The Conquest of the Land

Moses dies on Nebo, having seen the land and not entered it. Joshua son of Nun is told to be strong and courageous, and to do according to all the law Moses commanded, not turning from it to the right or the left. Joshua 1:7 The officers tell the people to prepare provisions, for in three days they will cross.

The priests carry the ark into the Jordan. The waters stand in a heap far upstream at Adam, and the nation crosses opposite Jericho on dry ground. Twelve stones are set up as a memory for children who will ask what the stones mean. Joshua 4:6 The men of that generation are circumcised, and they keep Passover on the fourteenth day of the month, on the plains of Jericho. The manna stops the next day. They eat the fruit of the land. Joshua 5:10 Joshua 5:12

A man stands opposite Joshua with a drawn sword and says he is the commander of the army of the LORD. Joshua worships. The commander tells him to take off his sandals. The place is holy. Joshua 5:14 The conquest is not narrated as Joshua's talent.

Jericho, and the rest

Jericho is circled six days, and seven times on the seventh, and the wall falls down flat, and they go up. Rahab and her house are spared, as sworn. Joshua 6:20 Joshua 6:25 Achan takes what was devoted. Israel flees from Ai until the thing is brought into the open and judged. Then Ai falls. Joshua builds an altar on Ebal and reads the blessing and the curse, as Moses commanded. Joshua 8:34

The Gibeonites trick Israel into a treaty. The sun stands still in the valley of Aijalon while Israel strikes the Amorite kings. The book says there has been no day like it, before or since, when the LORD obeyed the voice of a man. Joshua 10:14 City after city in the south and then the north is taken. The summary is uneven on purpose, and a later chapter will say that much land remains. Joshua 13:1 A conquest can be decisive and still leave work. The book says both, and a flattened "they took everything on page 11 and nothing on page 13" is a bad reading of both pages.

The land is allotted to the tribes. Cities of refuge are named. The eastern tribes go home and nearly start a war over an altar that was meant as a witness, not a second sanctuary. Joshua gathers them at Shechem. He recites the story from Terah to the day they are standing on. Choose this day whom you will serve. As for me and my house, we will serve the LORD. Joshua 24:15 He writes these words in the Book of the Law. Israel serves the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who outlive him and who had known the work the LORD did. Joshua 24:31 Then another generation rises that does not know, and the judges begin.

The year

If the exodus is about 1446, the crossing is about 1406. If the exodus is late, the crossing is late, and still before Merneptah's stele around 1208, which already speaks of Israel in Canaan. Jericho is the test case people raise, because they expect digging to settle it, and the digging has not produced one agreed date.

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