What Does Joshua 5:7 Mean?
And their children, whom he raised up in their place, Joshua cut, for they were uncut, because they had not cut them on the road.
Key words are shown with the Hebrew or Greek and what each word meant.
Selah Decoded Version The Selah Decoded Version renders what the Hebrew and Greek words meant to the people who first heard them.
King James wording
King James Version
And their children, whom he raised up in their stead, them Joshua circumcised: for they were uncircumcised, because they had not circumcised them by the way.THE KEY
The next generation is raised into the place of the previous one, yet it still carries what the journey left covered.
THE MEANING
You can stand in a place opened by those before you while something remains unmarked. The verse holds both realities together: a new generation is raised up, yet the journey has left the bodily covenant sign undone. Their arrival does not erase the interruption; the covering makes it visible.
WHAT THIS UNDOES
That being raised into the place of those before you means nothing has been interrupted. The verse shows succession can continue while a defining mark remains undone.
THE ROOT
עֲרֵלִים
ʿarēlîm
GROWS FROM
ערל
Foreskin; to be uncircumcised, with figurative uses for what is covered or closed.
“uncut” in this verse is ʿarēlîm. The verse names a bodily covering, and the same root describes lips, ears, and the heart as uncircumcised. That shared language lets the physical image open onto other kinds of obstruction without erasing the bodily meaning here.
ALSO GROWS
ʿorlat levavkhem: The heart’s foreskin or covering.
עָרְלַת לְבַבְכֶם
Deuteronomy uses the same root to describe a covering around the heart, extending this verse’s bodily image inward.
Uncircumcised ear: An ear described as uncircumcised.
עֲרֵלָה אָזְנָם
Jeremiah uses the root for an ear closed to hearing, revealing how the image can name obstruction in another part of the body.
Uncircumcised lips: Lips described as uncircumcised.
עֲרַל שְׂפָתָיִם
Exodus applies the same root to speech, showing that the language of covering reaches the mouth as well.
הֵקִים
hēqîm
GROWS FROM
קום
Rise or stand; in the causative form, raise, set up, or establish.
“raised up” in this verse is hēqîm. The verb is a causative form of qum: to make stand, raise, or establish. The children are described as stood up in the place of the generation before them, while the verse also names what remains undone.
ALSO GROWS
qûm: Rise or stand.
קוּם
The basic verb shows the action underneath the phrase: the next generation is made to stand where others stood.
māqôm: Place, or standing place.
מָקוֹם
This related word carries the sense of a place to stand, echoing the children’s position in their predecessors’ stead.
hēqîm: Raise up or establish.
הֵקִים
This causative form appears in the verse itself, making succession an act of setting a generation in place.
יְהוֹשֻׁעַ
Yehoshuaʿ
GROWS FROM
ישע
Deliver; bring out from constriction into spaciousness. The name means “the LORD delivers.”
Joshua’s name carries the root yasha, deliverance from narrowness into spaciousness. The name places the act within that nature of deliverance, while the verse keeps the unfinished mark in view.
ALSO GROWS
yāshaʿ: Deliver or bring out.
יָשַׁע
This verb is the root within Joshua’s name and gives the name its nature of deliverance.
yeshuʿāh: Deliverance.
יְשׁוּעָה
This noun grows from the same root, connecting the name with deliverance as an action and a state.
THE PATTERN
Scripture uses circumcision language for a covering around the inner person that can be removed.
So cut the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stiff-necked.To whom shall I speak and bear witness, that they may hear and respond? Behold, their ear is uncircumcised, and they cannot bend it. Behold, the word of the LORD has become to them a taunt; they have no delight in it.But the one in what is covered is a Jew, and the cutting around of the heart is in breath, not in the scratched letter, whose praise is not from humans but from God.THE THREAD
So cut the foreskin of your heart, and be no longer stiff-necked.Deuteronomy names the heart’s covering as עָרְלָה (ʿorlāh, foreskin), from ערל (ʿ-r-l, be uncircumcised), the same root behind “uncircumcised” here. It carries the bodily image into the inner life: a covering can be named as something capable of removal.
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