Both of these Rahab prescribed to them thus, v. 16: “Go up to the mountains, lest perhaps [those] returning meet you; and there lie hidden three days, until they return, and so you shall go your way.” [Those] who had been sent by the King to capture the Israelites’ spies, our Interpreter calls “[those] returning,” to express more [clearly] how they could meet these [spies]; but in the Hebrew and Greek these same are here called twice “[those] pursuing the spies themselves,” οἱ καταδιώκοντες ὀπίσω αὐτῶν [hoi katadiōkontes opisō autōn, “those pursuing after them”]. Rightly indeed did Rahab advise them to go to the mountains — that is, into a place contrary, either wholly or nearly, to [that] which the royal guards would think. For, as [was] said [in] part 1, ch. quest. 4, Jericho was girt by mountains toward the West, the North, and the South; but the Jordan itself was to the East. The royal pursuers, therefore, advanced toward the river, by which [route] they judged these [spies] to be hastening to their camp. If the spies had gone straight by the same [route], those [pursuers] could, while they retraced [their] step, have met these [spies], or even, while they now and then looked back, have somehow seen them even through the darkness, or at least heard [them] — since the nocturnal silences betray even the least footsteps, especially among those who are then seeking something with mind, eyes, and ears. Three days she fixed for them for lying hidden — because that was consonant to the guarding of their safety, [so] that neither less nor more were needed. Not less, because (as [was] said [in] that same quest. 4) from Jericho to the Jordan there were 60 stadia — that is, 7½ Italian miles, our [miles being]—
(col. 371)
—[our miles being] about two [to the Italian], that is, one and ¼. Because, therefore, in the evening — when the city gates were to be shut — these guards went out, they reached the Jordan in good time, before midnight. Let us grant [that] they went now up, now down, to this ford and that, or halted, and silently considered [everything], and shook out [searched] all — hedges, thickets, ridges, streams, roads, and all the neighbouring hiding-places. For [there] was no time for sleeping. But, if [one] please, [suppose] they even slept: they could, at daybreak, survey everything more accurately, betake themselves hither and thither, and yet return in good time, still before midday. Nevertheless, lest — if they perhaps tarried longer, or, by lingering somewhere, kept watch — the good spies fall upon them, it was most safely provided for them [i.e. Rahab’s counsel] that they should rest hidden that whole day and night, and not put themselves on the road. Nor was [it] needful to lie hidden more than three days. For [as to] those whom they [the pursuers] had not overtaken, they could suppose [them] to have advanced with excessive speed, and to have anticipated the crossing of the Jordan before they themselves came. Then the King’s expectation pressed them [the pursuers], desiring to be at once made more certain about the whole matter; perhaps hunger too recalled [them] home. For [it is] not likely [that] they had carried food with them for so sudden an excursion. And therefore, [for the spies] to proceed most gladly, or scout most carefully, and see everything through, one night — and as much of the following day as they pleased — was abundantly enough for them. And thus, without any peril, the Israelites’ spies could return to Joshua.
There will therefore have been only a certain synecdoche in “those three days” — because only some part of the first and last [day] was spent in hiding; just as the Lord is handed down [to have] risen “on the third day,” and [as] it everywhere happens that the time of night which was before sleep is attributed to the preceding day. And therefore they returned to Joshua on the third day from [their] departure — that is, on the 4th or 5th day of the first month, as [was] expounded above, part 1, ch. quest. 5. But did Rahab fix that three-day term by human prudence so aptly? or rather by divine inspiration? This latter Rabbi Solomon [Rashi] and other Talmudists assert — “which,” says Masius, “we too think [is] not to be refuted”; although [it is] not absurd [that] a prudent and clever woman used human conjectures prudently.