Bible Survey - Joshua

We are looking at Joshua, having looked at the first five books of the Bible, Deuteronomy last week. So now looking at the book of Joshua, we've got some slides I want us to step through, and you've got some of those on the back of your handout. We have four pages of color printout. I think it's some really cool stuff. So your handout looks like this and we'll be looking at some of these slides here that are on the last page of your handout.

This is where the priests first go across the Jordan River, which is at flood stage. And as they go into the river and hold the Ark of the Covenant, the Lord stops the flow of the Jordan River, which is again at flood stage, overflowing its banks. It is high. It is up there. And the Lord, you know, stops it, backs it up. and so the Israelites, as long as they're standing in the riverbed, the Israelites are able to walk right across. Does that sound familiar? Going across on dry land? This is the site of Old Testament Jericho, which is the first city that they went after.

It's been excavated several times, about a century ago by John Garstang, Kathleen Kenyon, about the time I was born, and more recently, and we'll take a look at some of the slides and pictures, Dr. Brian Wood has investigated it. He spoke in this room here just a little over ten years ago. Yes? So is it on top of that mound?

This mound here is Old Testament Jericho. New Testament Jericho, which you read about, of course, in the Gospels, is right nearby. But Old Testament Jericho is right in here. And what you see here is the remains of the mud brick wall around the perimeter that we'll see closer up. And this is an excavation down into the middle to kind of take a sampling of it. So what you see is, that's the mound, and there are various places where it's been excavated. A major one here, but also there are places around the perimeter where it's been excavated.

And we'll take a closer look at that, and you actually have that in your handout. Here's a computer model of Jericho. Can you go back? Is that the river, the Jordan on the left? No, no, no. This is an actual paved roadway. It goes off here and off. Here's another paved roadway here. Jordan River is way off this direction.

And then here's a computer model of Jericho at the time of the conquest. What they've done is to take what's been seen there in the excavations to date, and they put that together with what you see described in the Bible, and they ended up making a computer model. This is a side one, a lateral view. as the Israelites would have looked at it from the ground. There's another one, I think it's included in your handout, that also shows sort of an oblique view looking down. I don't see the red string hanging out of Ray's head. No, and this is all you notice is kind of white and grayscale.

So was it originally just a big mound of dirt there? built the wall around and built the city on top? Jericho is very old and so it's the original part was kind of a tell that is a mound and so but yes they had a mound and then they built two layers of walls so that's why it would have been very difficult for an enemy to take it on with the technology military technology of the day and you think the Israelites they're not necessarily all that well equipped for their attack and so it's only with the Lord's help that they're able to come in and take it out. And actually Jericho was rebuilt a number of times before the Israelites ever got there. That's where you get this tell where you got a mound with human layers building up this mound.

Between the two walls, was that where the soldiers stayed and everything? Did people live in that room also, or just inside? You could have people living inside, but the point there that even if you were living between the walls, there was a place to retreat. So if you had the lower wall breached, now the people who are attacking have to breach the upper wall. So you could take your key valuables and yourself get into the inner area and that model was followed for a number of centuries in different places. I went to a place in Germany where they had that same kind of phenomenon where you have to attack essentially two sets of walls and defeat two sets of walls.

Here is the section looking, here's the retaining wall and a mud brick wall and the earthen embankment up above it. So that's a sectional view. So here's the retaining wall here. This is an artist's depiction of what it would have been like when the Lord shook the walls and they came down.

And then what happened is the wall, rather than just collapsing randomly, the wall fell out. And it not only broke down the wall, but it made a ramp for the soldiers. The Israelite soldiers could then just simply go straight up the ramp and everything broke down except where Rahab was. So it was not just simply a random, this whole thing fell down, but it was particular in the direction that it fell, because it could have just fallen up and made it harder for the Israelite soldiers. Instead it fell out and made a ramp, but it didn't break where Rahab was located.

Here is Dr. Bryant Wood. Again, he's the fellow that spoke in this room here just a little over a decade ago. He's standing up here. Here is with the mud brick wall excavated and cleaned out. There were actually some structures on the outside. Here is the remains of the stone wall, the lower retaining wall. He's showing how this all went like this and fell out. Now, here's the other thing.

See Joshua 3.15, the Jordan River overflows its banks all the days of the harvest. And by the way, the harvest is different at that low elevation. All the days of the harvest is when the Jordan River is overflowing its banks.

And so, with a fresh harvest, that meant that all the grain was in inside the city walls, right? But the instruction was, burn it all. And so what did the archaeologists find? The archaeologists found jars full of grain burnt. Hmm, just exactly like the Bible says. Here is an ash layer. Here's the white, like you sometimes see with a burn layer, and then a layer underneath it of more black material. And then here is more of the grain. So these jars, they encountered these jars one after the next, full of grain, all burnt. The Israelites did what they were supposed to.

We'll see with an exception. Now, here is Kirbet el-Mekeder. AI is how it's often pronounced. The Hebrews didn't actually pronounce it that way, but we'll do that because that's the way most people pronounce it. So at any rate, it is believed after 11 seasons of excavation to be the biblical AI. We're going to take a look at this part of this panoramic photo here, because it's labeled. Here is Bethel just a couple miles off in the distance, that direction.

Here is the A.I. City Wall from the time of Joshua with houses from the time of Judges built up against it, and the A.I. City Gate from the time of Joshua. They've excavated various things in that area. This structure up in the foreground is actually first century, New Testament time. It so happens that Dr. Wood got his PhD in dating Canaanite pottery, so he's an expert. on that specific field. So when he comes to this and he can look at pieces of broken pottery and tell you the date very accurately.

So here are the gate sockets. What they would do is they would have a large piece of stone and they would have an indentation in it for the base post for the gate. So here is one of the gate sockets and you can see a part of the other one. So that was the gate of AI.

And then here are the sling stones. As of the third season, they found several dozen of them dating from the time of the Israelite attack. Now sling stones, you know, we may not think much of it, but they were apparently very accurate with it. A range up to a quarter mile. And the sling stones, they could sling them at up to 70 miles an hour. It's like having a tennis ball, only it's solid rock, coming at you at 70 miles an hour. With the ability, only if they're putting it over a wall, obviously they can't have quite the accuracy, but if they see a soldier, say up on the wall, they can nail them. It was a pretty formidable military weapon. Actually twice the range of the archers. the guys who hit the sling stones. So yeah, those are sling stones from AI. So anyway, let's with that take into our handout here. What you have at the top is kind of our graphical outline.

And you have first the conquest of Canaan from the beginning into the end of chapter 12, starting with chapter 13, you get the settlement east of the Jordan, and then the settlement west of the Jordan, starting with chapter 14, and with chapter 20, the settlement of the religious community there, and then the conditions for continued settlement in the last couple of chapters. So first they are entering Canaan, then they are conquering Canaan, and then they are dividing it up. Preparation, subjection, and possession is kind of the three stages that it shows there. The first preparation was about a month long. The conquest was about seven years. So if we were to give that some kind of a modern comparison, it would be, you'd be looking at 2021 as when we're done. So that's a fair chunk of time. Yes?

It was the land of the people called the Canaanites, and that's kind of an umbrella term because there are various other subgroupings, the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, and the Jebusites. Different groups or subgroups, but the general name was Canaanite.

Real interesting, a lot of them in the northern part were driven up into what's now Lebanon. And just after I moved here 12 and a half years ago, I actually got an email contact with a guy from Lebanon. He was a Lebanese Christian that had been driven off by the Muslims. And so it was real interesting to talk to this guy because he says, yes, I'm a Canaanite. I'm descended from those who were driven off.

So then you have the settlement, eight years. So this whole process what you see in Joshua is just about 15 years in length. So what we see is there's a transition at the end of Deuteronomy from Moses into Joshua and that transition is not with the exact same terms, but some actually identical, is repeated at the beginning of the book of Joshua, just so that you're caught up to speed with where things are at.

In both places, we see the words, be strong and courageous, that comes out. Be strong and courageous. And by the way, that was a command. That wasn't just an encouragement. Be strong and courageous. And if you disobey Joshua's words, capital punishment. So it's like, you're going to be strong and courageous, and by the way, that's a command. And don't even think of being cowardly.

So, let's go through it. Chapter 1, God speaks to Joshua, so Joshua's getting directions from the Lord. Joshua assumes command and prepares the people of Israel to take the land. Three days we're going in, guys. Get ready. Chapter 2, two spies sent into Jericho and are harbored by Rahab. Rahab is given a promise then that she and anyone in her household, outside no deal, anyone in your household when they come will be preserved. along with any in their house.

In chapter 3, the priests carry the Ark of the Covenant, precede the Israelites by 3,000 feet, 2,000 cubits, so 3,000 feet, begin to cross the Jordan River at flood stage, and the water is stopped upstream, so they all cross on dry ground. I've seen some artist depictions where they have, here's the priest with the Ark of the Covenant, and then right behind them is the Israelites.

And uh-uh, at 3,000 feet ahead, the priests go into the water, and as they go into the water, the water pulls away from where the Israelites are crossing, dries up. Chapter 4, as the Israelites crossed and as Joshua commanded them, they picked up twelve large stones, one for each of the tribes, and when all had crossed, the priests came out of the water and the Jordan returned to its flood flows. The Israelites set the mound of memorial stones in place. So they get the stones across that they picked up from the river, they build them in a mound as a memorial mound. And then in chapter 5, the kings of the Amorites hear of the Jordan River being stopped for the crossing of the Israelites and lose their spirit. It says their hearts melted.

Oh no. Oh no. Yeah, this is terrible. But here's something else that happens. As soon as they step in the land and have their first meal from the produce of the land, the manna stops. So for four decades, they've had manna. Of course, they may even be glad for this, I don't know. But for four decades, they've had this manna. As soon as they step into the Promised Land and have their first meal, having crossed the Jordan River, end of the manna. That all stops.

Joshua has an angelic encounter just before the advance on Jericho. And here it is, Joshua 5, 13-15. Now it came about when Joshua was by Jericho, and he lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold, a man was standing opposite him with his sword drawn in his hand.

And Joshua went to him and said to him, Are you for us or for our adversaries? Which side are you on? So the angel says, No. Wait a minute, that isn't the answer I was expecting, right? The angel says no. No, rather, I indeed come now as captain of the host of the Lord. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth and bowed down and said to him, What has my Lord to say to his servant? And the captain of the Lord's host said to Joshua, Remove your sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy. And Joshua did so. So Joshua is getting a definite sense that, you know, we're not just going in there as human beings. We're not just going in there as human beings. As a matter of fact, this may be one of the things that clues us in.

Why did the walls not just kind of break apart and land randomly? Why didn't they do that? Well, this is a divine action, not just a big earthquake happened to bust things up. So this wasn't an angel actually, it was a theophany movement. I would ordinarily think not, and there's one reason. And that is because what we find on into even later Old Testament books, but certainly starting in Genesis, it says specifically, the angel of the Lord.

And I don't see that wording here. Why didn't you allow him to fall down and worship? Most of the time that doesn't happen, right? No, to remove your sandals from the feet for the place you are standing is holy ground. He recognized his authority in his place, but he didn't fall down and worship. It's holy ground, but I don't see the worship part of it.

If he actually did worship him, then I'd say, yeah, that's a theophany. Didn't it say he fell down? It does say he fell out of space into the earth and bowed down and said to him, It was my Lord to say to a servant, but it wasn't Lord Yahweh, and it wasn't the angel of the Lord. So I think I would fall, I'd come short of calling it a theophany, or an appearance of the Lord.

So was the bush with Moses, was that an angel? No, that was the angel of the Lord. That was the angel of the Lord, which is God speaking. One of the things that you'll see where the term the angel of the Lord is used in these Old Testament books is people will say that I've seen God and you'll have sometimes in some passages an interchange, you'll say the angel of the Lord and then they'll say God and just use it interchangeably.

I'm sorry, what's a theophany? A theophany is, a theo is God, right? And then phanos would be an appearance or an appearance of God. So that's a theophany. So for example, the burning bush is definitely a theophany because it says the angel of the Lord and it actually talks about God.

So it uses interchangeably, and that would be one of the passages, that's Exodus chapter 3. And then the answer, you know, who should Isaiah sent me, I am. In the Greek Old Testament, egoimi. Just like Jesus used it in the New Testament. Okay, let's take a look at page 2. Here you have the oblique view in there, and those kind of black and white and gray shade pictures copy pretty well.

So here's Jericho, the left and oblique view computer model based on biblical description, archaeological investigation, and inference from other archaeological sites. So Joshua, based on God's directions, Joshua chapter 6, had the Israelites go around Jericho once for six days in a row, then seven times on the seventh day. At the end of those seven times around the city on the seventh day, the Israelites all shouted, and God intervened, and mud-brick walls fell outwards."

Well, and one other thing, one other detail, what did he have the priest doing? blowing their horns. And that's one thing that's very interesting is a lot of times we think of the priests and their work in the temple and all that, but that was the priest's military role. The Levites and the priests, their military role was to blow the trumpets. That was their military role. And why would you blow the trumpets? What value would that have?

I would imagine that's similar to even Civil War days and a lot of other wars. They had the bugle and so the enemy could hear and it's kind of scary when you're sitting back and someone's attacking and you hear these sounds. Yeah, here's this really loud trumpet blast.

And there's many of them here. This is also a coordination. Because if people are spread out over some kind of distance, if you want everybody to charge at once, you have to have some method of letting them know, now's the time. Yes, so trumpets were used to startle and disturb the enemy, to make it harder for them to communicate. So they had that. They would also use drums. It was another military instrument. So drums and trumpets were a couple of things that were used real commonly. So then, seven times the seventh day, interesting, seven times the seventh day, and at that, you know, shouting, and then, boom! You imagine these people at Jericho shouting, what is this, you know? All this walking around.

There's kind of an interesting application for us, perhaps. Sometimes when we feel that God has spoken, that something's going to happen, we want it to happen now, just like in the New Testament, looking for the return of Christ immediately. And sometimes God has to kind of prepare us for a time and let us realize that that his timing is a better thing than just rushing in to do what we feel we're called to do. There's preparation involved.

Let's ask that question. Why didn't God just have them, you know, look, as soon as you get everybody in place, I'm going to break down the walls and you guys go to it. Why didn't God just do it that way? Teach them patience. Yeah, one is patience shows God's timing. There's a lesson in God's timing. Okay, what else? Well, He works through people. If He does everything, then they don't have to be strong and courageous. Here the Lord is going to do miraculous things, but He involves them. He didn't have to, but He did.

Good, why else? He wanted a grand entrance. One thing, you could ask another question, why go into Jericho, break down the walls, kill everybody except for Rahab and those with her, burn everything, Why do that? Why not just say, hey, if you guys will surrender after we break your walls down, we're okay. Why kill everyone except for Rahab and whoever's there, and burn everything, even good stuff?

Yeah. Because it says later that all the kings heard this and they became frightened. Ah, yes. The intent was, I'm going to make an event that will be inexplicable. as to how this happened, it won't be just some natural, and it's going to be a complete and total destruction that will make the other kings shaken in their boots. Yes.

Part of the seven days too, the inhabitants of Jericho are found to be going crazy as, what are they doing? Part of it is the preparation, not only of the Israelites, but also in the hearts of their enemies. And another side effect of the burning and destruction is it was devoted to God.

God said, this is your land that I'm giving to you. You're to drive out the people because they're worshipping false gods and carrying on in immoral ways. And I don't want you getting contaminated with any of that. You're supposed to be my people, living by my commands, my way, as Joseph Klein did in the high books. A double side is like sanctification, set apart unto God and set apart away from the world.

Yes. And this was a victory like none other in history. Because God didn't just have him go to every city and do the same thing, did he? This was to be one that was like no other victory at any other time at any other place in the world. before or since. Yeah.

I think it's interesting also the pattern of the seventh day is a day of rest. Yes. Here it is. This is a day of seven times. Of accomplishment. Right. Instead of one time. Yes. So. The seventh day is seven times. Right. The priority here seems to be we are now at war. Yes. Yep. We're now at war and the usual thing, seventh day is a day of rest, is no, that's not what's going to happen today. Right? Yeah. Not what's going to happen today.

The Israelites did everything that they were supposed to, with one exception. And we mentioned that at the end of that item there on Jericho, and that is Achan went into the city and took some things he wasn't supposed to take, and he went and hid it underneath his tent, right? And it describes in detail what those things are, which, by the way, to me, that indicates that, no, this is an actual historical event, not just some made-up thing. It tells the amount of silver and what the other objects were. He took some things he wasn't supposed to.

So the first thing, the first attack on AI was a mess, a disaster. And Joshua was wondering, man, this wasn't what we just saw. And so the Lord, nope, you've got a problem here and it's with Aiken's household. And basically everything was All of them were killed and everything that they had was burnt. Now, was that an overreaction, do you think? Why not just say, hey Aiken, put it back where it's supposed to be, or don't do this again? Why this intense reaction to Aiken?

Well, God's involved. I think He expects the people to do exactly What he wants. Yeah. One thing is they're under law, right? Yeah. They're under law and so whatever, you know, you're supposed to do, you're supposed to do. And the command was, you obey Joshua or you're going to die. So it wasn't, it wasn't like there was some prior, you know, pattern or prior statement that we're going to take it easy on anybody who doesn't do exactly what they're supposed to. Yeah.

But with the whole scenario, he's making a very definite point. Yeah. you know, this is the way it's gonna be, and this is what I say, and you'll hear what I say, or there are pots and pans, and everybody saw this and go, hmm. Everything is in the extreme. That's one thing. During this conquest, it's like everything's in the extreme. You know, we just really beat these guys, you know, like crazy, or else we really lose, and whoever's fault it is is, you know, gonna die, and they're gonna lose all their stuff. Yeah.

It's also the The thing was, everything was devoted to God. It was God's possession. And Corbin, the Pharisees used that as an excuse for not taking care of their parents. I've devoted my wealth to God, and so I can't give it to orphans and widows or my old parents, because this is God. So they used it with the wrong attitude. But here in this part, God wanted to make Don't mess with this.

If I say it's mine, it's mine. Whatever is said is absolute and nobody is getting away with it. I got away with that. Is anybody going to get away with anything? Not happening. So imagine being in a society where this is a whole life and death thing for seven years. And everybody's got to do what they've got to do. And there is nothing that you're going to get away with. Nothing.

No, it also doesn't indicate that they ask God about going up to Ai. They just say, well, that's just a little settlement up there. We don't have to send the whole army. Just send a few troops up there. No big deal. No problem. Wrong. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Wrong.

Now, here's the other thing. When they went up against AI, what they did is they had a small group of soldiers come and make an attack and then draw back to draw the soldiers out of the city to chase after them. And then the main Israelite group then went into the city with the gates open. with the gates open and took out the city.

The Israelites then from there went to Mount Gerizim and Ebal. These are two mountains in what later was to become Samaria. At Mount Gerizim and Ebal, is the place where Joseph's bones are buried. That is the place where Jacob built the well. And that's where Jesus met the woman at the well, the Samaritan woman at the well. So it's a very significant place historically in biblical terms there.

And then to the south is where they went next. And so you see the accompanying map, page one. I don't have a slide to match it, so take a look at the accompanying map, page one. It shows the arrows first after going through Jericho and Ai that it then went to the south, sweeping to the south, and then moved north. So that was their general approach, and you see that in the arrows. So anyway, they went to the south there, and the Bible gives a more detailed description of this city and that city and that sort of thing.

And then, page three, the inhabitants of Gibeon and nearby villages, by deception, they came to them pretending to be travelers. Because they thought, we've got to do something other than try to hold these people off militarily. So they came to them instead and said, hey, we're travelers, you know, let's make a deal.

And so the Israelites then made a vow to them about how they would be handled, and that spared the lives of the Gibeonites. And even though it was by deception, the Israelites held their vow. They stood by their vow and didn't take out the Gibeonites. They even, at a later point when some kings were attacking the Gibeonites, the Gibeonites appealed to the Israelites for help, and the Israelites came and and helped attack the other five kings. They did however put them to work. They were water carriers as I recall. Yes, water carriers and woodcutters.

Just as a thought, you asked that question about keeping that for himself. The whole purpose of going into Canaan is to drive the people out because of their immoral practices. That's a lot of it. Where you have an individual who's keeping this God or whatever it was for himself, but that's in direct opposition to the mission at hand. That's right. Which is get rid of all this. That's right.

And also you notice nothing was done for personal advantage. Everything was done for the sake of the Israelites as a whole. Everything was done at God's command through Joshua. Much like the first church in the New Testament. Yes, and simply do not deviate from that. You will not get away with anything. That was the lesson learned.

So this attack on Gibeon is then described. Then when things shifted to the north, that's Joshua chapters 11 and 12, those detailed battles to the north and subsequent battles in a few other places. So there are limitations to the battles, and they are these, the ones bulleted there in the middle of page 3.

So the Israelites would not always kill everyone, nor did they always destroy everything. Remember what happened at Jericho was to really make everybody else extremely afraid, very afraid, because you would have the Jordan River stopped, you would have this very bizarre initial attack and then miraculous action where the mud walls all fell out, not just randomly fell down and up and whatnot, but they all fell out and everywhere except where Rahab was, And so you have a miraculous destruction and then a complete wipeout. But they didn't always do everything all the time. The main theme begun back in the book of Numbers is to drive them out, not to just kill everybody. Not to just kill everybody, but drive them out. They were not allowed, and in fact it's against the law of Moses, to cut down living, fruit-producing trees and vineyards and things of that sort. That's against the law of Moses. You can't do that. And one of the reasons was you're to go in here and take advantage of crops and orchards and things like that that are present, not just go and do a burn to the earth kind of strategy.

Yes? So is this a picture of what Romans When Paul's talking about enrollments where you're supposed to drive out all sin, you accept the law, you know, be identified with Christ, and you're supposed to drive out all sin in your memory? Yeah, if you look at it, that's an analogy that you could put together. Yeah, drive it out. Yes.

Another point, and God doesn't do things arbitrarily. he has a plan and a purpose and sometimes it takes a while to reveal that and one of the things about the campaign and the promised land is he stated specifically drive them out gradually so that you don't just have a barren land with the wild beasts and the thistles and things but drive them out gradually so that the land can sustain you as time goes by and you can have crops and you can have orchards with fruit bearing and the rest.

See, it was common in the Middle East, you go in and attack, to just go in and destroy things. Scorched earth. Scorched earth, yeah. Just burn everything, cut everything down, and just completely wreck the land. That was very common, but that's not the strategy the Lord had them use. What's interesting is you look at things in the Bible, there are some things that compare with other cultures, and some things radically different. That's one of the things that's radically different. Go in there and keep things that are there in the land, in a great many cases, not just burn and cut, tear down everything.

The next bullet there, as we saw with Jericho and Ai, the Israelites were not to conduct every battle the same, but to vary their strategy as directed by the Lord in each case or at the discretion of Joshua. So the strategy got varied, not we always do this.

There were instances in which the Canaanites were accommodated by the Israelites population as with the Gibeonites. The Canaanites were accommodated by the Israelites population. The Israelites did not drive out all the inhabitants in all the land that they were supposed to drive out. Some of the groups who continued to plague the Israelites for centuries include the Philistines along the southern coast and the Canaanites especially in the area of Tyre and Sidon. What's very interesting, we'll take a look at this in a little bit, but what's very interesting is Jesus deliberately went into the areas of Israel that the Jews had failed to drive out the Gentiles. And Tyre and Sidon was one of those.

OK, now we have the settlement of the tribes of Israel. That's chapters 13 through 24. So the allotments of each tribe is shown on the supplement map, page 3. Take a look at that. And so what we show there is here is the area allotted by Joshua's description to each of the tribes.

And very interesting how that lays out. What do you notice about Manasseh? It's divided, okay? So here is a divided land, west and east, a large half-tribe. And then something else, how about Simeon? Yeah, that's interesting that he's encircled by Judah. Yeah, so here is Simeon inside of Judah's territory, and so that's kind of a fascinating thing. Some of the tribes have a fairly small area as well. And then, what do you notice Asher towards the north? What city do you see right along the coast for Asher? Tyre, and that was one that the Jews never took it. They're supposed to. But they never took it.

Yes. OK. You said that Jesus went into those areas. Yes. OK. But also in Revelations, I think those are the similar or those are the same areas that are going to be touched when he comes back a second time. Right. Aren't they listed as some of the spots that he will come back? Because I think Tyreton and I think that's one.

I think They are mentioned later as being included in the Millennial Kingdom in their place, but we actually have the Millennial Kingdom where Christ reigns. It is amazing to see what's written there, because countries that are now staunch enemies of Israel are going to be serving Israel. and saying, can we take care of your crops? Can we take care of your livestock? You guys can go ahead and pay attention to the Messiah. We'll take care of this stuff for you. Isn't that amazing? A complete turnabout from what you see in world events right now.

Yes, because a lot of the cities, instead of having a mayor, they would have a king. And Tyre was particularly well off because they had a sea trade network. They were part of a sea trade network. So it was essentially a chain around the various places in and nearby the Mediterranean. It was particularly a stronghold too, because in prophecy there, the king of Tyre, said, I don't want to go on the rabbit trail there. And we easily could.

But it's one of them they didn't conquer, and it continued for centuries to be a Gentile stronghold. Now let's take a look In reality, not all the tribes conquered and held all their allotments. And this had consequences for centuries, including the events in the Book of Esther, where because of a failure to completely conquer and drive out and subjugate. And so that's Haman is descended in the Book of Esther. Haman is descended from one of the groups that was not driven out and pushed out as it ought to have been.

Okay, let's take to page four. So now, the Son of God, we have several points here. One, the name Joshua, which is the Hebrew Yeshua, means Savior. This is carried into Greek as Yesus, and then into English as Jesus. Matthew 121 gives that. Next, Rahab, who was preserved from Jericho, is in the lineage of King David. And so you have Rahab and you also have Ruth in the lineage of King David.

Well, that's a surprise, right? Within their allotment was Bethlehem, later the city of David, and the birthplace of Christ. It's not called Bethlehem in the book of Joshua, but that's the territory. And then, Jesus seems to have deliberately visited places that were supposed to be within Israel's tribal allotment, but the Israelites never conquered them, such as Tyre and Sidon.

And we give the reference in Matthew 15. A time will come when Christ will return with his saints and carry out judgment upon the Gentiles who attack Israel. Then we have a few slides there and some text. What about the claims that the Israelites committed genocide?

And one of the key reasons they were spiritually and morally corrupt, even to the point that the nearby Gentile nations were disgusted with them. They were that disgusting that the neighboring pagan empires and countries thought they were repulsive. We have in the next slide over, and under the Canaanites, the Canaanite religious rituals included child sacrifice, some of it in fire, burning the babies, incest, bestiality, homosexuality, male and female cultic prostitution. So it was gross.

Unfortunately, you find that repeatedly when archaeologists are digging into this culture. They find evidence in the Canaanite culture of these very things. It's not just that the Bible describes it. That's what the archaeologists find. They were a repulsive culture. These are all descendants of Ham, right? Yes, through Canaan. Can the Canaanites live in Jericho? Canaan was the overall name for this whole area, including Jericho. Just a gross culture, a really gross culture. And so the law of Moses specifically forbade the various things that were present in the Canaanite culture. Why? It's because you guys are going in and you are not to be absorbed by them. You're to impact them, but not they you. So that's why they were particularly warned against carrying that sort of thing out.

Alright, now, one other thing, was it moral for the Israelites to use deception in their military campaigns? Was it immoral for the Israelites, or was it moral for the Israelites to use deception in their military campaigns? If lying and deception is wrong, why, or was it okay for the Israelites to use deception, for example, the way they conquered the people in Ai? You know, go in there with a small group, you know, start to attack and then withdraw, and then have the people, the soldiers at AI chase them, and then have the main Israelite army then go into AI and take them out? Was that wrong? They used deception. Was that evil or good? Yeah. Warfare seems to be a different scenario. There are exceptions from what is rightful individual moral law.

When we fought in World War II, one of the things we did for the D-Day invasion was we had fake troops and tanks and everything else at another location to try to get the military wrongly committed and wrongly understanding things on the German side. And so they used deception as a means of giving an advantage to the D-Day victory. I remember hearing an interview of one of the German soldiers who was looking at the radar readings on his screen. He says, there are not that many ships in the whole world. He thought there was something wrong with his screen. Something wrong with my instruments. There can't possibly be that many shifts. Yes?

Would that kind of deception be considered lying if known at your base? What it is, however, is at a national level there is an allowance for things that at a personal level would not be allowed. So you have, for example, capital punishment. The government is allowed, this is according to Genesis and the covenant with Noah, the government is allowed to carry out capital punishment, biblically, even though killing at a personal level is completely wrong.

In the Psalms, it says quite frequently, without cause and without reason. So when the morality of the Canaanites was so gross, Even though God is holy, holy, holy, he is, without cause or without reason, in these particular cases, able to use the deception in this warfare. That's the way I see it. But I think that without reason or without cause is something that David used many, many times in the Psalms.

Yes? Could it be called military strategy? Yeah, ultimately... Personal... If you look at it, just personally, I took Judo and actually taught Judo and one of the things in Judo is you pretend to have a particular momentum and direction and then you suddenly reverse it in order to carry out the throw or hold or whatever you're going to do next.

So giving the enemy the impression that they're going to do this, then they begin to commit assets and personnel in that direction and it ends up being in the wrong place. You actually minimize loss of life by carrying out that approach. The mother robin went broke one day. Yes, so you have that where you find it in nature as well. So what might be personally wrong for someone to carry out, a government is authorized to do in cases of military and criminal enforcement.

Alright, so any other thoughts, questions? Well, they were trying to get to the wall. Trying to get to the wall at what place? Jericho. At Jericho, okay. And notice that they first went around the city. Do you think they went right up against the wall or do you think they stood away a little bit?

The two reasons to stand away, you can stand outside of bow shot and slingshot and still go around. Imagine going around the city, you can go around the city outside of bow shot range and slingshot range. And they basically can't touch you unless they go out, which they don't want to do. Also, it loses their armory, if they start using up their... Yeah, you don't want to start shooting arrows in... start using the slings if somebody's out of range, right? Because then you have this armory stored up and you're going to use it up.

Yeah. Don't you think they were laughing a lot? Yeah, they're probably like, what are these silly people doing, right? Yeah. And here they are the next day. What idiots, right? Yeah. It was entertainment. Yes. We'll see who's an idiot here in a week, but yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that's a good question.

They would stand away from the wall in order to stay out of bow shot and slingshot range because the Lord is going to take care of this, not the usual attack approach. This could have been a very costly, pricey battle if they had used the usual assault approach to go against Jericho. You'd lose a lot of people. The technology for archery at the time was pretty primitive. Their ability to get actual draw weight to be able to shoot any distance was minimal and the precision of the tools that any of your arrow and it won't fly straight. So a lot of those things would have been very expensive and cost prohibitive. We've got people starting to press their noses very quick. I want to mention two things.

This is a book on the historical conquest. It's a good one in terms of going through the history and archaeology and supporting the historicity of what the Bible describes. I had some various pictures from Dr. Bryant Wood on Jericho and this is a DVD. And you're welcome to look at and borrow any of these things. Let's pray. Okay.

Lord, we do give you thanks for what you've revealed here. We thank you for the fact that we can take great confidence in what you've had recorded for our benefit. And also, as Paul wrote more than once, what happened with these was written for our instruction. And so we want to take the lessons learned and just ask that you would apply them to our hearts and lives. And we thank you for this. Thank you for this time. And we pray in Jesus' name, amen.