“Moses my servant is dead. Now therefore arise, go across this Jordan, you and all these people, to the land which I am giving to them, even to the children of Israel.
ExplanationCommentary
Verse 2. Jordan, a river well known, which rises in Antilibanus, not from Panion, but from the lake Phiala, as Herod the Tetrarch discovered by throwing some straw into the latter, which passed by a subterraneous passage into Panion. Thence it proceeds to the Semonite lake and to Daphne, where it begins to be called the Great Jordan. Joseph. Bel. iii. 33. Having traversed the land of Palestine in the southern direction, it loses itself in the lake of Sodom. Calmet.—It is a very rapid river, and hence its appellation from irod, of jord, descendit, is very probably derived. Bible.—The Arabs call it Zacchar, “overflowing,” because the snows and rains cause it formerly to overflow about Easter. Univ. Hist.—When Maundrell travelled through this country, the stream was too rapid for a person to swim against it. Parkhurst.—Hence the miracle of the Hebrews passing through the Jordan on dry land, when its waters were the most copious and violent, would be the more observable.