“Why have you brought this trouble upon us?” said Joshua. “Today the LORD will bring trouble upon you!” And all Israel stoned him to death. Then they stoned the others and burned their bodies.
Parallel translations
- WEB Joshua said, “Why have you troubled us? Yahweh will trouble you today.” All Israel stoned him with stones, and they burned them with fire and stoned them with stones.
- KJV And Joshua said, Why hast thou troubled us? the LORD shall trouble thee this day. And all Israel stoned him with stones, and burned them with fire, after they had stoned them with stones.
- NKJV And Joshua said, “Why have you troubled us? The Lord will trouble you this day.” So all Israel stoned him with stones; and they burned them with fire after they had stoned them with stones.
- NASB And Joshua said, “Why have you brought disaster on us? The Lord will bring disaster on you this day.” And all Israel stoned them with stones; and they burned them with fire after they had stoned them with stones.
- NLT Then Joshua said to Achan, “Why have you brought trouble on us? The Lord will now bring trouble on you.” And all the Israelites stoned Achan and his family and burned their bodies.
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
Joshua pronounces that the one who troubled Israel will now be troubled by God, and Achan is stoned and burned. Sin's penalty falls fully and publicly.
Overview
The wordplay on 'trouble' ties Achan's name and the valley to the calamity his sin caused the nation. The execution carries out the herem judgment that should have fallen on Jericho's spoil, now applied to the one who appropriated it. The severity reveals the holiness of God and the deadliness of sin, and it magnifies the grace of the gospel where Christ bears the curse of the lawbreaker in the sinner's place (Galatians 3:13).
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 19
- Josh 6:18But keep away from the things devoted to destruction, lest you yourself be set apart for destruction. If you take any of these, you will set apart the camp of Israel for destruction and bring disaster upon it.
- 1 Chr 2:7The son of Carmi: Achar, who brought trouble upon Israel by violating the ban on devoted things.
- Lev 24:14“Take the blasphemer outside the camp, and have all who heard him lay their hands on his head; then have the whole assembly stone him.
- Deut 17:5you must bring out to your gates the man or woman who has done this evil thing, and you must stone that person to death.
- Lev 20:2“Tell the Israelites, ‘Any Israelite or foreigner living in Israel who gives any of his children to Molech must be put to death. The people of the land are to stone him.
- Josh 7:11–13Israel has sinned; they have transgressed My covenant that I commanded them, and they have taken some of what was devoted to destruction. Indeed, they have stolen and lied, and they have put these things with their own possessions.
- 1 Kgs 18:17–18When Ahab saw Elijah, he said to him, “Is that you, O troubler of Israel?”
- Hab 2:6–9Will not all of these take up a taunt against him, speaking with mockery and derision: ‘Woe to him who amasses what is not his and makes himself rich with many loans! How long will this go on?’
- Gal 5:12As for those who are agitating you, I wish they would proceed to emasculate themselves!
- 2 Th 1:6After all, it is only right for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you,
- Heb 12:15See to it that no one falls short of the grace of God, and that no root of bitterness springs up to cause trouble and defile many.
- Gen 34:30Then Jacob said to Simeon and Levi, “You have brought trouble upon me by making me a stench to the Canaanites and Perizzites, the people of this land. We are few in number; if they unite against me and attack me, I and my household will be destroyed.”
- Lev 20:14If a man marries both a woman and her mother, it is depraved. Both he and they must be burned in the fire, so that there will be no depravity among you.
- Gen 38:24About three months later, Judah was told, “Your daughter-in-law Tamar has prostituted herself, and now she is pregnant.” “Bring her out!” Judah replied. “Let her be burned to death!”
- Lev 21:9If a priest’s daughter defiles herself by prostituting herself, she profanes her father; she must be burned in the fire.
- Deut 22:21–24she shall be brought to the door of her father’s house, and there the men of her city will stone her to death. For she has committed an outrage in Israel by being promiscuous in her father’s house. So you must purge the evil from among you.
- Deut 13:10Stone him to death for trying to turn you away from the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.
- Deut 21:21Then all the men of his city will stone him to death. So you must purge the evil from among you, and all Israel will hear and be afraid.
- Josh 7:15The one who is caught with the things devoted to destruction must be burned, along with all that belongs to him, because he has transgressed the covenant of the LORD and committed an outrage in Israel.’”
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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 7:25 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
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