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So Moses said to Joshua, “Choose some men for us, and tomorrow go out and engage Amalek in battle. I will be standing on top of the hill with the staff of God in my hand.”

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18 And the Lord replied to Moses: Take Joshua, son of Nun,(A) a man of spirit,[a] and lay your hand upon him. 19 Have him stand before Eleazar the priest and the whole community, and commission him in their sight. 20 Invest him with some of your own power, that the whole Israelite community may obey him. 21 He shall present himself to Eleazar the priest, who will seek for him the decision of the Urim[b] in the Lord’s presence; and as it directs, Joshua, all the Israelites with him, and the whole community will go out for battle; and as it directs, they will come in.

22 Moses did as the Lord had commanded him. Taking Joshua and having him stand before Eleazar the priest and the whole community, 23 he laid his hands on him and commissioned him, as the Lord had directed through Moses.

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Footnotes

  1. 27:18 A man of spirit: lit., “a man in whom there is spirit,” that is, probably one who is endowed with a courageous spirit (Jos 2:11); compare Gn 41:38; Dt 34:9.
  2. 27:21 The Urim: certain sacred objects which Israelite priests employed to discern the divine will, probably by obtaining a positive or negative answer to a given question. The full expression was “the Urim and Thummim”; cf. Ex 28:30; Lv 8:8; Dt 33:8; Ezr 2:63; Neh 7:65. Joshua ordinarily did not receive direct revelations from God as Moses had received them.

Now Joshua, son of Nun,(A) was filled with the spirit of wisdom, since Moses had laid his hands upon him; and so the Israelites gave him their obedience, just as the Lord had commanded Moses.

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I. Conquest of Canaan

Chapter 1

Divine Promise of Assistance. After Moses, the servant of the Lord, had died, the Lord said to Moses’ aide Joshua, son of Nun: [a]Moses my servant is dead. So now, you and the whole people with you, prepare to cross the Jordan to the land that I will give the Israelites. (A)Every place where you set foot I have given you, as I promised Moses. [b]All the land of the Hittites, from the wilderness and the Lebanon east to the great river Euphrates and west to the Great Sea, will be your territory.(B) No one can withstand you as long as you live. As I was with Moses, I will be with you:(C) I will not leave you nor forsake you. Be strong and steadfast, so that you may give this people possession of the land I swore to their ancestors that I would give them. (D)Only be strong and steadfast, being careful to observe the entire law which Moses my servant enjoined on you. Do not swerve from it either to the right or to the left, that you may succeed wherever you go. Do not let this book of the law depart from your lips. Recite it by day and by night,(E) that you may carefully observe all that is written in it; then you will attain your goal; then you will succeed. I command you: be strong and steadfast! Do not fear nor be dismayed, for the Lord, your God, is with you wherever you go.

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Footnotes

  1. 1:2–9 The beginning of the Book of Joshua strongly emphasizes the credentials of Joshua as Moses’ worthy successor (vv. 2, 3, 4, 7; cf. v. 17; 3:7; 4:14; 5:15). The movement Joshua leads, whereby the Israelites take possession of the land of Canaan, is thus made continuous with the exodus from Egypt, even though (except for Joshua and Caleb) the generation that left Egypt under Moses’ leadership has died out (5:4, 6), and the people who will make the land of Canaan the land of Israel are a new generation. Thus the book is at pains to establish the continuity between exodus and conquest.
  2. 1:4 The frontiers are as follows: in the south the wilderness of Sinai, in the north the Lebanon range, in the east the Euphrates, and in the west the Great Sea, the Mediterranean. These boundaries are ideal rather than actual.