‘ And Joshua tore his clothes, and fell to the earth on his face before the ark of YHWH until the evening, he and the elders of Israel, and put dust on their heads.'
Meanwhile Joshua was desperately concerned to discover what had gone wrong. The tearing of clothes in a formal way was an ancient method of expressing grief and distress (compare Genesis 37:29; Genesis 44:13; 2 Samuel 1:11). As was dust on their heads (Job 2:12). Joshua knew that something was amiss. He could not understand why YHWH had not acted for them. So he and the leading men of Israel spent the remainder of the day prostrated before ‘the Ark of YHWH'. Why had the God of battle failed them? While the Ark had not been taken up the ascent it was probably outside and uncovered in view of the battle to take place.