upon him to say that at an important crisis in the progress of the events which were to prepare the way for this grand consummation, it was not fitting for the Almighty to suspend for a time even the ordinances of heaven, in order that a days work, carrying such vast consequences, might not be interrupted before its triumphant close? One other notable feature in the transaction of this day was the completeness of the defeat inflicted by Joshua on the enemy. This defeat went on in successive stages from early morning till late at night. First, there was the slaughter in the plain of Gibeon. Then the havoc produced by the hail and by Joshua on the retreating army. Then the destruction caused as Joshua followed the enemy to their cities. And the work of the day was wound up by the execution of the five kings. Moreover, there followed a succession of similar scenes at the taking and sacking of their cities. When we try to realise all this in detail, we are confronted with a terrible scene in blood and death, and possibly we may find ourselves asking, Was there a particle of humanity in Joshua, that he was capable of such a series of transactions? But it must be said, and said firmly for Joshua, that there is no evidence of his acting on this or on other such occasions in order to gratify personal feelings; it was not done either to gratify a thirst for blood, or to gratify the pride of a conqueror. Joshua all through gives us the impression of a man carrying out the will of another; inflicting a judicial sentence, and inflicting it thoroughly at the first so that there might be no need for a constant series of petty executions afterwards. This certainly was his aim; but the enemy showed themselves more vital than he had supposed. And when we turn to ourselves and think what we may learn from this transaction, we see a valuable application of his method to the spiritual warfare. God has enemies still, within and without, with whom we are called to contend. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. When we are fighting with the enemy within our own hearts leniency is our great temptation, but at the same time our greatest snare. What we need here is courage to slay. And in reference to the outside world, want of thoroughness in warfare is still our besetting sin. If only the Church had more faith, and, as the fruit of faith, more courage and more enterprise, what help from heaven might not come to her! True, she would not see the enemy crushed by hailstones, nor the sun standing in Gibeon, nor the moon in the valley of Ajalon; but she would see grander sights; she would see men of spiritual might raised up in her ranks; she would see tides of strong spiritual influence overwhelming her enemies. Jerichos dismantled, Ais captured, and the champions of evil falling like Lucifer from heaven to make way for the King of kings and Lord of lords. Let us go to the Cross of Jesus to revive our faith and recruit our energies. (W. G. Blaikie, D. D.)

Fixing of sun and moon in the heavens

I. Consider the arguments, usually advanced against the possibility of the sun and moon standing still in the heavens. Not merely is it objected that such an occurrence would be an unwarrantable interference with the laws of nature; but the historians veracity has also been called in question. It is argued that in recording the circumstance he does not express himself scientifically; but that, on the contrary, he evinces ignorance of the true principles of astronomy: that therefore he should not be regarded as an inspired writer, this circumstance being sufficient in itself to shake credit in his testimony. To this objection we reply–Joshua did not mean to furnish us with a treatise on astronomy. He expressed himself according to the opinion formed on scientific topics during the times in which he lived. Do not we, ourselves, who know that it is the earth which moves, and not the sun, commonly speak of his rising and setting; while perfectly aware that in reality he neither rises nor sets. Certainly the lengthening out of the day (on the occasion of Joshua defeating the five kings) must have been caused by the earth not revolving so rapidly on its axis as it usually does. It is well known that in the equatorial regions the earth moves from west to east at the rate of one thousand miles in the hour; and that the rapidity of motion gradually diminishes as we go from the equator to the poles; so that, at the poles, there is no motion whatever. Supposing that, instead of moving at its usual speed, our earth were to revolve, on its axis, only five hundred miles in the hour: the result would be that the day would be protracted to double the ordinary length, because the apparent passage of the sun first, and of the moon next, over the concave surface would be proportionally retarded. But it is further objected that such an interference with the course of nature would have occasioned irreparable mischief. What! Is anything too hard for God? Cannot He, who called nature into existence, suspend its laws and operations when He pleases? Is any man so well acquainted with the complex machinery of nature as to be prepared to say that the conception and development of animal life are possible things; but that the slackening of the earths rotary motion is an impossibility? And now, before dismissing this head of our subject, we shall adduce from pagan mythology a proof that the miracle referred to in our text did really occur. The superstitious Greeks, in olden times, worshipped the sun, under the name of Apollo, who (according to them) had a son who was called Phaeton. Apollo was supposed to drive the chariot of the sun daily through the skies. Phaeton requested his father to permit him to drive the chariot for a single day. Apollo granted the request. Phaeton proved an unskilful charioteer, in being unable to curb the horses, which therefore went out of the proper track. Jupiter (whom the ancient pagans regarded as the supreme god) irritated at Phaetons rashness, and fearing that a conflagration of heaven and earth might ensue, struck the youth with the thunderbolt and hurled him into the river Po in Italy. This heathen anecdote cannot be altogether an invention. There lies a truth at the bottom of it. Some irregularity in the suns apparent diurnal course must have occurred at an early period of history; otherwise ancient heathens would have no foundation whereon to build their superstitious legend. And let us observe that where heathen testimony can be brought to corroborate revelation the testimony is invaluable; because it is the testimony of enemies.

II. We proceed to show that there existed an absolute necessity for the miracle in question being performed. Yes; there is an intimate connection between this miracle and the redemption which is in Jesus Christ. If sun and moon had not stood still at Joshuas command there would (on human calculation) have been no chance of salvation for a single member of our fallen race. If Israel had not had sufficient light to guide them in pursuing their Canaanite enemies these enemies would have escaped during the darkness of the night. Had they escaped the five kings might have rallied; and, instead of Israel exterminating them, they might have exterminated Israel. Thus the advent of the promised Redeemer would have been prevented: for God had decreed that of Jacobs seed (in the line of Judah) Messiah should descend. No doubt the Divine plans have long been settled in the councils of eternity; and the Most High will take good care that Satan shall not defeat them. But then God employs second means to work His ends. He ordains every single step and event which will be conducive thereto in order that a single link may not be broken in the chain of His providential dealing.

III. The conflict which Israel, under Joshua, had to maintain with the wicked nations of Canaan prefigured that deadlier conflict which we ourselves, under a greater than Joshua, have to keep up with the world, the devil, and the flesh. TO enable us to make head against these spiritual foes, who have in view nothing less than our destruction, God in mercy lengthens out the day. There is a spiritual sun, and there is a spiritual moon: even as there exist a literal sun and moon. God has set these moral luminaries in the spiritual firmament, to give such persons as have hitherto turned a deaf ear to the gospel space to believe it and be saved, ere it be too late; and also to afford light to those who already believe that they may continue firm to the end. (John Caldwell, B. A.)

How Joshua stopped the sun

For ages multitudes of Bible readers have seen in this narrative a stupendous miracle. Seeing the statement some have rebelled against it, and refused to believe it. Others have conscientiously striven to believe the statement, and defend it. Now, if a miracle is really declared to have taken place upon that day, its stupendous nature forms no objection whatever to my faith. Every miracle is to me stupendous, or else it is no miracle at all. Where God is concerned nothing is impossible. What objection then is there? The first, that such an act would seem, at any rate to be out of keeping with Gods economy of power; it serves no direct purpose here. Mere flourishes of almightinesses are never found in the Bible. Every miracle in the Bible is a means to an end, and there is a proportion between the means and the end in view. There is no waste. I search the Bible in vain for any reference to the fact that the earth was stopped, or the sun stayed. I find no such reference at all. No use whatever is made of this in any other age, or in any other book. God led His people out of Egypt with a high hand, and the nation was cradled among miracles, and these miracles are appealed to time after time, age after age, to the end of the Bible. But there is a remarkable silence with regard to this. But my chief objection to the ordinary view is that I do not believe that the Bible says there was a miracle at all. I hold that, given a fair translation of this chapter, and an average amount of intelligence in the reader, and a reasonable freedom for traditional bias, the alleged stupendous miracle disappears entirely, and gives way to something far more valuable. And I claim that it is one of the inestimable and innumerable benefits conferred upon us by the Revised Translation of the Bible, that by its means the average reader can, without the help of any commentary, see at a glance how the case stood, and what really took place on that great day. Now, you will ask, What is the difference, then, between the Revised and the Old Version? Why, simply this. If you read this chapter in the Old Version the verses follow one another in unbroken continuity, and no hint what ever is given to the reader that when he arrives at the twelfth verse he is no longer reading what the author of the Book of Joshua himself wrote; he is not warned that the author, at the twelfth verse, breaks off from telling his own story, and introduces a quotation as a climax to the description of the battle, and that that quotation is a poetical one, taken from a book once popular, but now entirely lost, the Book of Josher. If you read the Old Version it would seem to you that from the twelfth to the fifteenth verses is as much prose as the rest of the chapter, whereas in the Hebrew Bible, from the first, these verses were marked as a piece of quoted poetry; and in the Revised Version the thing is done almost in the same way. So that the reader who just looks at this chapter as it stands in the Revised Version will see that in the first part of the chapter he has to deal with history, and in this part he has to deal with poetry–a poetical quotation introduced by the historian as the climax of his description of the great battle of Bethhoron. Now it appears to me that this simple fact solves the difficulty entirely–relieves the faith of multitudes from a great burden; and, best of all, deprives a certain class of unbelievers of a very coarse but at the same time a very effective weapon. What; have we here, then? precisely what we have in many other parts of the Bible–namely, two accounts of the same thing: one the sober account of the historian, and the other the more glowing account of the poet. For instance, you have the same thing in the Book of Judges. You will remember–for you are Bible readers–you remember the great battle of Mount Tabor, The Jews were groaning under the tyranny of Jabin, the king of Jerusalem, and at last there arose Deborah. She aroused Barak, Barak routed the army of Sisera; Jael completed Baraks work, and with a tent-pin and a hammer killed Sisera in her tent. This is the story of the battle of Mount Tabor, as told by the historian. But in the chapter next to it you will find the song of Deborah, and in that song an inspired poetess gives her account of the battle from the standpoint of the poet. She says: They fought from heaven; the stars in their courses fought against Sisera. It was Barak who did it, and Jael, and the tent-pin and the hammer. No, no; they fought out of heaven. The stars in their courses, says Deborah, fought against Sisera. Is there any man on the face of the earth that has ever stood up to say that because Deborah said that the battle of Mount Tabor was actually won by planetary impulses, therefore the stars really entered the Jewish army and fought against the oppressor? Who is there that does not see at once that in that case we have to deal with poetry? We have something like that even in the New Testament. Our Lord Jesus Christ said on the very first day when discipleship was born–He said to one of His first disciples–Ye shall see the heavens opened, and the angels ascending and descending upon the Son of Man. Did they ever? Never, never. They never saw the blue rent; they never saw angels walking up and down the body of Christ. Never; it was a poetical form–a great mystical spiritual promise thrown into the larger language of poetry. And so the Gospel closes–They shall take up serpents, and if they drink any deadly thing it shall do them no manner of harm. Is that being carried out in everybody or in anybody that believes the name of Christ? No, not literally. The serpent will kill a Christian as well as an infidel. Poison is as effective on a saint as on a sinner. What does it mean then? It is a grand spiritual fact, put in the large language of poetry. And that is what we have in this chapter. But you will say, Is not the Bible a serious book? Of what value is the introduction of a bit of poetry like this when it misleads so many? I reply–

I. Yes, the bible is intensely serious. This is not quoted as an ornament; it is for use. And if you ask, What is the value of it? I reply it is immensely valuable. Apart from this poetical quotation the whole chapter is comparatively worthless. Why? Because a body without a soul is worthless. The Bible is valuable to us in so far as it touches my life and yours. To tell me that Joshua routed those people does not help me very much. That is the body of it. I want to get at the soul of it. I want to understand Joshua himself, to modernise him, to make him a brother and to get some good out of him. Well, this bit of poetry helps me: this is the key to it. If I read this i see how the thing is done, and I see how I can do the same thing, in a measure, when I am called upon to do it. This piece of poetry is a window through which we can look into Joshuas heart. The great battle of Bethhoron was a battle that threatened to be a drawn battle. There stands the man on the ridge. The men have been running away faster than he has been able to pursue them, and at this moment it seemed as if nature were conspiring against him; as if he were not to have the usual hours of the day. A black, mysterious cloud was coming to help the people who were running away from him. Dont you understand the agony that would come into a mans soul at that moment?–the impassioned prayer that would go up to God from his heart–not to stretch the laws of nature till they crack–but to give him the usual day, to keep the sun from going down at noon. No child was Joshua, crying for the moon. No man with such sick fancies could have done the work he did. What this man prayed for was a fair days light to do a fair days work in the strength of and for the glory of God. And do not you know something of the fear that came over him? If you are trying to do any work you too will come to this point. It will seem to you as if God were going to make your day too short. You will see the night falling all too soon. The night cometh, and you will say, Oh, for more light. Life is not long enough; I am being taken away in the very middle of my days. And you will then know what it is to cry, Sun, stand thou in the heaven; and thou, moon, in the valley of Ajalon.

II. and the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the nation had avenged themselves. That is the key–until the nation had avenged themselves. What was coming up from the Mediterranean was not some awful preternatural piece of night, as Joshua feared. It was only a shower: a hailstorm. It was not going to help his enemies, but to slay them. The sun was not hasting from the heavens; the heavenly orbs would do their work as usual. The sun and moon were to be depended on; but if Joshua really wanted to have a longer day than usual, that did not depend on the sun and moon, he had to make it himself. How? Just as he lengthened the preceding night. From Gilgal to Gibeon, how long? Three days journey. What did Joshua do? Why, he took the twelve hours and stretched them till they became thirty-six. He did three days march in one night. So if Joshua wants a longer day on Bethhoron, it is not the sun that can make it for him, nor the moon either. He must go back on his recipe of the night before, and take the twelve hours of the day and stretch them. It is for Joshua himself to make the day longer, for it is not up in the skies that days are lengthened, but here on earth. The secret of a long day lies with Joshua, and not with the sun. No, the sun will not wait for you; but you can quicken your pace, and so lengthen your days. The longest day in your life is the day in which you work hardest, think the closest, live noblest.

III. Is that all? No. Was nothing done by god? Yes, everything, And there was no day like that, says the old poet, before it, or after, that the Lord hearkened unto the voice of a man. By stopping the sun? No; The Lord fought for Israel. That cloud coming up from the Mediterranean, that Joshua mistook for the night, was one of his own soldiers marching to meet him; it was one of his own allies. Nature herself was in league with him. It was the hailstorm, one of Gods reinforcements coming to do the work of God. It is one of the deepest truths of experience that all things work together for good to them that love God. The hailstorms are still in league with the Joshuas. Are you false and mean in your aims? Are your ways corrupt on the earth? Then I tell you, whoever you are, you may succeed for a while, or you may seem to succeed, as the tares that ripen in the autumn sun that the fire may burn them all the easier by and by. You may seem to succeed for a while, but the very framework of the universe must be shattered; Gods throne must crumble in decay; heaven itself must be carried at the assault of hells dark troops before you can ultimately and really succeed. You too will be caught some day between Joshua and the hailstorm of the Lord. But are you seeking to be true, trying to be right, yet often finding things arrayed against you? Then, in Gods name, go on. You misread the signals. The blackness that threatens you is only an ally in disguise. You are bound to succeed in the battle of the Lord. The nature of things is in league with righteousness.

IV. and Joshua returned into the camp at Gilgal. Did he know what he had done? No. He knew he had done something; that it had been a great day, but he had no idea how great it was. It was one of the thousand-year days of God. It is still with us. That sun that Joshua cried to is still shining, and the moon has never left the vale of Ajalon. Serve the Lord with all your might, and you will do a work greater than you imagine, or dream, or desire. Our time-tables are altogether wrong–sixty seconds to the minute, sixty minutes to the hour; that will do very well for the rough and tumble work in the city, but apply a time-table like that to Gethsemane. Read the Gospels, watch in hand, beneath the shadow of the Cross–From the sixth to the ninth hour Jesus hung on the Cross, dying. Sixty minutes to the hour, sixty seconds to the minute! It will not do. These are eternal things, and they upset all our calculations. We do not know what we do when we serve God. Life is greater, grander than we dream. Do not think life is small. We sow time, and, lo, we reap eternity. We may so live as to leave behind us a light shining till the world itself shall end. Returned to the camp. Ah, men and women, the pathos of that old phrase! You and I will return to the camp very soon. The day over. Well, you may arrest the sun before night; but the sun, once it has dipped beneath the western wave, cannot be brought back. Yesterday! Where is it? It is beyond, in the great eternity. Can you run after the lightning and catch it and bring it back? Sooner shall you do that than at the end of the day recover the sun that has set. We shall be returning to camp soon. What histories are we bringing back–you and I? The number of our days is with God; but the length, fulness, quality, and eternalness arc with us. (J. M. Gibbon.)

Providential help

1. We may learn whither to have recourse for help whenever the state of the weather has proved unfavourable to our respective undertakings. Is our land drenched with floods, that threaten to wash away or decay the seed lately sown? or chilled by cold and blighting winds? or parched up with a scorching heat, unmitigated by a passing cloud or a solitary shower? To complain and murmur under such visitations is as vain as ii is impious; whereas prayer for their alleviation or removal will probably procure us Gods favourable consideration, and certainly work for our spiritual profit.

2. Again, we learn by what unlikely means the Almighty brings about the deliverance of His people and the discomfiture of His enemies. To promote this great end, all hearts are in His hand, all events are at His disposal; yea, He directs and controls the elements themselves, so as to extort from the sons of men the confession, This is Gods doing; it is marvellous in our eyes. What befell the Spanish Armada, fitted out for the invasion and conquest of Great Britain? The Lord sent a great wind into the sea, to destroy the remnant of those ships which had hitherto escaped defeat; so that the final discomfiture of the fleet was as much owing to the tempestuous violence of the ocean as to the desperate valour of the English. However inextricable your difficulties, however insuperable your dangers may appear, the time for surmounting or escaping them may be at hand: your last extremity is Gods gracious opportunity: the valley of Achor He is changing into the door of hope, and making the vast magazine of ordinary and extraordinary dispensations instrumental to your eventual happiness and eternal glory. But tremble, ye wicked, though peace and prosperity at present attend your path. The resources in the hand of a retributive Providence are leagued against you, which, if delayed now, will fall on your devoted heads with tripled weight hereafter.

3. But I may instance some still clearer points of resemblance between this special interference of the Almighty in the case of Joshua and His providential arrangements at the present day. Every year presents to us an appearance in the heavens as deserving our surprise and admiration as that which attracted the notice of the camp of Israel. From the depth of winter to the height of summer the sun gradually travels over a wider space in its daily course. Morning after morning it rises earlier; evening after evening later sets. At length it escapes nut sight for a few hours only; and during that short interval the twilight in great degree compensates for its absence. Lest, moreover, during winter nearly utter darkness should veil the skies, on account of the suns few and contracted visits, the stars on frosty nights shine with a brilliancy unknown in summer, while the unclouded moon supplies its place, a welcome substitute, guided by whose friendly rays at any time the wanderer may confidently rely on reaching his place of destination. I scarcely need remind you what assistance this lesser light lends the labourer in late harvests by rising about the full at the same hour for some evenings in succession; or how, when the sun does not rise above their horizon for months together, and they would otherwise be enveloped in continual darkness, Divine Providence lights up for the inhabitants of the polar regions the brilliant aurora borealis, or northern lights, to illumine and cheer their noonday nights. Is not as effectual a provision made for light by these contrivances as though the sun and moon in set terms stood still, and hasted not to go clown about a whole day? Are they not as hard to be accounted for?

4. By comparing this miracle wrought by the hand of Joshua with those performed by Jesus Christ, we may learn to ascribe all proper honour to His person, all due reverence to the religion He came hither to establish. (H. A. Herbert, B. A.)

The sun standing still

A new suggestion in regard to the standing still of the sun and the moon at the apostrophe of Joshua is given by the Rev. J. Sutherland Black in his edition of Joshua, issued as one part of the Smaller Cambridge Bible series. His new postulate is to the effect that no physical miracle occurred, or was desired; he thinks the cosmical features of the event do not touch upon the supernatural at all. His explanation runs thus: To understand the quotation from the Book of Jasher, we must figure to ourselves the speaker at two successive periods of the summer day–first on the plateau to the north of the hill of Gibeon, with Gibeon lying under the sun to the south-east or south, at the moment when the resistance of the enemy has at last broken down, and again, hours later, when the sun has set, and the moon is sinking westward over the valley of Ajalon, threatening by its disappearance to put an end to the victorious pursuit. The appeal to the moon is, of course, for light–i.e., after sunset. The moon appears over Ajalon; that is somewhat south of west, as seen by one approaching from Beth-horon. There was, therefore, evening moonlight. Joshua prayed first that the sunlight, and then that the moonlight following it, might suffice for the complete defeat of the enemy.

The desire and the improvement of life

It is the language of the passions, in the midst of a fervid and impetuous career. Sun, stand thou still, equally exclaim the sons of pleasure and of ambition: every rank, pursuit, and age joins in the same prayer. In the morning of our existence, when all things display their fairest aspect, and in the midst of a succession of pleasurable scenes time rolls rapidly along: should a moment of reflection intervene, who does not exclaim, with a sigh, How brief, how vain is life! how silently and swiftly do the hours advance and vanish! O sun, stand thou still; give us a few more of thy bright morning beams, that we may a little longer taste the sweetness of unsullied pleasure. When we advance to the noon of the human course; amidst all the weighty cares, the thronging projects and objects of strenuous pursuit, that by turns awaken our ardour and elude our expectation–if, amidst this busy scene, we throw a glance upon the enlarged and enlarging space we have already passed, and the short and shortening limits of that which remains–how naturally does the heart send forth the involuntary, fruitless wish, Sun, stand thou still. Hasten not so precipitately to crush our aspiring hopes, and extinguish in untimely darkness our unripened purposes: shine a little longer in thy meridian brightness, that we may not only exert our strength, but reap some recompense of our toil. Arrived at this period of imaginary tranquility–though many ties may be loosened which once bound us to the world, yet new objects of attachment rise, and new motives for wishing that our stay might be prolonged–or if expectation saddens, and all around the prospect grows more dim and desolate, still do we linger fondly on the verge of life, though bereft of its most valued comforts, from that unconquerable dread with which the untried and unknown future strikes the imagination. O sun, stop, stop thy course. Stand thou still in the midst of heaven, yet another year, another day, to soften our removal from the cheerful light, from the society of our fellow-beings, that, with more composed and collected thoughts, we may stand before the tribunal of our Creator. Thus various and inexhaustible are the excuses of each successive stage for wishing to lengthen out the brief span of life; and the same sentiment pervades all the different conditions and circumstances of mankind. If prosperity smile upon us, we think the sun, which lights us every day to a succession of pleasures, moves too quickly to his setting: O sun, stand thou still in the midst of this fair horizon–hasten not to draw the veil of night over these delightful prospects. And if adversity oppress our spirits, we complain that the days which are clouded with grief, like those which are illumined with joy, equally pass away never to return. O Sun, stand thou still, let the dark and lowering tempest pass from before thy refulgent orb: let thy sweet and pleasant light again gladden our hearts, that our few remaining hours may glide peacefully to the close. But if he, who, without his own fault, and by inevitable circumstances, has been deprived of happiness, may complain of the swiftness of time and the brevity of life, how much deeper regret must that man feel who is conscious of having wasted its most valuable seasons, in thoughtless inactivity! Well may he cry out to time, to suspend its course, Sun, stand thou still, or rather reverse thy flaming and impetuous career. On the other hand, the virtuous man. But who is so virtuous as to have no faults to repair, no defects to supply–the man, however, comparatively virtuous, whose youthful days have been introductory to a scene of honourable and useful exertion; who may justly look upon himself as a blessing to his fellow-creatures; and who is pursuing, with steady vigour, his well-chosen course; gradually extending his usefulness and his good affections; and is a progressive pattern of every social and every religious duty; though he may submissively await the Divine disposal, yet will he view, not without awe, the narrow space which even virtue itself can boast of here below; and will be almost tempted to wish that it might be the will of Divine Providence to protract the duration of a span so brief, so inadequate to his views and his desires: Sun, stand thou still; withdraw not thy precious and useful light so soon; let me still pursue the happy course on which I have entered. Unavailing are all such wishes; the tide of time will be neither accelerated nor retarded by our entreaties; the sun will neither suspend nor deviate from his course. Since, therefore, we cannot rule the course of nature, let us endeavour to rule ourselves. If we are so unhappy as to have wasted our past hours in folly or to have abused them by misconduct it is in vain to sit down and fold our arms in melancholy inaction; wishing that the past might be recalled, and grieving that the future cannot be hindered from advancing. We should rather call upon our souls and all that is within us to amend our faults, and repair the ills we have thereby incurred, before it be too late; like travellers who having wandered from the right path hasten to regain it before the sun goes down. If, on the contrary, we have happily chosen the path of virtue, let us cheerfully and thankfully pursue our way. Pleasant but fleeting is the season of youth, lifes cheerful morning. You cannot prolong its absolute duration; but you can add inestimably to its value. You can extend its happy influence over every remaining period, and draw from it a rich harvest of knowledge, virtue, and true felicity. Youth is the blossom, the promise of mature years these are equally transitory with the former. In vain you implore the sun to stay, but you may call him to witness a train of pious and charitable actions as he passes; you may crowd into a small extent a multitude of valuable labours; it is not for us to fix the limits, but to fulfil the duties of life–well pleased to act in concert with the great first mover of all things, among the innumerable instruments of His benevolent designs, and not unwilling to cease from action, whenever He shall see fit to transfer the pleasing though arduous toil from ourselves to others. No sooner has the sun passed his meridian than the shadows lengthen and night approaches. The dawn, the noon, the evening, all glide with uninterrupted speed; and the hour when we must bid farewell to all their successive scenes nature cannot now long delay. All that remains is, by reason and reflection, by prayer and repentance, to calm the perturbation of our minds–by holy resignation to the will of God, and a cheerful performance of our remaining duties, to seek His aid and protection–then, though we cannot escape the stroke of death, we shall render it less painful and alarming; thus disarmed of its sting, it will lose its greatest terrors; and will appear somewhat like a sound and refreshing slumber, falling on the over-wearied mariner, who is within sight of his desired haven, and who expects, with the dawn of the succeeding day, to meet the glad congratulations of all whom he loves. (P. Houghton.)

Sun, stand thou still

Oh, you say, the sun and moon didnt stand still. One man comes to me and says, According to the Copernican system the sun stood still anyhow, and it was no miracle for it to stand still. Another man says, If you stop the sun, you upset the whole universe, and throw everything out of order. Another man tells me it was only the refraction of the suns rays which made the sun seem to stand still. Another man tells me that all that was necessary to have this miracle right, was to stop the world on its own axis, and it was not necessary to stop it in its revolution through its orbit. The universe is only Gods watch. I suppose He could make it. Then I suppose He could stop it. Then I suppose He could start it again, and stop it again. Oh! not the sun standing still! Yes. A bad man does not live out half his days. His sun may set at noon. But a good man may prolong his days of usefulness. If a man, in the strength of Joshua, will go forth to fight against sin and in behalf of the truth, he shall live; a thousand years will be as one day. John Summerfield was a consumptive Methodist. He stood looking fearfully white in Old Sand Street Methodist Church, preaching the glorious gospel, and on the anniversary platform in New York pleading for the Bible until the old book unrolled new glories the world had never seen. And on his death-bed he talked of heaven until the wing of the angelic messenger brushed the pillow on which he lay. Has John Summerfields sun set? Has John Summer-fields day ended? No! He lives in the burning words he uttered in behalf of the Christian Church. He lives in the fame of that Christ whom he recommended to the dying people. He lives in the eternal raptures of that heaven into which he has already introduced so many immortal souls. Faint, and sick, and dying, and holding with one hand to the rail of the altar of the Methodist Church, with the other hand he arrested the sun in the heavens, seeming to say, I cant die now; I want to live on, and live on; I want to speak a word for Christ that will never die; I am only twenty-seven years of age. Sun of my Christian ministry, stand still over America. And it stood still. Robert MCheyne, of Scotland, was a consumptive Presbyterian. He used to cough in his sermon so hard that the people thought that he would never preach again; but thousands in Aberdeen, and Edinburgh, and Dundee, heard the voice of mercy from his lips. The people rejoiced under his ministry. His name to-day is fragrant in all Christendom, and that name is mightier than ever was his living presence. The delirium of his last sickness was filled with prayer, and when in his dying moment he lifted his hand for a benediction upon his friends, and upon his country, he was only practically saying, I cant die now; I want to live on for Christ; I am only thirty years of age. Sun of my Christian ministry, stand still over Scotland. And it stood still. (T. De Witt Talmage.)

No day like that.—

High days

I. There had been none like it in the number and strength of the confederacy which was gathered against Israel. The highlanders, and lowlanders, and the maritime tribes combined their forces to oppose and crush the invaders, who now, by the defection of Gibeon, possessed a pathway into the heart of the country. Israel had previously dealt with separate cities, Jericho, At, Gibeon; but now six of the seven nations of Canaan joined together at the summons of the king of Jerusalem, who was allied with the kings of Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish, and Eglon.

II. There was none like it in joshuas life for heroic faith.

1. It was a day of vigour. As soon as he received the message he saw the importance of at once vindicating the trust reposed in him. Inertness and indolence ill become those who are entrusted with great concerns. The stirring of Gods Spirit in man makes the pulse throb quickly, purposes form themselves in the will; and all the nature is braced, and knit, to subserve the heroic soul.

2. It was a day of fellowship. Soon after the first message had come, with surely a certain amount of startling surprise, God had spoken to him and said, Fear them not, &c. And so we may expect it to be always. Sometimes the assurance comes first to prepare us for what is at hand. But if not then it will reach us simultaneously with the alarm, reassuring us, and giving us quiet confidence in the midst of evil tidings, as the bird rocks in its nest over the rush of the waterfall, serene, though the branch beneath it sways in the storm. There are high days in human lives when thought and purpose, which had been quietly gathering strength, like waters swelling against a barrier, suddenly leap from their leash, and vent themselves in acts, or words, or prayers, such as stand out from the ordinary routine of existence, like the cathedral of Cologne from the mean houses that gather around its base. We are not, then, drunk with wine, but we are flushed, as to our spirits, with the exhilaration and sense of power which the Spirit of God alone can give, or, to put it in another form, we catch fire. There is too little experience of this capacity of rising into the loftiest experience of that Spirit life which is within the reach of us all, through living fellowship with God; but whenever we realise and use it, it is as when the feeble, smouldering wick is plunged into oxygen gas, or as when a flower, that had struggled against the frost, is placed in the tropical atmosphere of the hot-house. In such hours we realise what Jesus meant when He said, Whosoever shall say unto this mountain, &c.

3. It was a day of triumphant onlook. The kings were summoned from their hiding-place, and as they crouched abjectly at the feet of their conquerors, Joshua called for all the men of Israel, and said unto the chiefs of the men of war, Come near, put your feet upon the necks of these kings. And whilst they stood in that attitude of unquestioned victory, there broke on the exalted spirit-kindled imagination of the warrior-chieftain the sure prevision of the ultimate issue of the conflict in which they were engaged. He already saw the day when every knee should bow before Jehovahs might, when every king should be prostrate before Israels arm, and when the whole land should be subdued.

III. There had been none like it in the extraordinary co-operation of Jehovah. The Israelites were the executioners of Divine justice, commissioned to give effect to the sentence which the foul impurities of Canaan called for. There is a judgment-seat for nations as well as for individuals. Within the limits of the ages as they pass, and on the surface of this earth, that throne is erected and that judgment is proceeding. We get some glimpse of this in the hand that wrote the doom of Belshazzars kingdom on the walls of the palace which beheld a scene of wanton revelry lit by the light of the temples sacred lamps. And the almighty Judge sees to it that His sentences are carried out. He has many agents–the Persian legions to execute his sentence on Babylon, the Vandals on Rome, the Russian Cossacks on Napoleon, as the Israelites on the Amorites, whose iniquity was now full, and threatened to infect the world.

IV. Such days come still to men. There are days in our lives so extraordinary for the combination of difficult circumstances, human opposition, and Satanic combination, that they stand out in unique terror from the rest of our lives. Looking back on them, we may almost adopt the language of the sacred historian, there was no day like that before it or after it. But these days do not come if we are living in friendship with God, intent on doing His will, without there coming also His sweet Fear them not, for I have delivered them into thine hands. Our only anxiety should be that nothing should divert us from His path, or intercept the communication of His grace. Like a wise commander we must keep open the passage back to our base of operations, which is God. Careful about that, we need have no anxious care beside. The greatness of our difficulties is permitted to elicit the greatness of His grace. He covers our heads in the day of battle. He is our shield and exceeding great reward. Though an host should encamp against us, we will not fear; though war should rise against us, in this we will be confident. Moreover, these days may always be full of the realised presence of God. All through the conflict Joshuas heart was in perpetual fellowship with the mighty Captain of the Lords host, who rode beside him all the day. The blessed colloquy between the two was unbroken, as between a Wellington and a Blucher, a Napoleon and a Marshal Ney. So amid all our conflicts, our hearts and minds should thither ascend and there dwell where Christ is seated, drawing from Him grace upon grace, as we need, like the diver on the ocean floor who inhales the fresh breeze of the upper air. At these times it is very necessary not merely to ask God to help us, because the word help may mean that there is a great deal of reliance on self, and whatever there is of ourselves is almost certain to give way in the strain of battle. Achilles was mortally wounded in the heel, the one place which did not share in the plunge given him by his goddess mother into the immortal stream. The Divine part of our deliverance will be nullified by the alloy of our own energy, strength, or resolution. Let us substitute for the word help the word keep. Let us put the whole matter into the hands of God, asking Him to go before us, to fight for us, to deliver us, as He did for His people on this eventful day. The Lord discomfited them before Israel. (F. B. Meyer, B. A.)

Fuente: Biblical Illustrator Edited by Joseph S. Exell

Verse 12. Then spake Joshua to the Lord] Though Joshua saw that the enemies of his people were put to flight, yet he well knew that all which escaped would rally again, and that he should be obliged to meet them once more in the field of battle if permitted now to escape; finding that the day was drawing towards a close, he feared that he should not have time sufficient to complete the destruction of the confederate armies; in this moment, being suddenly inspired with Divine confidence, he requested the Lord to perform the most stupendous miracle that had ever been wrought, which was no less than to arrest the sun in his course, and prolong the day till the destruction of his enemies had been completed!

Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.] To account for this miracle, and to ascertain the manner in which it was wrought, has employed the pens of the ablest divines and astronomers, especially of the last two centuries. By their learned labours many difficulties have been removed from the account in general; but the very different and contradictory methods pursued by several, in their endeavours to explain the whole, and make the relation accord with the present acknowledged system of the universe, and the phenomena of nature, tend greatly to puzzle the plain, unphilosophical reader. The subject cannot be well explained without a dissertation; and a dissertation is not consistent with the nature of short notes, or a commentary on Scripture. It is however necessary to attempt an explanation, and to bring that as much as possible within the apprehension of common readers, in order to this, I must beg leave to introduce a few preliminary observations, or what the reader may call propositions if he pleases.

1. I take it for granted that a miracle was wrought as nearly as circumstances could admit, in the manner in which it is here recorded. I shall not, therefore, seek for any allegorical or metaphorical interpretations; the miracle is recorded as a fact, and as a fact I take it up.

2. I consider the present accredited system of the universe, called sometimes the Pythagorean, Copernican, or Newtonian system, to be genuine; and also to be the system of the universe laid down in the Mosaic writings – that the SUN is in the centre of what is called the solar system; and that the earth and all the other planets, whether primary or secondary, move round him in certain periodical times, according to the quantity of their matter, and distance from him, their centre.

3. I consider the sun to have no revolution round any orbit, but to revolve round his own axis, and round the common centre of gravity in the planetary system, which centre of gravity is included within his own surface; and in all other respects I consider him to be at rest in the system.

4. I consider the earth, not only as revolving round the sun in 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 48 seconds, but as revolving round its own axis, and making this revolution in 23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4 seconds; that in the course of 24 hours complete, every part of its surface is alternately turned to the sun; that this revolution constitutes our day and night, as the former does our year; and it is day to all those parts which have the sun above the horizon, and night to those which have the sun below it; and that this diurnal revolution of the earth, or revolving round its own axis, in a direction from west to east, occasions what is commonly called the rising and setting of the sun, which appearance is occasioned, not by any motion in the sun himself, but by this motion of the earth; which may be illustrated by a ball or globe suspended by a thread, and caused to turn round. If this be held opposite to a candle, it will appear half enlightened and half dark; but the dark parts will be seen to come successively into the light, and the enlightened parts into the shade; while the candle itself which gives the light is fixed, not changing its position.

5. I consider the solar influence to be the cause both of the annual and diurnal motion of the earth; and that, while that influence continues to act upon it according to the law which God originally impressed on both the earth and the sun, the annual and diurnal motions of the earth must continue; and that no power but the unlimited power of God can alter this influence, change, or suspend the operation of this law; but that he is such an infinitely FREE AGENT, that HE can, when his unerring wisdom sees good, alter, suspend, or even annihilate all secondary causes and their effects: for it would be degrading to the perfections of his nature to suppose that he had so bound himself by the laws which he has given for the preservation and direction of universal nature, that he could not change them, alter their effects, or suspend their operations when greater and better effects, in a certain time or place, might be produced by such temporary change or suspension.

6. I consider that the miracle wrought on this occasion served greatly to confirm the Israelites, not only in the belief of the being and perfections of God, but also in the doctrine of an especial providence, and in the nullity of the whole system of idolatry and superstition.

7. That no evil was done by this miraculous interference, nor any law or property of nature ultimately changed; on the contrary, a most important good was produced, which probably, to this people, could not have been brought about any other way; and that therefore the miracle wrought on this occasion was highly worthy of the wisdom and power of God.

8. I consider that the terms in the text employed to describe this miracle are not, when rightly understood, contrary to the well-established notions of the true system of the universe; and are not spoken, as some have contended, ad captum vulgi, to the prejudices of the common people, much less do they favour the Ptolemaic or any other hypothesis that places the earth in the centre of the solar system.

Having laid down these preliminaries, some short observations on the words of the text may be sufficient.

Joshua’s address is in a poetic form in the original, and makes the two following hemistichs: –

Shemesh begibon dom:

Veyareach beemek Aiyalon.

Sun! upon Gibeon be dumb:

And the moon on the vale of Ajalon.

The effect of this command is related, Jos 10:13, in the following words: –

vaiyiddom hashSHEMESH veYAREACH amad, And the sun was dumb or silent and the moon stood still. And in the latter clause of this verse it is added: And the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.

It seems necessary here to answer the question, At what time of the day did this miracle take place? The expression bachatsi hashshamayim, in the midst of heaven, seems to intimate that the sun was at that time on the meridian of Gibeon, and consequently had one half of its course to run; and this sense of the place has been strongly contended for as essential to the miracle, for the greater display of the glory of God: “Because,” say its abettors, “had the miracle been wrought when the sun was near the going down, it might have been mistaken for some refraction of the rays of light, occasioned by a peculiarly moist state of the atmosphere in the horizon of that place, or by some such appearance as the Aurora Borealis.” To me there seems no solidity in this reason. Had the sun been arrested in the meridian, the miracle could scarcely have been noticed, and especially in the hurry and confusion of that time; and we may be assured, that among the Canaanites there were neither clocks nor time-keepers, by which the preternatural length of such a day could have been accurately measured: but, on the contrary, had the sun been about the setting, when both the pursuers and the pursued must be apprehensive of its speedy disappearance, its continuance for several hours above the horizon, so near the point when it might be expected to go down, must have been very observable and striking. The enemy must see, feel, and deplore it; as their hope of escape must, in such circumstances, be founded on the speedy entering in of the night, through which alone they could expect to elude the pursuing Israelites. And the Israelites themselves must behold with astonishment and wonder that the setting sun hasted not to go down about a whole day, affording them supernatural time totally to destroy a routed foe, which otherwise might have had time to rally, confederate, choose a proper station, and attack in their turn with peculiar advantages, and a probability of success. It appears, therefore, much more reasonable that Joshua should require this miracle to be performed when daylight was about to fail, just as the sun was setting. If we were to consider the sun as being at the meridian of Gibeon, as some understand the midst of heaven, it may be well asked, How could Joshua know that he should not have time enough to complete the destruction of his enemies, who were now completely routed? Already multitudes of them had fallen by the hail-stones and by the sword: and if he had yet half a day before him, it would have been natural enough for him to conclude that he had a sufficiency of time for the purpose, his men having been employed all night in a forced march, and half a day in close fighting; and indeed had he not been under an especial inspiration, he could not have requested the miracle at all, knowing, as he must have done, that his men must be nearly exhausted by marching all night and fighting all day. But it may be asked, What is the meaning of bachatsi hashshamayim, which we translate in the midst of heaven? If, with Mr. Bate, we translate chatsah, to part, divide asunder, then it may refer to the horizon, which is the apparent division of the heavens into the upper and lower hemisphere; and thus the whole verse has been understood by some eminently learned men, who have translated the whole passage thus: And the sun stood still in the (upper) hemisphere of heaven, and hasted not to go down when the day was complete; that is, though the day was then complete, the sun being on the horizon; the line that to the eye constituted the mid heaven – yet it hasted not to go down; was miraculously sustained in its then almost setting position; and this seems still more evident from the moon’s appearing at that time, which it is not reasonable to suppose could be visible in the glare of light occasioned by a noon-day sun.

But the main business relative to the standing still of the sun still remains to be considered.

I have already assumed, as a thoroughly demonstrated truth, that the sun is in the centre of the system, moving only round his own axis, and the common centre of the gravity of the planetary system, while all the planets revolve round him, Prop. 2 and 3; that his influence is the cause of the diurnal and annual revolutions of the earth; nor can I see what other purpose his revolution round his own axis can possibly answer, Prop. 5.

I consider that the word dom, in the text, refers to the withholding or restraining this influence, so that the cessation of the earth’s motion might immediately take place. The desire of Joshua was, that the sun might not sink below the horizon; but as it appeared now to be over Gibeon, and the moon to be over the valley of Ajalon, he prayed that they might continue in these positions till the battle should be ended; or, in other words, that the day should be miraculously lengthened out.

Whether Joshua had a correct philosophical notion of the true system of the universe, is a subject that need not come into the present inquiry: but whether he spoke with strict propriety on this occasion is a matter of importance, because he must be considered as acting under the Divine influence, in requesting the performance of such a stupendous miracle; and we may safely assert that no man in his right mind would have thought of offering such a petition had he not felt himself under some Divine afflatus. Leaving, therefore, his philosophic knowledge out of the question, he certainly spoke as if he had known that the solar influence was the cause of the earth’s rotation, and therefore, with the strictest philosophic propriety, he requested that that influence might be for a time restrained, that the diurnal motion of the earth might be arrested, through which alone the sun could be kept above the horizon, and day be prolonged. His mode of expression evidently considers the sun as the great ruler or master in the system; and all the planets (or at least the earth) moving in their respective orbits at his command. He therefore desires him, in the name and by the authority of his Creator, to suspend his mandate with respect to the earth’s motion, and that of its satellite, the moon. Had he said, Earth, stand thou still, the cessation of whose diurnal motion was the effect of his command, it could not have obeyed him; as it is not even the secondary cause either of its annual motion round the sun, or its diurnal motion round its own axis. Instead of doing so, he speaks to the sun, the cause (under God) of all these motions, as his great archetype did when, in the storm on the sea of Tiberias, he rebuked the wind first, and then said to the waves, Peace! be still! , Be SILENT! be DUMB! Mr 4:39; and the effect of this command was a cessation of the agitation in the sea, because the wind ceased to command it, that is, to exert its influence upon the waters.

The terms in this command are worthy of particular note: Joshua does not say to the sun, Stand still, as if he had conceived him to be running his race round the earth; but, Be silent or inactive, that is, as I understand it, Restrain thy influence – no longer act upon the earth, to cause it to revolve round its axis; a mode of speech which is certainly consistent with the strictest astronomical knowledge; and the writer of the account, whether Joshua himself or the author of the book of Jasher, in relating the consequence of this command is equally accurate, using a word widely different when he speaks of the effect the retention of the solar influence had on the moon: in the first case the sun was silent or inactive, dom; in the latter, the moon stood still, amad. The standing still of the moon, or its continuance above the horizon, would be the natural effect of the cessation of the solar influence, which obliged the earth to discontinue her diurnal rotation, which of course would arrest the moon; and thus both it and the sun were kept above the horizon, probably for the space of a whole day. As to the address to the moon, it is not conceived in the same terms as that to the sun, and for the most obvious philosophical reasons; all that is said is simply, and the moon on the vale of Ajalon, which may be thus understood: “Let the sun restrain his influence or be inactive, as he appears now upon Gibeon, that the moon may continue as she appears now over the vale of Ajalon.” It is worthy of remark that every word in this poetic address is apparently selected with the greatest caution and precision.

Persons who are no friends to Divine revelation say “that the account given of this miracle supposes the earth to be in the centre of the system, and the sun moveable; and as this is demonstrably a false philosophy, consequently the history was never dictated by the Spirit of truth.” Others, in answer, say “that the Holy Spirit condescends to accommodate himself to the apprehensions of the vulgar. The Israelites would naturally have imagined that Joshua was deranged had he bid the earth stand still, which they grant would have been the most accurate and philosophical mode of command on this occasion.” But with due deference both to the objectors and defenders I must assert, that such a form of speech on such an occasion would have been utterly unphilosophic; and that the expressions found in the Hebrew text are such as Sir Isaac Newton himself might have denominated, every thing considered, elegant, correct, and sublime. Nor does it at all appear that the prejudices of the vulgar were consulted on this occasion; nor is there a word here, when properly understood that is inconsistent with the purest axiom of the soundest philosophy, and certainly nothing that implies any contradiction. I grant that when the people have to do with astronomical and philosophical matters, then the terms of the science may be accommodated to their apprehensions; it is on this ground that Sir Isaac Newton himself speaks of the rising and of the setting of the sun, though all genuine philosophers know that these appearances are produced by the rotation of the earth on its own axis from west to east. But when matters of this kind are to be transacted between God and his prophets, as in the above case, then subjects relative to philosophy are conceived in their proper terms, and expressed according to their own nature. At the conclusion of the 13th verse a different expression is used when it is said, So the sun stood still, it is not dom, but amad; vaiyaamod hashshemesh, which expression, thus varying from that in the command of Joshua, may be considered as implying that in order to restrain his influence which I have assumed to be the cause of the earth’s motion, the sun himself became inactive, that is, ceased to revolve round his own axis, which revolution is probably one cause, not only of the revolution of the earth, but of all the other planetary bodies in our system, and might have affected all the planets at the time in question; but this neither could nor did produce any disorder in nature; and the delay of a few hours in the whole planetary motions dwindles away into an imperceptible point in the thousands of years of their revolutions. But the whole effect mentioned here might have been produced by the cessation of the diurnal motion of the earth, the annual being still continued; and I contend that this was possible to Omnipotence, and that such a cessation might have taken place without occasioning the slightest disturbance in the motions of any others of the planetary system. It is vain to cry out and say, “Such a cessation of motion in one planet could not take place without disordering the motions of all the rest;” this I deny, and those who assert it neither know the Scripture nor the power of God; therefore they do greatly err. That the day was preternaturally lengthened, is a Scripture fact. That it was so by a miracle, is asserted; and whether that miracle was wrought as above stated, is a matter of little consequence; the thing is a Scripture fact, whether we know the modus operandi or not. I need scarcely add that the command of Joshua to the sun is to be understood as a prayer to God (from whom the sun derived his being and his continuance) that the effect might be what is expressed in the command: and therefore it is said, Jos 10:14, that the LORD HEARKENED UNTO THE VOICE OF A MAN, for the Lord fought for Israel.

I have thus gone through the different parts of this astonishing miracle, and have endeavoured to account for the whole in as plain and simple a manner as possible. It is not pretended that this account should satisfy every reader, and that every difficulty is solved; it would be impossible to do this in such a compass as that by which I am necessarily circumscribed; and I have been obliged, for the sake of brevity, to throw into the form of propositions or observations, several points which may appear to demand illustration and proof; for such I must refer the reader to Astronomical Treatises. Calmet, Scheuchzer, and Saurin, with several of our own countrymen, have spoken largely on this difficult subject, but in such a way as, I am obliged to confess, has given me little satisfaction, and which appears to me to leave the main difficulties unremoved. Conscious of the difficulties of this subject, I beg leave to address every candid reader in the often quoted words of an eminent author: –

Vive, Vale! si quid novisti rectius istis,

Candidus imperti; si non, his utere mecum.

Hor. Epist. l. i., E. vi., ver. 68.

Farewell! and if a better system’s thine,

Impart it frankly or make use of mine.

FRANCIS.

Book of Jasher] The book of the upright. See the note on Nu 21:14. Probably this was a book which, in reference to Joshua and his transactions, was similar to the commentaries of Caesar, on his wars with the Gauls. Critics and commentators are greatly divided in their sentiments relative to the nature of this book. The opinion above appears to me the most probable.

Fuente: Adam Clarke’s Commentary and Critical Notes on the Bible

Joshua spake to the Lord, to wit, in way of petition for this miracle; being moved to beg it out of zeal to destroy Gods enemies, and directed to it by the motion of Gods Spirit; and receiving a gracious answer, and being filled with holy confidence of the success, he speaks the following words before the people, that they might be witnesses of it.

In the sight of Israel, i.e. in the presence and audience of Israel; seeing being sometimes put for hearing, as Gen 42:1, compared with Act 7:12; although these words may seem rather to be joined with the following, thus,

In the sight of Israel stand still, O sun, & c., which sense the Hebrew accents favour.

Upon Gibeon, i.e. over and above or against Gibeon, i.e. in that place and posture in which now it stands towards and looks upon Gibeon. Let it not go down lower, and by degrees, out of the sight of Gibeon. It may seem that the sun was declining; and Joshua perceiving that his work was great and long, and his time but short, begs of God the lengthening out of the day, and that the sun and moon might stop their course, and keep the place in which they now were.

In the valley, or, upon the valley; as before, upon Gibeon; the preposition being the same there and here.

Ajalon; either,

1. That Ajalon which was in the tribe of Zebulun, Jdg 12:12 northward from Gibeon. Or rather,

2. That Ajalon which was in the tribe of Dan, Jos 19:42 Jdg 1:35, westward from Gibeon, For,

1. This was nearer Gibeon than the other.

2. This was most agreeable to the course of the sun and moon, which is from east to west.

3. This way the battle went, from Gibeon westward to Ajalon, and so further westward, even to Lachish, Jos 10:31. And he mentions two places, Gibeon and Ajalon, not as if the sun stood over the one, and the moon over the other, which is absurd and ridiculous to affirm, especially these places being so near the one to the other; but partly to vary the phrase, as is common in poetical passages; partly because he was in his march in the pursuit of his enemies to pass from Gibeon to Ajalon; and he begs that he may have the help and benefit of longer light to pursue them, and to that end that the sun might stand still, and the moon also; not that he needed the moons light when he had the suns, but because it was fit, either that both the sun and moon should go, or that both should stand still, to prevent disorder and confusion in the heavenly bodies.

Fuente: English Annotations on the Holy Bible by Matthew Poole

12-15. Then spake Joshua to the Lord. . . and . . . he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still. . . and thou, MoonThe inspired author here breaks off thethread of his history of this miraculous victory to introduce aquotation from an ancient poem, in which the mighty acts of that daywere commemorated. The passage, which is parenthetical, contains apoetical description of the victory which was miraculouslygained by the help of God, and forms an extract from “the bookof Jasher,” that is, “the upright”an anthology, orcollection of national songs, in honor of renowned and eminentlypious heroes. The language of a poem is not to be literallyinterpreted; and therefore, when the sun and moon are personified,addressed as intelligent beings, and represented as standing still,the explanation is that the light of the sun and moon wassupernaturally prolonged by the same laws of refraction andreflection that ordinarily cause the sun to appear above the horizon,when it is in reality below it [KEIL,BUSH]. Gibeon (“ahill”) was now at the back of the Israelites, and the heightwould soon have intercepted the rays of the setting sun. The valleyof Ajalon (“stags”) was before them, and so near that itwas sometimes called “the valley of Gibeon” (Isa28:21). It would seem, from Jos10:14, that the command of Joshua was in reality a prayer to Godfor the performance of this miracle; and that, although the prayersof eminently good men like Moses often prevailed with God, never wasthere on any other occasion so astonishing a display of divine powermade in behalf of His people, as in answer to the prayer of Joshua.Jos 10:15 is the end of thequotation from Jasher; and it is necessary to notice this, as thefact described in it is recorded in due course, and the same words,by the sacred historian (Jos10:43).

Jos10:16-27. THE FIVEKINGS HANGED.

Fuente: Jamieson, Fausset and Brown’s Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible

Then spake Joshua to the Lord,…. In prayer, and entreated as follows, that the sun and moon might stand still, until the victory was complete; though the Jewish writers interpret it of a song; so the Targum, then Joshua praised, or sung praise, as in the Targum on So 1:1; and which is approved of by Jarchi and Kimchi:

in the day when the Lord delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel; the five kings of the Amorites, and their armies,

Jos 10:5;

and he said, in the sight of Israel; in their presence, and in the hearing of great numbers, being under a divine impulse, and having strong faith in the working of the miracle, after related, and that it would be according to his word; he was bold to say what he did, being fully persuaded he should not be disappointed, and made ashamed:

sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon, and thou, moon, in the valley of Ajalon; where they now appeared, and were seen by all Israel, the one as if over Gibeon, and the other as in the valley of which Masius thinks is the same with the valley of Gibeon, Isa 28:21; and so must be near Gibeon, and the sun and the moon not far from one another, as they might be if it was now new moon, as Kimchi and R. Isaiah; or on the decrease; some say seven days before her change: but Abarbinel is of opinion that it was near the full of the moon, which was just rising in the valley of Ajalon, and the sun near setting as it seemed over Gibeon, and were just opposite one to another; and Joshua fearing he should not have time to pursue his enemies, and make the victory entire, should the sun set, prays that both sun and moon might continue in the position they were; the sun that he might have the benefit of daylight, which was the chief thing desired; the moon being only mentioned, that the heavenly motions might not be confounded, and the order of the orbs disturbed; and he observes, with Jarchi and Kimchi, that Gibeon was in the tribe of Benjamin, Jos 18:25; and Ajalon in the tribe of Dan, Jos 19:42; and it may be observed, that there was also another in the tribe of Zebulun, Jud 12:12; but that seems to be at too great a distance; and still less probable is what some late travellers have observed e, that the plain of Sharon near Joppa, is thought by many to be the place where Joshua defeated the five kings, when the sun stood still, &c. the opinion of Masius, first mentioned, seems most likely.

e Egmont and Heyman’s Travels, vol. 1. p. 290.

Fuente: John Gill’s Exposition of the Entire Bible

In firm reliance upon the promise of God (Jos 10:8), Joshua offered a prayer to the Lord during the battle, that He would not let the sun go down till Israel had taken vengeance upon their foes; and the Lord hearkened to the prayer of His servant, and the sun hastened not to go down till the defeat of the Amorites was accomplished. This miraculous victory was celebrated by the Israelites in a war-song, which was preserved in the “ book of the Righteous.” The author of the book of Joshua has introduced the passage out of this book which celebrates the mighty act of the Lord for the glorification of His name upon Israel, and their foes the Amorites. It is generally admitted, that Jos 10:12-15 contain a quotation from the “book of Jasher,” mentioned in Jos 10:13. This quotation, and the reference to the work itself, are analogous to the notice of “the book of the wars of the Lord,” in Num 21:14, and to the strophes of a song which are there interwoven with the historical narrative; the object being, not to confirm the historical account by referring to an earlier source, but simply to set forth before other generations the powerful impression which was made upon the congregation by these mighty acts of the Lord. The “ book of Jasher,” i.e., book of the upright, or righteous man, that is to say, of the true members of the theocracy, or godly men. ( Jasher, the righteous) is used to denote the genuine Israelite, in the same sense as in Num 23:10, where Balaam calls the Israelites “the righteous,” inasmuch as Jehovah, the righteous and upright one (Deu 32:4), had called them to be His people, and to walk in His righteousness. In addition to this passage, the “book of the righteous ( Jasher)” is also mentioned in 2Sa 1:18, as a work in which was to be found David’s elegy upon Saul and Jonathan. From this fact it has been justly inferred, that the book was a collection of odes in praise of certain heroes of the theocracy, with historical notices of their achievements interwoven, and that the collection was formed by degrees; so that the reference to this work is neither a proof that the passage has been interpolated by a later hand, nor that the work was composed at a very late period. That the passage quoted from this work is extracted from a song is evident enough, both from the poetical form of the composition, and also from the parallelism of the sentences. The quotation, however, does not begin with ( and he said) in Jos 10:12, but with ( in the day when the Lord delivered) in Jos 10:12, and Jos 10:13 and Jos 10:14 also form part of it; so that the title of the book from which the quotation is taken is inserted in the middle of the quotation itself. In other cases, unquestionably, such formulas of quotation are placed either at the beginning (as in Num 21:14, Num 21:27; 2Sa 1:18), or else at the close of the account, which is frequently the case in the books of Kings and Chronicles; but it by no means follows that there were no exceptions to this rule, especially as the reason for mentioning the original sources is a totally different one in the books of Kings, where the works cited are not the simple vouchers for the facts related, but works containing fuller and more elaborate accounts of events which have only been cursorily described. The poetical form of the passage in Jos 10:13 also leaves no doubt whatever that Jos 10:13 and Jos 10:14 contain the words of the old poet, and are not a prose comment made by the historian upon the poetical passage quoted. The only purely historical statement in Jos 10:15; and this is repeated in Jos 10:43, at the close of the account of the wars and the victory. But this literal repetition of Jos 10:15 in Jos 10:43, and the fact that the statement, that Joshua returned with all the people to the camp at Gilgal, anticipates the historical course of the events in a very remarkable manner, render it highly probable, it not absolutely certain, that Jos 10:15 was also taken from the book of the righteous.

In the day when Jehovah delivered up the Amorites to the children of Israel (“before,” as in Deu 2:31, Deu 2:33, etc.), Joshua said before the eyes (i.e., in the presence) of Israel, so that the Israelites were witnesses of his words (vid., Deu 31:7): “ Sun, stand still (wait) at Gibeon; and, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.” , to be silent, to keep one’s self quiet or still, to wait (1Sa 14:9). The address to the sun and moon implies that they both of them stood, or were visible in the heavens at the time; and inasmuch as it was spoken to the Lord, involves a prayer that the Lord and Creator of the world would not suffer the sun and moon to set till Israel had taken vengeance upon its foes. This explanation of the prayer is only to be found, it is true, in the statement that the sun and moon stood still at Joshua’s word; but we must imagine it as included in the prayer itself. without an article, when used to denote the people of Israel, is to be regarded as a poetical expression. In the sequel ( Jos 10:13) the sun only is spoken of: “ and the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.” The poetical word , to press or hurry, is founded upon the idea that the sun runs its course like a strong man, with vigour, and without weariness or cessation (Psa 19:6-7). It follows from this, that Joshua merely prayed for the day to be lengthened, i.e., for the setting of the sun to be delayed; and that he included the moon (Jos 10:12), simply because it was visible at the time. But even if this is the case, we are not therefore to conclude, as C. v. Lapide, Clericus, and others have done, that Joshua spoke these words in the afternoon, when the sun was beginning to set, and the moon had already risen. The expression , “ in the half,” i.e., the midst, “ of the sky,” is opposed to this view, and still more the relative position of the two in the sky, the sun at Gibeon and the moon in the valley of Ajalon, i.e., in the fine broad basin on the north side of Yalo (see at Jos 19:42), the present Merj Ibn Omeir ( Rob. iii. p. 63, 64), which is four hours’ journey to the west of Gibeon. As Joshua smote the enemy at Gibeon, and they fled to the south-west, he was not doubt on the west of Gibeon when he commanded the sun and moon to stand still; and therefore from his point of view the sun would be in the east when it stood over Gibeon, and the moon in the far west when it stood over the valley of Ajalon. But that could only be the case before noon, a few hours after sunrise, when the moon had not yet set in the western sky. In all probability the battle took place quite early in the morning, as Joshua had marched from Gilgal the night before, and fell quite suddenly upon the enemy (Jos 10:9). But after the conflict had lasted for some hours, and Joshua began to be anxious lest he should be unable to overcome the enemy before night came on, he addressed the prayer to the Lord to lengthen out the day, and in a short time saw his prayer so far fulfilled, that the sun still stood high up in the sky when the enemy was put to flight. We take for granted that these words were spoken by Joshua before the terrible hail-storm which fell upon the enemy in their flight, when they were near Bethhoron, which is about two hours from Gibeon, and smote them to Azekah. There is nothing to prevent our assuming this. The fact, that in the historical account the hail is mentioned before the desire expressed by Joshua and the fulfilment of that desire, may be explained on the simple ground, that the historian, following the order of importance, relates the principal incident in connection with the battle first, before proceeding to the special point to be cited from the book of the righteous. , “ towards (about, or as it were) a whole day,” neither signifies “when the day was ended” ( Clericus), nor “as it usually does when the day is perfected or absolutely finished” ( Rosenmller); but the sun did not hasten or press to go down, delayed its setting, almost a whole day (“ day ” being the time between sunrise and sunset).

What conception are we to form of this miraculous event? It is not stated that the sun actually stood still in one spot in the heavens-say, for instance, in the zenith. And if the expression, “the sun stood still in the midst of heaven,” which is added as an explanation of , is so pressed as to mean that the sun as miraculously stopped in its course, this is hardly reconcilable with , “it hasted not to go down,” as these words, if taken literally, merely denote a slower motion on the part of the sun, as many of the Rabbins have observed. All that is clearly affirmed in Jos 10:12 and Jos 10:13 is, that at Joshua’s word the sun remained standing in the sky for almost a whole day longer. To this there is added, in Jos 10:14, “ There was no day like that before it, or after it, that Jehovah hearkened to the voice of a man; for Jehovah fought for Israel.” This expression must not be pressed too far, as the analogous passages (“there was none like him,” etc.) in 2Ki 18:5 and 2Ki 23:25 clearly show. They merely express this thought: no other day like this, which God so miraculously lengthened, ever occurred either before or afterwards. So much, therefore, is obvious enough from the words, that the writer of the old song, and also the author of the book of Joshua, who inserted the passage in his narrative, were convinced that the day was miraculously prolonged. At the same time, it must be borne in mind that it is not stated that God lengthened that day at the request of Joshua almost an entire day, or that He made the sun stand still almost a whole day, but simply that God hearkened to the voice of Joshua, i.e., did not permit the sun to go down till Israel had avenged itself upon its enemies. This distinction is not without importance: for a miraculous prolongation of the day would take place not only if the sun’s course or sun’s setting was delayed for several hours by the omnipotent power of God, and the day extended from twelve to eighteen or twenty hours, but also if the day seemed to Joshua and all Israel to be miraculously prolonged; because the work accomplished on that day was so great, that it would have required almost two days to accomplish it without supernatural aid. It is not easy to decide between these two opposite views; in fact, it is quite impossible if we go to the root of the matter. When we are not in circumstances to measure the length of the day by the clock, it is very easy to mistake its actual length, especially in the midst of the pressure of business or work. The Israelites at that time had neither sun-clocks nor any other kind of clock; and during the confusion of the battle it is hardly likely that Joshua, or any one else who was engaged in the conflict, would watch the shadow of the sun and its changes, either by a tree or any other object, so as to discover that the sun had actually stood still, from the fact that for hours the shadow had neither moved nor altered in length. Under such circumstances, therefore, it was quite impossible for the Israelites to decide whether it was in reality, or only in their own imagination, that the day was longer than others. To this there must be added the poetical character of the verses before us. When David celebrates the miraculous deliverance which he had received from the Lord, in these words, “In my distress I called upon the Lord … . He heard my voice out of His temple … . He bowed the heavens also, and came down … . He sent from above, He took me, He grew me out of many waters” (Psa 18:7-17), who would ever think of interpreting the words literally, and supposing them to mean that God actually came down from the sky, and stretched out His hand to draw David out of the water? Or who would understand the words of Deborah, “They fought from heaven, the stars in their courses fought against Sisera” (Jdg 5:20), in their literal sense? The truthfulness of such utterances is to be sought for in the subjective sphere of religious intuition, and not in a literal interpretation of the words. And it may be just the same with these verses, without their actual contents being affected, if the day was merely subjectively lengthened, – that is to say, in the religious conviction of the Israelites. But even if the words really affirmed that a miraculous and objective lengthening of the day did actually take place, we should have no reason whatever for questioning the credibility of the statement.

All the objections that have been raised with reference to the reality or possibility of such a miracle, prove to have no force when we examine the subject more closely. Thus, for example, the objection that the annals of the other nations of the earth contain no account of any such miracle, which must have extended over the whole world, loses all its significance from the simple fact that there are no annals in existence belonging to other nations and reaching back to that time, and that it is altogether doubtful whether the miracle would extend far beyond the limits of Palestine. Again, an appeal to the unchangeableness of the motions of the stars according to eternal and unchangeable laws, is not adapted to prove the impossibility of such a miracle. The eternal laws of nature are nothing more than phenomena, or forms of manifestation, of those divine creative powers, the true character of which no mortal has ever fathomed. And does not the almighty Creator and Upholder of nature and all its forces possess the power so to direct and govern the working of these forces, as to make them subservient to the realization of His purposes of salvation? And lastly, the objection that a sudden stoppage of the revolution of the earth upon its axis would have dashed to pieces all the works of human hands that were to be found upon its surface, and hurled the earth itself, with its satellite the moon, out of their orbits, cannot prove anything, because it leaves out of sight the fact that the omnipotent hand of God, which not only created the stars, but gave them the power to revolve with such regularity in their orbits as long as this universe endures, and which upholds and governs all things in heaven and on earth, is not too short to guard against any such disastrous consequences as these. But to this we may add, that even the strictest and most literal interpretation of the words does not require us to assume, as the fathers and earlier theologians did, that the sun itself was miraculously made to stand still, but simply supposes an optical stopping of the sun in its course, – that is to say, a miraculous suspension of the revolution of the earth upon its axis, which would make it appear to the eye of an observer as if the sun itself were standing still. Knobel is by no means warranted in pronouncing this view of the matter an assumption at variance with the text. For the Scriptures speak of the things of the visible world as they appear; just as we speak of the sun as rising and setting, although we have no doubt whatever about the revolution of the earth. Moreover, the omnipotence of God might produce such an optical stoppage of the sun, or rather a continuance of the visibility of the sun above the horizon, by celestial phenomena which are altogether unknown to us or to naturalists in general, without interfering with the general laws affecting the revolution of the heavenly bodies. Only we must not attempt, as some have done, to reduce the whole miracle of divine omnipotence to an unusual refraction of the light, or to the continuance of lightning throughout the whole night.

Fuente: Keil & Delitzsch Commentary on the Old Testament

12. Then spoke Joshua to the Lord, etc Such is the literal reading, but some expound it as meaning before Jehovah: for to speak to God, who, as piety dictates, is to be suppliantly petitioned, seems to be little in accordance with the modesty of faith, and it is immediately subjoined that Joshua addressed his words to the sun. I have no doubt that by the former clause prayer or vow is denoted, and that the latter is an expression of confidence after he was heard: for to command the sun to stand if he had not previously obtained permission, would have been presumptuous and arrogant. He first, then, consults God and asks: having forthwith obtained an answer, he boldly commands the sun to do what he knows is pleasing to God.

And such is the power and privilege of the faith which Christ inspires, (Mat 17:20; Luk 17:6) that mountains and seas are removed at its command. The more the godly feel their own emptiness, the more liberally does God transfer his power to them, and when faith is annexed to the word, he in it demonstrates his own power. In short, faith borrows the confidence of command from the word on which it is founded. Thus Elias, by the command of God, shut and opened the heaven, and brought down fire from it; thus Christ furnished his disciples with heavenly power to make the elements subject to them.

Caution, however, must be used, lest any one may at his own hand presume to give forth rash commands. Joshua did not attempt to delay and check the course of the sun before he was well instructed as to the purpose of God. And although, when he is said to have spoken with God, the words do not sufficiently express the modesty and submission which become the servant of God in giving utterance to his prayers, let it suffice us briefly to understand as implied, that Joshua besought God to grant what he desired, and on obtaining his request, became the free and magnanimous herald of an incredible miracle unlike any that had previously taken place. He never would have ventured in the presence of all to command the sun so confidently, if he had not been thoroughly conscious of his vocation. Had it been otherwise, he would have exposed himself to a base and shameful affront. When, without hesitation, he opens his mouth and tells the sun and the moon to deviate from the perpetual law of nature, it is just as if he had adjured them by the boundless power of God with which he was invested. Here, too, the Lord gives a bright display of his singular favor toward his Church. As in kindness to the human race he divides the day from the night by the daily course of the sun, and constantly whirls the immense orb with indefatigable swiftness, so he was pleased that it should halt for a short time till the enemies of Israel were destroyed. (94)

(94) One might almost suspect from this concluding sentence, that Calvin was a stranger to the Copernican system, and still continued to believe that it was not the earth but the sun that revolved. As we know, however, that he was before his age in many points, so we cannot believe that he was behind it in this. — Ed.

Fuente: Calvin’s Complete Commentary

MAIN HOMILETICS OF THE PARAGRAPH.Jos. 10:12-15

THE VICTORY OF FAITH

John says, This is the victory that overcometh the world, even your faith. This triumph at Beth-horon is hardly less owing to faith than was the triumph of the Israelites at Jericho.
Consider

I. The life of faith in the greatness of its emergencies.

1. Believing men by no means escape emergencies. Life is full of them. Every realm of duty discovers them. They confront us when we seek to aid our fellows. Joshua was here aiding the Gibeonites. They meet us as we seek to obey the commands of God. So far from being exempt from them as we do the will of God, it is here that they seem most plentiful and most severe.

2. The emergencies of believing men are God-given opportunities for faith. The proverb tells us that, Necessity is the mother of invention. Necessity which is beyond the capacity of human wit or power to meet is not seldom the mother of faith.

3. God often times and measures the necessities of His people so as to tempt their faith. Joshua was fast gaining the victory. The hail was giving witness of Divine help. Yet the light was threatening too speedy a departure to allow of complete victory. Unless Heaven helped more fully, many would escape, and to a great extent the battle would have to be fought over again. Why might not Jehovah, already so manifestly making the battle His own, help yet more? Thus the very crisis entices trust: Then spake Joshua to the Lord, etc.

II. The life of faith in the boldness of its requests.

1. Faith, like love, cannot wait for precedents. No prayer like this had ever been offered before. The chronicles of prayer shewed nothing approaching this. As the woman who wept on Christs feet, and wiped away the tears with her hair, shews us love which never thought of staying to ask if that kind of thing had ever been done before; so Joshua shews us a faith which forgets all but Gods power and love, and Israels need. Faith is not empirical; it acts from given principles which have been accepted by the heart, rather than from the proofs which are written in history. He who only suffers his faith to imitate that of some one else will win little renown among spiritually minded men, and obtain little blessing from God. Faith is essentially spontaneous, and independent of men, and is always weak when imitative.

2. Faith cannot be limited by difficulties. It begins by granting a might which is omnipotent and a love which is infinite, and then simply speaks as moved by its necessities.

III. The life of faith in its prevalence with God.

1. They who trust shall never be confounded, no matter for what they trust. When God promises to answer prayer, He never stipulates beforehand to know the nature of the prayer. This sublime feature runs through the entire Bible. Men inquire about the thing which they are asked to promise; God simply inquires about the kind of spirit which asks.

2. What some would think the extravagancies of faith, the Scriptures occasionally guarantee Gods acceptance of, by giving us instances in kind. Christ certifies that the very mountains should be at the command of faith. If some adequate necessity required the removal of a mountain, and occasion were thus given for a faith that should deal with a reality, and not with an experiment; then, on the exercise of faith, the Saviour assures us that the mountain should be removed. So this seemingly extravagant request of Joshuas is put before us to shew that with a need that is real, and a heart that asks unquestioningly, God answers without any respect whatever to the magnitude of our petitions.

IV. The life of faith in the thoroughness of its victories over error.

1. The idolaters themselves were utterly overthrown.

2. The objects of their idolatry were placed at the command of the enemies of idolatry. The Canaanites, like the Phnicians, worshipped Baal and Ashtoreth. This worship was closely connected with the adoration of the heavenly bodies. Baal by some has been identified as the Sun-god, while Ashtoreth, it is thought, was worshipped as the Moon-goddess. There can be no doubt that the general notion symbolised by Ashtoreth is that of productive power, as Baal symbolises that of generative power; and it would be natural to conclude that as the sun is the great symbol of the latter, and therefore to be identified with Baal, so the moon is the symbol of the former, and must be identified with Ashtoreth. That this goddess was so typified can scarcely be doubted. At any rate it is certain that she was by some ancient writers identified with the moon. [Smiths Dict.] The commanding of the sun and the moon to stand still thus becomes profoundly significant. Just as the miracles of Moses were directed against all the gods of Egypt, so does this miracle in answer to the prayer of Joshua demean the gods of the Canaanites before the eyes of all concerned. The sun and moon, which had so long been worshipped, were shewn to be at the command of Joshua; the deities which the idolaters had adored were bidden by a man to stay, and to give their light while the idolaters were slain. This, it may be remarked, affords, in the light of the plagues of Egypt, presumptive evidence of the reality of the miracle itself, and shews, what for the purposes of the battle is somewhat obscure, why the moon was addressed as well as the sun. As objects of worship, these symbols of idolatry should be degraded in the sight of both the Canaanites and the Israelites (cf. Deu. 4:19). So thorough is the victory of truth; so complete is the triumph of the man who, in unquestioning faith, fights for the God of truth.

OUTLINES AND COMMENTS ON THE VERSES

ESSENTIAL ACCOMPANIMENTS OF FAITH.

I. He only believes well who works well. Joshua had hastened up against this confederacy of Canaanites as though the entire burden of the battle lay on the men who were to fight it. It is the man who labours thus diligently that believes thus fully.

II. He alone can rightly believe in Gods word, who is very jealous of his own word. Joshua had kept faith most conscientiously with the Gibeonites. In all that in which he had excited their hopes he met them with strict integrity. The hope of a trusting heart was a sacred thing to him. This is the man who, remembering that God had said, I will not fail thee, dared to believe that every hope which such words had encouraged would be sacredly honoured by God. A lack of integrity in our hearts towards men will assuredly work within us a proportionately weak trust in God. It is he who honours every hope which he has caused in the bosoms of others, who is best prepared to cry for himself, Stablish Thy word unto Thy servant, upon which Thou hast caused him to hope.

III. He best believes in Divine help for the penitent, who himself has compassion for the penitent. The penitence of the Gibeonites seems to have been very poor. Whatever may have been its motives, and however low its manifestation, Joshua seems really to have been glad to spare these men who pleaded for mercy, even though they came with lies upon their lips. It was easy for such a man to feel, Can I be more merciful than God? If I find pleasure in hastening to save them from their foes, must not God be even more interested in their deliverance?

IV. He most fully believes in the overthrow of error, who has long learned to hate error. Joshua had long shewn far more than a mere love for the cause of the Israelites. He had shewn a hatred of unbelief as seen in the ten spies, and of sin as manifested in Achan. We seldom hear him speak without feeling how deep is his love for the truth. He who thus hates evil himself has little difficulty in believing that God hates it more, and that He will spare no work to overthrow it.

V. He who would believe that no thing is too hard for the Lord must walk very much with the Lord. Joshua had not only proved the might of the Divine arm, but the love of the Divine heart. He walked in sympathy with God, and in joy in God. This is the man who dared to say, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.

THE POETICAL CELEBRATION OF THE MIGHTY WORKS OF THE LORD.
Gods mighty works should be perpetuated in song. They should be chronicled, not only in language which can inform the mind, but in words adapted to move the heart. They should be written down in the natural language of joy and praise. Poetry is the smile of the fair face of literature, while logic, in its sterner procedure and heavier forms, more nearly resembles the frown. Gods gladdening works of deliverance are not so much things to be argued about, as mercies to be sung.

A BELIEVING WORD OF JOSHUA

1. Spoken under what circumstances?
2. How intended?
3. How answered?

THE GREAT DAY AT GIBEON
It was great:

1. Through the mighty strife of the combatants.
2. Through the courageous faith of the general.
3. Through the victory which God gave.[Fay; Langes Com.]

It is a good care how we may not anger God; it is a vain study how we may fly from His judgments when we have angered Him.
Gods glory was that which Joshua aimed at: he knew that all the world must needs be witnesses of that which the eye of the world stood still to see.[Bp. Hall.]

Fuente: The Preacher’s Complete Homiletical Commentary Edited by Joseph S. Exell

THE SUN AND MOON STAND STILL, Jos 10:12-15.

We are not to regard these remarkable verses as giving an unauthentic and merely poetical description of the victory, as rationalistic expositors teach, but rather a parenthesis thrown into the narrative, by the author himself, or by a later hand, and taken from the book referred to in Jos 10:13. This may be clearly seen from the statement, in Jos 10:15, that Joshua returned to Gilgal, which he did not do until the close of the campaign, as stated in Jos 10:43. On the supposition that Jos 10:15 is the conclusion of the quotation all the confusion is cleared up. We may admit that this quotation from the Book of Jasher was inserted here some time after the Book of Joshua was otherwise completed. The Book of Jasher was not completed, possibly not composed, until the time of David. See note on Jos 10:13. But from this admission it does not follow that the passage is unhistorical, or to be explained merely as poetry.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

12. Then spake Joshua to the Lord What Joshua said to the Lord we do not know, unless we are to construe the command to the sun and moon as Joshua’s prayer, “O Lord, let the sun stand still.” But it is more probable that the great captain, standing on the mountain summit, and seeing his fugitive enemies hastening for their lives far down in the valley below, ejaculated a prayer to Jehovah for supernatural aid, and that he was, in answer to prayer, suddenly endowed with the gift of faith to believe that the laws of the universe would be suspended at his command. The difference between the grace of faith and the gift of faith is this: The trust which Joshua reposed in God’s promise at Gilgal, Jos 10:8, was an exercise of the grace of faith, which has a moral character, inasmuch as its opposite, a disbelief of God’s word, would have been sin; while the gift of faith is an extraordinary endowment, enabling the possessor to ask for things for which he has no specific promise, the non-exercise of which faith would not be sinful, inasmuch as it does not discredit God’s word. The Lord had never promised to arrest the sun in answer to Joshua’s command. Hence it would have been the highest presumption for Joshua to command a thing so extraordinary on the ground of God’s general promises. But being endowed with this miraculous gift of faith, the act of Joshua in giving orders to the sun and moon to halt in their march through the heavens given, doubtless, in the name of Jehovah becomes perfectly proper.

He said in the sight of Israel That is, in their presence, or in sight of the army. This was done in their presence, in order that they might know to what cause to attribute so remarkable an occurrence, and might glorify God, who had given such power to a man. They could afterward attest to their children the truth of an event of which they had been eye-witnesses.

Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon [Jos 10:12 and the first part of Jos 10:13 may be thus poetically rendered:

Then spake Joshua to Jehovah.

In the day of Jehovah’s giving the Amorite

In the presence of the sons of Israel;

And he said in the eyes of Israel:

Sun, in Gibeon be still,

And moon, in the valley of Aijalon.

Then still was the sun,

And the moon stood,

Until a nation should take vengeance on its enemies.]

Various have been the theories devised to explain the manner of this stupendous miracle. Some assert that the passage is merely a poetical interpolation to adorn the narrative and heighten its effect. They allege that it is never quoted in the catalogues of Old Testament miracles. To this we reply, that, as we never find any exhaustive catalogues of those miracles, the omission of this proves nothing. The writer of the Epistle to the Hebrews omits the striking and unquestioned miracle of the passage of the Jordan. See Heb 11:29-30. Others explain this miracle as merely a poetical statement of the fact that the Israelites, in answer to Joshua’s prayer, were endowed with power to do two days’ work in one; a theory too absurd to call for sober refutation. There are others who insist that the earth’s motion on its axis was actually arrested, causing a cessation of the apparent diurnal revolution of the sun and moon. Our objection to this theory is, that it involves several secret miracles. A sudden check in the velocity of rotation of the earth on its axis would violently throw down objects on its surface, especially near the equator. If a resisting force were gradually applied, like a brake to a car-wheel, Prof. Mitchell has ascertained that “in forty seconds the motion might cease entirely, and the change would not be sensible to the inhabitants of the earth, except from the appearance of the heavens.” But this would require a direct interposition of a secret miracle to keep the ocean, which is sustained at a higher level in the equatorial regions by the centrifugal force, from flowing toward the poles, and from submerging much of the continents, and to keep the Mediterranean Sea from dashing over Palestine. Again: By the recent discovery of the correlation of forces it has been demonstrated that a force requisite to arrest the revolution of the earth must convert momentum into heat equal to that generated by the burning of a mass of anthracite coal fourteen times as large as the globe itself. Another secret miracle would be required to prevent this universal conflagration. But secret miracles, so far as we know, have no place in the divine system, since they cannot authenticate a revelation, or demonstrate to man the interposition of God’s hand in the course of nature. We, therefore, with a large number of commentators and Christian philosophers, adopt the theory that the standing still of the sun and moon was optical, and not literal that we have a description of phenomena as presented to the eyes of the spectators. The language of the Scriptures is evidently popular, and not scientific; as when they speak of the earth as standing still and the sun as rising and setting. By the supernatural refraction, or bending of the rays of light, the sun and moon might maintain a stationary appearance for several hours. Even by natural refraction we daily see the sun before he has risen above, and after he has gone below, the horizon. The miraculous receding of the shadow on the dial of Ahaz (2Ki 20:11; Isa 38:8) was probably caused by a similar supernatural refraction of the sun’s rays. This explanation of these astronomical miracles involves the principle which is found in nearly all miracles, namely, the intensifying of some natural agency rather than the violation of any natural laws. As in the case of the widow’s cruse and the feeding of the multitudes, new oil and new loaves were not created, but that which was in existence was multiplied, so do we believe that instead of a new and strange force brought to bear on nature the natural law of refraction was intensified in both of these miracles.

There is no astronomical difficulty in the statement of the positions of the sun and the moon at that time. To Joshua, standing at Upper Beth-horon, the direction of Gibeon was southeast, which would also be the direction of the sun in the early part of the day, at which time the moon might have been in the southwest, above the valley of Aijalon, approaching its setting. See map of the scene of the battle, page 74. To the question why Joshua should ask for the day to be lengthened while more than half the day was still unspent, we reply that the account does not say that he asked for such a miracle. He “spake to the Lord.” We are left to supply the subject-matter of his prayer, which would most naturally be for aid to annihilate God’s foes. He receives no answer, but is suddenly endowed with the gift of faith that at his command to the sun and moon God will work an unheard-of miracle, for the demonstration of his sovereignty over physical law, and of his interest in his people.

It is quite probable that the sun and the moon, the gods of so many pagan nations, were the divinities of the Canaanites, to whom they were then appealing for aid against the victorious Hebrews. If this be true, there is a peculiar appropriateness in this miracle, strikingly demonstrating to both armies the superiority of the God of Joshua.

The absence of any account of this miracle in the annals of other nations should have little weight with us, since the records of nearly all the contemporaneous nations have perished, and none of them have histories containing complete accounts of that early period.

Fuente: Whedon’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Jos 10:12-13 a

‘Then spoke Joshua to YHWH, in the day when YHWH delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel,

“Sun on Gibeon be silent (still),

Moon in the vale of Aijalon

So the sun was silent (still) and the moon stayed,

Until the nation was revenged on its foes.”

Is not this written in the book of Jasher?’

This poem was found in the Book of Jasher (the book of the righteous), mentioned also in 2Sa 1:18. The Book of Jasher was clearly a collection of songs, possibly put together over a period of time (compare The Book of the Wars of YHWH – Num 21:14). If the reference in Samuel refers to a poem written at that time, it was written at the time of Saul’s death. But some argue that 2Sa 1:18 should simply read ‘he instructed them to train the Judeans in bowmanship (‘song of’ is not in the Hebrew), the training-poem for which is written in the Book of Jasher ’ and do not refer it to David’s poem at all. As we know that music was regularly used as a part of military training that is possibly the correct translation, and in that case it does not fix a date for the Book of Jasher making its appearance. Alternately this reference to the Book of Jasher here may be an added note by a copyist, the poem itself being contemporary with the event but having found its way into the Book of Jasher.

It is not quite clear from these words what happened or when it happened, and the extreme weather conditions. which must have included thick, dark clouds, must be noted. Does the reference to Gibeon mean that it happened while they were at Gibeon? If so it was while the sun was rising (Jos 10:9), an idea supported by the fact that the moon was still visible. But why then ask for the sun to stand still at that point? If it was light that was in mind there would be plenty of time still left in the day. It is more probable therefore that he would want it to be ‘silent’, that is, not to rise so as to be able to continue the advantage of the night attack. In that case ‘be silent’ would mean, ‘let it remain dark’. This would tie in with the visibility of the moon over Aijalon and its continuing visibility, the remarkable weather conditions, and the later hailstorm that destroyed the enemy from a black sky. It should be noted that there is no suggestion in the actual historical account of an excessively long day.

Alternately the reference to Gibeon may simply indicate the direction in which the sun was from looking from Joshua’s viewpoint.

For the meaning ‘be silent’, which is the primary meaning of the verb, compare Amo 5:13; Lev 10:3; Psa 4:4 (5); Psa 31:17; Job 31:34. For the meaning ‘be still’ compare Jer 8:14; Jer 47:6; 1Sa 14:9, but note that these latter could equally be rendered by ‘silence’, for they refer to the stillness of silence, to non-activity.

Or was it much later in the day when Joshua wanted more light to continue the battle and the moon had begun again to appear? That is how it is often taken. We must certainly recognise that weather conditions were very strange as is evidenced by the extraordinary hail. They were such as occurred very rarely indeed and must have resulted in freak weather conditions. Did such freak weather conditions result in the sun’s light reflecting even when it had gone down so that ‘the day’ (period of light) lasted longer, or result in the moon being excessively bright, so giving a continuation of a long day (period of light) which they naturally interpreted in terms of the sun? Certainly something unusual happened that was vividly remembered. But it was not such as to destroy the world’s environment. (The question here is not what God could do but what He would and did do).

We are not incidentally to see in it the literal adding of a twenty four hour period. At the most it indicates additional daylight. ‘About a whole day’ would be in terms of the period between sunrise and sunset.

Jos 10:13-14 (13b-14)

‘And the sun stayed in the midst of heaven and hasted not to go down about a whole day. And there was no day like that before it or after it, that YHWH heard the voice of a man. For YHWH fought for Israel.’

This need not mean that they actually saw the sun stop in the heavens (which was unlikely given the known cloud cover and the hailstorm). Thus it could mean that the sun having begun to appear simply disappeared behind the thick, threatening clouds which resulted, among other things, in the hailstorm, and a big advantage for Israel. As far as they were concerned it would then have ‘stopped’ in the midst of heaven. The word in Hebrew means to stand still, stop still, thus here possibly meaning that they no longer saw its movement. As far as they were concerned it had stopped moving. It no longer produced any effect. And the day had gone very dark. They were describing what they saw. That would mean that that day there was no sun seen hasting to go down. And it was seen as all due to Joshua’s request, God’s response to the latter being seen as a unique event in history.

Many, however, follow the traditional interpretation considering that the period of daylight seemingly lasted ‘almost twice as long as usual’, although we must allow for the possible overstatement of the writer. He had no means of telling the time. It must not be seen as a strict scientific statement, but as the awed statement of a believer. God had given them additional daylight! One question is how would the Israelites know this, having no measure of time if sun and moon were not behaving normally? They certainly had no way of measuring the time accurately. One method may have been based on such things as the number of times cattle and goats had to be milked and fed linked to a general sense of passing time. But this would not be reliable for cattle and goats can be affected by extreme weather conditions, while we have all known days that have seemed interminable. And we must keep in mind that to them ‘a day’ was a period of light, not necessarily a fixed period between sunrise and sunset (which they had no way of measuring). It would not have been a fixed number of hours, because hours had not yet been invented.

In this view then we are looking at what seemed an extra long day, a day in which unusual and remarkable weather conditions applied, which very conditions may have resulted in ‘daylight’ being seen as continuing into the night in some way. But given the unusual weather conditions, the appearance of the moon, and the rare nature of the hailstorm, it seems far more probable that the reference is to a dark day not a light one.

All we can really say with certainty is that there were hugely remarkable events affecting both the weather and the heavens, which were seen as the work of YHWH in direct response to Joshua’s prayer, an event unique in history up to that time. The important thing was that YHWH fought for Israel. It is interesting that the poem concentrates on the activities of sun and moon while the prose account stresses the remarkable hailstorm. The two were clearly connected.

Fuente: Commentary Series on the Bible by Peter Pett

Ver. 12-14. Then spake Joshua, &c. We may refer all that is necessary to say on this remarkable passage to the five following heads. I. The miracle itself, and the manner in which it is described. To facilitate the Israelites obtaining a complete victory over the five kings of the Amorites, God, at the prayer of Joshua, caused the sun and the moon to stand still, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies: there are the words of the historian, confirmed by Hab 3:11. But as, in the opinion of all modern philosophers, it is the earth which rolls round the sun, and not the sun round the earth, how is it possible to reconcile this system with the expressions of the sacred writer? To answer this question, without entering into discussions foreign to the design of a commentary, we content ourselves with remarking, that nothing is more common in Scripture than to express things, not according to the strict rules of philosophy, but according to their appearances, and the vulgar apprehension concerning them. For instance, Moses calls the sun and moon two great lights; but, however this appellation may agree with the sun, it cannot in the same sense signify the moon, which is now well known to be but a small body, and to have no light at all but what it borrows by a reflection of the rays of the sun; appearing to us larger than the other planets, merely because it is placed nearer to us. From this appearance it is, that the Holy Scriptures give it the title of a great light. In like manner, because the sun seems to us to move, and the earth to be at rest, the Scriptures represent the latter as placed on pillars, bases, and foundations, compare the former to a bridegroom issuing from his chamber, and rejoicing as a giant to run his course, and speak of his arising and going down, and hastening to the place from whence he arose, &c. when it is certain, that if the sun were made to revolve round the earth, the general laws of nature would thereby be violated, the harmony and proportion of the heavenly bodies destroyed, and the oeconomy of the universe thrown into confusion and disorder. On the contrary, supposing the earth to turn upon its own axis within the space of twenty-four hours, and to go round the sun in the compass of a year, it will then be easily conceived to move according to the same laws of motion which impel the other planets round one common centre, and the execution whereof constitutes the order and harmony admired in the whole frame of nature. The general design of God when he inspired the sacred writers, having been to form mankind to holiness and virtue, not to make them philosophers; it no way derogates from the respect due to the Holy Spirit, or from the consideration which the writings of those holy men merit, whose pens he directed, to suppose, that in order to accommodate themselves to the capacity, the notions and language of the vulgar, they have purposely spoken of the phaenomena of nature in terms most conformable to the testimony of the senses. In the present case, Joshua seems to have had in view the modern system, when he commanded the moon as well as the sun to stand still; for, of what use could the presence of the moon be to him, while favoured with that of the sun? What he required, without doubt, was, that the sun and moon might lend him their light till he had completed the overthrow of his enemies. Now he could not be ignorant, that if the earth stood still, the sun, the moon, and the rest of the planets, must also seem to stand still: he chose, therefore, to speak the common language of the people, in order to be generally understood. II. The second thing which here presents itself to our consideration is, the place or places where Joshua desired and obtained that the sun and moon might appear to stand. Sun, said he, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, moon, in the valley of Ajalon! “Let those two great lights seem stopped and immoveable in that part of the heavens where they at this instant appear to be; the one upon Gibeon, the other over Ajalon.” Supposing the modern system of the sun’s motion to be accurate, Joshua could not speak this in a proper and philosophical sense. The sun, near a million times bigger than the earth, is many millions of miles distant from it. To justify, therefore, its being literally upon Gibeon, a line drawn perpendicularly from the centre of the sun to that of the earth must exactly take Gibeon in its way; now this is impossible, in as much as the Holy Land does not lie between the tropics. We must, therefore, necessarily conclude, that Joshua here speaks in the popular and figurative style; which is very intelligible, on a supposition that the earth moves round the sun. Those who would enter more philosophically into this subject, we refer to Scheuchzer, tom. 4: p. 37. III. Our third observation respects the time of the miracle. The text imports, that the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day; or more simply, for the whole day. The words, in the midst of heaven, always signify the place of the sun and moon. Accordingly there it stood still, appearing to remain for a whole day, or twelve hours, in the same position. The account of the sacred historian necessarily leads us to understand it in this manner. The various transactions here recorded could not have been brought about in the compass of an ordinary day. The notion of Maimonides is so absurd, that it is inconceivable how Grotius and Masius could have approved it; for he makes the whole miracle to consist, not in God’s having granted to Joshua’s request really a longer day than was common at this season of the year, but in his giving that general and his soldiers powers sufficient for the effecting in one day what would otherwise have required two: whereas the historian expressly declares that the sun stood still, and that there was no day like that, before it or after it; and, indeed, never before, or since, was there so great a victory as this of Joshua obtained in a single day. It has been asked, why did not Joshua, instead of desiring God to arrest the sun in his mid-day course, delay his request till it was just upon its decline? Now it appears very evident from the event, how greatly it concerned the certainty and splendour of the miracle, that it should begin from the sun’s being at the meridian of Gibeon. Had the retardation of the sun not happened till it was going to set, how many might have thought it plausible to attribute, with Spinosa, the extraordinary length of this day to the refraction of the rays from the clouds, which, at that time, were loaded with hail; or to maintain, with Piererius, that it was owing to some aurora borealis, or other similar phaenomenon, which, after the setting of the sun, might appear about Gibeon, and so be mistaken for the sun’s standing still! See Spin. Tract. Theol. Polit. cap. 2. & Praeadam. lib. 4: cap. 6. But now, by supposing the sun arrested at noon-day, all these cavils are effectually removed; and God, no doubt, who heard Joshua so readily, inspired him to request the miracle at the very time he did so. See Calmet’s Dissertation on the subject. IV. But what is that book of Jasher, or the righteous, to which that sacred historian refers for the truth of this fact? Some are of opinion, that it was a poetical work, in the taste of the Orientals, full of hyperboles, and which it would be absurd to understand in a literal sense: and they add, that perhaps the author, in singing the victory of Joshua, had, under an elegant fiction, represented the planets arrested and day lengthened, in order to render the victory more complete; in the same manner as a Greek poet said, that the sun was used to stay his chariot to hear the melody of a choir of nymphs (see Callim. Hym. ad. Dian. ver. 120.); or as another poet represents the course of this planet as suspended with horror at the offence of Atreus, bloody with the murder of the son of Thyestes, whom he gave to the unhappy father to eat. See Stat. Theb. lib. 1: ver. 289 and lib. 5: ver. 177. We find, say the defenders of this opinion, several passages in Scripture like this; which yet there is no necessity to understand literally, Jdg 5:20. Isa 13:9-10; Isa 34:1-5. But those, who are inclined to see this method of interpretation defended to the utmost, may refer to a dissertation, intitled, “The Sun’s standing still in the days of Joshua, rationally accounted for by A. O. LL. D. London, 1739:” an interpretation which appears to us in every respect ill-grounded, as there is nothing in the text of Joshua, which does not lead one to believe, that the historian spoke in the most simple and literal manner; and surely no examples in such cases should be drawn from the strongly figurative and metaphorical expressions of the classics. As to the passages brought in proof from Scripture, they are evidently figurative, and cannot be understood with propriety in a literal sense; those, for instance, in the song of Deborah, would be absurd in a literal sense: the sun may easily be supposed to stand still, but it cannot be supposed to sing; the stars may easily be retained by a divine course in their orbits, but they cannot fight. It is wonderful, that men should compare things which have so little resemblance. Though the Hebrew, according to some, may be translated, Sun, be silent upon Gibeon; it is no less true, that it may be translated with great propriety, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon. See 1Sa 14:9; 1 Samuel 5. As to the objections raised against this miracle from St.

Paul’s silence respecting it, Hebrews 11 and its being entirely unknown to heathen writers, the answer is easy: the argument with respect to St. Paul proves too much; for how came the apostle to omit other miraculous events? He speaks not, for example, of the plagues of Egypt, of the miracles of Moses in the wilderness, nor of the passage of the Jordan, &c. Designing only to give some notable examples of the efficacy of faith, he is neither curious in his choice, nor exact in his enumeration; of which there was the less need, as he wrote to Hebrews well acquainted with all these facts. And as to the silence of the heathen writers, that is nothing surprising; for the miracle of which we speak so long preceded every prophane writer of whom we have any remains, that there is no wonder that all remembrance of it was lost before the time of their writings: and yet, if one may be allowed to draw light out of darkness, it should seem very reasonable to conjecture, that the idea of the poets, that their heroes and demi-gods had the power of prolonging days and nights upon certain occasions, arose from this extraordinary event; nay, after all, should we find nothing in prophane history to confirm this fact, no conclusion can be drawn from thence against the literal sense of the words of the sacred writer, even setting aside his divine authority, if we would judge of him with the same candour as of every other historian. But see Huet, Demonstr. Evang. prop. 4: sect. 13. Quaest. Alnet. lib. 2: cap. 12 sect. 27 and Lucan, lib. 6: ver. 460, &c. Purver, in a note upon the passage, observes, that the Chinese History has a tradition, that the sun did not set for ten days, while the emperor Yao reigned. Days, says he, may be thought a mistake for hours, and both miracles to be the same, as the chronological computation exactly agrees.

In conclusion of this note we just observe, that it is easy to show that God, in the present case, interposed his sovereign power in a manner worthy his wisdom and greatness. I. The Gibeonites, now become subject to God, were to be protected against their unjust oppressors. 2. The best way of protecting them, was that which most powerfully evinced the superiority of the God of Israel, and his infinite might. Had the sword of the Israelites alone gained the victory, the success might have been attributed to their valour, to the courage and good conduct of their general, to the fortuitous arrangement of circumstances, or to other similar causes; whereas, the traces of the divine power gave incontestable splendor to the miracle thus wrought at the prayer of Joshua 3. The sun and the moon were the principal objects of adoration with the Canaanites: to arrest these great luminaries in their course, and to do this at Joshua’s request, was to give idolatry the severest blow; was to teach idolaters, in the most striking manner, that their gods were but vanity, and their worship foolishness.

Fuente: Commentary on the Holy Bible by Thomas Coke

This memorable event, one of the most extraordinary we meet with in history, hath mightily amused sceptics. But it is the misapprehension of the thing itself, which hath occasioned their folly, and not the real fact. God was pleased to suspend the light of the heavenly bodies, for the purpose of Joshua ‘ s carrying on the great victory, of destroying the enemies of the Lord. It was not the body of the sun that stood still in Gibeon, nor the moon itself in Ajalon: but the reflected light of those heavenly bodies. The original word, which means the sun or body of the sun, in Scripture is Chemah; and that of the moon Libnah; whereas, in this passage, the original is Shemish, solar light; and Jarech, lunar light; evidently meaning, that the Lord miraculously caused the reflected light of the sun and moon, to answer the purposes intended, by preserving both on the earth for the discomfiture of his enemies. And is there anything for laughter in this? Can anything be too hard with God? Doth not the Holy Ghost say, that if we ask anything according to his will, he heareth us? 1Jn 5:14 . Read that wonderful condescension of God: Isa 45:11 . We have no account in God’s word, concerning this book of Jasher. Probably it was some historian of that day. But from not being commissioned by the Holy Ghost to write, no further account is taken of him. I stop the Reader, just to beg him to remark with me, that at the death of our glorious Joshua, which was the hour of his victory over death, hell, and the grave, the reverse of this miracle took place; for the sun was darkened at midday. And I detain him once more to observe, that there is a day coming when all the victories of our glorious Joshua shall be summed up, and it is promised that the sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come. See Luk 23:44-45 ; Act 2:20 And doth not Jesus suspend the operations of nature very frequently, and the powers of darkness, in order to carry on his victories in the hearts of his people? The Holy Ghost gives us authority to believe this, by what he saith in the ministry of his servant the prophet: when he goeth forth for the salvation of his people. Hab 3:11-13 .

Fuente: Hawker’s Poor Man’s Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Five Modern Kings

Jos 10:12-43

WE are now travelling in the midst of wars and rumours of wars in our progress through these sacred pages. The reading is very exciting and distressing. Every page is a battlefield, and every sentence is like a stain of blood. Our distress can only be mitigated by taking in great breadths of time and viewing the course of Providence, not in detail, but in entirety, as a stupendous and well-composed unity. This is the law of just judgment in all life, so we are not creating a law for special application to exceptional circumstances. We do not fully know why this waste of human life was made. But why say “was” made, as if referring to an exhausted history? We need not speak in the past tense, but in the present, for this same waste of life is made, in some form or other, every day, and seems to be part of the very law of progress. We cannot understand it. We are not called upon to defend it. We must seriously stop and consider it. But there is the law: peace comes through battle, and life through death. Every garden is only a planted cemetery. Wherever you set your foot, you set it upon death. Who can understand the philosophy of destruction, the apparent wastefulness of God? It is a mistake to suppose that destruction is unnecessary. Every day slays its countless thousands. War is not a term definable by one word, nor is it confined to one set of circumstances; it is at the very heart of all imperfect and yet developing things. Life lives upon life. Blood is renewed by blood. A great mystery this and a tragedy that expresses infinite pain. But such is the devouring rapacity of life. It cannot live upon dead things. Life must live upon life, cannibalism, not regulated, directed, and brought under some law of sanctification, a great fact, a solemn and terrible thing! What a hunger it is that gnaws our being; it would soon develop itself into cruelty if civilisation did not limit it, and supply it with what it wants. No fire could deter it; no force could restrain it; it must be appeased from heaven. Which is to be uppermost? is the question of all life. What is to be uppermost? is the question of Heaven, and God has declared for the righteous. So righteousness will win, and purity will sit upon the throne that is everlasting. We know all this, in part, without the Bible. There are many bibles upon this subject Men have written revelations who never suspected what they were doing. They described their exercises by quite other and inferior terms, namely: they were observing, collating, laying down a basis of induction; but do what they may, they all end in law, and the law would seem to be: destruction necessary to life, the out-crowding of some by others, “the survival of the fittest.” This is not the day of judgment upon which we can settle all these things, giving fully-matured opinions upon them and disposing of them decisively and finally. Thank God, we are permitted to speak as we think, that is to say, God permits speech to relieve thinking; so men publish immature books, speakers deliver immature speeches; but their books and speeches are not to be regarded as final and unchangeable. Revelation is a growing quantity. Biblical interpretation is a progressive science. The observation of human life expands and clears and enlarges. Who, then, shall bind any man to his own punctuation, or search the foregone pages to charge him with inconsistency? No man thinks two days alike. To-morrow is not responsible for this day, forasmuch as it will bring its own evil and its own good, its own light and its own darkness. It is needful to remember these things in reading the ancient books of Scripture, for they are full of terror and battle and cruelty and destruction and oppression and wrong, in many a detail, showing how easily the best men were tempted, how soon the noblest men fell into miserable humiliations, and how even women and children and innocent persons were borne down by a tremendous rush, as if the impulse were from heaven.

What use, then, can we make of these ancient instances? We can make great and profitable use of them if we be so minded. Before attempting to make some use of this incident, let us be thankful that the mystery of the sun standing still, and the moon being stayed until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies, has been cleared up. What battles have been fought about these words! How astronomy has been subpoenaed as a witness, and all nature been forced into court! It was quite needless as is much of the clamour and debate raging round strange things in the Bible. The writer himself asks, “Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day.” It was written in a poetical book as a grand instance of sublime imagining. It was as if it had been so. It appeared as if this battle must be fought out before eventide, and as if, strangely, men had so fought and so won that the great issue was completed before the setting of the sun. The instance is specially referred to even upon this page as a quotation from a poetical book; so there need not be any solemn summoning of astronomic science to contradict what has never been asserted.

Now we come to the slaying of the kings the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, the king of Lachish, and the king of Eglon. They were immured in a cave; they were kept for further uses: they were hanged upon a tree; they were burnt and condemned. Are there not five kings yea, fifty, yea, countless hundreds with whom we can do this very same thing kill them, hang them, bury them? We have come to spiritual battlefields. The weapons of our warfare are not carnal; we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and spiritual powers invisible, but tremendous in strength, nor less tremendous in subtlety. We are not straining the instance by pausing to consider the meanings of the names of the places connected with the names of the king, such as the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, the king of Lachish, the king of Eglon. The names of the places may help us to consider the nature of their respective kings.

“The king of Jerusalem.” That such a king should have been slain works violently in our memory and whole thought, for “Jerusalem” means peace the city of peace, the restful city, the sabbatic metropolis, the home of rest. But is there not a false peace? If we could not bring some good words into our use and qualify them by bad names, the case of the wicked man would be simply intolerable: the little truth he does tell, makes way for the much falsehood he wishes to propagate. Is there, then, not a false peace? Do we not hear men crying, Peace, peace, where there is no peace? Is it not possible to daub the wall with untempered mortar? Do we not create a wilderness, and call it peace? By banishing all anxieties, by stifling the voices within us that call to righteousness and truth and purity, by occupying the mind with other things, do we not suppose that we have entered into peace enough and realised all the rest we need? Have we not shut out the light, and said, There is none? Have we not given an opiate to conscience, and then said our life is going forward without rebuke? Have we not declined to discuss certain things, and therefore imagined that the things are not open to discussion? We have wronged our own souls in this matter. It is pitiful, yea, heart-rending, to mark how prone we are to close our eyes and consider that, because we have excluded the sense of danger, we have destroyed its presence. The king of false peace must be slain. He has ruled over some of us too long. He has lived upon us, plundered us with both hands, and all the while flattered us, until we have lost all power to criticise his baleful sovereignty. When men are not real with themselves, the case is hopeless. And who is real with himself? Who can take out his very heart, as it were, and analyse it, sift its motives, cross-examine its purposes, and test its half-spoken words? On all subjects of this kind we can but ask the piercing question; it lies with every man to return the honest answer.

“Hebron” means conjunction, joining, alliance. Is not the king of false fellowship to be killed? What concord hath Christ with Belial? Why these ill-assorted marriages in life, not marriages of a merely human and social kind, but all kinds of unions, fellowships, alliances, partnerships, that are founded upon rottenness, and are meant to mislead and deceive? What fellowship hath light with darkness? Yet we are beguiled into such associations, and we enter into them so gradually and in some cases so unsuspectingly that we hardly realise our relation to the false and the abominable until it is completed and sealed. God has always been against unholy alliances. Many a man he has, so to say, arrested with the words, Why this conjunction? What right have you to be here, pledging your character to sustain a known dishonesty? Why do you throw your respectability over this rottenness? But who can be true to himself and to God in this matter? Because we unite at certain parts or points of character, therefore we imagine that we do not include the whole line, and we decline responsibility in proportion to the number of points which our closure does not include. This is trifling with life; this is making a fool of conscience; this is giving to the moral power within us a dread narcotic: and we know it, and to pray after it is to crown our profanity with a lie. “Come out from among them, and be ye separate,” saith the Lord. It is very difficult to be associated with some men merely for a temporary purpose, and then to leave them as if the association had never existed. Oftentimes that cannot be done. A certain contagion has operated, and although the formal association may be dissolved, the results of it may abide and express themselves in many insidious, but emphatic ways. Here, again, detail is out of the question. It is only possible to put the inquiry sharply, unflinchingly, and to leave every man to find out where he is, and why he is there. You may pay too much for high fellowships. A man may pay his soul as the price of being allowed to go into a saloon; he may pay his manhood, he may pay his conscience. To spend a giddy half-hour in the gas-lighted saloon, he may be compelled to leave himself outside, that he may emptily and self-renouncingly play the fool in what he calls Society. That rule applies to all life, to all business, to all social fellowships, to all temporary associations. Have nothing to do with bad men, even though the purpose for which they seek your association is itself good. Do not believe any Scripture which the devil quotes to you. It ceases to be Scripture in his vile lips. He spoils all beauty, all loveliness, all honour. Take the same Scripture from the fountain, and carry it out; but do not say, He has quoted Scripture, and my relation to him is only that which ought to subsist between myself and a quoter of Scripture. We must have cleanness of conjunction, purity and reality of alliance, meeting on sympathetic ground. Even the Church of Christ, as constituted in some places, may be wrong in this particular.

And the king of Jarmuth. The word means high, that which is lifted up. And is not the king of false ambition to be slain and then hanged to have contempt added to murder? Contempt is never so well expended as upon false ambition. This false ambition is killing many people. They do not see how foolish it is to be living under king Jarmuth. Why live a strained life always trying to reach something that is just half an inch beyond your stretching power? If you were trying to seize the stars, men would simply smile upon you as imbeciles. It is the odd half-inch that deceives you, makes you think that, because it is only half an inch, surely you may reach it and use it. That is a false law of life. It means ruin. Whilst you are so stretching yourselves beyond your due proportion, men are robbing every pocket you have, and you do not know it; cutting the ground from under your feet, and you are not aware of it; and you yourselves are losing power to do the simple, real, needy business of life with both hands and undivided strength. The temptation to be just a little more than we are is the temptation we read of in the garden of Eden: Eat, says the serpent, of that tree, “and ye shall be as gods,” ye shall go into another kind of society, into a saloon higher up, larger, and better lighted; put forth your hands, eat freely, and become “as gods.” See if the serpent is not still deceiving society by this very suggestion. Who can live simply and lovingly within the lines of his own conscious strength, and do the work which God has obviously designed him to do? It is when the wish to do something else and something better comes in, that many a man is thrown down and loses what strength he has, much or little, as the case may be.

Then the king of Lachish. The word means hard to be captured, almost out of reach, or so defended that it will be almost impossible to get at the king. Is not the king of fancied security to be slain and hanged? We say it is impossible to penetrate to our hiding-place and dislodge us from our ramparts, not knowing that our ramparts, which are supposed to be made of granite, are constituted but of ice, and the rising sun shall not smite them, but dissolve them, and they shall stream away from us and leave us exposed to every dart and every stroke of the assailant. What is our security? Not money, I hope: for riches take to themselves wings and fly away. Not physical strength, I hope: for even Samson has had his energy drawn out of him, and has been left a giant in carcase, but a cripple in power. Not ancestry, I hope: for who would live upon the dead and wear the respectabilities of an exhausted generation? There is only one security, and that is harmony with God, peace with Heaven, identification with righteousness, the absorption of the little imperfect will with the infinite will of God. You have seen the wicked in great power, spreading himself like a green bay-tree: yet he passed away, and, lo, he was not, yea, you sought him, and he could not be found. The mystery was that there was no violence; there was no record of the decadence in the newspaper of the. day. It was a mystery. The man changed: his mental power deserted him: he put out his hands to take something when there was nothing to be seized; he spoke, as it were, upside down, in confusion that would have amused you if it had not too much distressed your sensibilities. He lost, he reeled, he groped at noonday, he went back to find his rampart, and, behold, it was gone! This we have seen in life in countless cases; but if we have only seen it, the sight will do us little good: such visions should be laid to heart.

King of Eglon. The word “Eglon” means pertaining to a calf, and may be taken as representing the whole system of false worship. A great mocking voice is heard in one of the minor prophets, saying, “Thy calf, O Samaria, hath cast thee off.” It is the way of false gods: they betray their worshippers; they withdraw themselves when danger crowds the scene with innumerable hostilities; they will do in the sunshine that is to say, they will do when there is nothing to be done; but they have no biding pith, no staying power, no quality divine. Such is the difference between men. Under some circumstances the men are, as it were, equal equal in pleasantness, in cheerfulness, and willingness to assist; but some of them can bear no strain: so long as the whole business can be done by assurances that are without security, they are willing that the whole business should be completed. Men are known by their staying power. Many a man walks the first mile as if he were treading upon air. It is a kind of exercise in levitation, rather than in ponderous and literal walking. But there are ten miles to be walked. The second mile sees a difference; the third mile excites pity in the beholder: the man was never made for that task. So it is with false worship, with imperfect worship, with fancy worship. There are men who worship reason; but reason never worships them or trusts them: it does but coldly smile upon them and wonder at their philosophic insanity. And there are those who worship gold and fame and honour and ease; and these base deities cast them off at eventide. Be right in worship, if you would be right in character. Be right in religious conviction, if you would be right along the whole line of life and equally strong at every point.

Joshua, having slain these kings, goes upon his conquering way. Joshua said, in effect, There are not only five kings to be killed, but more and more, a line of kings, far as the eye can see. So, soldier-like, captain of God, he passed on from Makkedah to Libnah, from Libnah to Lachish, from Lachish to Eglon, from Eglon to Hebron; and there we lose sight of him for a moment. His sword is up, his eyes aflame, and he is the captain of the Lord towards all “devoted” things. And on, too, we must go on from evil to evil, until the last bad king is slain: on from habit to habit till the whole character is purified: on until the whole life is cleansed; and this sweet old earth, so debased, so ill-used, shall become, in every land, in every clime, beautiful as a palace built for God.

Prayer

Almighty God, we pray with our hearts because thou hast taught us to pray, and we know that in heart-prayer the answer is found in the very petition itself. We are cleansed by this exercise; our mouth is purified and our lips are made clean. How can we speak the name of God, and then speak any other name that is not related to it by pureness or by love? How can we lift up our eyes unto heaven to behold the revelation of light, and then turn them downwards to look upon anything which that light has not created and approved? So thou dost make us better by our praying; we feel the stronger after we have spoken to God. Thou dost draw nigh unto those that address thee; thou dost put out thine hand towards them, and in thine hand is the sceptre of gold. We come by the way of the Cross. We have tried other ways, and they end in cloud and nothingness: but the way of the Cross is a way straight up to heaven; we meet angels upon the road and the spirits of the just made perfect, a sweet and innumerable companionship of souls: all the dear friends we have lost, and the brave comrades, and the crowned ones of every name and quality whom we have known and with whom we have consorted; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. So we form one host: part of it in heaven, part of it on earth; still, we are one family in Christ, and we shall all be brought together into the larger house, and stand night and day in thy presence, whose look is heaven, whose breath is peace. For religious hopes we bless thee: they sing in the soul like angels from heaven; they make the night as the morning, and the morning they make as sevenfold noontide in the summer-time. We thank thee for them; they drive away dejection and fear and solitariness and all evil. We pray thee to multiply these hopes; increase not only their number, but their radiance, and in their light we shall work industriously and hopefully, and every hour shall create its own heaven. The days are few with many now before thee, because the pilgrims are hastening quickly to the end. The end may be tomorrow; the end may be to-night; the end cannot be far off, by reason of natural weakness and the increase of days. Some are young, and full of hope and high life and hot blood, brave and chivalrous when good, but desperate and evil-minded when under the inspiration of the devil; the Lord send a message to such a great gospel of love that shall seize the attention, attract the confidence, and save the soul. Help the young man in his struggle; it goes hardly with him sometimes. Now and again he is quite down, and but for thy touch he would remain there a dead man. Save him in the time of peril! Kill the tempter that sits beside his ear to speak as he may be able to receive the bad communication. Some are engaged in good service: the Lord help them; their heaven is in Christian toil; their delight expresses itself in sacrificial labour. Give them courage and good cheer, and may they be able again to draw together their whole strength, in the name of Christ and for the sake of his Cross, and to go out and do valiantly for the Son of God. The Lord hear us when we pray, and be patient with us in our best endeavours. Pity our littlenesses and vanities and mean conceits. Pity us wherein we carry diseases, distresses of mind or body, brought upon us by no blame of our own; when the evil rises within us, consider our estate, we beseech thee, and remember whence we sprang and through what course we have come in all the ages gone. Take us into thine arms; give us rest awhile from storm and strife; quiet us with thy peace, thou tranquil one; and all this and more immeasurably do thou accomplish for us, because we pray in the name which must prevail. Amen.

Fuente: The People’s Bible by Joseph Parker

Jos 10:12 Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon.

Ver. 12. Then spake Joshua to the Lord. ] He first prayed, and then laid his commands on sun and moon to stand still, and not stir, till he had achieved a full victory, Hereupon one crieth out, O admirabilem piarum precum vim ac potentiam quibus etiam caelestia cedunt! O fidem heroicam, cuius virtutem ipsa astra sentiunt! quos non hostes terreret, feriret, fugaret illa manus quae victoriae suae trophaea etiam in ipsis caeli orbibus figit? O the power of prayer! O the force of faith! How could that hand do less than confound his enemies, which had set trophies of victory in the very celestial orbs?

Fuente: John Trapp’s Complete Commentary (Old and New Testaments)

Joshua

THE SUN STAYED

Jos 10:12 .

‘The last time,’ what a sad sound that has! In all minds there is a shrinking from the last time of doing even some common act. The walk down a street that we have passed every day for twenty years, and never cared in the least about, and the very doorsteps and the children in the streets, have an interest for us, as pensively we leave the commonplace familiar scene.

On this last Sunday of another year, there comes a tone of sober meditation over us, as we think that it is the last. I would fain let the hour preach. I have little to say but to give voice to its lessons.

My text is only taken as a starting-point, and I shall say nothing about Joshua and his prayer. I do not discuss whether this was a miracle or not. It seems, at any rate, to be taken by the writer of the story as one. What a picture he draws of the fugitives rushing down the rocky pass, blind in their fear, behind them the flushed and eager conqueror, the burst of the sudden tempest and far in the west the crescent moon, the leader on the hilltop with his prayer for but one hour or two more of daylight to finish the wild work so well begun! And, says the story, his wish was granted, and no day has been ‘like it before or since, in which the Lord hearkened unto the voice of a man.’ Once, and only once, did time seem to stand still; from the beginning till now it has been going steadily on, and even then it only seemed to stand. That day seemed longer, but life was passing all the same.

And so the first thought forced upon us here by our narrative and by the season is the old one, so commonplace and yet so solemn.

I. Life inexorably slides away from us.

Once, and only once, it seemed to pause. How often since has Joshua’s prayer been prayed again! By the fearful,-the wretch to be hanged at eight o’clock to-morrow morning, the man whom the next train will part from all he loves. By the hopeful,-the child wearying for the holidays, the bridegroom,

‘Gallop apace, ye fiery-footed steeds!’

By the suffering,-

‘Would God it were evening!’

By the martyr amid the flames,

‘Come quickly, Lord Jesus!’

But all in vain. We cannot expand the moments to hours, nor compress the hours to moments. Leaden or winged, the hours are hours. The cold-blooded pendulum ticks on, equable and unaltered, and after sixty minutes, no sooner and no later, the hour strikes. ‘There is a time for every purpose.’

How solemn is the thought of that constant process! It goes on for ever, like the sea fog creeping up from the wide ocean and burying life and sunshine in its fatal folds, or like the ever-flowing river, or like the fall plunging over the edge of the cliff, or like the motions of the midnight sky. Each moment in its turn passes into the colourless stony past, and the shadow creeps up the hillside.

And how unnoticed it is! We only know motion by the jolts. The revolution of the earth and its rush along its orbit are unfelt by us. We are constantly startled to feel how long ago such and such a thing took place. The mother sees her little girl at her knee, and in a few days, as it seems, finds her a woman. How immense is our life in the prospect, how awfully it collapses in the retrospect! Only by seeing constellation after constellation set, do we know that the heavens are in motion. We have need of an effort of serious reflection to realise that it is of us and of our lives that all these old commonplaces are true.

That constant, unnoticed progress has an end. Our life is a definite period, having a bounded past behind it, a present, and a bounded future before it. We have a sandglass and it runs out. We are like men sliding down a rope or hauling a boat towards a fixed point. The sea is washing away our sandy island, and is creeping nearer and nearer to where we stand, and will wash over us soon. No cries, nor prayers, nor wishes will avail. It is vain for us to say, ‘Sun! stand thou still!’

II. Therefore our chief care should be to finish our work in our day.

Joshua had his day lengthened; we can come to the same result by crowding ours with service. What is the purpose of life? Is it a shop? or a garden? a school? No. Our ‘chief end’ is to become like God and a little to help forward His cause. All is intended to develop character; all life is disciplinary.

God’s purpose should be our desire. That desire should mould all our thoughts and acts. There should be no mere sentimental regrets for the past, but the spirit of consecration should affect our thoughts about it. There should be penitence, thankfulness, not vain mourning over what is gone. There should be no waste or selfish use of the present. What is it given us for but to use for God?

Strenuous work is the true way to lengthen each day. Time is infinitely elastic. The noblest work is to do ‘the works of Him that sent me.’ There should be no care for the future. It is in His hand. There will be room in it for doing all His will.

‘Lord, it belongs not to my care,

Whether I die or live.’

III. If so, the passing day will have results that never pass.

Joshua’s day was long enough for his work, and that work was a victory which told on future generations. So life, short as it is, will be long enough for all that we have to do and learn and be.

Christ’s servant is immortal till his work is done.

God gives every man time enough for his salvation.

What may we bring out of life? Character, Christ-likeness, thankful memories, union with God, capacity for heaven. The transient leaves the abiding. The flood foams itself away, but deposits rich soil on the plain.

IV. Thus the passing away of what must pass may become a joy.

Why should we be sad? There are reasons enough, as many sad, lonely hearts among us know too well To some men dark thoughts of death and judgment make the crumbling away of life too gloomy a fact to be contemplated, but it may and should be calm joy to us that the weary world ends and a blessed life begins. We may count the moments and see them pass, as a bride watches the hours rolling on to her marriage morning; not, indeed, without tremor and sadness at leaving her old home, but yet with meek hope and gentle joy.

It is possible for men to see that life is but ‘as a shadow that declineth,’ and yet to be glad. By faith in Christ, united to ‘Him Who is for ever and ever,’ our souls shall ‘triumph over death and thee, O time.’

We need not cry, ‘Sun! stand still!’ but rather, ‘Come quickly, Lord Jesus!’

Then Time shall be ‘the lackey to eternity,’ and Death be the porter of heaven’s gate, and we shall pass from the land of setting suns and waning moons and change and sorrow, to that land where ‘thy sun shall no more go down,’ and ‘there shall be no more time.’

Fuente: Expositions Of Holy Scripture by Alexander MacLaren

NASB (UPDATED TEXT): Jos 10:12-14

12Then Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the sons of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, O sun, stand still at Gibeon, And O moon in the valley of Aijalon. 13So the sun stood still, and the moon stopped, Until the nation avenged themselves of their enemies. Is it not written in the book of Jashar? And the sun stopped in the middle of the sky and did not hasten to go down for about a whole day. 14There was no day like that before it or after it, when the LORD listened to the voice of a man; for the LORD fought for Israel.

Jos 10:12 O sun, stand still at Gibeon Jos 10:12-13 are a poem (from the book of Jashar) which shows God’s control of nature. As He controlled the hailstones, He can (1) slow down or stop the rotation of the earth (cf. Isa 38:7-8); (2) stop the morning light (this is the meaning of the Hebrew stand still, literally, be silent, BDB 198, KB 226, Qal IMPERATIVE in Jos 10:12 and Qal IMPERFECT in Jos 10:13, e.g., 1Sa 18:9; Jer 47:6); and thereby keep the sun from shining on the Israelis who were traveling by night to reach Gibeon or allowing them to move up undetected (cf. Jos 10:10); or (3) send a storm that darkened the day (i.e., made it cooler for the tired Israeli troops). It is uncertain whether this is merely a poetic account (cf. Jdg 5:20) or if it is to be taken literally (cf. Isa 38:7-8) as the sun actually stood still (i.e., [1] longer night; [2] longer day; or [3] darkness of a storm), or shined less brightly (i.e., cooler). For those who believe in a supernatural God exactly what happened is not as important as knowing that God is sovereign over time, history, and nature. Theologically this shows YHWH’s control over the heavenly bodies (Babylonian deities). These astral gods must now help the Israelites conquer the Canaanites.

Jos 10:13 book of Jashar Jashar means upright (BDB 449). This book was an ancient Israeli collection of war poems. It is also mentioned in 2Sa 1:17 ff. This book has been lost except for the biblical quotes.

Jos 10:14 there was no day like that before it or after it, when the LORD listened to the voice of a man This is a strange phrase. It may be part of the poem from the book of Jashar. YHWH responded to Joshua’s prayer request. All of the other military strategies were given by YHWH; this miracle was possibly Joshua’s idea.

for the LORD fought for Israel This VERB (BDB 535, KB 526, Niphal PARTICIPLE) is used several times for YHWH’s acting on Israel’s behalf (cf. Jos 10:42; Jos 23:3; Jos 23:10; Exo 14:14; Deu 1:30; Deu 3:22; Deu 20:4).

Fuente: You Can Understand the Bible: Study Guide Commentary Series by Bob Utley

Israel. Here the Septuagint supplies the words omitted by Homoeoteleuton (App-6) of the word “Israel, [when He destroyed them in Gibeon, and they were destroyed before the sons of] Israel”.

Sun = the sun itself, because of what is said in the next verse.

stand thou still. Hab 3:11. This is not the only miracle in connection with the sun. See shadow going back (2Ki 20:11;. Isa 38:8). Going down at noon (Amo 8:9). No more going down (Isa 60:20), Darkened (Isa 13:10. Eze 32:7. Joe 2:10, Joe 2:31; Joe 3:13. Mat 24:29. Rev 6:12; Rev 8:12; Rev 9:2; Rev 16:8). Miracle to be again performed (Luk 23:44, Luk 23:45). His motion described (Psa 19:4-6).

upon = in, as in next line.

Fuente: Companion Bible Notes, Appendices and Graphics

Sun: Joshua doubtless acted, on this occasion, by an immediate impulse upon his mind from the Spirit of God. The terms here employed to record the miracle, agree with the accustomed manner in which the the motions of the earth and sun are described in our own day. The sun apparently moves, but really is stationary; while the diurnal movement of the earth on its axis is by us unnoticed, and would not have been known except by astronomical science. The sun appeared to the Israelites over Gibeon, and the moon over the valley of Ajalon, and there they stayed in their course for “a whole day.” Many vain enquiries have been made concerning the way in which this miracle was wrought, and many difficulties and objections have been urged against understanding it literally. But the fact is authenticated by the Divine testimony; and the manner in which it was accomplished lies entirely out of our province, because beyond our comprehension. Jos 10:13, Deu 4:19, Deu 17:3, Job 9:7, Job 31:26, Job 31:27, Psa 19:4, Psa 74:16, Psa 148:3, Isa 28:21, Isa 38:8, Isa 60:20, Amo 8:9, Hab 3:11

stand thou: Heb. be silent, Hab 2:20,*marg. Zec 2:13

Ajalon: Jos 19:42, Jdg 12:12, Aijalon

Reciprocal: Gen 1:16 – to rule Exo 34:10 – I will do marvels Jos 10:41 – Gibeon Jos 21:24 – Aijalon Jdg 1:35 – Aijalon 1Sa 12:17 – I will call 1Sa 14:31 – Aijalon 2Sa 2:12 – Gibeon 2Ki 20:11 – he brought 1Ch 6:69 – Aijalon 2Ch 13:16 – God delivered Psa 37:7 – Rest in Psa 119:91 – all are Isa 45:11 – command Luk 8:25 – being Jam 5:16 – The effectual

Fuente: The Treasury of Scripture Knowledge

Jos 10:12. Then spake Joshua Being moved so to do out of zeal to destroy Gods enemies, and directed by the motion of Gods Spirit, and being filled with a holy confidence, that what he said would be accomplished. And he spake it in the sight That is, in the presence and audience; of all Israel That they might be witnesses of the fact. Sun, stand thou still Joshua does not speak according to the terms of modern astronomy, which it would have been highly improper for him to have done, as he would not have been understood by the people that heard him, but according to the appearance of things. The sun appeared to the Israelites over Gibeon, the moon was over the valley of Ajalon, which we may suppose to be situated in a different direction; and there, in the name of God, he commanded them to continue to appear, which they did for a whole day That is, either for the space of twelve hours, or for the time of one whole diurnal revolution. Nothing, we may observe in the words of Dr. Dodd, is more common in Scripture than to express things, not according to the strict rules of philosophy, but according to their appearance, and the vulgar apprehension concerning them. For instance, Moses calls the sun and moon two great lights; but however this appellation may agree with the sun, it cannot in the same sense signify the moon, which is now well known to be but a small body, and the least of all the planets, and to have no light at all but what it borrows by a reflection of the rays of the sun; appearing to us larger than the other planets, merely because it is placed nearer to us. From this appearance it is that the Holy Scriptures give it the title of a great light. In like manner, because the sun seems to us to move, and the earth to be at rest, the Scriptures represent the latter as placed on pillars, bases, and foundations, compare the former to a bridegroom issuing from his chamber, and rejoicing as a giant, to run his course, and speak of his arising and going down, and hastening to the place from whence he arose, &c., when it is certain, that if the sun were made to revolve round the earth, the general laws of nature would thereby be violated, the harmony and proportion of the heavenly bodies destroyed, and the economy of the universe thrown into confusion and disorder. The general design of God, when he inspired the sacred writers, having been to form mankind to holiness and virtue, not to make them philosophers, it no way derogates from the respect due to the Holy Spirit, or from the consideration which the writings of those holy men merit, whose pens he directed, to suppose that, in order to accommodate themselves to the capacity, the notions, and language of the vulgar, they have purposely spoken of the phenomena of nature in terms most conformable to the testimony of the senses. Add to this, those who are best informed in, and most assured of, the system of modern astronomy, and therefore well know that the succession of day and night is not caused by any motion of the sun and moon, but by the rotation of the earth upon its own axis; yet continually speak of the rising and setting, ascending and declining of the sun and moon, according as they appear to our senses to do. Indeed, if they spoke otherwise they would not be understood by people in general.

Fuente: Joseph Bensons Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Joshua based his petition (Jos 10:12) on God’s promise (Jos 10:8). It was a public prayer that he spoke in the hearing of the Israelites.

There are two basic explanations of this miracle among evangelical scholars.

1.    God slowed or stopped the earth’s rotation, or He tilted its axis thereby lengthening the period of daylight. Most of those who hold this view believe God counteracted the worldwide effects of this miracle by His supernatural power. [Note: Schaeffer, p. 142; Campbell, No Time . . ., pp. 81-83; idem, "Joshua," p. 351; et al.] The main problem with this view is its improbability. Would God (He could, of course) perform such a worldwide miracle simply to give Israel more daylight? Advocates reply that this is the normal meaning of the words the writer used.

 

2.    This may have been a local miracle whereby God provided additional light for Israel. Some advocates of this view believe God created unusual atmospheric conditions that resulted in the refraction of sunlight after the sun had set. Others feel God provided a light for Israel that may even have looked like the sun but was a different source of light, such as the shekinah. [Note: Bush, p. 119; Davis and Whitcomb, pp. 69-70; Keil and Delitzsch, pp. 109-112; et al.] The main problem with this view is the language used in the text that seems to imply an actual alteration of the earth’s rotation. Advocates reply that this is the language of appearance and point to similar miracles in Scripture (e.g., Exo 10:21-23; 2Ki 20:10-11). Some also cite God’s promise to provide day and night regularly, which seems to favor this view (Gen 8:22; cf. Jer 33:20-21).

Robert Dick Wilson, a competent and conservative Hebrew scholar, believed that both the sun and the moon experienced an eclipse by other heavenly bodies. [Note: Robert Dick Wilson, "Understanding ’The Sun Stood Still,’" in Classical Evangelical Essays in Old Testament Interpretation, pp. 61-65.] He argued that the Hebrew words translated "stand still" and "stood still" can be translated "be eclipsed" and "was eclipsed." This is another possible explanation. Various writers have suggested many other views and variations of these views. [Note: See Davis and Whitcomb, pp. 66-70, for several.] For example, John Holladay Jr. believed Joshua was voicing belief in astrology and was calling for a favorable alignment of the heavenly bodies. [Note: John S. Holladay Jr., "The Day(s) the Moon Stood Still," Journal of Biblical Literature 87 (1968):167-78.] David Howard Jr. suggested that God spoke the words in Jos 10:12 b and Jos_10:13 a rather than Joshua. [Note: Howard, An Introduction . . ., p. 88.] Most interpreters take Jos 10:12 b and Jos_10:13 a as Joshua’s words and believe he was praying to Yahweh.

The Canaanites regarded the sun and moon as deities. Their control by Yahweh must have deeply impressed Israel’s enemies. [Note: See Robert B. Chisholm Jr., "The Polemic against Baalism in Israel’s Early History and Literature," Bibliotheca Sacra 151:603 (July-September 1994):276-77.] The Book of "Jashar" ("righteous," Jos 10:13) seems to have been a collection of stories of Israel’s heroes. Some of these stories, if not all of them, were in verse and commemorated God’s great acts for Israel (cf. 2Sa 1:18). An additional note that Yahweh fought for Israel (Jos 10:14) reemphasized God’s initiative for His people in faithfulness to His promises.

"God fights for Israel. He also fights with and through Israel. She cannot expect the victory, however, if she does not do her part." [Note: Butler, p. 117.]

Fuente: Expository Notes of Dr. Constable (Old and New Testaments)