Event 6 of 8

The Story of Joshua

WEBWorld English Bible — Protestant Edition

The conquest of Canaan

After defeat at Ai because of Achan's sin, Israel takes Ai, makes a treaty with Gibeon, and under Joshua defeats the kings of the south and north; the sun stands still at Gibeon.

84 verses to read

Joshua 7:1–26 WEB

¹But the children of Israel committed a trespass in the devoted things; for Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took some of the devoted things. Therefore the LORD’s anger burned against the children of Israel. ²Joshua sent men from Jericho to Ai, which is beside Beth Aven, on the east side of Bethel, and spoke to them, saying, “Go up and spy out the land.” The men went up and spied out Ai. ³They returned to Joshua, and said to him, “Don’t let all the people go up, but let about two or three thousand men go up and strike Ai. Don’t make all the people to toil there, for there are only a few of them.” ⁴So about three thousand men of the people went up there, and they fled before the men of Ai. ⁵The men of Ai struck about thirty-six men of them. They chased them from before the gate even to Shebarim, and struck them at the descent. The hearts of the people melted, and became like water. ⁶Joshua tore his clothes, and fell to the earth on his face before the LORD’s ark until the evening, he and the elders of Israel; and they put dust on their heads. ⁷Joshua said, “Alas, Lord GOD, why have you brought this people over the Jordan at all, to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites, to cause us to perish? I wish that we had been content and lived beyond the Jordan! ⁸Oh, Lord, what shall I say, after Israel has turned their backs before their enemies? ⁹For the Canaanites and all the inhabitants of the land will hear of it, and will surround us, and cut off our name from the earth. What will you do for your great name?” ¹⁰The LORD said to Joshua, “Get up! Why have you fallen on your face like that? ¹¹Israel has sinned. Yes, they have even transgressed my covenant which I commanded them. Yes, they have even taken some of the devoted things, and have also stolen, and also deceived. They have even put it among their own stuff. ¹²Therefore the children of Israel can’t stand before their enemies. They turn their backs before their enemies, because they have become devoted for destruction. I will not be with you any more, unless you destroy the devoted things from among you. ¹³Get up! Sanctify the people, and say, ‘Sanctify yourselves for tomorrow, for the LORD, the God of Israel, says, “There is a devoted thing among you, Israel. You cannot stand before your enemies until you take away the devoted thing from among you.” ¹⁴In the morning therefore you shall be brought near by your tribes. It shall be that the tribe which the LORD selects shall come near by families. The family which the LORD selects shall come near by households. The household which the LORD selects shall come near man by man. ¹⁵It shall be, that he who is taken with the devoted thing shall be burned with fire, he and all that he has, because he has transgressed the LORD’s covenant, and because he has done a disgraceful thing in Israel.’” ¹⁶So Joshua rose up early in the morning and brought Israel near by their tribes. The tribe of Judah was selected. ¹⁷He brought near the family of Judah, and he selected the family of the Zerahites. He brought near the family of the Zerahites man by man, and Zabdi was selected. ¹⁸He brought near his household man by man, and Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, was selected. ¹⁹Joshua said to Achan, “My son, please give glory to the LORD, the God of Israel, and make confession to him. Tell me now what you have done! Don’t hide it from me!” ²⁰Achan answered Joshua, and said, “I have truly sinned against the LORD, the God of Israel, and this is what I have done. ²¹When I saw among the plunder a beautiful Babylonian robe, two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold weighing fifty shekels, then I coveted them and took them. Behold, they are hidden in the ground in the middle of my tent, with the silver under it.” ²²So Joshua sent messengers, and they ran to the tent. Behold, it was hidden in his tent, with the silver under it. ²³They took them from the middle of the tent, and brought them to Joshua and to all the children of Israel. They laid them down before the LORD. ²⁴Joshua, and all Israel with him, took Achan the son of Zerah, the silver, the robe, the wedge of gold, his sons, his daughters, his cattle, his donkeys, his sheep, his tent, and all that he had; and they brought them up to the valley of Achor. ²⁵Joshua said, “Why have you troubled us? The LORD will trouble you today.” All Israel stoned him with stones, and they burned them with fire and stoned them with stones. ²⁶They raised over him a great heap of stones that remains to this day. The LORD turned from the fierceness of his anger. Therefore the name of that place was called “The valley of Achor” to this day.

Joshua 8:1–35 WEB

¹The LORD said to Joshua, “Don’t be afraid, and don’t be dismayed. Take all the warriors with you, and arise, go up to Ai. Behold, I have given into your hand the king of Ai, with his people, his city, and his land. ²You shall do to Ai and her king as you did to Jericho and her king, except you shall take its goods and its livestock for yourselves. Set an ambush for the city behind it.” ³So Joshua arose, with all the warriors, to go up to Ai. Joshua chose thirty thousand men, the mighty men of valor, and sent them out by night. ⁴He commanded them, saying, “Behold, you shall lie in ambush against the city, behind the city. Don’t go very far from the city, but all of you be ready. ⁵I and all the people who are with me will approach the city. It shall happen, when they come out against us, as at the first, that we will flee before them. ⁶They will come out after us until we have drawn them away from the city; for they will say, ‘They flee before us, like the first time.’ So we will flee before them, ⁷and you shall rise up from the ambush, and take possession of the city; for the LORD your God will deliver it into your hand. ⁸It shall be, when you have seized the city, that you shall set the city on fire. You shall do this according to the LORD’s word. Behold, I have commanded you.” ⁹Joshua sent them out; and they went to set up the ambush, and stayed between Bethel and Ai on the west side of Ai; but Joshua stayed among the people that night. ¹⁰Joshua rose up early in the morning, mustered the people, and went up, he and the elders of Israel, before the people to Ai. ¹¹All the people, even the men of war who were with him, went up and came near, and came before the city and encamped on the north side of Ai. Now there was a valley between him and Ai. ¹²He took about five thousand men, and set them in ambush between Bethel and Ai, on the west side of the city. ¹³So they set the people, even all the army who was on the north of the city, and their ambush on the west of the city; and Joshua went that night into the middle of the valley. ¹⁴When the king of Ai saw it, they hurried and rose up early, and the men of the city went out against Israel to battle, he and all his people, at the time appointed, before the Arabah; but he didn’t know that there was an ambush against him behind the city. ¹⁵Joshua and all Israel made as if they were beaten before them, and fled by the way of the wilderness. ¹⁶All the people who were in the city were called together to pursue after them. They pursued Joshua, and were drawn away from the city. ¹⁷There was not a man left in Ai or Bethel who didn’t go out after Israel. They left the city open, and pursued Israel. ¹⁸The LORD said to Joshua, “Stretch out the javelin that is in your hand toward Ai, for I will give it into your hand.” Joshua stretched out the javelin that was in his hand toward the city. ¹⁹The ambush arose quickly out of their place, and they ran as soon as he had stretched out his hand and entered into the city and took it. They hurried and set the city on fire. ²⁰When the men of Ai looked behind them, they saw, and behold, the smoke of the city ascended up to heaven, and they had no power to flee this way or that way. The people who fled to the wilderness turned back on the pursuers. ²¹When Joshua and all Israel saw that the ambush had taken the city, and that the smoke of the city ascended, then they turned back and killed the men of Ai. ²²The others came out of the city against them, so they were in the middle of Israel, some on this side, and some on that side. They struck them, so that they let none of them remain or escape. ²³They captured the king of Ai alive, and brought him to Joshua. ²⁴When Israel had finished killing all the inhabitants of Ai in the field, in the wilderness in which they pursued them, and they had all fallen by the edge of the sword until they were consumed, all Israel returned to Ai and struck it with the edge of the sword. ²⁵All that fell that day, both of men and women, were twelve thousand, even all the people of Ai. ²⁶For Joshua didn’t draw back his hand, with which he stretched out the javelin, until he had utterly destroyed all the inhabitants of Ai. ²⁷Israel took for themselves only the livestock and the goods of that city, according to the LORD’s word which he commanded Joshua. ²⁸So Joshua burned Ai and made it a heap forever, even a desolation, to this day. ²⁹He hanged the king of Ai on a tree until the evening. At sundown, Joshua commanded, and they took his body down from the tree and threw it at the entrance of the gate of the city, and raised a great heap of stones on it that remains to this day. ³⁰Then Joshua built an altar to the LORD, the God of Israel, on Mount Ebal, ³¹as Moses the servant of the LORD commanded the children of Israel, as it is written in the book of the law of Moses: an altar of uncut stones, on which no one had lifted up any iron. They offered burnt offerings on it to the LORD and sacrificed peace offerings. ³²He wrote there on the stones a copy of Moses’ law, which he wrote in the presence of the children of Israel. ³³All Israel, with their elders, officers, and judges, stood on both sides of the ark before the Levitical priests, who carried the ark of the LORD’s covenant, the foreigner as well as the native; half of them in front of Mount Gerizim, and half of them in front of Mount Ebal, as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded at the first, that they should bless the people of Israel. ³⁴Afterward he read all the words of the law, the blessing and the curse, according to all that is written in the book of the law. ³⁵There was not a word of all that Moses commanded which Joshua didn’t read before all the assembly of Israel, with the women, the little ones, and the foreigners who were among them.

Joshua 10:1–15 WEB

¹Now when Adoni-Zedek king of Jerusalem heard how Joshua had taken Ai, and had utterly destroyed it; as he had done to Jericho and her king, so he had done to Ai and her king; and how the inhabitants of Gibeon had made peace with Israel, and were among them, ²they were very afraid, because Gibeon was a great city, as one of the royal cities, and because it was greater than Ai, and all its men were mighty. ³Therefore Adoni-Zedek king of Jerusalem sent to Hoham king of Hebron, Piram king of Jarmuth, Japhia king of Lachish, and Debir king of Eglon, saying, ⁴“Come up to me and help me. Let’s strike Gibeon; for they have made peace with Joshua and with the children of Israel.” ⁵Therefore the five kings of the Amorites, the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, the king of Lachish, and the king of Eglon, gathered themselves together and went up, they and all their armies, and encamped against Gibeon, and made war against it. ⁶The men of Gibeon sent to Joshua at the camp at Gilgal, saying, “Don’t abandon your servants! Come up to us quickly and save us! Help us; for all the kings of the Amorites that dwell in the hill country have gathered together against us.” ⁷So Joshua went up from Gilgal, he and the whole army with him, including all the mighty men of valor. ⁸The LORD said to Joshua, “Don’t fear them, for I have delivered them into your hands. Not a man of them will stand before you.” ⁹Joshua therefore came to them suddenly. He marched from Gilgal all night. ¹⁰The LORD confused them before Israel. He killed them with a great slaughter at Gibeon, and chased them by the way of the ascent of Beth Horon, and struck them to Azekah and to Makkedah. ¹¹As they fled from before Israel, while they were at the descent of Beth Horon, the LORD hurled down great stones from the sky on them to Azekah, and they died. There were more who died from the hailstones than those whom the children of Israel killed with the sword. ¹²Then Joshua spoke to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel. He said in the sight of Israel, “Sun, stand still on Gibeon! You, moon, stop in the valley of Aijalon!” ¹³The sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the nation had avenged themselves of their enemies. Isn’t this written in the book of Jashar? The sun stayed in the middle of the sky, and didn’t hurry to go down about a whole day. ¹⁴There was no day like that before it or after it, that the LORD listened to the voice of a man; for the LORD fought for Israel. ¹⁵Joshua returned, and all Israel with him, to the camp to Gilgal.

Joshua 11:16–23 WEB

¹⁶So Joshua captured all that land, the hill country, all the South, all the land of Goshen, the lowland, the Arabah, the hill country of Israel, and the lowland of the same, ¹⁷from Mount Halak, that goes up to Seir, even to Baal Gad in the valley of Lebanon under Mount Hermon. He took all their kings, struck them, and put them to death. ¹⁸Joshua made war a long time with all those kings. ¹⁹There was not a city that made peace with the children of Israel, except the Hivites, the inhabitants of Gibeon. They took all in battle. ²⁰For it was of the LORD to harden their hearts, to come against Israel in battle, that he might utterly destroy them, that they might have no favor, but that he might destroy them, as the LORD commanded Moses. ²¹Joshua came at that time, and cut off the Anakim from the hill country, from Hebron, from Debir, from Anab, and from all the hill country of Judah, and from all the hill country of Israel. Joshua utterly destroyed them with their cities. ²²There were none of the Anakim left in the land of the children of Israel. Only in Gaza, in Gath, and in Ashdod, did some remain. ²³So Joshua took the whole land, according to all that the LORD spoke to Moses; and Joshua gave it for an inheritance to Israel according to their divisions by their tribes. Then the land had rest from war.

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