1 And Joshua gathered all the tribes of Israel to Shechem, and called for the elders of Israel, and for their heads, and for their judges, and for their officers; and they presented themselves before God. 2 And Joshua said unto all the people, Thus saith Jehovah the God of Israel: Your fathers dwelt of old on the other side of the river, Terah, the father of Abraham and the father of Nahor, and they served other gods. 3 And I took your father Abraham from the other side of the river, and led him throughout the land of Canaan, and multiplied his seed and gave him Isaac. 4 And I gave unto Isaac Jacob and Esau; and I gave unto Esau mount Seir, to possess it; and Jacob and his sons went down into Egypt. 5 And I sent Moses and Aaron, and I plagued Egypt, according to that which I did among them; and afterwards I brought you out. 6 And I brought your fathers out of Egypt, and ye came unto the sea; and the Egyptians pursued after your fathers with chariots and horsemen unto the Red sea. 7 Then they cried to Jehovah, and he put darkness between you and the Egyptians, and brought the sea upon them, and covered them; and your eyes saw what I did in Egypt; and ye dwelt in the wilderness a long time. 8 And I brought you into the land of the Amorites, who dwelt beyond the Jordan, and they fought with you, and I gave them into your hand, and ye took possession of their land, and I destroyed them from before you. 9 And Balak the son of Zippor, king of Moab, arose and warred against Israel, and sent and called Balaam the son of Beor to curse you; 10 but I would not hearken unto Balaam, and he blessed you expressly, and I delivered you out of his hand. 11 And ye went over the Jordan, and came unto Jericho, and the men of Jericho fought against you, the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Girgashites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; and I delivered them into your hand. 12 And I sent the hornet before you, which drove them out from before you, [as] the two kings of the Amorites; not with thy sword, nor with thy bow. 13 And I have given you a land for which ye did not labour, and cities which ye built not, and ye dwell in them; of vineyards and oliveyards which ye planted not do ye eat. 14 And now fear Jehovah and serve him in perfectness and in truth; and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the river, and in Egypt; and serve Jehovah. 15 And if it seem evil unto you to serve Jehovah, choose you this day whom ye will serve; whether the gods whom your fathers that were on the other side of the river served, or the gods of the Amorite, in whose land ye dwell; but as for me and my house, we will serve Jehovah. 16 And the people answered and said, Far be it from us that we should forsake Jehovah, to serve other gods; 17 for Jehovah our God, he it is that brought us up and our fathers out of the land of Egypt, from the house of bondage, and who did those great signs before our eyes, and preserved us in all the way wherein we went, and among all the peoples through whom we passed! 18 And Jehovah drove out from before us all the peoples, and the Amorites the inhabitants of the land: so therefore we will serve Jehovah, for he is our God. 19 And Joshua said to the people, Ye cannot serve Jehovah, for he is a holy God; he is a jealous God; he will not forgive your transgressions nor your sins. 20 If ye forsake Jehovah, and serve strange gods, then he will turn and do you hurt, and consume you, after that he hath done you good. 21 And the people said to Joshua, No; but we will serve Jehovah. 22 And Joshua said unto the people, Ye are witnesses against yourselves that ye have chosen you Jehovah, to serve him. And they said, [We are] witnesses. 23 Now therefore put away the strange gods that are among you, and incline your heart unto Jehovah the God of Israel. 24 And the people said unto Joshua, Jehovah our God will we serve, and to his voice will we hearken. 25 So Joshua made a covenant with the people that day, and set them a statute and an ordinance in Shechem. 26 And Joshua wrote these words in the book of the law of God, and took a great stone, and set it up there under the oak that was by the sanctuary of Jehovah. 27 And Joshua said unto all the people, Behold, this stone shall be a witness unto us, for it hath heard all the words of Jehovah which he spoke unto us; and it shall be a witness against you, lest ye deny your God. 28 And Joshua dismissed the people, every man to his inheritance. 29 And it came to pass after these things, that Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of Jehovah, died, a hundred and ten years old. 30 And they buried him in the border of his inheritance in Timnath-serah, which is in mount Ephraim, on the north side of the mountain of Gaash. 31 And Israel served Jehovah all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders whose days were prolonged after Joshua, and who had known all the works of Jehovah, which he had done for Israel. 32 And the bones of Joseph, which the children of Israel had brought up out of Egypt, buried they in Shechem in the portion of the field which Jacob had bought of the sons of Hamor, Shechem's father, for a hundred kesitahs; and it became the inheritance of the children of Joseph. 33 And Eleazar the son of Aaron died; and they buried him in the hill of Phinehas his son, which had been given him in mount Ephraim.
Joshua 24 Darby Translation
Audio: World English Bible (WEB), read by Winfred W. Henson · About the recordings
People & places in this chapter
From this site's family tree and Bible maps, only where those guides cite this chapter.
People
Zippor
The father of Balak, king of Moab.
Cited in the guide: Numbers 22:2; Numbers 22:4; Joshua 24:9
Places
Shechem
Shechem lay between Mount Gerizim and Mount Ebal. Abram built an altar here, Joshua gathered Israel for covenant renewal, and Jacob's well stands nearby.
Cited in the guide: Genesis 12:6; Joshua 24:1; John 4:5
Cross references (33)
Related passages for each verse, from the Treasury of Scripture Knowledge as collected and ranked by readers at OpenBible.info.
- 1 Joshua 23:2; 1 Samuel 10:19; Exodus 18:25–26; Genesis 33:18–19; Genesis 12:6
- 2 Joshua 24:15; Genesis 31:30; Ezekiel 16:3; Isaiah 51:2; Genesis 31:53
- 3 Genesis 12:1–4; Genesis 21:2–3; Acts 7:2–3; Genesis 15:5; Psalm 127:3
- 4 Genesis 36:8; Deuteronomy 2:5; Genesis 25:24–26; Acts 7:15; Psalm 105:23
- 5 Exodus 3:10; Exodus 7:1–12; Psalm 78:43–51; Exodus 12:51; Psalm 105:26–36
- 6 Acts 7:36; Hebrews 11:29; Isaiah 63:12–13; Exodus 12:37; Psalm 136:13–15
- 7 Deuteronomy 4:34; Exodus 14:20; Exodus 14:10; Nehemiah 9:12–21; Exodus 14:31
- 8 Numbers 21:21–35; Psalm 136:17–22; Deuteronomy 2:32–3:7; Nehemiah 9:22; Psalm 135:10–11
- 9 Judges 11:25; Micah 6:5; Numbers 22:2; Deuteronomy 23:4–5; Numbers 22:5–21
- 10 Deuteronomy 23:5; Isaiah 54:17; Numbers 24:5–10; Numbers 22:35; Numbers 22:11–12
- 11 Joshua 3:14–17; Joshua 4:10–12; Deuteronomy 7:1; Psalm 105:44; Psalm 78:54–55
- 12 Exodus 23:28; Deuteronomy 7:20; Psalm 44:3–6
- 13 Deuteronomy 6:10–12; Deuteronomy 8:7; Joshua 21:45; Proverbs 13:22; Joshua 11:13
- 14 1 Samuel 12:24; Deuteronomy 10:12; Genesis 35:2; Joshua 24:23; 2 Corinthians 1:12
- 15 1 Kings 18:21; John 6:67–68; Ruth 1:15–16; Deuteronomy 29:18; Ezekiel 20:39
- 16 Hebrews 10:38–39; 1 Samuel 12:23; Romans 6:2; Romans 3:6
- 17 Exodus 19:4; Isaiah 63:7–14; Amos 2:9–10; Deuteronomy 32:11–12; Isaiah 46:4
- 18 Psalm 116:16; Micah 4:2; Exodus 10:2; Zechariah 8:23; Luke 1:73–75
- 19 Exodus 23:21; Isaiah 5:16; Exodus 20:5; Psalm 99:5; Psalm 99:9
- 20 Hebrews 10:26–27; Acts 7:42; Ezekiel 18:24; 1 Chronicles 28:9; Jeremiah 17:13
- 21 Exodus 20:19; Deuteronomy 5:27–28; Exodus 19:8; Isaiah 44:5; Exodus 24:7
- 22 Psalm 119:173; Psalm 119:11; Job 15:6; Luke 10:42; Deuteronomy 26:17
- 23 Joshua 24:14; 2 Corinthians 6:16–18; 1 Samuel 7:3–4; Judges 10:15–16; Hebrews 12:28–29
- 24 Exodus 24:7; Exodus 24:3; Deuteronomy 5:27–29
- 25 Nehemiah 9:38; Exodus 15:25; 2 Chronicles 23:16; 2 Kings 11:17; Joshua 24:26
- 26 Judges 9:6; Genesis 35:4; Joshua 4:20–24; Deuteronomy 31:24–26; Exodus 24:4
- 27 Luke 19:40; Joshua 22:34; Deuteronomy 31:26; Matthew 10:33; Joshua 22:27–28
- 28 Judges 2:6
- 29 Judges 2:8; Genesis 50:22; Genesis 50:26; Psalm 115:17; Deuteronomy 34:5
- 30 Joshua 19:50; Judges 2:9; 2 Samuel 23:30
- 31 Judges 2:7; Deuteronomy 31:13; Deuteronomy 11:2; Deuteronomy 31:29; 2 Chronicles 24:2
- 32 Genesis 50:25; Genesis 33:19; Exodus 13:19; Acts 7:16; John 4:5
- 33 Exodus 6:25; Joshua 22:13; Exodus 6:23; Job 30:23; Numbers 3:32
Cross references: OpenBible.info (CC BY), drawn mainly from the public-domain Treasury of Scripture Knowledge. · Sources & licences
What the Fathers said
Passages from the Church Fathers that expound or quote this chapter, verbatim from the public-domain Schaff edition (19th-century English translations).
How these were chosen
“Commentary” is the opening of a homily or exposition on this chapter (John Chrysostom’s homilies, Augustine’s tractates, sermons and expositions of the Psalms). “Quotes” are sentences where the edition’s own footnotes identify a quotation of a verse here, kept only when the wording matches the verse. Only works whose authorship is not in doubt are used. Psalms follow the Hebrew/English numbering (Augustine numbers them as the Septuagint does: his Psalm 50 is Psalm 51 here).
… belonged, was the only one in which the worship of the true God survived, and the only one, we may suppose, in which the Hebrew language was preserved; although Joshua the son of Nun tells us that even this family served other gods in Mesopotamia. The other descendants of Heber gradually became absorbed in other races and other languages.
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 1, vol. 2 (1887)
… a stone as witness of his words (already a heap somewhere had been called a witness by Jacob), for he says, "Behold this stone shall be a witness unto you this day to the end of days, when ye lie to the Lord our God," perhaps believing that by God's power even the stones would speak to the conviction of …
Read in context · Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers, series 2, vol. 8 (1895)