Charles Ellicott Commentary Joshua 22:12

"And when the children of Israel heard of it, the whole congregation of the children of Israel gathered themselves together at Shiloh, to go up against them to war." — Joshua 22:12 (ASV)

To go up to war against them. —There is no more striking proof of Israel’s obedience to the law and veneration for it in the days of Joshua than this. A single altar to Jehovah, besides the one in Shiloh, is sufficient cause for war against its builders. But see what the language of the prophet is: “According to the number of your cities were your gods, O Judah; and according to the number of the streets of Jerusalem have you set up altars to Bosheth (disgrace), even altars to burn incense to Baal” (Jeremiah 11:13).

What stronger proof could we require of the veracity of the narrative in this place, and that it is genuine contemporary history? What writer of the days of Jeremiah, to which date some have attributed the Book of Deuteronomy and its requirements, could have conceived such a scene as this, when altars to Jehovah on the high places were hardly regarded as illegal, and altars to Baal were as numerous as the very streets?

Another passage in a different part of the Old Testament corroborates indirectly, but in a striking manner, the tone of this (Nehemiah 8:17): “The congregation... made booths, and sat under the booths” (as required by the law of Moses in the Feast of Tabernacles); “for since the days of Joshua the son of Nun unto that day had not the children of Israel done so.”