Joshua 5:4

4 This [is] the reason why Joshua circumcised all the people: all the males who went out from Egypt, all the warriors, died in the wilderness as they went out from Egypt {on the journey}.

Joshua 5:4 Meaning and Commentary

Joshua 5:4

And this [is] the cause why Joshua did circumcise
Or the reason of the command given him to circumcise the children of Israel at this time, namely, what follows:

all the people that came out of Egypt [that were] males, [even] all
the men of war;
meaning such that were twenty years old, and upwards:

died in the wilderness, by the way, after they came out of Egypt;
not directly, but in a course of forty years, as they journeyed through the wilderness; this is to be understood with an exception of Joshua, Caleb, Eleazar but then there was a large number who were under twenty years of age, that came out of Egypt, and were now living.

Joshua 5:4 In-Context

2 At that time Yahweh said to Joshua, "Make for yourself knives of flint, and circumcise the {Israelites} a second time."

3 So Joshua made knives of flint, and he circumcised the {Israelites} at the hill of the foreskins.

4 This [is] the reason why Joshua circumcised all the people: all the males who went out from Egypt, all the warriors, died in the wilderness as they went out from Egypt {on the journey}.

5 For all the people who left were circumcised, but all the people born in the wilderness {on the journey} [after] they left from Egypt were not circumcised.

6 For forty years the {Israelites} traveled in the wilderness until all the nation, the warriors that left Egypt, perished, because they did not listen to the voice of Yahweh. To them Yahweh swore that they would not see the land that he swore to their ancestors to give to us, a land flowing with milk and honey.

Footnotes

• [a]. Literally "on the road"