Joshua Chapter 4 verse 16 Holy Bible
Command the priests that bear the ark of the testimony, that they come up out of the Jordan.
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Give orders to the priests who take up the ark of witness, to come up out of Jordan.
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Command the priests who bear the ark of the testimony, that they come up out of the Jordan.
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Command the priests that bear the ark of the testimony, that they come up out of Jordan.
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Command the priests that bear the ark of the testimony, that they come up out of Jordan.
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Command the priests who bear the ark of the testimony, that they come up out of the Jordan.
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`Command the priests bearing the ark of the testimony, and they come up out of the Jordan.'
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Pulpit Commentary
Pulpit CommentaryVerse 16. - The testimony. The word עֵדוּת though derived from the same root as עֵד witness, would seem rather to have the sense of precept, from the idea of repetition contained in the root. Compare the well known Hebrew particle עוד again. It must refer to the two tables of the law which (Hebrews 10:4) were placed in the ark (see Deuteronomy 10:5, and comp. Exodus 25:16, 21, 40, Numbers 17:10, where this is said to be the testimony). Other things were placed in the ark, such as the manna, Aaron's rod, and these, no doubt, were for a witness to the facts of the Mosaic record. The LXX., however, consistently render this word by μαρτύρια μαρτύριον. The Vulgate here has arcam foederis.
Ellicott's Commentary
Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers(16) Command the priests . . . that they come up out of Jordan.--Observe that the removal of the priests and the ark of the covenant from their station in Jordan is made the subject of a distinct section, and treated as a distinct event. It need not have been so for the purpose of the mere historical narrative. We might have taken it for granted. But the significance of the event is so marked as to receive a separate notice. We are not suffered to forget by what means Jordan was driven back, and held in check; and the check was not meant to be perpetual. We are reminded that the suspension of the power of death for men has its limits. When the day of grace is over, the waters will "return unto their place and flow over all the banks as before." (Comp. Isaiah 28:16-18; Isaiah 28:20.)