Josue 3:4

Clementine Latin Vulgate

vastantes cunctas civitates illius uno tempore. Non fuit oppidum, quod nos effugeret : sexaginta urbes, omnem regionem Argob regni Og in Basan.

Parallel Translations

Jerome's Latin Vulgate (405)
sitque inter vos et arcam spatium cubitorum duum millium: ut procul videre possitis, et nosse per quam viam ingrediamini: quia prius non ambulastis per eam: et cavete ne appropinquetis ad arcam.

Nova Vulgata (1979)
sitque inter vos et arcam spatium cubitorum duum fere milium, et cavete, ne appropinquetis ad eam ut sciatis per quam viam ingrediamini, quia prius non ambulastis per eam".

Bible Verse Review
  from Treasury of Scripure Knowledge

a space: Exodus 3:5, Exodus 19:12, Psalms 89:7, Hebrews 12:28, Hebrews 12:29

heretofore: Heb. since yesterday and the third day, Genesis 31:2, Exodus 4:10, 1 Chronicles 11:2, Isaiah 30:33, *marg.

Reciprocal: Exodus 19:23 - Set bounds Numbers 2:2 - far off Deuteronomy 19:4 - in time past Isaiah 42:16 - lead

Gill's Notes on the Bible

Yet there shall be a space between you and it,.... The ark; the Keri or marginal reading is, "between you and them"; the priests that bear it: hence sprung a fiction among the Jews, that there were two arks, the ark of the Shechinah or divine Majesty, and the ark of Joseph, in which his bones were put, which went together q; which Jarchi, Kimchi, and Abarbinel take notice of, but has no foundation in the text:

about two thousand cubits by measure; by a certain well known measure, that of a common cubit; for the "caph" we render "about" is a note of truth, reality, and certainty, and designs the exact precise measure here given: this difference was to be observed, partly in reverence to the ark, the symbol of the divine Presence; Christ is to be reverenced by his people, and so his word and ordinances; and there is a reverence and respect due to his ministers and priests that bear the ark; as also that they might the better see the ark and go after it, as Ben Gersom; or the way in which they should go, as is suggested in the following clause; and likewise have the better view of the greatness of the miracle, as Abarbinel; the dividing of the waters of Jordan as soon as the ark came to it, and while it was in it: the Jews conclude from hence that this was the measure of ground they may go on a sabbath day, and no further, called a sabbath day's journey, Acts 1:12;

come not near unto it, that ye may know the way by which ye must go; over Jordan into Canaan's land; for being at some distance from them they could better discern that and the way he directed them to walk in: Christ the antitype of the ark is the way to the heavenly Canaan, and his ministers point out the right way of salvation by him, in the ministration of the word, by attending to which the way is seen and known in which men must go:

for ye have not passed [this] way heretofore; a path indeed untrodden by any; neither they nor any other ever went into Canaan the way they were now going, through the river Jordan as on dry land: the way to heaven by Christ is only revealed in the Gospel, and only trodden by believers in him, and especially the way to glory through Jordan's river; or death is an untrodden path, which, though the way of all flesh, is a trackless path, and gone through, but once, and those who pass it have never before gone that way.

q T. Bab. Sotah, fol. 13. 1.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The ark, which was since the making of the covenant the special shrine and seat of God’s presence, went before to show the people that God, through its medium, was their leader. They were to follow at a distance that they might the better observe and mark how the miracle was accomplished. This they would do to the greatest advantage while coming down the heights, the ark going on before them into the ravine.

Clarke's Notes on the Bible

Verse Joshua 3:4. About two thousand cubits — This distance they were to keep,

1. For the greater respect, because the presence of the ark was the symbol and pledge of the Divine presence.

2. That the ark, which was to be their pilot over these waters, might be the more conspicuous which it could not have been had the people crowded upon it.