Joshua Installment Three

 

The Beat Goes On

As we move on from the infrequently interrupted parade of genocide that entertained and inspired us in Chapters Six through Ten, we seque quite handily into...let's see...You're familiar with the phrase "Divide and Conquer" are you not? well, in Chapters Eleven through Nineteen Joshua switches that around to "Conquer and Divide."

    All will become clear.

    It seems the Land of Milk and Honey is lousy with kings, all of them seemingly reluctant to hand over their little kingdoms to the new arrivals. In Chapter Eleven Joshua and his mighty warriors settle the hash of a bunch of these minor monarchs from the northern reaches of Canaan. Here's the cast list:

• King Jabin of Hazor
• King Jobab of Madon
• King No Name Given of Shimron
• King Also No Name Given of Achshaph
• A whole bunch of kings we will call The Ensemble since they don't get individual billing of any sort.

    But of course no matter how many kings, with however many big strong men and iron chariots and noble horses come out to challenge Joshua on the field of battle, if God says you're gonna whup 'em, you can put good money of the fact that whupped they're gonna be. 

8) ...They struck them down, until they had left no one remaining. 9) And Joshua did to them as the Lord commanded him; he hamstrung their horses, and burned their chariots with fire.

     What in the world did those horse do to deserve that? Just asking. I mean, they're horses, it's not like they signed up for that duty and understood what they were getting themselves into. And in case you're wondering, all the opposing players of a Homo Sapiens persuasion were "stuck down with the edge of the sword" just to give their steeds a bit of company on the field of battle. 

    In Chapter Twelve we get an inventory of the kings that have found themselves voted out of office as a result of the surge of undocumented immigrants led first by Moses and then Joshua. The Moses list is presented in paragraph form and is, I think, a bit of a slog to plow through, whereas the Joshua list is done very neatly in a sort of bullet point presentation beginning with "the king of Jericho" and ending with "the king of Tirzah": we are even provided with a total at the end. That total being a big thirty-one.

    And even though it meant a whole five minutes of dealing with small print, I counted the kings voted off the island by Moses. It starts with King Sihon of the Amorites and ends with King Og of Bashan with nobody in between, just a whole lot of surveying talk.  So once you take the trouble to wade through all the verbiage the total for Moses as presented here is all of two.

    Advantage: Joshua.

    Not that we're keeping score.

    Chapter Thirteen opens with one of my favorite bits, just because.

Now Joshua was old and advanced in years; and the Lord said to him, "You are old and advanced in years"

    God goes on to tell Joshua that there is still a lot to do, more kings to skewer and territory to claim under the Middle Eastern edition of Manifest Destiny. God lists all the little kingdoms that have yet to be liberated from their current residents and then assures Joshua that he doesn't need to bother with the actual fighting at his advanced age, because God his own darned self "will drive them out from before the Israelites" and all Joshua needs to worry about is distributing the land once all the blood has been soaked up by the thirsty earth. And it's all of the fascinating real estate details we get in the next five thousand or so verses, a sort of surveying catalogue of which tribe gets what, and in some cases what they think of their share. Every once in a while we are reminded--because the author here is big advocate of learning through repetition--that the Levites aren't getting any territory to call their own, because "the Lord God of Israel is their inheritance." I bet they appreciate that.

    And just in case you think I exaggerate regarding the amount of ink given over to how the Land of Milk and Honey and dead horses is to be divided amongst the tribes, I'll just say that that's pretty much all you're going to find in Chapters Thirteen through Nineteen and we're not going to do a play by play here, thank you very much.

    If you're curious about how the Tribe of Zebulun made out I invite you to turn to Chapter Nineteen, verses 13-16 and you will be satisfied. Any fans of the Tribe of Dan should skip along in that chapter to verses 40-48. 

    Next time we meet up we'll learn all about the Cities of Refuge, a bit of real estate that actually does get set aside for the Levites, and, Spoiler Alert! Joshua exits this mortal coil. Whether or not there is a succession plan in place we hope to find out.