Month: March 2021

Week 9 Joshua

Last year I was impressed with the land holdings that went to Judah, Ephraim and Manasseh.
This year I’m not as impressed with how things have developed for Benjamin Simeon Zebulun Issachar Asher Naphtali & Dan.
For one thing their land allotments are sketched out pretty thinly. Benjamin’s is described in eighteen verses but none of the others get more than nine. Which seems short compared to the sixty-three Judah got in chapter fifteen.
Another thing I noticed is that the lands of Zebulun Issachar Asher & Naphtali all have clear borders spelled out. For instance: the boundary of Zebulun’s inheritance started at Sarid. From there it went west, going past Maralah, touching Dabbesheth, and proceeding to the brook east of Jokneam. In the other direction, the boundary line went east from Sarid to the border of Kislothtabor, and from there to Daberath and up to Japhia… (and so on). Pretty specific. But there are no border markings for Simeon or Dan – they’re only given a list of the towns they’ll get. In fact Simeon’s tract wasn’t even an independent territory – the tribe was plunked in the middle of Judah’s land.
Reading Joshua I’ve mostly been getting a feeling of all-for-one-and-one-for-all. But I can also see where fractures might develop; where conflict might come along.

Note: Benjamin is in Joshua 18:11-28; S-Z-I-A-N-D are in 19:1-48. The Zebulun quote is from 19:10-12 (NLT). And my map shows the Z-I-A-N Quartet clustered in the north country.

Week 9 Joshua

Land Distribution time had arrived so a delegation from Judah came to Joshua with their claim. And Caleb came with them – the Caleb who spied out the land. So I know who I’m dealing with.
He’s called Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite. I wonder: if Caleb was a Kenizzite why did he come with the Judah clan? Was he or wasn’t he Judah-ite?
I flip back to the Twelve Spies Story in Numbers 13. One spy was chosen from each tribe, and each spy was a tribal leader. I look down the list and in third spot – listed as Judah’s man – is Caleb son of Jephunneh. So it definitely looks like he was Judah-ite.
But why is he called a Kenizzite?
I get out a word book and check Kenizzite. It’s only used four times, three of them about Caleb. The other time is when the Lord promised Abraham land that included the territory of the Kenite and the Kenizzite – non-Israelite country for sure.
It doesn’t make it easier when a few minutes later I read that Caleb had a brother named Kenaz. My word book says a man named Kenaz – a different Kenaz but same name – belonged to the Esau-Edom family. Is an Esau-family link even possible?
I already think the bible is pretty complicated, and my take-away today is that it’s sometimes maybe more complicated than I already think it is.

Note: see Joshua 14:6; Numbers 13:2-6; Genesis 15:19; Joshua 15:17; Genesis 36:11

Week 9 Joshua

Twelve is a short chapter. And it’s mostly names. Before I start reading I can see – visually and obviously – that the second half of the chapter is a repetitive list of names. Thirty-one lines formatted in a column, all starting with the words the-king-of.
I page forward. Names, names, names. From chapter twelve to chapter twenty-two. Hundreds of them.
After a bit I go back to twelve and start reading. It’s broken in two by geography. The first six verses name the kings east of the Jordan River; the second half is a list of the kings on the west side.
There were only two kings defeated in the Jordan East sector – Sihon and Og. I remember reading about them a couple of weeks ago. I don’t recall most of the place names so I check my bible map, but even though it’s okay it doesn’t locate all of them for me. I see Heshbon the Arnon River Aroer the Jabbok River Pisgah the Salt Sea and the sea of Chinneroth. The names I can find are all east of the Jordan.
The rest of the chapter swings over to the west. I do a quick map scan. The only pattern I detect is that the place-name list seems to start in the south and work north.
Soon land is going to be doled out to landless nomads.
No matter what I think these people were no doubt very interested in what these chapters said.

Week 9 Joshua

The back-to-back stories of the battles for the city of Jericho (chapter six) and the city of Ai (chapter seven) are contrasting stories.
The big and obvious contrast is that Jericho was successfully conquered; Ai was successfully not conquered.
Another pretty striking and unexpected contrast is between the Main Characters. Rahab was a citizen of Jericho. She was a totally non-Israel-ite Jericho-ite who bafflingly decided – against her own home-city and lifelong-culture – to throw in her lot with Israel. There weren’t a million people in Jericho but if there had been Rahab would be the one-in-a-million. She took an independent chancy life-or-death stand. And she was rescued.
In the battle at Ai the Israelite army was defeated. The key player was a man named Achan. Kind of like Rahab he had bafflingly taken a solitary personal decision – but against the Lord – back at Jericho. There weren’t a million soldiers fighting against Ai but if there had been Achan was the one-in-a-million who stole some booty. He took his chance; paid a high price.
In these conquest battles in Joshua it’s easy to get a sense of the Lord operating in the aggregate, taking a kind of broad brush destroy-that-whole-town approach. But with Rahab and Achan you get another sense of the weight attached to each individual taking her-or-his own individual eyes-wide-open decision.

Note: I checked my January-February reading progress. I’ve read 371 out of a total 1730 pages. Means 21.4% read with 16.7% of the year gone. So far, so good.