Commentary on Joshua - Keil & Delitzsch - David Cox

Keil and Delitzsch <strong>Commentary</strong> on the Old Testament
in a north-westerly direction from Jericho through the Wady Faran, the detachment
sent forward might easily accomplish the distance in a night, so as to arrive on the
western side of Ai before the break of day. They were then to hold themselves in
readiness to fight. He (Joshua) himself would approach the town with the people of
war that remained with him; and if the inhabitants of Ai should come out against him
as they did before, they would flee before them till they had drawn them quite away
from their town (v. 5). This was to be expected; "for they will say, They flee before
us, as at the first: and we will flee before them" (v. 6). When this was done, the
warriors were to come forth from their ambush, fall upon the town, and set it on fire
(vv. 7, 8). Having been sent away with these instructions, the 30,000 men went into
ambush, and posted themselves "between Bethel and Ai, on the west side of Ai" (v. 9),
i.e., according to Strauss , in the Wady es Suweinit, to the north-west of Ai, where it
forms almost a perpendicular wall, near to which the ruins of Chai are to be found,
though "not near enough to the rocky wady for it to be possible to look down its
almost perpendicular wall" ( Ritter , Erdk. xvi. p.
528). Joshua remained for the night in the midst of the people, i.e., in the camp of that
portion of the army that had gone with him towards Ai; not in Gilgal, as Knobel
supposes.
Verse 10. The next morning he mustered the people as early as possible, and then
went, with the elders of Israel, "before the people of Ai." The elders of Israel are not
"military tribunes, who were called elders because of their superiority in military
affairs," as Masius supposes, but, as in every other case, the heads of the people, who
accompanied Joshua as counsellors.
Verse 11-13. The whole of the people of war also advanced with him to the front of
the town, and encamped on the north of Ai, so that the valley was between it ( bynw
(OT:996), as in Josh 3:4) and Ai. This was probably a side valley branching off
towards the south from the eastern continuation of the Wady es Suweinit. - In vv. 12,
13, the account of the preparations for the attack is founded off by a repetition of the
notice as to the forces engaged, and in some respects a more exact description of their
disposition. Joshua, it is stated in v. 12, took about 5000 men and placed them in
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