Joshua 9:5

5 They put old, patched sandals on their feet and dressed in worn-out clothes; and took as provisions nothing but dried-up bread that was crumbling to pieces.

Joshua 9:5 Meaning and Commentary

Joshua 9:5

And old shoes and clouted upon their feet
Which being worn out, were patched with various pieces of leather:

and old garments upon them;
full of holes and rents, ragged and patched:

and the bread of their provision was dry [and] mouldy;
having been kept a long time, and unfit for use; or like cakes over baked and burnt, as the Targum and Jarchi: the word for "mouldy" signifies pricked, pointed, spotted, as mouldy bread has in it spots of different colours, as white, red, green, and black, as Kimchi and Ben Melech interpret it; or it signifies bread so dry, as Ben Gersom notes, that it crumbles into pieces easily, with which the Vulgate Latin version agrees; or rather through being long kept, it was become dry and hard like crusts, so Noldius ^F9; or very hard, like bread twice baked, as Castell ^F11.

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FOOTNOTES:

F9 P. 379. No. 1218.
F11 Lex. col. 2395.

Joshua 9:5 In-Context

3 But when the inhabitants of Giv'ah heard what Y'hoshua had done to Yericho and 'Ai,

4 they developed a clever deception: they made themselves look as if they had been on a long journey by putting old sacks on their donkeys and taking used wineskins that had burst and been mended back together.

5 They put old, patched sandals on their feet and dressed in worn-out clothes; and took as provisions nothing but dried-up bread that was crumbling to pieces.

6 Then they went to Y'hoshua in the camp at Gilgal and said to him and the men of Isra'el, "We have come from a country far away. Now, make a covenant with us."

7 The men of Isra'el said to the Hivi, "How do we know that you don't live here among us? If you do, we don't want to make a covenant with you."