Joshua 1 · a question people ask

"From the wilderness and this Lebanon even to the great river, the river Euphrates" (1:4). Did Israel ever hold all of it?

In the text

The Euphrates is the border the LORD named to Abram, "from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates" (Genesis 15:18), and Moses gave nearly the same borders as 1:4 (Deuteronomy 11:24). The Bible says several things, and they sit side by side. Moses had tied it to a condition: "For if you shall diligently keep all these commandments which I command you… then the LORD will drive out all these nations from before you" (Deuteronomy 11:22-23). Late in the book, "So the LORD gave to Israel all the land which he swore to give to their fathers. They possessed it, and lived in it" (21:43), and "Nothing failed of any good thing which the LORD had spoken" (21:45). Yet the LORD also tells the old Joshua, "there remains yet very much land to be possessed" (13:1), and after his death says, "I also will no longer drive out any of the nations that Joshua left when he died" (Judges 2:21). Later, "Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms from the River to the land of the Philistines, and to the border of Egypt" (1 Kings 4:21). This chapter doesn't say when all of it would be held; it gives the borders and the promise, "I have given you" (1:3).

The verses

“I have given you every place that the sole of your foot will tread on, as I told Moses. From the wilderness and this Lebanon even to the great river, the river Euphrates, all the land of the Hittites, and to the great sea toward the going down of the sun, shall be your border.”
Joshua 1:3-4 · World English Bible
“In that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, “I have given this land to your offspring, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates:”
Genesis 15:18 · World English Bible
“For if you shall diligently keep all these commandments which I command you—to do them, to love the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, and to cling to him— then the LORD will drive out all these nations from before you, and you shall dispossess nations greater and mightier than yourselves. Every place on which the sole of your foot treads shall be yours: from the wilderness and Lebanon, from the river, the river Euphrates, even to the western sea shall be your border.”
Deuteronomy 11:22-24 · World English Bible
“So the LORD gave to Israel all the land which he swore to give to their fathers. They possessed it, and lived in it.”
Joshua 21:43 · World English Bible

From Favor's study of Joshua 1

Joshua 1: Arise, go across this Jordan

"Meditate" in 1:8 is a Hebrew verb used both for murmuring and for musing, and it comes right after "shall not depart from your mouth". In the WEB, only Psalm 1:2 also has someone meditate "day and night". And the chapter ends with the LORD's words given back to Joshua by those he leads: "Only be strong and courageous" (1:18).

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Scripture quotations are from the World English Bible, which is in the public domain. Every answer cites the verses it rests on. What we believe · All Bible questions