Then ye shall let your children know, saying, Israel came over this Jordan on dry land.
Parallel translations
- WEB Then you shall let your children know, saying, ‘Israel came over this Jordan on dry land.
- BSB you are to tell them, ‘Israel crossed the Jordan on dry ground.’
- NKJV then you shall let your children know, saying, ‘Israel crossed over this Jordan on dry land’;
- NASB then you shall inform your children, saying, ‘Israel crossed this Jordan on dry ground.’
- NLT Then you can tell them, ‘This is where the Israelites crossed the Jordan on dry ground.’
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Parents were to tell their children that Israel crossed the Jordan on dry land. The stones preserved the memory of this concrete miracle.
Overview
The answer to the children's question centers on a real, historical act of God. Faith here rests not on myth but on remembered deeds done in space and time. By rehearsing the crossing, each generation confessed that the same God who acted then is their God still.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 8
- Josh 3:17And the priests that bare the ark of the covenant of the LORD stood firm on dry ground in the midst of Jordan, and all the Israelites passed over on dry ground, until all the people were passed clean over Jordan.
- Isa 51:10Art thou not it which hath dried the sea, the waters of the great deep; that hath made the depths of the sea a way for the ransomed to pass over?
- Isa 11:15–16And the LORD shall utterly destroy the tongue of the Egyptian sea; and with his mighty wind shall he shake his hand over the river, and shall smite it in the seven streams, and make men go over dryshod.
- Rev 16:12And the sixth angel poured out his vial upon the great river Euphrates; and the water thereof was dried up, that the way of the kings of the east might be prepared.
- Isa 44:27That saith to the deep, Be dry, and I will dry up thy rivers:
- Exod 15:19For the horse of Pharaoh went in with his chariots and with his horsemen into the sea, and the LORD brought again the waters of the sea upon them; but the children of Israel went on dry land in the midst of the sea.
- Exod 14:29But the children of Israel walked upon dry land in the midst of the sea; and the waters were a wall unto them on their right hand, and on their left.
- Ps 66:5–6Come and see the works of God: he is terrible in his doing toward the children of men.
Themes, concepts, people & topics
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Christ at the center
Joshua — the same name as Jesus, 'the LORD saves' — leads God's people into their inheritance, a shadow of the greater Joshua who brings us into the true rest and the promised land that remains.
How Joshua 4:22 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.