Joshua 22

1 Joshua then summoned the leaders of the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half of the tribe of Manasseh.

Then Joshua sent for the Reubenites and the Gadites and the half-tribe of Manasseh,

2 He said to them, “You have done everything that Moses, who served Yahweh [well], told you to do. You have also done what I told you to do.

And said to them, You have kept all the orders of Moses, the Lord's servant, and have done everything I gave you orders to do:

3 For a long time you have helped the other tribes [to defeat their enemies]. You have obeyed everything that Yahweh your God commanded you to do.

You have now been with your brothers for a long time; till this day you have been doing the orders of the Lord your God.

4 He promised to give peace to us Israelis, and he has done what he promised. So now you may go back to your homes, to the land that Moses gave to you, on the east side of the Jordan [River].

And now the Lord your God has given your brothers rest, as he said: so now you may go back to your tents, to the land of your heritage, which Moses, the Lord's servant, gave to you on the other side of Jordan.

5 Moses also commanded you to love Yahweh your God and to obey his commands, and to continue to worship him and serve him by everything that you think and everything that you do.”

Only take great care to do the orders and the law which Moses, the Lord's servant, gave you; to have love for the Lord your God and to go in all his ways; and to keep his laws and to be true to him and to be his servants with all your heart and with all your soul.

6 Then Joshua blessed them and said goodbye to them, and they [prepared to] leave and return to their homes [on the east side of the Jordan River].

Then Joshua gave them his blessing and sent them away: and they went back to their tents.

7 Moses had given the Bashan region to half the tribe of Manasseh, and land on the west side of the Jordan [River] to the other half of the tribe. Before they left, he [asked God to] bless them.

Now to the one half of the tribe of Manasseh, Moses had given a heritage in Bashan; but to the other half, Joshua gave a heritage among their brothers on the west side of Jordan. Now when Joshua sent them away to their tents, he gave them his blessing,

8 He said, “Go back to your homes and to all the things that you have taken from your enemies—the many animals and silver and gold and [things made of] bronze and iron, and many beautiful clothes. But you should share some of those things with other people of your tribe.”

And said to them, Go back with much wealth to your tents, and with very much cattle, with silver and gold and brass and iron, and with a very great store of clothing; give your brothers a part of the goods taken in the war.

9 So the people of the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh left the other Israelis at Shiloh in Canaan land, to return to their homes in the Gilead region. That was the area that belonged to them. It had been allotted to them by Moses as Yahweh had commanded.

So Reuben and Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh went back, parting from the children of Israel at Shiloh in the land of Canaan, to go to the land of Gilead, to the land of their heritage which had been given to them by the Lord's order to Moses.

10 The people from those three tribes arrived near the western side of the Jordan River, at a town called Geliloth. There they built a large altar. [Then they crossed the Jordan River to the Gilead region].

Now when they came to the country by Jordan in the land of Canaan, the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh put up there, by Jordan, a great altar, seen from far.

11 But the other Israelis who were still at Shiloh heard about the altar that those men had built.

And news came to the children of Israel, See, the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh have put up an altar opposite the land of Canaan, in the country by Jordan on the side which is Israel's.

12 They became very angry with the men of those tribes, so they decided to fight them.

Then all the meeting of the children of Israel, hearing this, came together at Shiloh to go up against them to war.

13 The Israelis sent Phinehas, who was the son of Eleazar the Supreme Priest, to [talk with] the people of those three tribes.

And the children of Israel sent Phinehas, the son of Eleazar the priest, to the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh, to the land of Gilead,

14 They also sent one leader from each of the ten tribes that were still at Shiloh. Each of them was a leader of his clan.

And with him they sent ten chiefs, one for every tribe of the children of Israel, every one of them the head of his house among the families of Israel.

15 Those leaders went to the Gilead region to talk to the people of the tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh. They said,

And they came to the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh, to the land of Gilead, and said to them,

16 “All the other Israelis are asking, ‘Why have you rebelled against the God whom we Israelis [worship] by building an altar for yourselves?

This is what all the meeting of the people of the Lord has said, What is this wrong which you have done against the God of Israel, turning back this day from the Lord and building an altar for yourselves, and being false to the Lord?

17 Have you forgotten what happened at Peor, [when some Israelis sinned by worshiping the god that the Moab people-group worship]? Many Israelis became very sick and died because of that sin, and we are still suffering because of their sin.

Was not the sin of Baal-peor great enough, from which we are not clear even to this day, though punishment came on the people of the Lord,

18 Are you now turning away from obeying Yahweh and refusing to do what he wants? If you do not stop rebelling against Yahweh today, he will be angry with all of us Israelis tomorrow.’

That now you are turned back from the Lord? and, because you are false to him today, tomorrow his wrath will be let loose on all the people of Israel.

19 “If [you think that Yahweh considers] that your land here is not suitable for worshiping him, come back to our land where Yahweh’s Sacred Tent is. We can share our land with you. But do not rebel against Yahweh and against us by building another altar for Yahweh our God.

But if the land you now have is unclean, come over into the Lord's land where his House is, and take up your heritage among us: but do not be false to the Lord and to us by building yourselves an altar in addition to the altar of the Lord our God.

20 Do you remember what happened when Zerah’s son Achan refused to obey [Yahweh’s command to destroy everything in Jericho]? That one man disobeyed God’s command, but many [HYP] other Israelis were punished. Achan died because of his sin, but other Israelis also died.”

Did not Achan, the son of Zerah, do wrong about the cursed thing, causing wrath to come on all the people of Israel? And not on him only came the punishment of death.

21 The [leaders of the] tribes of Reuben, Gad, and half the tribe of Manasseh replied,

Then the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh said in answer to the heads of the families of Israel,

22 “Yahweh, the Almighty God, knows [why we did that], and we want you to know, too. If we have done something wrong [against Yahweh], you may kill us.

God, even God the Lord, God, even God the Lord, he sees, and Israel will see — if it is in pride or in sin against the Lord,

23 If we have disobeyed one of Yahweh’s laws, we request that he should punish us. We did not build that new altar to completely burn animals as sacrifices to Yahweh, or to offer on it sacrifices of grain or sacrifices to maintain fellowship with God.

That we have made ourselves an altar, being false to the Lord, keep us not safe from death this day; and if for the purpose of offering burned offerings on it and meal offerings, or peace-offerings, let the Lord himself send punishment for it;

24 “This is the reason that we built that altar: We were afraid/worried that some day your descendants would say that our descendants are not true Israelis. We were afraid that then they would say, ‘You are not allowed to worship Yahweh, the God whom we Israelis [worship].

And if we have not, in fact, done this designedly and with purpose, having in our minds the fear that in time to come your children might say to our children, What have you to do with the Lord, the God of Israel?

25 Yahweh caused the Jordan River to be a boundary between us and you people of the tribes of Reuben and Gad. So you are not allowed to worship Yahweh.’ We were worried that your descendants would force our descendants to stop worshiping Yahweh.

For the Lord has made Jordan a line of division between us and you, the children of Reuben and the children of Gad; you have no part in the Lord: so your children will make our children give up fearing the Lord.

26 “That is the reason that we decided to build that [new] altar. But it is not an altar for completely burning sacrifices of animals and [burning other] sacrifices.

So we said, Let us now make an altar for ourselves, not for burned offerings or for the offerings of beasts:

27 We built that new altar to prove/show to you and to us and to all of our descendants that we worship Yahweh by completely burning animal sacrifices and offerings of grain and offerings to maintain fellowship with Yahweh [only at the place Yahweh chooses]. We do not want your descendants to say to our descendants, ‘You do not belong to Yahweh.’

But to be a witness between us and you, and between the future generations, that we have the right of worshipping the Lord with our burned offerings and our offerings of beasts and our peace-offerings; so that your children will not be able to say to our children in time to come, You have no part in the Lord.

28 “In the future, if your descendants say that, our descendants can say, ‘Look at the altar that our ancestors made! It is exactly like Yahweh’s altar [that our ancestors built], but we do not burn sacrifices on it. It only shows that we are Israelis!’

For we said to ourselves, If they say this to us or to future generations, then we will say, See this copy of the Lord's altar which our fathers made, not for burned offerings or offerings of beasts, but for a witness between us and you.

29 We certainly do not want to rebel against Yahweh or stop doing what he desires, by building an altar for completely burning some sacrifices and burning grain offerings and making [other] sacrifices. [We know that] there is only one true altar for Yahweh our God, and it is in front of the Sacred Tent [at Shiloh].”

Never let it be said that we were false to the Lord, turning back this day from him and building an altar for burned offerings and meal offerings and offerings of beasts, in addition to the altar of the Lord our God which is before his House.

30 When Phinehas the priest and the other [ten] leaders heard what they said, they were pleased.

Then Phinehas the priest and the chiefs of the meeting and the heads of the families of Israel who were with him, hearing what the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the children of Manasseh said, were pleased.

31 So Phinehas said to them, “Now we know that Yahweh is with all of us Israelis, and that you were not rebelling against him [when you built that altar]. And we know that Yahweh will not punish us Israelis [because of your having done that].”

And Phinehas, the son of Eleazar the priest, said to the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the children of Manasseh, Now we are certain that the Lord is among us, because you have not done this wrong against the Lord: and you have kept us from falling into the hands of the Lord.

32 Then Phinehas and the Israeli leaders left the people of the tribes of Reuben and Gad in the Gilead region, and returned to Canaan. There they told the other Israelis what had happened.

Then Phinehas, the son of Eleazar the priest, and the chiefs went back from the land of Gilead, from the children of Reuben and the children of Gad, and came to the children of Israel in Canaan and gave them the news.

33 They were pleased, and they thanked God. And they did not talk any more about fighting against the people of the tribes of Reuben and Gad and destroying everything in their land.

And the children of Israel were pleased about this; and they gave praise to God, and had no more thought of going to war against the children of Reuben and the children of Gad for the destruction of their land.

34 The people of the tribes of Reuben and Gad named their new altar ‘A reminder to us all that Yahweh is God’.

And the children of Reuben and the children of Gad gave to that altar the name of Ed. For, they said, It is a witness between us that the Lord is God.