6Then Joshua tore his clothes, and fell to the ground on his face before the ark of the LORD until the evening, he and the elders of Israel; and they put dust on their heads. 7Joshua said, “Ah, Lord GOD! Why have you brought this people across the Jordan at all, to hand us over to the Amorites so as to destroy us? Would that we had been content to settle beyond the Jordan! 8O Lord, what can I say, now that Israel has turned their backs to their enemies! 9The Canaanites and all the inhabitants of the land will hear of it, and surround us, and cut off our name from the earth. Then what will you do for your great name?”
10The LORD said to Joshua, “Stand up! Why have you fallen upon your face? 11Israel has sinned; they have transgressed my covenant that I imposed on them. They have taken some of the devoted things; they have stolen, they have acted deceitfully, and they have put them among their own belongings. 12Therefore the Israelites are unable to stand before their enemies; they turn their backs to their enemies, because they have become a thing devoted for destruction themselves. I will be with you no more, unless you destroy the devoted things from among you. 13Proceed to sanctify the people, and say, ‘Sanctify yourselves for tomorrow; for thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, “There are devoted things among you, O Israel; you will be unable to stand before your enemies until you take away the devoted things from among you.” 14In the morning therefore you shall come forward tribe by tribe. The tribe that the LORD takes shall come near by clans, the clan that the LORD takes shall come near by households, and the household that the LORD takes shall come near one by one. 15And the one who is taken as having the devoted things shall be burned with fire, together with all that he has, for having transgressed the covenant of the LORD, and for having done an outrageous thing in Israel.’”
16So Joshua rose early in the morning, and brought Israel near tribe by tribe, and the tribe of Judah was taken. 17He brought near the clans of Judah, and the clan of the Zerahites was taken; and he brought near the clan of the Zerahites, family by family,a and Zabdi was taken. 18And he brought near his household one by one, and Achan son of Carmi son of Zabdi son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, was taken. 19Then Joshua said to Achan, “My son, give glory to the LORD God of Israel and make confession to him. Tell me now what you have done; do not hide it from me.” 20And Achan answered Joshua, “It is true; I am the one who sinned against the LORD God of Israel. This is what I did: 21when I saw among the spoil a beautiful mantle from Shinar, and two hundred shekels of silver, and a bar of gold weighing fifty shekels, then I coveted them and took them. They now lie hidden in the ground inside my tent, with the silver underneath.”
22So Joshua sent messengers, and they ran to the tent; and there it was, hidden in his tent with the silver underneath. 23They took them out of the tent and brought them to Joshua and all the Israelites; and they spread them out before the LORD. 24Then Joshua and all Israel with him took Achan son of Zerah, with the silver, the mantle, and the bar of gold, with his sons and daughters, with his oxen, donkeys, and sheep, and his tent and all that he had; and they brought them up to the Valley of Achor. 25Joshua said, “Why did you bring trouble on us? The LORD is bringing trouble on you today.” And all Israel stoned him to death; they burned them with fire, cast stones on them, 26and raised over him a great heap of stones that remains to this day. Then the LORD turned from his burning anger. Therefore that place to this day is called the Valley of Achor.b
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a Mss Syr: MT man by man
b That is Trouble
7.1–26 The first of two attacks at Ai is repulsed. The embarrassing defeat is traced to Achan’s violation of the decree against taking devoted things (6.17–18). The narrative units in ch. 7 are spliced in such a way that the story of Achan (vv. 1, 6–26) is interrupted by the defeat at Ai (vv. 2–5). Ai, lit. “The Ruin,” is identified as et-Tell (Arabic for “The Ruin”), two miles (three kilometers) east of Bethel. During the period described in Joshua, et-Tell was at most a small un-walled village nestled amid the remains of a long-ruined walled city from the third millennium BCE. As in the case of Jericho, this narrative is folklore, not history.
7.1 Details about Achan’s family background portend the procedure by which his crime will be uncovered (vv. 16–18). Even though Achan acted alone in ignoring Joshua’s warning (6.18), the principle of corporate responsibility means that all the Israelites broke faith (cf. v. 11), so that the anger of the LORD is directed against the entire nation.
7.2 Gathering intelligence was sometimes the first step in a sacral war (2.1; Judg 1.23).
7.3 Not all…go up. As in the first reconnaissance (2.24), these spies bring an optimistic report.
7.5 Israel experiences the panic that the enemy is supposed to feel in sacral war: the hearts of the people melted (contrast 2.11; 5.1). Though their losses were only about thirty-six, Israel had been expecting an easy victory.
7.6 Exposure of the guilty one begins with rituals of mourning and penitence (cf. 2 Sam 12.15–16; Job 1.20; Jer 16.6–7; Joel 1.8–14) before the ark of the LORD. The ark focuses the presence of the Lord (3.4, 10–11) and is a medium for human inquiry and divine response (see Judg 20.27–28).
7.7–9 Joshua seeks to prompt divine action by questioning the Lord’s motives and citing possible danger to the Lord’s reputation (your great name, v.9).
7.11 Achan’s crime violates the covenant (also v. 15) and so fundamentally jeopardizes Israel’s relationship with the Lord.
7.12 The defeat at Ai is explained. Items under the cherem ban have a contagious effect, causing the entire nation to pass into the state of being devoted for destruction (see notes on 6.17; 6.18). Thus the Lord’s promise to be with them is in abeyance (cf. 3.7; 6.27).
7.13 Proceed to sanctify, sanctify yourselves. Here the “holiness” root (Hebrew qdsh) is used twice to emphasize that the people must prepare themselves for the Lord’s intervention (cf. 3.5).
7.14–18 The elimination proceeds, most likely by sacred lot, which is explicitly mentioned in the determination of tribal territories (14.2; 18.6). Three concentric circles within which individual identity was established—house, clan, tribe—are the basis of the proceedings. Apparently the lot gave only yes and no answers. Cf. 1 Sam 10.17–24; 14.37–42.
7.15 An outrageous thing in Israel denotes scandalous wrongdoing that puts the whole nation in danger. The purge must be radical, burning up not just the guilty party himself, but also whatever (and whomever; cf. v. 24) the forbidden booty has contaminated.
7.16 Joshua rose early in the morning, indicating his eager obedience (3.1; 6.12).
7.19 Confession is the equivalent of giving glory to the LORD in that it is a recognition of divine justice.
7.21 Mantle from Shinar describes a luxury item imported from Babylon.
7.22 The detail regarding the discovery of the silver underneath confirms Achan’s confession in v. 21.
7.24–26 A stone cairn in the Valley of Achor (Hebrew, “Trouble”) marks the place of Achan’s execution and reminds readers of the trouble (v. 25; cf. 6.18) he caused.
JOSHUA 8
Ai Captured by a Stratagem and Destroyed
1Then the LORD said to Joshua, “Do not fear or be dismayed; take all the fighting men with you, and go up now to Ai. See, I have handed over to you the king of Ai with his people, his city, and his land. 2You shall do to Ai and its king as you did to Jericho and its king; only its spoil and its livestock you may take as booty for yourselves. Set an ambush against the city, behind it.”
3So Joshua and all the fighting men set out to go up against Ai. Joshua chose thirty thousand warriors and sent them out by night 4with the command, “You shall lie in ambush against the city, behind it; do not go very far from the city, but all of you stay alert. 5I and all the people who are with me will approach the city. When they come out against us, as before, we shall flee from them. 6They will come out after us until we have drawn them away from the city; for they will say, ‘They are fleeing from us, as before
.’ While we flee from them, 7you shall rise up from the ambush and seize the city; for the LORD your God will give it into your hand. 8And when you have taken the city, you shall set the city on fire, doing as the LORD has ordered; see, I have commanded you.” 9So Joshua sent them out; and they went to the place of ambush, and lay between Bethel and Ai, to the west of Ai; but Joshua spent that night in the camp.a
10In the morning Joshua rose early and mustered the people, and went up, with the elders of Israel, before the people to Ai. 11All the fighting men who were with him went up, and drew near before the city, and camped on the north side of Ai, with a ravine between them and Ai. 12Taking about five thousand men, he set them in ambush between Bethel and Ai, to the west of the city. 13So they stationed the forces, the main encampment that was north of the city and its rear guard west of the city. But Joshua spent that night in the valley. 14When the king of Ai saw this, he and all his people, the inhabitants of the city, hurried out early in the morning to the meeting place facing the Arabah to meet Israel in battle; but he did not know that there was an ambush against him behind the city. 15And Joshua and all Israel made a pretense of being beaten before them, and fled in the direction of the wilderness. 16So all the people who were in the city were called together to pursue them, and as they pursued Joshua they were drawn away from the city. 17There was not a man left in Ai or Bethel who did not go out after Israel; they left the city open, and pursued Israel.
18Then the LORD said to Joshua, “Stretch out the sword that is in your hand toward Ai; for I will give it into your hand.” And Joshua stretched out the sword that was in his hand toward the city. 19As soon as he stretched out his hand, the troops in ambush rose quickly out of their place and rushed forward. They entered the city, took it, and at once set the city on fire. 20So when the men of Ai looked back, the smoke of the city was rising to the sky. They had no power to flee this way or that, for the people who fled to the wilderness turned back against the pursuers. 21When Joshua and all Israel saw that the ambush had taken the city and that the smoke of the city was rising, then they turned back and struck down the men of Ai. 22And the others came out from the city against them; so they were surrounded by Israelites, some on one side, and some on the other; and Israel struck them down until no one was left who survived or escaped. 23But the king of Ai was taken alive and brought to Joshua.
24When Israel had finished slaughtering all the inhabitants of Ai in the open wilderness where they pursued them, and when all of them to the very last had fallen by the edge of the sword, all Israel returned to Ai, and attacked it with the edge of the sword. 25The total of those who fell that day, both men and women, was twelve thousand—all the people of Ai. 26For Joshua did not draw back his hand, with which he stretched out the sword, until he had utterly destroyed all the inhabitants of Ai. 27Only the livestock and the spoil of that city Israel took as their booty, according to the word of the LORD that he had issued to Joshua. 28So Joshua burned Ai, and made it forever a heap of ruins, as it is to this day. 29And he hanged the king of Ai on a tree until evening; and at sunset Joshua commanded, and they took his body down from the tree, threw it down at the entrance of the gate of the city, and raised over it a great heap of stones, which stands there to this day.
Joshua Renews the Covenant
30Then Joshua built on Mount Ebal an altar to the LORD, the God of Israel, 31just as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded the Israelites, as it is written in the book of the law of Moses, “an altar of unhewnb stones, on which no iron tool has been used” and they offered on it burnt offerings to the LORD, and sacrificed offerings of well-being. 32And there, in the presence of the Israelites, Joshuac wrote on the stones a copy of the law of Moses, which he had written. 33All Israel, alien as well as citizen, with their elders and officers and their judges, stood on opposite sides of the ark in front of the levitical priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the LORD, half of them in front of Mount Gerizim and half of them in front of Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded at the first, that they should bless the people of Israel. 34And afterward he read all the words of the law, blessings and curses, according to all that is written in the book of the law. 35There was not a word of all that Moses commanded that Joshua did not read before all the assembly of Israel, and the women, and the little ones, and the aliens who resided among them.
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a Heb among the people
b Heb whole
c Heb he
8.1–29 Ambush and victory at Ai. Now the Lord takes charge, Joshua and Israel strictly obey orders, and victory is secured.
8.1 Divine encouragement (do not fear or be dismayed) was a traditional element in sacral-war stories (Ex 14.13; Deut 1.21; 3.2; 7.18; 20.1; 31.8).
8.2 Now Israel is to follow a less sweeping pattern of cherem (see notes on 6.17; 6.18). All human inhabitants of Ai are to be killed, but the other booty may be kept as the spoils of war (cf. v. 26–27). The Lord wins this victory (vv. 1, 7, 18) through the strategy of an ambush (cf. Judg 20.29–44).
8.3 Different versions of this story have been blended together. Here the ambush numbers thirty thousand; in v. 12 it totals five thousand.
8.8 The reason for setting the city on fire will only become clear in v. 20.
8.10 The elders share Joshua’s leadership role in 7.6; 20.4; 23.2; 24.1, 31.
8.12–17 Victory depends on luring the fighters of Ai away from the safety of their city wall. Seeing Israel’s main army towards the north (vv. 11, 13), the forces of Ai are lured out of the city. Israel’s feigned retreat draws them even farther away from the safety of the city defenses in the direction of the wilderness (v. 15), i.e., eastward, and thus away from the ambush concealed to the west (vv. 12–13). Ai is completely emptied of its defenders.
8.18–19 The Hebrew uses a special word for the sword that Joshua holds high at the Lord’s command. This is the sickle-shaped sword depicted in Mesopotamian and Egyptian art as symbol of sovereignty. Cf. the outstretched arms of Moses at the battle with Amalek (Ex 17.11). Joshua’s brandished sword calls out the ambush party to attack the undefended city.
8.20–21 The smoke of the city has two effects. It robs the warriors of Ai of their courage and signals the retreating Israelites to turn around and attack.
8.22 Victory is complete when the ambush party comes out of Ai to attack the enemy from behind, so the enemy was surrounded by Israelites.
8.25–27 Following the guidelines given in v. 2, the human inhabitants of Ai are treated as cherem and utterly destroyed, while the animals and material objects are taken as plunder (see notes on 6.17; 6.18).
8.28 Joshua’s action accounts for the name Ai, “The Ruin.”
8.29 Although Joshua is careful not to violate Deut 21.22–23, public exposure of a corpse was a grave affront (1 Sam 31.10). This great heap of stones is one of several well-known landmarks highlighted in Joshua (4.20; 5.3; 7.26; 10.27).
8.30–35 Covenant renewal at Mount Ebal. Mount Ebal on the north and Mount Gerizim on the south flank the pass controlled by Shechem, located about twenty miles (thirty kilometers) north of Ai. Whoever commanded the pass below Ebal could control all the hill country from a point not far north of Jerusalem almost to the plain of Esdraelon (or Jezreel). Most of that extensive territory centering in the neighborhood of Shechem, however, lacks a conquest tradition. Joshua carries out the Lord’s command given to Moses (Deut 11.29–30; 27.2–13) by building an altar and sacrificing, inscribing the law on stones (v. 32), and dividing the people into two groups for blessing and cursing (v. 33). Moses is mentioned five times in this brief unit.
8.30–31 The book of the law of Moses almost certainly refers to the form of Deuteronomy rediscovered during King Josiah’s reign (2 Kings 22; see Introduction). Burnt offerings were consumed entirely by the altar fire, while offerings of well-being were partially consumed by the worshipers as sacrifices establishing or maintaining a relationship with God. V. 31 quotes Deut 27.5.
8.32 He, presumably Joshua, wrote on the stones. These are not the stones of the altar, but standing stone pillars set up in accordance with Deut 27.4. Treaty inscriptions might characteristically be written on plastered stone surfaces (cf. 24.26–27).
8.33 Alien as well as citizen. The inclusive assembly (see also v. 35; Deut 31.12) reflects Deuteronomy’s concern for an egalitarian public policy.
8.34–35 In conformity to Deut 31.10–12, Joshua reads what was written in the book of the law. All is repeated four times in these two verses, emphasizing total obedience. Blessings and curses were standard elements in the Assyrian treaty form appropriated in the theology of Deuteronomy to motivate compliance (see esp. Deut 27–28).
JOSHUA 9
The Gibeonites Save Themselves by Trickery
1Now when all the kings who were beyond the Jordan in the hill country and in the lowland all along the coast of the Great Sea toward Lebanon—the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites—heard of this, 2they gathered together with one accord to fight Joshua and Israel.
3But when the inhabitants of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and to Ai, 4they on their part acted with cunning: they went and prepared provisions,a and took worn-out sacks for their donkeys, and wineskins, worn-out and torn and mended, 5with worn-out, patched sandals on their feet, and worn-out clothes; and all their provisions were dry and moldy. 6They went to Joshua in the camp at Gilgal, and said to him and to the Israelites, “We have come from a far country; so now make a treaty with us.” 7But the Israelites said to the Hivites, “Perhaps you live among us; then how can we make a treaty with you?” 8They said to Joshua, “We are your servants.” And Joshua said to them, “Who are you? And where do you come from?” 9They said to him, “Your servants have come from a very far country, because of the name of the LORD your God; for we have heard a report of him, of all that he did in Egypt, 10and of all that he did to the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan, King Sihon of Heshbon, and King Og of Bashan who lived in Ashtaroth. 11So our elders and all the inhabitants of our country said to us, ‘Take provisions in your hand for the journey; go to meet them, and say to them, “We are your servants; come now, make a treaty with us.” ’ 12Here is our bread; it was still warm when we took it from our houses as our food for the journey, on the day we set out to come to you, but now, see, it is dry and moldy; 13these wineskins were new when we filled them, and see, they are burst; and these garments and sandals of ours are worn out from the very long journey.” 14So the leadersb partook of their provisions, and did not ask direction from the LORD. 15And Joshua made peace with them, guaranteeing their lives by a treaty; and the leaders of the congregation swore an oath to them.
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