The account of the death and burial of Joshua in the Masoretic Text of Joshua 24:29–33 contains no description of an earthquake. It records Joshua's death at the age of 110 and his burial at Timnath-serah in the hill country of Ephraim, "north of Mount Gaash." The account subsequently records the burial of the bones of Joseph at Shechem and the death and burial of Eleazar. Thus, the biblical account provides a geographical reference to Mount Gaash but does not state that the ground shook during or after Joshua's death or burial.

A much later earthquake tradition is preserved in Ruth Rabbah. In its introductory exposition, Ruth Rabbah cites Joshua 24:30 and focuses specifically on the statement that Joshua was buried north of Gaash. Rabbi Berekhya remarks that he could find no other place in scripture bearing the name Gaash and asks what the name signifies.

Ruth Rabbah answers this question through Hebrew wordplay. It relates Gaash to the root ג־ע־שׁ (g-ʿ-sh), associated with shaking, quaking, heaving, or violent agitation. The midrash states that the Israelites had neglected the proper acts of kindness owed to Joshua because, following the division of the land, they were preoccupied with their fields, vineyards, olives, and other property. It then states explicitly that God sought to "bring an earthquake upon the world, upon all its inhabitants."

To explain this interpretation, Ruth Rabbah quotes Psalm 18:8: וַתִּגְעַשׁ וַתִּרְעַשׁ הָאָרֶץ (vatigʿash vatirʿash ha'aretz), translated approximately as "the earth heaved and shook." The verb וַתִּגְעַשׁ (vatigʿash) derives from the same ג־ע־שׁ root associated with the name Gaash. The verse also places this verb beside וַתִּרְעַשׁ (vatirʿash), from the root ר־ע־שׁ (r-ʿ-sh), another Hebrew root denoting shaking or quaking. Ruth Rabbah therefore constructs an explicitly seismic interpretation of the otherwise unexplained place-name in Joshua 24:30.

The evidence consequently consists of two very different textual traditions. The Masoretic Text of Joshua preserves the potentially suggestive place-name Gaash but reports no earthquake. Ruth Rabbah, composed many centuries later, explicitly associates Joshua's burial with an earthquake through an exegetical interpretation of that place-name and Psalm 18:8. Ruth Rabbah therefore provides evidence for the existence of a later Jewish tradition associating Joshua's death and burial with seismic shaking, but it cannot establish that such a tradition was present when the Book of Joshua was composed or that an historical earthquake accompanied Joshua's burial.

Joshua's burial place is identified in the Masoretic Text as Timnath-serah in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash. Timnath-serah is traditionally associated with Khirbet Tibnah.