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Joshua 4

Joshua book home•Chapter 4 of 24•24 verses

Chapter overviewAt a glance + deeper study

REVIEWED OVERVIEW

Joshua 4 Overview

After Israel crosses Jordan, twelve representatives take twelve stones from the riverbed and carry them to the place of lodging. Joshua also sets stones in the Jordan where the priests stood. When the priests come up, the river returns to its normal flow. At Gilgal, Joshua explains that the memorial stones are designed to make future children ask what happened so Israel can tell how the LORD dried up Jordan just as he dried up the Red Sea.

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Before you read Joshua 4

Coming from

Chapter 3 recorded the miraculous crossing of Jordan with the priests and ark standing in the dry riverbed.

In this chapter

The miracle is turned into durable communal memory so that later generations will know both what God did and why Israel should fear him.

Leads into

Chapter 5 shifts from crossing to covenant preparation inside the land: circumcision is renewed, Passover is kept, manna ceases, and Joshua meets the captain of the LORD’s host.

Key understandingExplore deeper

Biblical memorials are teaching devices, not magical relics. The stones are meant to trigger questions and testimony. The chapter gives two audiences for the memory: Israel’s children must know what the LORD did, and 'all the people of the earth' are to know that his hand is mighty. The Red Sea comparison makes the crossing part of one continuous redemption-and-inheritance story.

Major truths in this chapterExplore deeper

Truth 1

God’s mighty acts are to be remembered intentionally rather than left to fading memory.

Truth 2

Parents and the covenant community are responsible to explain the meaning of God’s acts to children.

Truth 3

The Jordan miracle connects Joshua’s generation to the exodus generation without repeating the earlier generation’s unbelief.

Truth 4

God’s works among Israel have a witness purpose before other peoples as well as an internal teaching purpose.

Connections to the rest of ScriptureExplore deeper

Connection 1

Exodus 12–13 similarly builds questions from children into the Passover memorial and exodus teaching.

Connection 2

Psalm 78 commands one generation to tell God’s works to the next.

Connection 3

Psalm 114 connects Red Sea and Jordan in one poetic remembrance of God’s power.

What is clear, and where care is neededExplore deeper

Keep this clear 1

Do not treat the stones as sacred objects with power in themselves; the chapter emphasizes what they cause people to remember.

Keep this clear 2

The two stone settings in the chapter should not be collapsed without noticing the text’s separate descriptions.

Keep this clear 3

The command to teach children is rooted in this historical event; avoid replacing the event with vague inspirational meaning.

Read Joshua 4 watching for…

Who selects and carries the twelve stones.

Where the priests remain during the memorial work.

What happens to Jordan when the priests leave the river.

The exact question future children are expected to ask.

The two stated purposes for remembering the crossing.

Chapter outline3 sections

1-9Twelve stones are taken from Jordan as a memorial 10-19The priests come out of Jordan after all Israel crosses 20-24Joshua sets up the stones at Gilgal and explains their purpose

And it came to pass, when all the people were clean passed over Jordan, that the LORD spake unto Joshua, saying,

Take you twelve men out of the people, out of every tribe a man,

And command ye them, saying, Take you hence out of the midst of Jordan, out of the place where the priests' feet stood firm, twelve stones, and ye shall carry them over with you, and leave them in the lodging place, where ye shall lodge this night.

Then Joshua called the twelve men, whom he had prepared of the children of Israel, out of every tribe a man:

And Joshua said unto them, Pass over before the ark of the LORD your God into the midst of Jordan, and take ye up every man of you a stone upon his shoulder, according unto the number of the tribes of the children of Israel:

That this may be a sign among you, that when your children ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean ye by these stones?

Then ye shall answer them, That the waters of Jordan were cut off before the ark of the covenant of the LORD; when it passed over Jordan, the waters of Jordan were cut off: and these stones shall be for a memorial unto the children of Israel for ever.

And the children of Israel did so as Joshua commanded, and took up twelve stones out of the midst of Jordan, as the LORD spake unto Joshua, according to the number of the tribes of the children of Israel, and carried them over with them unto the place where they lodged, and laid them down there.

And Joshua set up twelve stones in the midst of Jordan, in the place where the feet of the priests which bare the ark of the covenant stood: and they are there unto this day.

For the priests which bare the ark stood in the midst of Jordan, until every thing was finished that the LORD commanded Joshua to speak unto the people, according to all that Moses commanded Joshua: and the people hasted and passed over.

And it came to pass, when all the people were clean passed over, that the ark of the LORD passed over, and the priests, in the presence of the people.

And the children of Reuben, and the children of Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh, passed over armed before the children of Israel, as Moses spake unto them:

About forty thousand prepared for war passed over before the LORD unto battle, to the plains of Jericho.

On that day the LORD magnified Joshua in the sight of all Israel; and they feared him, as they feared Moses, all the days of his life.

And the LORD spake unto Joshua, saying,

Command the priests that bear the ark of the testimony, that they come up out of Jordan.

Joshua therefore commanded the priests, saying, Come ye up out of Jordan.

And it came to pass, when the priests that bare the ark of the covenant of the LORD were come up out of the midst of Jordan, and the soles of the priests' feet were lifted up unto the dry land, that the waters of Jordan returned unto their place, and flowed over all his banks, as they did before.

And the people came up out of Jordan on the tenth day of the first month, and encamped in Gilgal, in the east border of Jericho.

And those twelve stones, which they took out of Jordan, did Joshua pitch in Gilgal.

And he spake unto the children of Israel, saying, When your children shall ask their fathers in time to come, saying, What mean these stones?

Then ye shall let your children know, saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry land.

For the LORD your God dried up the waters of Jordan from before you, until ye were passed over, as the LORD your God did to the Red sea, which he dried up from before us, until we were gone over:

That all the people of the earth might know the hand of the LORD, that it is mighty: that ye might fear the LORD your God for ever.

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Joshua 4:16

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