Joshua 5:4

4 And this is the reason why Joshua did so: all the males of the people who came out of Egypt, all the fighting-men, had been overtaken by death in the waste land on the way, after they came out of Egypt.

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 the Lord said to Joshua, Make yourself stone knives and give the children of Israel circumcision a second time.

3 So Joshua made stone knives and gave the children of Israel circumcision at Gibeath-ha-araloth.

4 And this is the reason why Joshua did so: all the males of the people who came out of Egypt, all the fighting-men, had been overtaken by death in the waste land on the way, after they came out of Egypt.

5 All the people who came out had undergone circumcision; but all the people whose birth had taken place in the waste land on their journey from Egypt had not.

6 For the children of Israel were wandering in the waste land for forty years, till all the nation, that is, all the fighting-men, who had come out of Egypt, were dead, because they did not give ear to the voice of the Lord: to whom the Lord said, with an oath, that he would not let them see the land which the Lord had given his word to their fathers to give us, a land flowing with milk and honey.