Joshuachapter 14
15 verses · BSBJoshua book hub →
Key verse
Now behold, as the LORD promised, He has kept me alive these forty-five years since He spoke this word to Moses, while Israel wandered in the wilderness. So here I am today, eighty-five years old,
It stands in Caleb at eighty-five: give me this mountain, verses 6 to 15.
The chapter
Chapter summary
Eleazar, Joshua, and the tribal heads divide the western land by lot, and the first claim is a personal one. Caleb comes forward at eighty-five to collect on a forty-five-year-old promise made at Kadesh-barnea, where he brought back word as it was in his heart while his fellows melted the people's courage. Three times it is said he wholly followed Jehovah. His request is not for the easy valley but the fortified hill country of the Anakim: as strong this day for war as in the day Moses sent him. Joshua blesses him, and Hebron becomes Caleb's inheritance.
Context
History · Joshua · Joshua overview
Where the chapter sits
Joshua 14 falls in Tribal allotments (chapters 13–22). The east-of-Jordan and west-of-Jordan inheritances; Levitical cities; cities of refuge; the altar of Ed and the east-tribe controversy.
Before it: Conquest campaigns, chapters 6–12. After it: Covenant renewal at Shechem, chapters 23–24.
The whole shape of Joshua→The world behind this chapter
Joshua 14The history
Land was divided by lot, supervised by Eleazar the priest, Joshua, and the tribal heads. Casting lots removed human favoritism from the most contested decision a nation can make; it also meant no tribe could claim its territory was the reward of its own influence.
Joseph counted as two tribes through Ephraim and Manasseh, and Levi received no share of land, only towns to live in with pasture for their livestock. That arithmetic keeps the number of territorial portions at twelve.
The rest of the history, and what it meant to them
Caleb's speech supplies the timeline. He was forty when Moses sent him from Kadesh-barnea, and is now eighty-five, forty-five years, which fits the thirty-eight remaining wilderness years plus roughly seven years of campaigning. That internal arithmetic is one of the reasons the conquest is usually reckoned at about seven years.
What Caleb asks for is the hill country around Hebron, the very place the Anakim held and the place that frightened the other ten scouts into their report. The terrain is high, rocky, and fortified. He asks for the hardest ground in the settlement at eighty-five.
What it meant to them
Caleb is the living argument of the book. He is the man who wholly followed the LORD, and he is standing there, at the age his generation never reached, collecting on a promise made forty-five years earlier.
For first hearers dividing land, that was the model set in front of them. He does not ask for a safe valley; he asks for the mountain with the giants on it, and says perhaps the LORD will be with me and I shall drive them out.
Sources cited
- Roland de Vaux, Ancient Israel: Its Life and Institutions
- John H. Walton, Victor H. Matthews & Mark W. Chavalas, The IVP Bible Background Commentary: Old Testament
The structure of this chapter
The heads below are this chapter's scenes. The numbered points under each are its verses.
A. The lot begins on the west side of Jordan
1. (vv. 1-2)
Joshua 14:1
“And these are the countries which the children of Israel inherited in the land of Canaan,.... Of which an exact account is given in the following chapters, particularly in the Jos 15:1, which Eleazar the priest, and Joshua the son of Nun, and the heads of the fathers of the tribes of the children of Israel, distributed for an inheritance unto them; namely, ten princes, one of each tribe, who, with Eleazar and Joshua, were appointed of the Lord by name to do this business, even seven years ago, before their entrance into the land of Canaan, Num 34:17.”
Joshua 14:1, 1 more voiceWhat preachers and commentators have said about this verse, in their own words.
Joshua 14:1
“In everything pertaining to civil government, and even the division of the land, Joshua was the acknowledged chief. But in a matter to be determined by lot, a solemn appeal was made to God, and hence Eleazar, as high priest, is named before Joshua.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
Joshua 14:2
“In allusion to this we are said to obtain an inheritance in Christ ( Eph. i. 11 ), eklerothemen -- we have obtained it by lot, so the word signified; for it is obtained by a divine designation. Christ, our Joshua, gives eternal life to as many as were given him, John xvii.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
a.The three parties who divide the land were named by God seven years earlier, at Numbers 34:17, where Eleazar and Joshua are appointed with one prince from each tribe. Eleazar stands before Joshua here, though Joshua commands everything else in the book, and Jamieson, Fausset and Brown read the order from the method: what is settled by lot is settled by an appeal to God, and the priest handles that. The lot is meant literally and was commanded at Numbers 26:55, so the borders about to be traced were fixed by a means no man could steer toward his own tribe.
2. (vv. 3-5)
Joshua 14:4
“The children of Joseph were two tribes - This was ascertained by the prophetic declaration of their grandfather Jacob, Gen 48:5, Gen 48:6; and as Levi was taken out of the tribes for the service of the sanctuary, one of these sons of Joseph came in his place, and Joseph was treated as the first-born of Jacob, in the place of Reuben, who forfeited his right of primogeniture. With their suburbs for their cattle - For the meaning of this passage the reader is referred to the note on Num 35:6.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Joshua 14:5
“They divided the land - This work was begun some time before at Gilgal, and was finished some time after at Shiloh. It must have required a very considerable time to make all the geographical arrangements that were necessary for this purpose.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
a.For Moses had given the inheritance: Two arithmetic problems are answered in one breath. Levi is taken out of the count and receives cities with suburbs instead of territory, and Joseph is counted as two tribes, Manasseh and Ephraim, which Jacob had arranged at Genesis 48:5 long before there was any land to divide. Nine and a half tribes are left to provide for west of Jordan because two and a half already have their ground east of it, and the twelve are still twelve.
B. Caleb at eighty-five: give me this mountain
1. (vv. 6-7)
Joshua 14:6
“However, he [the Lord] said they should not come to that land which they had refused, as a penalty for their unbelief; but their children and wives, who had not murmured, and who, owing to their sex and age, were guiltless, should receive the promised inheritance of that land. So the bodies of those of twenty years old and upwards fell in the desert. The punishment of the rest was put aside. But they who had gone up with Joshua, and had thought fit to dissuade the people, died without delay of a great plague.”
Ambrose of Milan· written before 397· On the Duties of the Clergy 3.8.55-56patristic
Joshua 14:6, 1 more voice
Joshua 14:6
“Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenezite - In the note on the parallel place, Num 32:12, it is said Kenaz was probably the father of Jephunneh, and that Jephunneh not Caleb, was the Kenezite; but still, allowing this to be perfectly correct, Caleb might also be called the Kenezite, as it appears to have been a family name, for Othniel, his nephew and son-in-law, is called the son of Kenaz, Jos 15:17; Jdg 1:13, and 1Ch 4:13; and a grandson of Caleb is also called the son of Kenaz, 1Ch 4:”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
a.Caleb comes before the lot is cast, because he is not asking for a share of what the lot will assign. He calls Moses the man of God, a title the King James floor first gives him at Deuteronomy 33:1, after the whole Pentateuch has gone by without it, and this verse is the next place it is said of him. His summary of his own report at Kadesh is that he brought word as it was in mine heart, which claims sincerity rather than accuracy, and Numbers 13:30 records what he actually said.
2. (vv. 8-9)
Joshua 14:9
“This promise is his chief plea, and that on which he relies. As we find it ( Num. xiv. 24 ) it is general, him will I bring into the land whereunto he went, and his seed shall possess it; but it seems it was more particular, and Joshua knew it; both sides understood this mountain for which Caleb was now a suitor to be intended.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
a.Wholly followed the Lord is the exact phrase the King James floor uses six times, and three of the six are in this chapter, at verses 8, 9 and 14. It is first spoken of Caleb at Numbers 32:12 and repeated of him at Deuteronomy 1:36, so the man quoting it about himself is quoting a verdict God passed on him rather than inventing praise. Numbers 14:24 gives the same judgment in different words, that he had another spirit with him and hath followed me fully, and adds the promise of the land he walked on.
3. (vv. 10-11)
Joshua 14:10
“Forty and five years - The word of God to Moses was spoken after the return of the spies in the autumn of the second year after the Exodus Num 13:25; subsequently, 38 years elapsed before the people reached the Jordan Num 20:1; after the passage of the Jordan seven more years had passed, when Caleb claimed Hebron, before the partition of the land among the nine tribes and a half. These seven years then correspond to the “long time” Jos 11:18 during which Joshua was making war with the Canaanites.”
Joshua 14:11
“To go out, and to come in - To perform all the duties belonging to my place. Moses had said, that at eighty years old, even our strength is labour and sorrow. But Caleb was an exception to this rule: At eighty-five years old, his strength was still ease and joy.”
John Wesley· Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765)evangelical
a.The forty-five years break into two known stretches. Albert Barnes counts thirty-eight from the report of the spies to the arrival at Jordan, following Numbers 13:25 and Numbers 20:1, which leaves seven years of war since the crossing, and those seven are the long time of Joshua 11:18. Caleb was forty when he was sent and is eighty-five when he speaks, so he stood outside the sentence of Numbers 14:29 for the whole of it while every man he had marched out of Egypt with died in the desert.
4. (vv. 12-13)
Joshua 14:12
“I shall be able to drive them out - He cannot mean Hebron merely, for that had been taken before by Joshua; but in the request of Caleb doubtless all the circumjacent country was comprised, in many parts of which the Anakim were still in considerable force. It has been conjectured that Hebron itself had again fallen under the power of its former possessors, who, taking the advantage of the absence of the Israelitish army, who were employed in other parts of the country, re-entered the city, and restored their ancient domination. But the first opinion seems best founded.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Joshua 14:12, 1 more voice
Joshua 14:12
“The Chaldee paraphrase reads it, If the Word of the Lord be my helper, that Word which is God, and in the fulness of time was made flesh, and is the captain of our salvation. [2.] But he expresses without the least doubt his assurance that if God were with him he should be able to dispossess the sons of Anak.”
Matthew Henry· Commentary on the Whole Bible (1707-1721)puritan
Joshua 14:13
“Joshua blessed him - As the word bless often signifies to speak good or well of or to any person, (see the note on Gen 2:3), here it may mean the praise bestowed on Caleb’s intrepidity and faithfulness by Joshua, as well as a prayer to God that he might have prosperity in all things; and especially that the Lord might be with him, as himself had expressed in the preceding verse.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
a.He asks for the one piece of ground that frightened the ten, and he names its two difficulties himself, the Anakim on it and the cities great and fenced. Those Anakim are the sons of Anak the spies met at Hebron in Numbers 13:22, and they are the reason Numbers 13:33 says the report ended in men like grasshoppers. His claim rests on the promise and not on his own strength, and the sentence he uses is conditional, if so be the Lord will be with me, which Adam Clarke and John Wesley both take as a plain confession that the help is not owed to him.
5. (vv. 14-15)
Joshua 14:14
“But Hebron means "union" or "marriage." Perhaps this can be expressed by Hebron because the double cave purchased by the patriarch Abraham is there, and the remains of the fathers and their wives lie there: Abraham with Sarah, Isaac with Rebecca, and Jacob with Leah. Thus Caleb deserved to receive the remains of the fathers for an inheritance, because no doubt through the wisdom that was in him and by which he flourished both under Moses and under Jesus [Joshua], he had understood the nature of the union itself.”
Origen of Alexandria· written before 253· HOMILIES ON JOSHUA 18.3patristic
Joshua 14:14, 1 more voice
Joshua 14:14
“Hebron therefore became the inheritance of Caleb - Joshua admitted his claim, recognized his right, and made a full conveyance of Hebron and its dependencies to Caleb and his posterity; and this being done in the sight of all the elders of Israel, the right was publicly acknowledged, and consequently this portion was excepted from the general determination by lot; God having long before made the cession of this place to him and to his descendants.”
Adam Clarke· Commentary on the Bible (1810-1826)evangelical
Joshua 14:15
“A great man - literally, the great man; i. e. the renowned ancestor of the tribe, regarded as the founder of its greatness Jos 15:13.”
Joshua 14:15, 1 more voice
Joshua 14:15
“Kirjath-arba--that is, the city of Arba, a warrior among the native race remarkable for strength and stature. the land had rest from war--Most of the kings having been slain and the natives dispirited, there was no general or systematic attempt to resist the progress and settlement of the Israelites.”
Jamieson, Fausset & Brown· Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible (1871)reformed
a.The grant is given a reason, the third wholly followed in seven verses, and Joshua 15:14 and Judges 1:20 record him actually driving out the three sons of Anak afterward, so the request and the fighting are separate acts years apart. Hebron is where Abraham bought a grave at Genesis 23, where David reigned over Judah seven years and six months before he took Jerusalem, and Joshua 21:11-12 later gives the city itself to the priests while the fields stay Caleb's. The closing clause, the land had rest from war, is the first time the King James floor puts it in those words; Judges uses it three times, at 3:11, 3:30 and 5:31, and then stops using it for good.
The text of this chapter
This page carries no textual note on Joshua 14. Where this site has examined a place the manuscripts differ, the examination is in the manuscripts room. Every place this site examines →
This page draws on 9 works. Open for the list.
This page draws on Adam Clarke; Albert Barnes; Ambrose of Milan, On the Duties of the Clergy 3.8.55-56; Jamieson, Fausset & Brown; John Gill; John Wesley, Explanatory Notes upon the Old Testament (1765); Keil and Delitzsch, Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament: Joshua, Judges, Ruth; Matthew Henry and Origen of Alexandria, HOMILIES ON JOSHUA 18.3.
Keep studying
On this page
Studies2
On this book