Josue 6:15
But the seventh day, rising up early, they went about the city, as it was ordered, seven times.
Open Josue 6:15 in the Motif Searcher, word by word across all five texts →Show on the spiral →The verse in its languages
- Vulgate (Clementine)
- Dies autem septimo, diluculo consurgentes, circuierunt urbem, sicut dispositum erat, septies.
- Septuagint (Swete)
- καὶ τῇ ἡμέρᾳ τῇ ἑβδόμῃ ἀνέστησαν ὄρθρου, καὶ περιήλθοσαν τὴν πόλιν ἑξάκις·
- Hebrew (WLC)
- וַיְהִ֣י בַּיּ֣וֹם הַשְּׁבִיעִ֗י וַיַּשְׁכִּ֨מוּ֙ כַּעֲל֣וֹת הַשַּׁ֔חַר וַיָּסֹ֧בּוּ אֶת הָעִ֛יר כַּמִּשְׁפָּ֥ט הַזֶּ֖ה שֶׁ֣בַע פְּעָמִ֑ים רַ֚ק בַּיּ֣וֹם הַה֔וּא סָבְב֥וּ אֶת הָעִ֖יר שֶׁ֥בַע פְּעָמִֽים
Haydock's commentary
Seventh day. The Jews say it was the sabbath; but of this there is no proof. Marcion hence took occasion to accuse God of inconsistency, as he forbad all working, and yet ordered the people to go round Jericho on a sabbath day. But Tertullian (iv. 12,) answers very well, that servile work is forbidden, and not the works of God or of religion, and God may change the ceremonial law as he thinks proper. (Calmet)
Sabbato opera humana prohibentur non divina. (Du Hamel)
From Haydock's Catholic Bible Commentary, 1859, in the transcription made by Todd Easton and kept online by John Paul Wohlschied at johnblood.gitlab.io/haydock.
The Fathers on this verse
Tertullian An Answer to the Jews, Of the Observance of the Sabbath
But the Jews are sure to say, that ever since this precept was given through Moses, the observance has been binding. Manifest accordingly it is, that the precept was not eternal nor spiritual, but temporary, which would one day cease. In short, so true is it that it is not in the exemption from work of the sabbath, that is, of the seventh day, that the celebration of this solemnity is to consist, that Joshua the son of Nun, at the time that he was reducing the city Jericho by war, stated that he had received from God a precept to order the People that priests should carry the ark of the testament of God seven days, making the circuit of the city; and thus, when the seventh day’s circuit had been performed, the walls of the city would spontaneously fall. Which was so done; and when the space of the seventh day was finished, just as was predicted, down fell the walls of the city. …
St John Chrysostom The Homilies of St. John Chrysostom, Matthew XII. 1
“And what is this to the question,” one may say; “for it was not surely the Sabbath, that he transgressed?” Thou tellest me of that which is greater, and which especially shows the wisdom of Christ, that letting go the Sabbath, He brings another example greater than the Sabbath. For it is by no means the same, to break in upon a day, and to touch that holy table, which it was not lawful for any man to touch. Since the Sabbath indeed hath been violated, and that often; nay rather it is continually being violated, both by circumcision, and by many other works; and at Jerichotoo one may see the same to have happened; but this happened then only. So that He more than obtains the victory. …
The Fathers are given as they wrote. Where a passage lays the Passion on the Jewish people, the Church teaches that it cannot be charged against all the Jews then living, nor against the Jews of today, and that all sinners were its authors (CCC 597, 598).