CHAPTER X

JOSHUA AND THE CONQUEST OF CANAAN

WHEN Moses died the leadership of the people passed to his minister, Joshua, who was of the tribe of Ephraim. The great task which lay before him might have appalled any man. He was encouraged by God, who said “Every place that the sole of your foot shall tread upon, to you have I given it as I spake unto Moses. Be strong and of a good courage, . . . only be strong and very cour­ageous, to observe to do according to all the law which Moses my servant commanded thee.” God said something more, “This book of the law shall not depart out of thy mouth, but thou shalt meditate therein day and night, that thou mayest observe to do according to all that is written therein.” A book of the law of the Lord which had been written by Moses was already in existence.

Rahab and the spies

Joshua commenced his leadership by sending two men to view the land. Immediately across the Jordan was the city of Jericho, and there the two men lodged in the house of a harlot named Rahab. The king of the city sent to fetch them, but Rahab, whose house was on the town walls, hid them on the roof, covered them with flax, and told the king’s messengers that they had already left. When the messengers had gone she went up to the spies and told them that the fear of Israel had seized all the people of the district. Reports had reached them of the happenings in Egypt forty years before. In return for her help they promised that her life, and the lives of her relatives should be spared. She was to place a scarlet thread in her window so that they might recognise the house and spare all who were therein. Three days later the men returned to Joshua with the news that “all the inhabitants of the land do melt away because of us.”

Crossing the Jordan

Preparations were then made for crossing the Jordan. The priests were to bear the ark, and the people were to follow. As soon as the feet of the priests were dipped in the brink of the water, the waters rose up as a heap “a great way off at Adam, the city that is beside Zarethan,” while those that flowed to the Dead Sea failed and were cut off, thus allowing the people to cross over the bed of the river. News of this event travelled through the country, and the inhabitants of Jericho and the districts around realised that God was working for Israel. Before the Jordan re-commenced its flow twelve stones were taken from the bed of the river and placed on the west side in a circle, at a place called Gilgal, a name which means a wheel or a circle, to be a perpetual reminder of the crossing of the river.

Safely across, an important ceremony took place. Circumcision, the token of the covenant made with Abraham, had not been practised during the wilder­ness journey. It was necessary for it to be performed now, for all that was to follow was related to that covenant. As in the case of the circumcision of the sons of Moses sharp flints were used. After the rite had been performed it was said, “I have rolled away the reproach of Egypt from off you.” It was a play on the name “Gilgal” which thus obtained a double significance. Simultaneously with this event the supply of manna ceased.

Before the people advanced against Jericho Joshua saw a man beside him with a drawn sword in his hand. Toshua asked whether he were for them or for their enemies. His answer was startling, “Nay, but as captain of the host of the Lord am I now come.” Joshua recognised him as an angel, but nothing is recorded of what was said or done on the occasion.

The fall of Jericho

The siege of Jericho is one of the most peculiar episodes in the history of war. The army of Israel, with a company of priests carrying the ark of the covenant and seven trumpets made of rams’ horns, encompassed the city in silence once every day for six days. On the seventh day they marched round the walls seven times; then at a given signal, the priests blew with the trumpets and the people gave a great shout, “and it came to pass that the wall fell down flat.” We know now that the wall fell outwards so that the invaders might more easily enter the city. One part of it escaped, the portion where the house of Rahab stood, and where her father and kinsfolk were gathered. All the rest of the inhabitants were destroyed, and the city was burned. Later on Rahab was married to Salmon of the tribe of Judah, and became an ancestress of Jesus of Nazareth.

Before the fall of Jericho, Joshua had proclaimed all the city to be devoted to the Lord; and that all the spoil was to be placed in the treasury. He also pronounced a curse on anyone who attempted to rebuild the city.

Jubilant at the outcome of the first siege the Israelites went into the hill country to Ai. Confident of success only a portion of the armed men were used. Their confidence was misplaced, for they were defeated and driven back with loss. Joshua was dismayed; a reverse at this stage was likely to undo the effect of the crossing of the Jordan and the capture of Jericho. He fell on his face before the Lord. Then he learned the reason for the reverse; he was told “Israel hath sinned, they have trans­gressed My covenant; yea, they have even taken of the devoted thing.”

The culprit was identified by lot, which finally fell on Achan of the tribe of Judah. Thus identified, Achan confessed that he had taken a wedge of gold, two hundred shekels of silver, and a Babylonish gar­ment, and had hidden them in his tent. He had stolen that which belonged to God, and he, and all his, were stoned at a spot named the Valley of Achor (troubling). Seven hundred years later the prophet Hosea told of a time when the Valley of Achor should become a door of hope for the people of Israel.

The sin of Achan having been punished Ai was again attacked. This time stratagem was employed and the city was taken; it was burned and the whole of its inhabitants were put to the sword.

The fall of Jericho and Ai gave Israel a position in the country, and Joshua moved to Mount Ebal, where he erected an altar to the Lord. He inscribed a copy of the law of Moses (probably the ten Com­mandments) on stones. Then in a great assembly of the people he read the law from the book that Moses had written, and the blessings and cursings which Moses had pronounced on the obedient and dis­obedient respectively. It was a solemn dedication of the nation to be the people of God in the land that had been promised to their fathers.

Victory

The news of the fall of Jericho and Ai caused consternation in the country. The next cities on the direct route from Ai were Gibeon and certain cities that were confederate with it. They dared not challenge the might of Joshua, so they sought to beguile him. The elders of the cities came to Gilgal, whither he had returned, wearing old garments, and carrying old wineskins, and bread that was dry and mouldy. They said they had come from a far country and desired to enter into a covenant with Israel. Totally deceived, Joshua and the elders of Israel made a covenant with them. Three days afterwards they found that they were near neighbours; their cities were north-west of Jerusalem. Joshua remon­strated with them, but the oath that had been taken had to be respected, and the Gibeonites and their allies were made to be hewers of wood and drawers of water for the people and for the service of the tabernacle.

Gibeon was a great city, and the covenant that had been made between it and Israel made a deep impression on the kings of Southern Canaan. The kings of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish, and Eglon, combined to make war against Gibeon and its sister cities, whose leaders sent an urgent appeal to Joshua for assistance. Joshua responded, adopting methods that were characteristic of him. He left Gilgal by night and marched eighteen miles from the depths of the valley to the mountains of Judea, and falling unexpectedly on the assembled armies, gained a decisive victory. As the armies of the kings fled down the roads that led westward a violent thunder­storm broke out, and “the Lord cast down great stones from heaven . . . they were more which died with the hailstones than they whom the children of Israel slew.” Anxious to lose none of the advantage of the victory Joshua said,

Sun, stand thou still (or, be silent) upon Gibeon,
And thou moon in the Valley of Aijalon.

“And the sun stayed in the midst of heaven” until Israel had finished the slaughter of their enemies. The victory gave Israel the undisputed supremacy of the southern portion of the land. They held positions of strategical importance from which they could not be dislodged. Several other towns were taken and destroyed, and Joshua returned to the camp at Gilgal.

In the north a still greater coalition was arranged against Israel. There were the kings of Hazor, Madan, Shimron, Achsaph, “all the kings in the mountains and the plains,” as far as Mount Hermon. When their hosts were gathered together they were “as the sand which is on the seashore in multitude,” and they had great numbers of chariots and horses. Tidings of the new threat reaching Gilgal, Joshua went by forced marches and suddenly fell upon the assembled hosts. He gained another overwhelming victory, and the various sections of the enemy army fled in all directions. City after city was destroyed; the only ones that escaped were those that “stood on their mounds,” that is, the fortified cities on the heights above the plain of Esdraelon.

Thus by the capture of two cities, and the defeat of two confederations, Israel obtained practical possession of the Promised Land. There was much more to be done to secure the peaceable occupation of the country, but the land was, to all intents and purposes, won. The great fact which stands out is that the Lord fought for Israel, and that as a result they were invincible.

Dividing the land

Joshua’s work as a soldier was over, though there remained much land to be possessed. But there was another necessary task to be done, one for a statesman and an organiser. The conquest of the land brought many problems. The division of the land between the tribes was a difficult matter, which might have given rise to feelings of jealousy. The tribes of Reuben and Gad and the half tribe of Manasseh had received the land they desired on the east side of the Jordan. Levi was to have no in­heritance, they were to be sustained by the people in return for the religious services they performed. There were nine and a half tribes to be considered. In the conflicts of the past the territory of Judah and that of the sons of Joseph had been fixed-Judah in the south, Ephraim and the other half tribe of Manasseh in the central portion of the land. The possession of Judah was influenced by a promise that had been made to Caleb under which he was given possession of Hebron, and, as he was of the tribe of Judah, it followed that their inheritance must be in the south. The Joseph tribes were very numerous, and complained that their inheritance was not sufficient for them. Joshua told them they must take the additional land they required, driving out the Canaanites who dwelt in it.

The leading tribes having been provided for, the question of the rest had to be determined. A great assembly was held at Shiloh, to which place the tabernacle had been removed from Gilgal. There Joshua addressed them. “How long are ye slack to go in to possess the land which the Lord the God of your fathers, hath given you?” He then directed them to choose out three men from each tribe who should go through the land not already appropriated, describing it by its cities in a book, and dividing it into seven parts. The results of their survey were to be brought to him at Shiloh, where he would cast lots before the Lord for their possessions. Such a course would prevent feelings of jealousy, or charges of favouritism. The work was carried through, and the tribes of Benjamin, Simeon, Zebulon, Issachar, Asher, Naphtali, and Dan, were given their terri­tories. Joshua received an inheritance for himself in Mount Ephraim, where he built a city.

There remained the question of the possessions of the Levites. As the teachers, and the religious workers, of the nation it was not desirable to give them a portion of the land like that of the other tribes. They were needed everywhere to teach the people in the ways of God. The necessity was met by assigning them forty-eight cities in the territories of the various tribes.

One thing more remained to be done. Moses had given instructions that cities of refuge were to be provided, so that any one who killed another un­wittingly might flee thither and find “refuge” from the avenger of blood. It was a necessary provision in those days. One city was to be situate in each of the six geographical divisions of the land, three on each side of the Jordan. They appointed Kedesh in Galilee, Shechem in the centre of the land, and Hebron in the south, and on the east of the river, Bezer in the wilderness, Ramoth in Gilead, and Golon in Bashan. These were Levitical cities, for it was necessary for them to be in the hands of men who knew the Law, and were uninfluenced by tribal feeling.

Joshua’s final address

Joshua’s work was nearly done. He summoned the men of the two and a half tribes whose possessions lay on the east of the Jordan. They had carried out the bargain they had made to help their brethren in the conquest of the land. Now they could return to their families and possessions. In a farewell address Joshua charged them to take heed to keep the law which Moses had commanded them, to love the Lord their God, to walk in all His ways, and to serve Him with all their heart and with all their soul.

The two and a half tribes crossed the Jordan to reach their homes. Before they crossed, they erected a great altar by the river. News of this reached the rest of the people, who regarded it as a departure from the Lord, whose altar was in the tabernacle enclosure. They pursued the two and a half tribes purposing to fight against them, for their action seemed a rejection of the one thing that bound the twelve tribes together-the worship of Yahweh, the God of Israel. When they came to Jordan the eastern tribes gave an explanation of their action. The altar was not for sacrifice; it was a memorial. Instead of being an indication of the rejection of the worship of Yahweh it was a witness that the people were one in family and in worship. “Yahweh, El Elohim, Yahweh, El Elohim,” the eastern tribes said, “He knoweth, and Israel, he shall know, if it be in rebel­lion, or if in trespass against the Lord, that we have built up an altar.” The solemn repetition of three names of the Deity, and the assurance of the object for which the altar had been made, were grateful tidings to the rest of the tribes, who returned to their homes well content with the unity of the nation in the worship of the One True God.

Joshua was now an old man. Once more he called the people to him; this time at Shechem. He exhorted them to do all that was written in the Book of the law of Moses. He reminded them that in the past their ancestors had worshipped other gods, and that the One God had made promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He recounted the history of the deliver­ance from Egypt and the conquest of the land, and finished with these words, which are characteristic of the man. “Choose you this day whom ye will serve, whether the gods which your fathers served that were beyond the River (i.e. the Euphrates), or the gods of the Amorites in whose land ye dwell; but as for me and my house we will serve the Lord.”
When the people replied that they would serve the Lord he pointed out the seriousness of their under­taking. Yahweh was a jealous God; if they forsook Him after electing to serve Him, He would do them hurt. Again they replied, “Nay, but we will serve the Lord.” Then Joshua made a covenant with them, and established a statute and an ordinance in Shechem. Finally he wrote a record of the event in the book of the law of God.

Joshua died at the age of a hundred and ten years, leaving a great example to guide the people in the future.