Charles Ellicott Commentary Joshua 6

Now Jericho ... —This verse should be read parenthetically, and Joshua 6:2-5 should be taken as the orders given to Joshua by the captain of the Lord’s host.

Seven trumpets of rams’ horns. — Literally, trumpets of jubilee — that is, of loud or joyful sound.

Pass on, and compass the city. —The meaning of this proceeding becomes clearer when we remember that the center of the procession is the written law of God. The ark is the vessel that contains it. The armed men that precede it are its executioners. The priests who blow the trumpets are its heralds. It was this law that had brought Israel over Jordan; this law that was from that time forward to be established in Canaan; this law that was about to take vengeance on the transgressors. The whole law of Moses is only the expansion of the Decalogue; and the Pentateuch contains an ample statement of the transgressions which had brought the inhabitants of Canaan under the ban of the Divine law.

The seven days’ march around Jericho, in absolute silence, was well calculated to impress on the inhabitants the lesson of “the forbearance of God.” “These things hast thou done, and I kept silence.” For several generations the long-suffering of God had waited, while “the iniquity of the Amorites was not yet full.” In the first year of the Exodus He had threatened them, bringing the sword of Israel to their borders; and then He had drawn back His hand from them, and given them forty years’ respite more. But now the long-suffering of God had waited long enough. The shout that burst from the lips of Israel was a signal that He would wait no longer.

Looked at in this way, the shout of Israel at the sound of the trumpet on the seventh day becomes an apt figure of that which is connected with it by the language of Holy Scripture—“the shout,” accompanied by “the voice of the archangel and the trump of God,” which will notify to the world our Lord’s second coming. “Our God shall come, and shall not keep silence” any more (Psalms 1:3 and Psalm 21; 1 Thessalonians 4:16).

The priests going on. —Literally, with going, and blowing the trumpets. “The priests” is inserted by the Targum.

The city shall be accursed. — Hebrew, shall be chêrem, “a devoted or accursed thing”; and so in Joshua 6:18, from the accursed thing. (See Note on Deuteronomy 7:26.) The combination of the two ideas of devotion to God and utter destruction may be seen in the sin offering (Leviticus 6:25), which is called “holy of holies,” or most holy, and yet, when offered for the priest or congregation, must be utterly consumed.