Joshua 24:26 - Joseph Benson’s Commentary on the Old and New Testaments

Joshua wrote these words Namely, this covenant, or agreement of the people with the Lord. In the book of the law of God That is, in the volume which was kept in the ark, (Deuteronomy 31:9; Deuteronomy 31:26,) whence it was taken and put into this book of Joshua; this he did for the perpetual remembrance of this great and solemn action, to lay the greater obligation upon the people to be true to their engagement; and as a witness for God against the people, if afterward he punished them for their defection from him, to whom they had so solemnly and freely obliged themselves. Set it up As a witness and monument of this great transaction, according to the custom of those ancient times. Possibly this agreement was written upon this stone, as was then usual; under an oak that was by the sanctuary That is, near the place where the ark and tabernacle then were; for though they were forbidden to plant a grove of trees near unto the altar, as the Gentiles did, yet they might for a time set up an altar, or place the ark, near a great tree which had been planted there before.