Joshua 22:10

THE ALTAR OF WITNESS AT THE JORDAN, Joshua 22:10-34.

10. By Jordan Most commentators believe that the altar was on the western bank of the Jordan, because the language of the narrative is, when they came unto the borders of Jordan, that are in the land of Canaan. But in the next verse we read that the altar was built “over against the land of Canaan.” The purpose of the altar was to answer the taunting insinuation that they were aliens, by exhibiting within their own borders a facsimile of the altar at Shiloh as a proof of their Hebrew nationality and of their conformity to their brethren in religious worship. Josephus says, that the two and a half tribes “crossed the river and built an altar on the bank of the Jordan as a token of their affinity with those on the other side.” This altar, constructed by so large a body of men, was probably a vast heap of earth and stones.

A great altar to see to Conspicuously located, and huge in its dimensions. That this mound has not been found by any traveller is not strange, when we consider the almost total neglect of Eastern Palestine by all modern explorers; and, besides, this great altar may long ago have been destroyed.