Carl Friedrich Keil and Franz Delitzsch Old Testament Commentary

Joshua then commanded the five kings to be fetched out of the cave, and directed the leaders of the army to set their feet upon the necks of the kings; and when this had been done, he ordered the kings to be put to death, and to be hanged upon trees until the evening, when their bodies were to be thrown into the cave in which they had concealed themselves. Of course this did not take place till the day after the battle, as the army could not return from their pursuit of the foe to the camp at Makkedah till the night after the battle; possibly it did not take place till the second day, if the pursuit had lasted any longer. In Jos 10:24, "all the men of Israel" are all the warriors in the camp. ההלכוּא, with ה artic., instead of the relative pronoun (see Ges. 109; Ew. 331, b.); and the ending וּא for וּ or וּן, as in Isa 28:12 (see Ew. 190, b.). The fact that the military leaders set their feet at Joshua's command upon the necks of the conquered kings, was not a sign of barbarity, which it is necessary to excuse by comparing it with still greater barbarities on the part of the Canaanites, as in Jdg 1:7, but was a symbolical act, a sign of complete subjugation, which was customary in this sense even in the Eastern empire (see Bynaeus de calceis, p. 318, and Constant. Porphyrogen de cerimon. aulae Byzant. ii. 19). It was also intended in this instance to stimulate the Israelites to further conflict with the Canaanites. This is stated in the words of Joshua (Jos 10:25): "Fear not, nor be dismayed (vid., Jos 1:9; Jos 8:1); for thus shall the Lord do to all your enemies." On the putting to death and then hanging, see Jos 8:29 and Deu 21:22-23. The words וגו ויּשׂימוּ (Jos 10:27) are generally understood as signifying, that after the bodies of the kings had been cast into the cave, the Israelites placed large stones before the entrance, just as in other cases heaps of stones were piled upon the graves of criminals that had been executed (vid., Jos 7:25), and that these stones remained there till the account before us was written. But this leaves the words עצם עד unexplained, as עצם never occurs in any other case where the formula "until this day" is used with the simple meaning that a thing had continued to the writer's own time. הזּה היּום עצם expresses the thought that the day referred to was the very same day about which the author was writing, and no other (see Jos 5:11; Gen 7:13; Gen 17:23; Exo 12:17, etc.). If, therefore, it has any meaning at all in the present instance, we must connect the whole clause with the one preceding, and even construe it as a relative clause: "where they (the kings) had hidden themselves, and they (the Israelites) had placed large stones at the mouth of the cave until that very day" (on which the kings were fetched out and executed).