Taking the North - Joshua 11

Chapter 11 is basically just a continuation of chapter 10, where chapter 10 talks about the Israelites conquering the southern part of the promised land and chapter 11 talking about them taking the northern part of the land. The kingdoms of the north did similar to what the southern kingdoms did, which was to try to band together to defeat the Israelites so that they wouldn’t be killed. So all these northern kingdoms banded together and came out to battle against Israel. An interesting point that TB made is that all these cities had very large, impenetrable walls so the safest place for these people would have been inside their heavily fortified cities but they left the safety of their cities and came out against the Israelites to battle. TB asked why they would do that, and answered, “the reason these various Canaanite kings will do this foolhardy act of leaving positions of strength to come out into the open to fight Israel (and thus losing the military advantage of defending nearly impregnable cities from behind thick stone walls) is because God has supernaturally drawn them into doing it.” This was an interesting answer, especially considering that Jericho stayed within their walled city and were destroyed just as easily. Maybe because they knew what happened to Jericho, they knew their walls weren’t going to save them so they didn’t want to be sitting ducks and thought that maybe at least this way they had a chance. It would also be in line with God’s promise to cause confusion, and anxiety, and all types of mental disfunction in the enemy to bring victory to Israel. This might have been just one of the strategies that God used, convinced the enemy that their only real chance was to come out of their safety to battle.

But what was really interesting about this answer was what TB continued with, saying “The Lord did to the Canaanites what He will do to the leaders of the world’s nations in a time not so far ahead of us: He will harden their hearts just as He did with Pharaoh. God will fill them with vengeance and rage and cause them to commit to a suicidal stratagem of war. These nations will be unable to resist, pulled as a moth to a flame to their inevitable destruction at the hand of the Lord’s hosts.” This was interesting to me because as we’ve been going through this military section, I’ve been thinking about how Godly warfare would look in the modern day and this was the first time I’d heard modern warfare discussed. Especially considering how much urban combat there is today, but I guess there would have been then too, but it’s more hand to hand back then and more shooty now. It was just interesting to hear and think about modern day applications.

One other thing that I have been thinking about today that I thought was interesting was how in the case of Jericho where the trumpets destroyed the walls, and the one single day where there were 3 great miracles (God killing the enemy Himself, stones from the sky, and the sun standing still), the rest of the battles didn’r really mention miracles preformed by God. I’m sure there were some, like obviously causing confusion in the enemy, convincing them to have stupid, suicidal plans, He probably killed a lot of them Himself as well, but it’s not really mentioned. So this begs the question, why did God have such a strong show of force initially, but then not as much later on? Was it to build the confidence of the Hebrew army? If they saw that God was with them and truly felt protected by God in this war, then they probably fought with more valor, so maybe the early displays were to build confidence in the soldiers toward God, which makes sense, but I could be wrong. Is that what happens with us? Are we shown things that build our confidence and our testimony early on, then we move with faith? What happens when we aren’t shown those things? Does that build faith too? Interesting to think about.

These armies are gathered to fight against Israel, and God comes to Joshua and tells him to not be afraid of them “for to morrow about this time will I deliver them up all slain before Israel: thou shalt hough their horses, and burn their chariots with fire.” Just a side note, it’s pretty gruesome, but to “hough” a horse, the IM says, “is to cut the leg tendons above and behind the tarsal joint or ankle, thus rendering the horse useless.” Pretty sad for those horses, they would obviously die, why not just kill them? Why do that specifically? As far as why cut their tendons and not just kill them immediately, an excellent reddit thread gave a good answer, though it is long, said basically that in battle, horses were armored with their heads and necks protected so cutting their legs were easier and could be done with long spears. The answer summarized, “When you have infantry fighting on foot against armored cavalry, the easiest and least dangerous way to kill the enemy was to first attack the hoses legs to cripple the horse and them kill the rider on the ground.” Perhaps this command was a battle strategy, burning the chariots though would have probably taken place after the battle. But why burn the chariots and maim the horses? Why not use those for Israel’s own military to make it strong and better equipped for fighting? The IM says “the Israelites were foot soldiers rather than charioteers. The fear seems to have been that should the horses and chariots be used as vehicles of war, Israel would turn from faith in God and trust in the arm of flesh.” TB adds, “The Lord did NOT was the Israeli army to have these chariots and horses for themselves. Think about: logic says that if Israel had acquired the trained horses and chariots from the enemy, it would have been rather easy to capture some soldiers who knew how to operate and use them, have those soldiers train Joshua’s men, and then Israel could have employed this advanced weaponry themselves. The problem is that Israel, being as human as anyone else, would certainly have done what they did in the recent past and decide that they didn’t need to consult God concerning upcoming battles with the Canaanites; with such powerful weaponry as chariots at their disposal (something that only a handful of Canaanite kings possessed) it was obvious they could probably just overwhelm any enemy. The Lord was preventing Israel from dismissing Him and instead relying on their own power and strategies, which was a certain path to defeat but a trap they fell into all too often.” It seems to be a strategy that kept Israel reliant on God for victory. God doesn’t need chariots and horses for victory, so He didn’t want Israel to think that they did it themselves or that they didn’t need God, so they could justify breaking the commandments because they don’t need Him anyway.

The armies were coming, and God told Joshua that He would give them victory, so Joshua wasted no time and attacked, “and the Lord delivered them into the hand of Israel, who smote them, and chased them,” and they chased these armies from city to city killing them, and destroying their horses and chariots. Israel was allowed to take plunder from the cities, including the animals, but I think that they killed all the people, and I think they left the buildings, except for the city of Hazor, which they destroyed with fire. It’s noted that none of these cities “made peace with the children of Israel,” except for Gibeon which we’ve discussed. Verse 20 notes that “for it was of the Lord to harden their hearts, that they should come against Israel in battle, that he might destroy them utterly.” I’ve thought a lot about this concept of God hardening people’s hearts, and I had some insight into a personal situation that helps make this make sense. If God can cause fear, confusion, anxiety, despair, then it makes sense that He can harden people’s hearts too. What does that mean for manipulating people’s free will? If God can harden your heart are you accountable for the actions that come because of that hard heart? I’ve heard someone else say that this makes sense in the context of someone who is already hard hearted, like making their heart more hardened isn’t going against something that they would already be willing to do. Maybe that goes back to the “suicidal battle strategy” thing, maybe it’s not God making someone more stubborn but instead convincing them to act certain ways that fulfills His purposes. This is getting pretty deep and abstract so I might have to think about this some more.

All this war takes a long time, though how long I’m not sure, and Joshua and Israel take all the land that they needed to take in the north, “so Joshua took the whole land, according to all that the Lord said unto Moses; and Joshua gave it for an inheritance unto Israel according to their divisions by their tribes. And the land rested from war.”