John Gill Commentary Joshua 3

And Joshua rose early in the morning The morning after the spies had returned and made their report; which, as Kimchi rightly observes, was the ninth of Nisan; for on the morrow, which was the tenth, the people passed over Jordan, see (Joshua 3:5) (4:19) . Moses, according to the Jewish writers, died on the seventh of Adar or February; the thirty days of his mourning ended the seventh of Nisan or March; two days before they were ended the spies were sent, who returned on the eighth day of the month.

And the morning following Joshua rose early, which shows his readiness and alacrity to proceed in the expedition he was directed and encouraged to:

and they removed from Shittim, and came to Jordan ; from Shittim in the plains of Moab, to the river Jordan:

he and all the children of Israel ; he as their general, and they an army of six hundred thousand fighting men under him, besides women and children, and others that came along with them:

and lodged there before they passed over ; lay there encamped a night before they passed over the river Jordan.

And it came to pass after three days
At the end of the three days they were bid to prepare food for their expedition, and to go over Jordan, (Joshua 1:11) ;

that the officers went through the host ;
the camp of Israel; very probably the same as in (Joshua 1:10) ; this was, no doubt, by the order of Joshua, and who was directed to it by the Lord.

And they commanded the people
In the name of Joshua, by whom they were sent:

saying, when you see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, and
the priests the Levites bearing it :
the Targum reads, the priests and Levites; so the Septuagint: it was the business of the Levites, particularly the Kohathites, to bear the ark in journeying, but here the priests, who also were Levites, were to carry it: it is remarked in the Talmud ^F16 , that there are three places in which the priests are said to bear the ark; here, and when they surrounded Jericho, (Joshua 6:6) ; and when it was returned to its place in the times of David, (2 Samuel 15:29) ; and Kimchi and Abarbinel observe a fourth, when it was brought into Solomon's temple, (1 Kings 8:6) ;

then you shall remove from your place, and go after it ;
their usual signal for marching was the cloud, when that was taken up, (Numbers 9:17) , &c. but now the ark, the clouds of glory having removed at the death of Moses, and were seen no more, as Abarbinel and other Jewish writers observe; and therefore it was proper the Israelites should be made acquainted with this signal; for, as Jarchi says, this journey was different from all the journeys (though that of the three days journey from Sinai must be excepted, (Numbers 10:33) ), for all the time Moses was in being, the pillar of cloud marched first and showed them the way, and the ark moved after two of the standards (Judah and Reuben), and now the ark went first:

The cloud was a figure of the dark and cloudy dispensation of the law, particularly the ceremonial law, the shadow of good things to come, and which continued only during the former state, and discontinued to be of any use when the Mosaic dispensation ceased, and when Joshua or Jesus was come: the ark was a type of Christ, the forerunner for us entered, and whom we are to follow whithersoever he goes or directs to, in the exercise of grace and performance of duty; and the ark being carried now by different persons, may denote that Christ was held forth in a weaker manner under the legal dispensation, and by his apostles and ministers under the Gospel dispensation in a clearer and stronger manner, and who are to be followed no further or longer than as they bear the ark or direct to Christ.

FOOTNOTES:

• F16: T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 33. 2.

Yet there shall be a space between you and it
The ark; the Keri or marginal reading is, "between you and them"; the priests that bear it: hence sprung a fiction among the Jews, that there were two arks, the ark of the Shechinah or divine Majesty, and the ark of Joseph, in which his bones were put, which went together ^F17; which Jarchi, Kimchi, and Abarbinel take notice of, but has no foundation in the text:

about two thousand cubits by measure;
by a certain well known measure, that of a common cubit; for the "caph" we render "about" is a note of truth, reality, and certainty, and designs the exact precise measure here given: this difference was to be observed, partly in reverence to the ark, the symbol of the divine Presence; Christ is to be reverenced by his people, and so his word and ordinances; and there is a reverence and respect due to his ministers and priests that bear the ark; as also that they might the better see the ark and go after it, as Ben Gersom; or the way in which they should go, as is suggested in the following clause; and likewise have the better view of the greatness of the miracle, as Abarbinel; the dividing of the waters of Jordan as soon as the ark came to it, and while it was in it:

The Jews conclude from hence that this was the measure of ground they may go on a sabbath day, and no further, called a sabbath day's journey, (Acts 1:12);

come not near unto it, that you may know the way by which you must go;
over Jordan into Canaan's land; for being at some distance from them they could better discern that and the way he directed them to walk in: Christ the antitype of the ark is the way to the heavenly Canaan, and his ministers point out the right way of salvation by him, in the ministration of the word, by attending to which the way is seen and known in which men must go:

for you have not passed [this] way heretofore;
a path indeed untrodden by any; neither they nor any other ever went into Canaan the way they were now going, through the river Jordan as on dry land: the way to heaven by Christ is only revealed in the Gospel, and only trodden by believers in him, and especially the way to glory through Jordan's river; or death is an untrodden path, which, though the way of all flesh, is a trackless path, and gone through, but once, and those who pass it have never before gone that way.

FOOTNOTES:

• F17: T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 13. 1.

And Joshua said unto the people
On the third day; and the thirtieth day of the mourning for Moses, Jarchi says, was the first of the three days, and that being the seventh day of the month, this must be the ninth, as it is most clear the morrow was the tenth:

sanctify yourselves ;
in a ceremonial sense, by washing their bodies and their clothes, and abstaining from their wives; and in a moral sense, by acts of religion and devotion, by prayer and meditation, and the exercise of repentance and, good works: it may denote that sanctification is necessary to our passage over Jordan, or through death to the heavenly Canaan, for without holiness no man shall see the Lord:

for tomorrow the Lord will do wonders among you :
in their sight and presence, and for them, by dividing the waters of Jordan, that they might pass through it as on dry land; this, as Kimchi says, was the tenth of Nisan, as is plain from (Joshua 4:19) .