Joshua 9:5

5 They put on ragged clothes and worn-out sandals that had been mended. The bread they took with them was dry and moldy.

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.


FOOTNOTES:

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

Joshua 9:5 In-Context

3 But the people of Gibeon, who were Hivites, heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and Ai,
4 and they decided to deceive him. They went and got some food and loaded their donkeys with worn-out sacks and patched-up wineskins.
5 They put on ragged clothes and worn-out sandals that had been mended. The bread they took with them was dry and moldy.
6 Then they went to the camp at Gilgal and said to Joshua and the Israelites, "We have come from a distant land. We want you to make a treaty with us."
7 But the Israelites said, "Why should we make a treaty with you? Maybe you live nearby."
Scripture taken from the Good News Translation - Second Edition, Copyright 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by Permission.