John Gill's Bible Commentary Ver. 2. And Joshua said unto all the people , etc.] Then present, or to all Israel by their representatives: thus saith the Lord God of Israel ; he spoke to them in the name of the Lord, as the prophet did, being himself a prophet, and at this time under a divine impulse, and spirit of prophecy. According to an Arabic writer f526 : the Angel of God appeared in the form of a man, and with a loud voice delivered the following, though they are expressed by him in a different manner; perhaps he mean, the Captain of the Lord’s host, ( Joshua 15:13,14); and which is not unlikely: your fathers dwelt on the other side of the flood in old time ; on the offer side the, river Euphrates; so the Targum, “beyond Perat;” i.e. Euphrates; in Mesopotamia and Chaldea; meaning not the remotest of their ancestors, Noah and Shem, but the more near, and who are expressly named: [even] Terah the father of Abraham, and the father of Nachor ; the Israelites sprung from Terah, in the line of Abraham, on the father’s side, and from him in the line of Nachor on the mother’s side, Rebekah, Leah, and Rachel, being of Nachor’s family: and they served other gods ; besides the true God, strange gods, which were no gods: “idols”; the idols of the people, as the Targum; so did Terah, Abraham, and Nachor; (see Gill on “ Genesis 11:26”); (see Gill on “ Genesis 11:28”); (see Gill on “ Genesis 12:1”).
Matthew Henry Commentary
Verses 1-14 - We must never think our work for God done, till our life is done. If he lengthen out our days beyond what we expected, like those of Joshua, it is because he has some further service for us to do. He who aims at the same mind which was in Christ Jesus, will glory in bearing the las testimony to his Saviour's goodness, and in telling to all around, the obligations with which the unmerited goodness of God has bound him. The assembly came together in a solemn religious manner. Joshua spake to them in God's name, and as from him. His sermon consists of doctrin and application. The doctrinal part is a history of the great thing God had done for his people, and for their fathers before them. The application of this history of God's mercies to them, is an exhortatio to fear and serve God, in gratitude for his favour, and that it migh be continued.
Original Hebrew ויאמר559 יהושׁע3091 אל413 כל3605 העם5971 כה3541 אמר559 יהוה3068 אלהי430 ישׂראל3478 בעבר5676 הנהר5104 ישׁבו3427 אבותיכם1 מעולם5769 תרח8646 אבי1 אברהם85 ואבי1 נחור5152 ויעבדו5647 אלהים430 אחרים׃312
