The Jordan Opens

Israel camps at the Jordan three days. The officers command: "When ye see the ark of the covenant of the LORD your God, and the priests the Levites bearing it, then ye shall remove from your place, and go after it. Yet there shall be a space between you and it, about two thousand cubits." "Sanctify yourselves: for to morrow the LORD will do wonders among you."

"Hereby ye shall know that the living God is among you." "And as they that bare the ark were come unto Jordan, and the feet of the priests… were dipped in the brim of the water, (for Jordan overfloweth all his banks all the time of harvest,) That the waters which came down from above stood and rose up upon an heap very far from the city Adam, that is beside Zaretan… and the people passed over right against Jericho."

"And the priests that bare the ark… stood firm on dry ground in the midst of Jordan, and all the Israelites passed over on dry ground, until all the people were passed clean over Jordan."

The river in flood

The narrative sets the crossing in the first month, at the barley harvest (4:19; 5:10–11), when snowmelt from Mount Hermon raised the Jordan. Before modern dams and water diversion, the lower Jordan could swell well beyond its channel in spring.

Landslides at Adam

Adam is usually identified with Tell ed-Damiyeh, about 30 km upstream of Jericho, where the river runs between high, soft marl banks. Two blockages are recorded there. The Arab historian al-Nuwayri describes the river stopping for hours in AD 1267 (dated 1266/67) when a bank collapsed. During the earthquake of July 11, 1927, landslides near Damiya blocked the flow, by reports for about 21 hours. These show a natural way the Jordan can stop near Adam. They cannot show that this is what happened in Joshua 3, and the narrative presents the timing at the priests' feet as God's act.

Sea and river