And the people came up out of Jordan on the tenth day of the first month, and encamped in Gilgal, in the east border of Jericho.
The people came up out of Jordan on the tenth day of the first month - i:e., the month Nisan, four days before the Passover, and the very day when the paschal lamb required to be set apart, the providence of God having arranged that the entrance into the promised land should be at the feast.
And encamped in Gilgal. The name is here given by anticipation (see the note at Joshua 5:9). It was a tract of land, according to Josephus ('Antiquities,' b. 5:, ch. 4:, sec. 2), fifty stadia (six and a half miles) from Jordan, and ten stadia (one and a quarter miles) from Jericho, at the eastern outskirts of the palm forest, and in the vicinity of the village Riha. But, according to Robinson, no trace either of its name or site remains.