Joshua 22.
BEFORE ever the Jordan was crossed and the land entered by the children of Israel, the tribes of Reuben and Gad had chosen for their inheritance the country east of the river which was the proper boundary of Canaan. They had voiced their wishes in Numbers 32, and now that the war of conquest was ended, Joshua told them that they were free to return to their homes and with them were half the tribe of Manasseh. Had their uppermost thought been the God of Israel instead of their “very great multitude of cattle,” a safer place as well as a happier one on the west of the Jordan would have been their choice.
The opening verses of our chapter show that they had been obedient in the matters spoken of, but verse 5 discloses the feeling of danger that Joshua had about them when the Jordan should separate the two and a half tribes from the rest of the nation. Anything short of the place of God’s appointment for His children is indeed a source of danger to them, and we are not surprised to find in 2 Kings 10:32,3332In those days the Lord began to cut Israel short: and Hazael smote them in all the coasts of Israel; 33From Jordan eastward, all the land of Gilead, the Gadites, and the Reubenites, and the Manassites, from Aroer, which is by the river Arnon, even Gilead and Bashan. (2 Kings 10:32‑33) that the king of Syria attacked the tribes east of the Jordan and took part of their land, while 1 Chronicles 5:2020And they were helped against them, and the Hagarites were delivered into their hand, and all that were with them: for they cried to God in the battle, and he was entreated of them; because they put their trust in him. (1 Chronicles 5:20) records their being all carried away captive by the Assyrian kings nineteen years before the remaining portions of the Kingdom of Israel and 1:12 years before the Kingdom of Judah was brought to an end.
Not quite at ease, realizing- that they were not in the full divine position of the nine and one-half tribes, the children of Reuben, Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh built a “great altar to see to” by the Jordan at the place where the nation had crossed when entering the land. This monument, by which they intended to show their oneness with Israel, aroused their brethren across the Jordan to go to war with the builders. With earnest words (verses 10-20) they addressed them, reminding the two and one-half tribes of the iniquity of Peor and of Achan, and inviting them to “pass over unto the land of the possession of the Lord, wherein the Lord’s tabernacle dwelleth and take possession among” them. The answer of the Reubenites, Gadites and Manassites (verses 21-29) showed that they meant nothing wrong, so the others returned to their homes.
It will be noticed that the settling on the east of Jordan was not after seeking direction from God, and the erection of the great altar was likewise a human expedient; their own wisdom led the people to these things: not the Word of God. Complications arise and human expedients seem necessary only when the true path of obedience is given up, for a worldly one.
ML 09/13/1925