Into the "Promised Land"
Summary of Joshua
Joshua continues the story onward from the end of Deuteronomy. Moses has died, his assistant Joshua is now leader of the Israelites, and has been given responsibility for leading their entry into the Promised Land. As Moses had done forty years prior in the narrative, Joshua sends scouts to examine the land (Josh 2:1a). They check the first city on the list of potential conquest across the Jordan, Jericho, and are helped by a woman named Rahab, who hides the spies in her house as they complete their surveillance (Josh 2:1b-21).
In contrast to the panicked fear in the Book of Numbers, the scout reports are positive (Josh 2:24), and shortly after, the invasion commences. The Israelites miraculously capture Jericho (Josh 6) after miraculously crossing the Jordan River (Josh 3). As per their instructions (6:16-18), they proceed to massacre the entire city except for Rahab, who helped the spies hide, and her family. Everything is destroyed, with gold and silver saved for the Tabernacle treasury (6:24-25).
The one hiccup in the process is created by a man named Achan, who kept some of the gold and silver objects for himself (Josh 7:1). So God allows thirty-six Israelites to be killed in the next battle (Josh 7:5). An investigation takes place, Achan confesses, and Joshua leads the people in restitution. Taking Achan, his family, the gold and silver and all of his possessions including his animals and tents, they stone him and his family to death, and burn the corpses and everything he owned (Josh 7:25).
Joshua treats the city of Ai similarly, massacring 12,000 people (Josh 8:25). They enslave the people of Gibeon, who tricked Israel into not massacring them (Josh 9:22). Then further massacres proceed, as they destroy everyone in the cities named Makkedah, Libnah, Lacshish, Gezer, Debir and a number of other places (Josh 10:28-42). The slaughter then continues over chapters 11,12 and 13.
Having destroyed most of their major adversaries (according to chapter 13, a number of nations do still remain), the Israelites proceed in the allocation and division of territory between the Twelve Tribes (Josh 13:8–22:9). A farewell address is then given by Joshua, before he dies.
What Joshua may have meant to its original audience...
Joshua makes one key point, and makes it very clearly for its audience: that the land was promised to the Israelites, and the Israelites have a right to take it. This is a nationalistic text, making a claim to something akin to the notion of ‘manifest destiny’ in some sectors of the 19th century United States—the belief that God had ordained the expansion of this people across this land.
The deaths, destruction and division all serve to illustrate the belief of its authors and audience that the land was meant for the Israelites alone. It was likely written somewhere from between the end of Israelite rule (around the time of Josiah) through to the return from exile… a time when strengthening national identity was really important. For reasons outlined further below, it is probably less a historical text, and more idealistic. This doesn’t help the dark themes of the book to become more palatable, as it demonstrates a very clear preference towards extermination of enemies in the pursuit of God and national identity.
How Jesus might have read Joshua...
The name Jesus is simply the English version of the Greek ‘Yesous’, itself simply a Hellenised version of the Hebrew ‘Joshua’ or ‘Yeshua’, meaning ‘to deliver’ or ‘to save’. The similarity in names is where comparisons between Jesus and the Book of Joshua should really end. Although some people might point out that both sought to serve God and save people, the reality is that one did this in stories of massacring thousands of men, women and children, while the other taught love and compassion, and was killed for it.
It is difficult to reconcile the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth to love and pray for enemies (Matt 5:44, also see Luke 6:27), to ‘be a neighbor’ to your enemies (Luke 10). Joshua called for the extermination of others, while Jesus includes them.
What Joshua might mean for our faith today...
There is not a lot to like about the Book of Joshua. We can acknowledge the part it plays in the broader narrative of Israel, helping to connect the nomadic period of the wilderness with the settled kingdoms of their later stories.
Many Christians certainly try to like it, however. They perhaps try to see a connection between Joshua and Jesus as ‘saviours’ of their people. One approach is to try and justify the violence, pointing out the evil of the pagan-worshipping Canaanites (although this isn’t really mentioned as a justification, even by the text itself).
This article by Lawson Stone is one example of the type that looks to outright excuse the violence. Among the explanations given are that it was okay because God sanctioned the violence, and that violence was only committed by way of demonstrating love for God. Also, that the Canaanites were often the aggressors (note: this is after Jericho and Ai were completely destroyed).
These two articles (a and b - These are part of a seven-part series. The other articles can be accessed via the ‘a’ article) by Matt Lynch are interesting in that they demonstrate a really detailed look at the texts, and do a solid job of grappling with the complexity of the text using linguistic and exegetical interpretation. The articles, however, still appear to take the view that the severity of Joshua teaches us something valuable about God. After a well-researched, considered and thoughtful approach to many nuances in the text, the author writes “…it’s critical to remain open to receiving a challenging word from the OT—an OT that is other than us. This applies not only to the words of Joshua, but also to the words of Jesus, which are sometimes shocking” (Matt Lynch, “Joshua and Violence”, 22/6/2016). You may wish to read them for yourself – some really interesting observations are made by the author. For example, he points out the stories of sparing Rahab's family and also the Gibeonites as examples that it is not a complete ethnic cleansing (that may be small comfort to the citizens of Ai and Jericho, however).
However, what all these responses assume is that everything in the Bible carries deep spiritual truth for us today. While we can certainly learn something from each text of the Bible, it can be a mistake to assume that all stories about people acting in God’s name are positively instructive. Rather, we may consider that some stories, such as Joshua, are cautionary tales. Rather than showing us what God thinks, perhaps Joshua is better read as a story that illustrates what happens when we think that God is a conquering warrior figure. After all, Jesus tells his disciples to put away their swords.
More remarkable than an example of a powerful military God, Joshua shows us the confronting consequences of humans killing out of misguided religion. Jesus comes to challenge this narrative, and place us on a new direction. We must read such texts through a Jesus lens, rather than trying to fit a violent misappropriation of God into the Gospel story.
Some important questions to ask about this book...
+ The Walls of Jericho?
The first city to be destroyed in the book of Joshua is Jericho. The encounter is famous for the miraculous destruction of Jericho's walls.
The incident has become a flashpoint for debate around the ‘historicity’ of the Bible.
Lorenzo Nigro at Biblical Odyssey describes some of the challenges with the passages, noting that the key archaeological explorations at the site demonstrate the absence of walls and even population at Jericho in the time period of any Israelites conquest, pointing out that the major structures at the site are much older than the Biblical account. More ‘apologetic’ approaches argue that methods used to date the ruins at Jericho (ie. carbon dating) are incorrect.
One's position on this debate largely depends on your approach toward reading the Bible. Does science inform your reading of the Bible, or does your belief in the Bible shape your response to science? Your response will largely depend on what you believe about the Bible.
+ Ancient Extremists?
The vision promoted by the Israelites in the book of Joshua make for some grim reading: a warlike nation, devoted to the supremecy of one God, enforcing strict racial segregation accompanied by wholesale destruction of opposition and the redistribution of land among the successful conquerers. The story sounds like a disturbing mash-up of some of the worst parts of human history: the crusades, segregation in the United States, apartheid South Africa, extreme nationalism anywhere, colonialism everywhere, and the various modern manifestations of religious terrorism across the world in the 21st century.
If we were to only read the story from the perspective of its writers, those who believe that God is justifying and encouraging their behaviour, then we may find aspects of it less problematic. Yes, the behaviour seems bad, but it was necessary because those that are being killed are even worse! or God had already promised this land to the Israelites - they are only fulfilling God's promises or the catch-all answer when something in our belief system directly contrasts with something in our ethical system "God's ways are not our ways"... usually followed by a collection of platitudes or phrases that diminishes or dismisses any potential suffering on behalf of the victims of the Twelve Tribes.
"These are the people of God" we tell ourselves "this must somehow be different from what it looks like!" However, the answer may be simpler than we think. Perhaps the Israelites were no different from any of their neighbours! Locked in a battle for resources, cultural identity, and political power, one possible explanation of the severe response of the Israelites to their neighbours is that they were doing exactly what conquering bronze-age (or any other age!) warrior people did when they decided to settle land - take what they want, and justify their activity in writing.
Of course, that doesn't mean they were being sneaky or manipulative in what they were writing. It's quite likely that they believed that their success in establishing their own land was due to God's provenance (provision). But believing this does not change the facts of their actions, which make them no different to other extremist regimes to follow.
From a theological perspective, the question we must therefore ask is this: what do we do with these extremists texts? Do we justify them? Do we challenge them? Redeem them? Hide from them? Can we respond in more than one of these ways at once?
Perhaps Jesus doesn't allow us to sympathise with the conquerers of stories like this. Perhaps it simply exists as an example of people behaving badly, due to an inadequate understanding of God. What do you think?
+ All texts are not equal
The Book of Joshua serves as an important reminder as to why all books of the Bible cannot be read in the same way. We must read it with one eye open to a fairly brutal chapter of human existence where the world was seen as divided into extremes: Good versus evil, clean versus unclean, holy versus impure.
Yet not all stories of the time periods in question (whether from the immediate setting of the story, or when it was written down several hundred years later) follow the same pattern. Soon after Joshua comes the remarkable story of Ruth - where Israelites and their neighbours are peacefully coexisting, despite their religious differences.
If the story of Joshua seems extreme in its violence, then it stands in dramatic contrast to the book of Ruth demonstrates that peaceful coexistance is indeed an option for the Israelites.