Joshua 24:14

Now therefore fear the LORD, and serve him in sincerity and in truth: and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the flood, and in Egypt; and serve ye the LORD.

EXPOSITORY (ENGLISH BIBLE)

Ellicott's Commentary for English Readers

(14) Fear the Lord.—It should be remembered throughout the whole of this passage that Lord stands for JEHOVAH, the covenant God of Israel.

Benson Commentary

Joshua 24:14. Put away the gods — By this it appears, that although Joshua had doubtless prevented and purged out all public idolatry, yet there were some of them who practised it in their private houses and retirements. Your fathers — Terah, and Nahor, and Abraham, as Joshua 24:2, and others of your ancestors. In Egypt — See Ezekiel 23:3; Ezekiel 23:8; Ezekiel 23:19; Ezekiel 23:21; Ezekiel 23:27. Under these particulars, no doubt, he comprehends all other false gods which were served by the nations among whom they were, but only mentions these, as the idols which they were in more danger of worshipping than those in Canaan; partly because those of Canaan had been now lately and palpably disgraced by their inability to preserve their worshippers from total ruin; and partly because the other idols came recommended to them by the venerable name of antiquity, and the custom of their forefathers.

Matthew Henry's Concise Commentary

24:1-14 We must never think our work for God done, till our life is done. If he lengthen out our days beyond what we expected, like those of Joshua, it is because he has some further service for us to do. He who aims at the same mind which was in Christ Jesus, will glory in bearing the last testimony to his Saviour's goodness, and in telling to all around, the obligations with which the unmerited goodness of God has bound him. The assembly came together in a solemn religious manner. Joshua spake to them in God's name, and as from him. His sermon consists of doctrine and application. The doctrinal part is a history of the great things God had done for his people, and for their fathers before them. The application of this history of God's mercies to them, is an exhortation to fear and serve God, in gratitude for his favour, and that it might be continued.

Barnes' Notes on the Bible

The other side of the flood - Better "On the other side of the river," i. e. the Euphrates. See the marginal reference.

They served other gods - Possibly the "images," or teraphim, which we find their ancestor Laban calling "his gods" (see the marginal reference); and of which it would seem that there were, as Joshua spoke, some secret devotees among the people Joshua 24:14, Joshua 24:25. It is not stated that Abraham himself was an idolater, though his fathers were. Jewish tradition asserts that Abraham while in Ur of the Chaldees was persecuted for his abhorrence of idolatry, and hence, was called away by God from his native land. The reference in the text to the original state of those who were the forefathers of the nation, is made to show that they were no better than others: God chose them not for their excellences but of His own mere motion.

Jamieson-Fausset-Brown Bible Commentary

14-28. Now therefore fear the Lord, and serve him in sincerity and in truth—After having enumerated so many grounds for national gratitude, Joshua calls on them to declare, in a public and solemn manner, whether they will be faithful and obedient to the God of Israel. He avowed this to be his own unalterable resolution, and urged them, if they were sincere in making a similar avowal, "to put away the strange gods that were among them"—a requirement which seems to imply that some were suspected of a strong hankering for, or concealed practice of, the idolatry, whether in the form of Zabaism, the fire-worship of their Chaldean ancestors, or the grosser superstitions of the Canaanites.

Matthew Poole's Commentary

In sincerity and in truth; either these two expressions note the same thing; or sincerity is opposed to the mixture of false gods with the true, as it here follows, or of a false and corrupt worship of God with that which God appointeth; and truth is opposed to dissimulation and falseness, and instability of heart.

Put away the gods; whereby it appears, that although Joshua had doubtless prevented and purged out all public and manifest idolatry, yet there were some of them who practised it in their private houses and retirements. See Joshua 24:23 Amos 5:25,26 Ac 7:42,43. Your fathers, Terah, and Nahor, and Abraham, as Joshua 24:2, and others of your ancestors.

On the other side of the flood, and in Egypt: see Ezekiel 23:3,8,19,21,27. Under these particulars no doubt he comprehends all other false gods, which were served by the nations amongst whom they were, as appears from Joshua 24:15, but only mentions these, as the idols which they were in more danger of worshipping than those in Canaan; partly because those of Canaan had been now lately and palpably disgraced by their inability to preserve their worshippers from total ruin; and partly because the other idols came recommended unto them by the venerable name of antiquity, and the custom of their forefathers. See Jeremiah 44:17 Ezekiel 20:18.

Gill's Exposition of the Entire Bible

Now therefore fear the Lord,.... Since he has done such great and good things, fear the Lord and his goodness, fear him for his goodness sake; nothing so influences fear, or a reverential affection for God, as a sense of his goodness; this engages men sensible of it to fear the Lord, that is, to worship him both internally and externally in the exercise of every grace, and in the performance of every duty:

and serve him in sincerity and in truth: in the uprightness of their souls, without hypocrisy and deceit, and according to the truth of his word, and of his mind and will revealed in it, without any mixture of superstition and will worship, or of the commands and inventions of men:

and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the flood, and in Egypt; that is, express an abhorrence of them, and keep at a distance from them, and show that you are far from giving in to such idolatries your ancestors were guilty of, when they lived on the other side Euphrates, in Chaldea, or when they were sojourners in Egypt; for it cannot be thought that the Israelites were at this time guilty of such gross idolatry, at least openly, since Joshua had bore such a testimony of them, that they had cleaved to the Lord unto that day, Joshua 23:8; and their zeal against the two tribes and a half, on suspicion of idolatry, or of going into it, is a proof of it also:

and serve ye the Lord: and him only.

Geneva Study Bible

Now therefore {f} fear the LORD, and serve him in sincerity and in truth: and put away the gods which your fathers served on the other side of the flood, and in Egypt; and serve ye the LORD.

(f) This is the true use of God's benefits, to learn by it to fear and serve him with an upright conscience.

EXEGETICAL (ORIGINAL LANGUAGES)

Cambridge Bible for Schools and Colleges

14. Now therefore fear the Lord] Comp. Job 28:28, “Behold, the fear of the Lord, that is wisdom; and to depart from evil is understanding;” Psalm 2:11, “Serve the Lord with fear, and rejoice with trembling;” Proverbs 1:7, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge.”

in sincerity and in truth] “with perfite herte and most trewe,” Wyclif. The Greek word here rendered “sincerity” in the LXX. occurs also in 1 Corinthians 5:8, “let us keep the feast … with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth;” 2 Corinthians 1:12, “For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in simplicity and godly sincerity … we have had our conversation in the world;” 2 Corinthians 2:17, “but as of sincerity, but as of God, in the sight of God speak we in Christ.” The Latin word from which our “sincerity” comes, denotes “honey without wax,” unmixed purity. The Greek word is considered by some to be founded on the idea of something held up in the rays of the sun, and proved to be without speck or flaw.

put away the gods which your fathers served] Two epochs of ancestral idolatry are here alluded to; (a) on the other side of the flood, i. e. the Euphrates, in Mesopotamia; and (b) in Egypt. Some have supposed that the expression alludes to idolatry “in the heart,” but this is untenable. (i) In Leviticus 17:7 we read, “they (the people) shall no more offer their sacrifices unto devils, after whom they have gone a whoring.” (ii) Again in Amos 5:25-26, quoted by St Stephen in his address before the Sanhedrim (Acts 7:42-43), “Have ye offered (= did ye offer) unto Me sacrifices and offerings in the wilderness forty years, O house of Israel? But ye have borne the tabernacle of your Moloch and Chiun your images, the star of your god, which ye made to yourselves.” (iii) Once more, in Ezekiel 20:6-8 we read, “In the day that I lifted up my hand unto them, to bring them forth of the land of Egypt … then said I unto them, Cast ye away every man the abominations of his eyes, and defile not yourselves with the idols of Egypt … but they rebelled against Me, and would not hearken unto Me; they did not every man cast away the abominations of their eyes, neither did they forsake the idols of Egypt.” Joshua’s words plainly imply his sad conviction that there were still idolaters amongst them in secret, as there were in the days of Jacob before him, Genesis 35:2, and of Samuel after him, 1 Samuel 7:3, seq.

Pulpit Commentary

Verse 14. - Sincerity and truth. These words, rendered by the LXX. ἐν εὐθύτητι καὶ ἐνδικαιοσύνῃ, are not the precise equivalent of those so translated in other passages in the Bible, nor is St. Paul, in 1 Corinthians 5:8, quoting this passage. The word translated sincerity is rather to be rendered perfection, or perfectness. The Hebrew word signifying truth is derived from the idea of stability, as that which can stand the rude shocks of inquiry. Joshua 24:14

Keil and Delitzsch Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament

These overwhelming manifestations of grace on the part of the Lord laid Israel under obligations to serve the Lord with gratitude and sincerity. "Now therefore fear the Lord (יראוּ for יראוּ, pointed like a verb הל, as in 1 Samuel 12:24; Psalm 34:10), and serve Him in sincerity and in truth," i.e., without hypocrisy, or the show of piety, in simplicity and truth of heart (vid., Judges 9:16, Judges 9:19). "Put away the gods (Elohim equals the strange gods in Joshua 24:23) which your fathers served on the other side of the Euphrates and in Egypt." This appeal does not presuppose any gross idolatry on the part of the existing generation, which would have been at variance with the rest of the book, in which Israel is represented as only serving Jehovah during the lifetime of Joshua. If the people had been in possession of idols, they would have given them up to Joshua to be destroyed, as they promised to comply with his demand (Joshua 24:16.). But even if the Israelites were not addicted to gross idolatry in the worship of idols, they were not altogether free from idolatry either in Egypt or in the desert. As their fathers were possessed of teraphim in Mesopotamia (see at Joshua 24:2), so the Israelites had not kept themselves entirely free from heathen and idolatrous ways, more especially the demon-worship of Egypt (comp. Leviticus 17:7 with Ezekiel 20:7., Joshua 23:3, Joshua 23:8, and Amos 5:26); and even in the time of Joshua their worship of Jehovah may have been corrupted by idolatrous elements. This admixture of the pure and genuine worship of Jehovah with idolatrous or heathen elements, which is condemned in Leviticus 17:7 as the worship of Seirim, and by Ezekiel (l. c.) as the idolatrous worship of the people in Egypt, had its roots in the corruption of the natural heart, through which it is at all times led to make to itself idols of mammon, worldly lusts, and other impure thoughts and desires, to which it cleaves, without being able to tear itself entirely away from them. This more refined idolatry might degenerate in the case of many persons into the grosser worship of idols, so that Joshua had ample ground for admonishing the people to put away the strange gods, and serve the Lord.