Joshua 1:2-4

1:2 “Moses my servant is dead. Get ready! ¹  Cross the Jordan River! ²  Lead these people into the land which I am ready to hand over to them. ³  1:3 I am handing over to you every place you set foot, as I promised Moses. ⁴  1:4 Your territory will extend from the wilderness in the south to Lebanon in the north. It will extend all the way to the great River Euphrates in the east (including all of Syria) ⁵  and all the way to the Mediterranean Sea ⁶  in the west. ⁷ 

Joshua 1:6

1:6 Be strong and brave! You must lead these people in the conquest of this land that I solemnly promised their ancestors I would hand over to them. ⁸ 

Joshua 3:10-13

3:10 Joshua continued, ⁹  “This is how you will know the living God is among you and that he will truly drive out before you the Canaanites, Hittites, Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites, and Jebusites. 3:11 Look! The ark of the covenant of the Ruler ¹⁰  of the whole earth is ready to enter the Jordan ahead of you. 3:12 Now select for yourselves twelve men from the tribes of Israel, one per tribe. 3:13 When the feet ¹¹  of the priests carrying the ark of the Lord, the Ruler ¹²  of the whole earth, touch ¹³  the water of the Jordan, the water coming downstream toward you will stop flowing and pile up.” ¹⁴ 

Psalms 44:1-3

Psalm 44 ¹⁵ 

For the music director; by the Korahites, a well-written song. ¹⁶ 

44:1 O God, we have clearly heard; ¹⁷ 

our ancestors ¹⁸  have told us

what you did ¹⁹  in their days,

in ancient times. ²⁰ 

44:2 You, by your power, ²¹  defeated nations and settled our fathers on their land; ²² 

you crushed ²³  the people living there ²⁴  and enabled our ancestors to occupy it. ²⁵ 

44:3 For they did not conquer ²⁶  the land by their swords,

and they did not prevail by their strength, ²⁷ 

but rather by your power, ²⁸  strength ²⁹  and good favor, ³⁰ 

for you were partial to ³¹  them.

Psalms 78:54-55

78:54 He brought them to the border of his holy land,

to this mountainous land ³²  which his right hand ³³  acquired.

78:55 He drove the nations out from before them;

he assigned them their tribal allotments ³⁴ 

and allowed the tribes of Israel to settle down. ³⁵ 

Psalms 105:44

105:44 He handed the territory of nations over to them,

and they took possession of what other peoples had produced, ³⁶ 

[1:2]  ¹ tn Heb “Get up!”

[1:2]  ² tn Heb “this Jordan”; the word “River” has been supplied in the translation for clarity (likewise in v. 11).

[1:2]  ³ tc Heb “Cross over this Jordan, you and all these people, to the land that I am giving to them, to the children of Israel.” The final phrase, “to the children of Israel,” is probably a later scribal addition specifying the identity of “these people/them.”

[1:3]  ⁴ tn Heb “Every place on which the sole of your foot walks, to you I have given it, as I said to Moses.” The second person pronouns in vv. 3-4 are plural, indicating that all the people are addressed here. The verbal form נְתַתִּיו (nÿtattiv, “I have given it”) is probably a perfect of certitude, emphasizing the certainty of the action. Another option is to translate, “I have already assigned it.” In this case the verb would probably refer to the Lord’s decree to Abraham that he would give this land to his descendants.

[1:4]  ⁵ tn Heb “all the land of the Hittites.” The expression “the land of the Hittites” does not refer to Anatolia (modern Turkey), where the ancient Hittite kingdom of the second millennium b.c. was located, but rather to Syria, the “Hatti land” mentioned in inscriptions of the first millennium b.c. (see HALOT 1:363). The phrase is omitted in the LXX and may be a scribal addition.

[1:4]  ⁶ tn Heb “the Great Sea,” the typical designation for the Mediterranean Sea.

[1:4]  ⁷ tn Heb “From the wilderness and this Lebanon even to the great river, the River Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, even to the great sea [at] the place where the sun sets, your territory will be.”

[1:6]  ⁸ tn Heb “For you will cause these people to inherit the land that I swore to their fathers to give to them.” The pronoun “them” at the end of the verse refers to either the people or to the fathers.

[3:10]  ⁹ tn Heb “said.”

[3:11]  ¹⁰ tn Or “Lord”; or “Master.”

[3:13]  ¹¹ tn Heb “the soles of the feet.”

[3:13]  ¹² tn Or “Lord”; or “Master.”

[3:13]  ¹³ tn Or “rest in.”

[3:13]  ¹⁴ tn Heb “the waters of the Jordan, the waters descending from above, will be cut off so that they will stand in one pile.”

[44:1]  ¹⁵ sn Psalm 44. The speakers in this psalm (the worshiping community within the nation Israel) were disappointed with God. The psalm begins on a positive note, praising God for leading Israel to past military victories. Verses 1-8 appear to be a song of confidence and petition which the people recited prior to battle. But suddenly the mood changes as the nation laments a recent defeat. The stark contrast between the present and the past only heightens the nation’s confusion. Israel trusted in God for victory, but the Lord rejected them and allowed them to be humiliated in battle. If Israel had been unfaithful to God, their defeat would make sense, but the nation was loyal to the Lord. Comparing the Lord to a careless shepherd, the nation urges God to wake up and to extend his compassion to his suffering people.

[44:1]  ¹⁶ tn The meaning of the Hebrew term מַשְׂכִּיל (maskil) is uncertain. See the note on the phrase “well-written song” in the superscription of Ps 42.

[44:1]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “with our ears we have heard.”

[44:1]  ¹⁸ tn Heb “fathers” (also in v. 2; the same Hebrew word may be translated either “fathers” or “ancestors” depending on the context.

[44:1]  ¹⁹ tn Heb “the work you worked.”

[44:1]  ²⁰ tn Heb “in the days of old.” This refers specifically to the days of Joshua, during Israel’s conquest of the land, as vv. 2-3 indicate.

[44:2]  ²¹ tn Heb “you, your hand.”

[44:2]  ²² tn Heb “dispossessed nations and planted them.” The third masculine plural pronoun “them” refers to the fathers (v. 1). See Ps 80:8, 15.

[44:2]  ²³ tn The verb form in the Hebrew text is a Hiphil preterite (without vav [ו] consecutive) from רָעַע (ra’a’, “be evil; be bad”). If retained it apparently means, “you injured; harmed.” Some prefer to derive the verb from רָעַע (“break”; cf. NEB “breaking up the peoples”), in which case the form must be revocalized as Qal (since this verb is unattested in the Hiphil).

[44:2]  ²⁴ tn Or “peoples.”

[44:2]  ²⁵ tn Heb “and you sent them out.” The translation assumes that the third masculine plural pronoun “them” refers to the fathers (v. 1), as in the preceding parallel line. See Ps 80:11, where Israel, likened to a vine, “spreads out” its tendrils to the west and east. Another option is to take the “peoples” as the referent of the pronoun and translate, “and you sent them away,” though this does not provide as tight a parallel with the corresponding line.

[44:3]  ²⁶ tn Or “take possession of.”

[44:3]  ²⁷ tn Heb “and their arm did not save them.” The “arm” here symbolizes military strength.

[44:3]  ²⁸ tn Heb “your right hand.” The Lord’s “right hand” here symbolizes his power to protect and deliver (see Pss 17:7; 20:6; 21:8).

[44:3]  ²⁹ tn Heb “your arm.”

[44:3]  ³⁰ tn Heb “light of your face.” The idiom “light of your face” probably refers to a smile (see Eccl 8:1), which in turn suggests favor and blessing (see Num 6:25; Pss 4:6; 31:16; 67:1; 80:3, 7, 19; 89:15; Dan 9:17).

[44:3]  ³¹ tn Or “favorable toward.”

[78:54]  ³² tn Heb “this mountain.” The whole land of Canaan seems to be referred to here. In Exod 15:17 the promised land is called the “mountain of your [i.e., God’s] inheritance.”

[78:54]  ³³ tn The “right hand” here symbolizes God’s military strength (see v. 55).

[78:55]  ³⁴ tn Heb “he caused to fall [to] them with a measuring line an inheritance.”

[78:55]  ³⁵ tn Heb “and caused the tribes of Israel to settle down in their tents.”

[105:44]  ³⁶ tn Heb “and the [product of the] work of peoples they possessed.”