The People Set Up a Monument
1 After Israel had crossed the Jordan, the Lord said to Joshua:
2-3 Tell one man from each of the twelve tribes to pick up a large rock from where the priests are standing. Then tell the men to set up those rocks as a monument at the place where you camp tonight.
4 Joshua chose twelve men; then he called them together 5 and said:
Go to the middle of the riverbed where the sacred chest is, and pick up a large rock. Carry it on your shoulder to our camp. There are twelve of you, so there will be one rock for each tribe. 6-7 Someday your children will ask, “Why are these rocks here?” Then you can tell them how the water stopped flowing when the chest was being carried across the river. These rocks will always remind our people of what happened here today.
8 The men followed the instructions that the Lord had given Joshua. They picked up twelve rocks, one for each tribe, and carried them to the camp, where they put them down.
9 Joshua set up a monument next to the place where the priests were standing. This monument was also made of twelve large rocks, and it is still there in the middle of the river.
The People of Israel Set Up Camp at Gilgal
10-13 The army got ready for battle and crossed the Jordan with everyone else. They marched quickly past the sacred chest and into the desert near Jericho. Forty thousand soldiers from the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and East Manasseh led the way, as Moses had ordered.
The priests stayed right where they were until the people had followed the orders that the Lord had given Moses and Joshua. Then they watched as the priests carried the chest the rest of the way across.
14-18 “Joshua,” the Lord said, “tell the priests to come up from the Jordan and bring the chest with them.” So Joshua went over to the priests and told them what the Lord had said. And as soon as the priests carried the chest past the highest place that the floodwaters of the Jordan had reached, the river flooded its banks again.
That's how the Lord showed the Israelites that Joshua was their leader. For the rest of Joshua's life, they respected him as they had respected Moses.
19 It was the tenth day of the first month of the year when Israel crossed the Jordan River. They set up camp at Gilgal, which was east of the land controlled by Jericho. 20 The men who had carried the twelve rocks from the Jordan brought them to Joshua, and they made them into a monument. 21 Then Joshua told the people:
Years from now your children will ask you why these rocks are here. 22-23 Tell them, “The Lord our God dried up the Jordan River so we could walk across. He did the same thing here for us that he did for our people at the Red Sea, 24 because he wants everyone on earth to know how powerful he is. And he wants us to worship only him.”
1 And when all the people were wholy gone ouer Iorden, (after the Lord had spoken vnto Ioshua, saying, 2 Take you twelue me out of the people, out of euery tribe a man, 3 And command you them, saying, Take you hence out of the middes of Iorden, out of the place where the Priestes stoode in a readinesse, twelue stones, which ye shall take away with you, and leaue them in the lodging where you shall lodge this night) 4 Then Ioshua called the twelue men, whome he had prepared of the children of Israel, out of euery tribe a man, 5 And Ioshua said vnto them, Go ouer before the Arke of the Lord your God, euen through the middes of Iorden, and take vp euery man of you a stone vpon his shoulder according vnto the nomber of the tribes of the children of Israel, 6 That this may bee a signe among you, that whe your children shall aske their fathers in time to come, saying, What meane you by these stones? 7 Then ye may answere them, That the waters of Iorden were cut off before the Arke of the couenant of the Lord: for when it passed through Iorden, the waters of Iorden were cut off: therefore these stones are a memoriall vnto the children of Israel for euer. 8 Then ye children of Israel did euen so as Ioshua had commanded, and tooke vp twelue stones out of the mids of Iorden as ye Lord had said vnto Ioshua, according to the nomber of the tribes of the children of Israel, and caried them away with them vnto the lodging, and layd them down there. 9 And Ioshua set vp twelue stones in the middes of Iorden, in the place where the feete of the Priests, which bare the Arke of the couenant stood, and there haue they continued vnto this day. 10 So the Priests, which bare ye Arke, stoode in the middes of Iorden, vntill euery thing was finished that ye Lord had comanded Ioshua to say vnto the people, according to all that Moses charged Ioshua: then the people hasted and went ouer. 11 When all the people were cleane passed ouer, the Arke of the Lord went ouer also, and the Priests before the people. 12 And the sonnes of Reuben, and the sonnes of Gad, and halfe the tribe of Manasseh went ouer before the children of Israel armed, as Moses had charged them. 13 Euen fourty thousand prepared for warre, went before the Lord vnto battel, into ye plaine of Iericho. 14 That day the Lord magnified Ioshua in the sight of all Israel, and they feared him, as they feared Moses all dayes of his life. 15 And the Lord spake vnto Ioshua, saying, 16 Commande the Priests that beare ye Arke of the testimonie, to come vp out of Iorden. 17 Ioshua therefore commanded the Priests, saying, Come ye vp out of Iorden. 18 And when the Priests that bare the Arke of the couenant of ye Lord were come vp out of the middes of Iorden, and assoone as the soles of the Priests feete were set on the dry land, the waters of Iorde returned vnto their place, and flowed ouer all the bankes thereof, as they did before. 19 So the people came vp out of Iorden the tenth day of the first moneth, and pitched in Gilgal, in the Eastside of Iericho. 20 Also the twelue stones, which they tooke out of Iorden, did Ioshua pitch in Gilgal. 21 And he spake vnto ye childre of Israel, saying, When your children shall aske their fathers in time to come, and say, What meane these stones? 22 Then ye shall shew your children, and say, Israel came ouer this Iorden on dry land: 23 For the Lord your God dryed vp ye waters of Iorden before you, vntill ye were gone ouer, as the Lord your God did the red Sea, which hee dryed vp before vs, till we were gone ouer, 24 That all the people of the worlde may know that the hand of the Lord is mightie, that ye might feare the Lord your God continually.