Cross the Jordan River

Today as we walk or drive, we move quickly and easily over flowing rivers, giving little thought to our crossing and never pausing to contemplate the deeper significance of the moment. In order to capture all the Old Testament has to offer, we need to pay special attention to those instances when the Jordan River was crossed so we can appreciate both the realities of the crossing and the connotations linked to it.

Both bridges and ferries were available to cross rivers in Mesopotamia and Egypt during the time of the Old Testament. There is no evidence, however, that such devices were used in Israel and no mention of them within the pages of the Old Testament.[45] So we presume that when people crossed the Jordan River, they did so using natural fords. Fords typically occur where tributaries join the river, making the riverbed shallow with the silt they contribute. At such natural fords, one can more easily wade across the river or, if necessary, inflate a goatskin and float past those segments too deep to wade.[46] Natural fords on the Jordan occur opposite Adam, Beth Shan, and Jericho. During Bible times, those locations favored travelers except during the spring floods. Then the fords of the Jordan were susceptible to problems like those of other fords of the ancient world.[47] The water became more turbid, the approaches muddy, the water deep, and the current strong. The perils associated with crossing a ford during flood stage made heroes of those who successfully accomplished this feat (1 Chron. 12:14–15).

As the Israelites prepared to cross the Jordan River from the plains of Moab, Moses could only glimpse the Promised Land from the ridge on the horizon.

Certainly people crossed the Jordan River many times during the course of conducting family visits and business, but when such crossings are mentioned by the biblical authors, we need to consider their importance and connotations. Those connotations flowed from the first crossing of the Israelites into the Promised Land. The link between the land of Canaan and God’s plan to save the world is made early in the book of Genesis (12:1–3, 6–7). But by the time of Joshua, Abraham’s family had been out of the land for four hundred years. The anticipation of reentry fills the pages of Deuteronomy. Moses repeatedly urged the people to anticipate crossing the Jordan because it meant entering the land God had promised (Deut. 4:14, 21–22, 26; 6:1; 9:1; 11:8, 31; 12:10; 27:2–3; 30:17–18; 31:3, 13; 32:47). This refrain is quickly resumed in the book of Joshua: “Moses my servant is dead. Now then, you and all these people, get ready to cross the Jordan River into the land I am about to give to them—to the Israelites” (Josh. 1:2). When anticipation gives way to reality, the author of Joshua dedicates two full chapters to the actual crossing (Joshua 3–4). And what a crossing it was. God’s people stood before a very inhospitable ford brimming with deep, turbulent, muddy water caused by the spring runoff. As the crossing began, the Lord miraculously cut off the flow of the water, allowing the Israelites to cross on dry ground (Josh. 3:15–17).[48]

The significance of this crossing of the Jordan River lends interpretive energy to many others. The actual crossing still lay in the future when the three Transjordan tribes sought permission to make their homes east of the Jordan. Technically this would preclude crossing the Jordan River to come into their homeland. The request for land east of the Jordan was granted, but Moses insisted that these three and a half tribes be part of the momentous river crossing (Num. 32:6–7, 20–22, 27–32; Deut. 3:18; Josh. 1:14; 4:12–13). When the time came, they crossed but Moses did not. He and Aaron had failed to honor the Lord in the Desert of Zin, so they were not given that privilege (Num. 20:12). Moses, not one to surrender easily, longed to be part of this defining moment in Israel’s history so he pleaded with the Lord, but to no avail (Deut. 3:25–27; 4:21–22). Thus the somber moment of Moses’s passing is further tinged by the prohibition that prevented him from fording the Jordan into the Promised Land (Deut. 34:1–3).

Iron Age fortifications at Beth Shan provide an unrestricted view of the Jordan Valley and particularly of the important ford that lies in the valley floor below the distant ridges.

Subsequent exits and reentries via a Jordan River crossing must also be viewed in light of this first momentous crossing of the Jordan. Consider the negative connotations associated with those who forded the river in order to exit the land of Canaan, essentially reversing the direction of the momentous crossing at the time of Joshua. During the time of Saul, Israelites were fording the river eastward in order to escape the Philistine invasion (1 Sam. 13:7). The defeated Abner crossed the Jordan en route to Mahanaim (2 Sam. 2:29). And David forded to the east as he fled from Absalom, who was intent on wresting the kingdom from his father’s hands (2 Sam. 17:16, 22). In each case, the events of the narrative are made all the more dramatic by the fact that they reverse the entry into the Promised Land.

Those exits make the reentries even more spectacular—recapturing the spirit and excitement of Israel’s entry into the land. Perhaps the most striking example is that of David. After Absalom was defeated, the path was clear for David to return to his capital city via the ford that took him across the Jordan River. The crossing itself would have been a rather simple matter to execute and report, but the biblical author spends some time there with David on the east side of the river. And the longer we linger, the more people show up to make the ceremonial crossing with David—his personal reentry into the land (2 Sam. 19:15–40). For Bible readers, it is important to weigh into our interpretation not only when someone is crossing the Jordan River but also the direction of that crossing.