Joshua 7:16

Execution of the Command. - Jos 7:16-18. Discovery of the guilty man through the lot. In Jos 7:17 we should expect "the tribe" (shebet) or "the families" (mishpachoth) of Judah, instead of "the family." The plural mishpachoth is adopted in the lxx and Vulgate, and also to be met with in seven MSS; but this is a conjecture rather than the original reading Mishpachah is either used generally, or employed in a collective sense to denote all the families of Judah. There is no ground for altering לגּברים (man by man) into לבתּים (house by house) in Jos 7:17, according to some of the MSS; the expression "man by man" is used simply because it was the representative men who came for the lot to be cast, not only in the case of the fathers' houses, but in that of the families also.

We have in these verses, I. The discovery of Achan by the lot, which proved a perfect lot, though it proceeded gradually. Though we may suppose that Joshua slept the better, and with more ease and satisfaction, when he knew the worst of the disease of that body of which, under God, he was the head, and was put into a certain method of cure, yet he rose up early in the morning (Jos 7:16), so much was his heart upon it, to put away the accursed thing. We have found Joshua upon other occasions an early riser; here it shows his zeal and vehement desire to see Israel restored to the divine favour. In the scrutiny observe, 1. That the guilty tribe was that of Judah, which was, and was to be, of all the tribes, the most honourable and illustrious; this was an alloy to their dignity, and might serve as a check to their pride: many there were who were its glories, but here was one that was its reproach. Let not the best families think it strange if there be those found in them, and descending from them, that prove their grief and shame. Judah was to have the first and largest lot in Canaan; the more inexcusable is one of that tribe it, not content to wait for his own share, he break in upon God's property. The Jews' tradition is that when the tribe of Judah was taken the valiant men of that tribe drew their swords, and professed they would not sheathe them again till they saw the criminal punished and themselves cleared who knew their own innocency. 2. That the guilty person was at length fastened upon, and the language of the lot was, Thou art the man, v. 18. It was strange that Achan, being conscious to himself of guilt, when he saw the lot come nearer and nearer to him, had not either the wit to make an escape or the grace to make a confession; but his heart was hardened thro…

7:16-18 Achan might have been singled out by use of the Urim and Thummim, a God-given system of sacred lots. These items remained in the care of the high priest, probably in a bag or a pouch (see Exod 28:30; Num 27:21). They might have been two different-colored objects, perhaps stones or gems. Inquiries were phrased as “yes” or “no” questions.