will as exactly come upon you, if you tranfgrefs the Covenant of the Lord your God (m).

Some time after he fummoned the Tribes to Shechem (n); and fent thither for the Elders of Ifrael, and for their Heads, and for their Judges, and for their Officers to attend him before the Lord (0), where he repeated to them all the Mercies, which God had vouchfafed to their Fathers and to them, from the calling of Abraham down to that Day (oj); then he defired them to confider and refolve whether they would indeed faithfully ferve God, or whether they would choose to fall away to Idolatry (p) :

(m) Jofh. xxiii. 14-16. (n) xxiv. 1. (0) Some Copies of the LXX read Shiloh and not Shechem in this Place, and as jofhua and the Elders are faid to have presented themselves before God, i. e. at the Tabernacle, agreeably to which Senfe of the Expreffion it appears ver. 26. that they were at their holding their Meeting by or at the Sanctuary of the Lord; and as the Tabernacle was fet up not at Shechem, but at Shiloh, chap. xviii. 1. it may be thought, that here is fome Miftake, and that Shiloh not Shechem was the. Place to which Joshua convened the Tribes of Ifrael: Some of the Critics thought the Ark and Tabernacle were removed to Shechem against the holding this Convention, but we have no Hints of the Fact having been fo, nor occafion to fuppofe it. Shechem and Shiloh were about twelve Miles diftant from one another: Joshua lived at Timnath-Serah a Place almoft in the Mid-way between them: He fummoned the Tribes to meet in the Fields of Shechem: From thence he called the Heads of the Tribes and Officers to attend him to Shiloh to prefent themselves before God. All the Tribes of Ifrael were gathered to Shechem; but not all the Tribes, rather the Heads, Fudges and Officers only prefented themselves before God. A Meeting of all the Tribes muft form a Camp, not to be accommodated, but in a large and open Country: Shechem bad in its Borders Field enough for the Reception of all the People. See Gen. xxxiii. 19. Here therefore they met, and from hence made fuch Detatchments to Shiloh a Place in the Neighbourhood, as the Purposes for which they were convened required: Take the Fact to have been thus, and the Difficulties which fome Commentators furmife in this Paffage, do all vanish. (j) Jofh. xxiv. 2– 13. (P) ver. 14, 15.

upon

upon their affuring him that they would not forfake the Lord to ferve other Gods (q), Joshua reminded them that to ferve their God was a thing not so easy to be done as faid (r); for that God would be ftrict in demanding from them a punctual Performance of what he had requir ed, and that if they should be remifs or unmindful of any Part of it, that his Vengeance would most certainly fall upon them (s): Hereupon they repeated their Refolution to ferve the Lord (t): Well then, faid Joshua, if after all this you do not do it, let your own Declarations this Day testify against you (u): Unto this the People readily affented (w): And thus did Joshua fummon them to a most strict Engagement of themselves never to vary or depart from the Law which God had given them (x): And that a lafting Sense of what they had in fo folemn a manner agreed to, might remain upon them, he wrote what had paffed in the Book of the Law (y), and fet up a Pillar in Remembrance of it (z), and then dismissed the People. Not long after Joshua being an hundred and ten Years old died, and was buried on the North Side of the Hill of Gaash, in the Border of his Inheritance in Timnath-Serab (a): Jofephus informs us that Joshua governed the Ifraelites twenty five Years from after the Death of Mofes (b); accordingly we must fix the Time of his Death to about A. M. 2578.

(9) Jofh. xxiv. 16, 17, 18. (t) ver. 21. (u) ver. 22. (w) ibid. 26. (z) ver. 27. (a) ver. 29, 39. Lib. 5. c. 1.

It has been a Matter of Difpute amongst the Learned, whether Joshua was himself the Author of the Book which is call'd by his Name (c): But 1. It is obvious to be obferved, that the Book of Joshua feems to hint, that a Perfon, one of the Ifraelites, who made the miraculous Paffage over Jordan, was the Writer of it: This the first Verse of the fifth Chapter intimates to us: When all the Kings of the Amorites-beard, that the Lord had dried up the Waters of Jordan from before the Children of Ifrael, until we were paffed over. (d); the Writer would not have here used the first Perfon, WE were passed over, if himself had not been one of the Perfons who had passed the River (f): 2. It is evident, that this Book was written before Rabab died; for we are told, that Joshua faved Rahab the Harlot alive, and her Father's Houfbold, and all that she had, and fhe dwelleth in Ifrael unto this Day (g): The Writer was here willing to record to Pofterity, that Rabab had not only her Life given her, but that she was fo well received by the Ifraelites, as to continue even then to dwell amongst them; a Remark that could not have been made after Rabab was dead (b); and confequently

(c) Vid. Pol. Synop. Critic. Cleric. in Differt. de Scriptorib. Hiftoric. Vet. Teftam. Carpzov. Introduc. ad Libros Hift. Vet. Teft. at al. (d) The Hebrew Words are [17] (I ought not to omit, that the marginal Reference in the Hebrew Bibles reads the Word [y]; but the Learned allow the Hebrew Keri and Ketib not to be of fuch Authority, as that we must be absolutely determined by it. Walton. Bibl. Polyglot. Prolegom. viii. C. 26. (g) Josh. vi. 25. (b) The Remark is not, that Rahab's Family, Defcendants, or Father's Houfhold were then in Ifrael; but the Verbis [2] in the third Perfon feminine, and refers to Rahab in particular.

the

the Book that has it muft have been compofed whilft Rabab was yet alive: Rabab was afterwards married to Salmon, the Son of Naaffon (i), the Head of the Houfe of Judah (k); had the been fo, when the Book of Joshua was compofed, I should imagine the Author of it, as he appears, by the Hint abovementioned, inclined to intimate all the good Circumstances of her Condition, would not have omitted that, and confequently, by her Marriage not being mentioned, we have fome Reason to think the Book of Joshua to have been written not late in Rahab's Life. 3. We are exprefly informed that Joshua did himself write, and add what he wrote to the Book of the Law of God (1). 4. The Words that inform us of this Fact may, if taken in their natural Senfe, and according to the Conftruction put upon Words of the like Import, when when we find them upon ancient Monuments or Remains, be fuppofed to be Joshua's Conclufion of his Book, defign'd by him to inform Pofterity, that himfelf was the Writer of it: Joshua wrote these Words in the Book of the Law, &c. may fairly imply, unless we have good Reason to think the Fact was otherwife, that all that was found written in the Book of the Law, from the End of what was penned by the Hand of Mofes, unto the Clofe of the Period, of which thefe Words are a Part, was wrote by Joshua: And this was the Opinion of the Talmudifts (n): Joshua was

(i) Mat. i. 5. (*) Bava Bathra cap. I.

(k) Numb. i. 7. ( Josh. xxiv. 26.

the

0

the only facred Penman which we read the Israelites to have had in his Age: And after he had finished the Divifion of the Land, he had many Years of great Leifure (p): In thefe he probably applied himself to give Account of the Death and Burial of Mofes (q), and from thence continued a Narrative of what had been tranfacted under his own Direction (r), filling it up with a general Terrier of the Settlements of the Tribes (s), fuch as it could not but be expedient for the Ifraelites to have on Record, to prevent Confufions about their Inheritances in future Ages. After having done this, he fummoned the Tribes (t), gave them his Exhortations, and having added, to what he had before prepared, an Account of the Conventions he had held, and what had paffed at them, he transcribed the (u) whole into the Book of the Law, and then difmiffed the People (w): Accordingly I take the Work of Joshua to begin from where Mofes ended; at the xxxivth Chapter of Deuteronomy, and to end with the 27th Verse of the xxivth Chapter of Joshua: As Joshua thus added at the End of Deuteronomy the Account of Mofes's Death; fo what we find from the 28th Verse of the xxivth Chapter of Joshua to the End of that Book, was unquestionably not written until Joshua and all the Elders his Contemporaries, who over-lived him, were gone off the Stage (x), and was added to the

(p) Jofh. xxiii. 1. (9) Deut. xxxiv. (r) Jofh. i.-xii. (t) xxiii. 2. (u) xxiv. 26.

(s) xiii.-xxii.

(x) ver. 31.

(w) ver. 28.

End

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