Joshua 24:30

In the border of his inheritance in Timnath-Serah. Rather, perhaps, within the border. For Timnath-Serah, see note on Joshua 19:50 . The burial-place of Joshua has been supposed to be identified by the Palestine Exploration Committee. Lieutenant Conder describes what he saw at Tibneh. Amid a number of tombs he found one evidently, from more than 200 lamp niches on the walls of the porch, the sepulchre of a man of distinction. The simple character of the ornamentation, he thinks, and the entire absence of it in the interior of the tomb itself, not only suggest an early date, but are in harmony with the character of the simple yet noble-minded warrior, whose tomb it is supposed to be. In later papers, however, Lieutenant Conder abandons Tibneh for Kerr Haris, on the ground that Jewish tradition, usually found to be correct, is in its favour. And more mature reflection has induced him to modify his former opinion as to the early date of the tombs. Until these researches commenced, the situation of the hill Gaash was unknown, though it is mentioned in 2 Samuel 23:30 ("the brooks" or "valleys of Gaash"), and 1 Chronicles 11:32 . Nothing in these places serves to identify it. This passage is copied, with a few minute verbal discrepancies, into the Book of Judges ( Joshua 2:6-9 ), a strong ground, according to all ordinary haws of literary criticism, for concluding that the latter book was written after the former. This is the chain of evidence by which the authenticity of the historical books of the Scriptures is established, not, of course, beyond the reach of cavil or dispute, but to the satisfaction of practical men. The LXX . as well as the Arabic translators have added here the following words: "There they placed with him in the sepulchre, in which they buried him there, the stone knives with which he circumcised the children of Israel in Gilgal, when he led them out from Egypt, as the Lord commanded, and they are there unto this day." This passage is not found in the Hebrew. And as the Arabic and the LXX . do not altogether agree, the probability seems to be that some apocryphal legend was inserted here at a very early date.