_JOSHUA'S WORK FOR ISRAEL._
It now only remains for us to take a retrospective view of the work of
Joshua, and indicate what he did for Israel and the mark he left on
the national history.
1. Joshua was a soldier--a believing soldier. He was the first of a
type that has furnished many remarkable specimens. Abraham had fought,
but he had fought as a quaker might be induced to fight, for he was
essentially a man of peace. Moses had superintended military
campaigns, but Moses was essentially a priest and a prophet. Joshua
was neither quaker, nor priest, nor prophet, but simply a soldier.
There were fighting men in abundance, no doubt, before the flood, but
so far as we know, not believing men. Joshua was the first of an order
that seems to many a moral paradox--a devoted servant of God, yet an
enthusiastic fighter. His mind ran naturally in the groove of military
work. To plan expeditions, to devise methods of attacking, scattering,
or annihilating opponents, came naturally to him. A military genius,
he entered _con amore_ into his work.
Yet along with this the fear of God continually controlled and guided
him. He would do nothing deliberately unless he was convinced that it
was the will of God. In all his work of slaughter, he believed
himself to be fulfilling the righteous purposes of Jehovah. His life
was habitually guided by regard to the unseen. He had no ambition but
to serve his God and to serve his country. He would have been content
with the plainest conditions of life, for his habits were simple and
his tastes natural. He believed that God was behind him, and the
belief made him fearless. His career of almost unbroken success
justified his faith.
There have been soldiers who were religious in spite of their being
soldiers--some of them in their secret hearts regretting the
distressing fortune that made the sword their weapon; but there have
also been men whose energy in religion and in fighting have supported
and strengthened each other. Such men, however, are usually found only
in times of great moral and spiritual struggle, when the brute force
of the world has been mustered in overwhelming mass to crush some
religious movement. They have an intense conviction that the movement
is of God, and as to the use of the sword, they cannot help
themselves; they have no choice, for the instinct of self-defence
compels them to draw it. Such are the warriors of the Apocalypse, the
soldiers of Armageddon; for though their battle is essentially
spiritual, it is presented to us in that military book under the
symbols of material warfare. Such were the Ziskas and Procopses of the
Bohemian reformation; the Gustavus Adolphuses of the Thirty Years'
War; the Cromwells of the Commonwealth, and the General Leslies of the
Covenant. Ruled supremely by the fear of God, and convinced of a
Divine call to their work, they have communed about it with Him as
closely and as truly as the missionary about his preaching or his
translating, or the philanthropist about his homes or his rescue
agencies. To God's great goodness it has ever been their habit to
ascribe their successes; and when an enterprise has failed, the causes
of failure have been sought for in the Divine displeasure. Nor in
their intercourse with their families and friends have they been
usually wanting in gentler graces, in affection, in generosity, or in
pity. All this must be freely admitted, even by those to whom war is
most obnoxious. It is quite consistent with the conviction that a
large proportion of wars has been utterly unjustifiable, and that in
ordinary circumstances the sword is no more to be regarded as the
right and proper weapon for settling the quarrels of nations than the
duel for settling the quarrels of individuals. And the best of
soldiers cannot but feel that fighting is at best a cruel necessity,
and that it will be a happy day for the world when men shall beat
their swords into ploughshares and their spears into pruning-hooks.
2. Being a soldier, Joshua confined himself in the main to the work of
a soldier. That work was to conquer the enemy and to divide the land.
To these two departments he limited himself, in subordination,
however, to his deep conviction that they were only means to an end,
and that that end would be utterly missed unless the people were
pervaded by loyalty to God and devotion to the mode of worship which
He had prescribed. No opportunity of impressing that consideration on
their minds was neglected. It lay at the root of all their prosperity;
and if Joshua had not pressed it on them by every available means, all
his work would have been like pouring water on sand or sowing seed
upon the rocks of the seashore.
Joshua was not called to ecclesiastical work, certainly not in the
sense of carrying out ecclesiastical details That department belonged
to the high priest and his brethren. While Moses lived, it had been
under him, because Moses was head of all departments. Neither did
Joshua take in hand the arrangement in detail of the civil department
of the commonwealth. That was mainly work for the elders and officers
appointed to regulate it. It is from the circumstance that Joshua
personally confined himself to his two great duties, that the book
which bears his name travels so little beyond these. Reading Joshua
alone, we might have the impression that very little attention was
paid to the ritual enacted in the books of Moses. We might suppose
that but little was done to carry out the provisions of the Torah, as
the law came to be called. But the inference would not be warranted,
for the plain reason that such things did not come within the sphere
of Joshua or the scope of the book which bears his name. We may make
what we can of incidental allusions, but we need not expect elaborate
descriptions. There are many things that it would have been highly
interesting for us to know regarding this period of the history of
Israel; but the book limits itself as Joshua limited himself. It is
not a full history of the times. It is not a chapter of universal
national annals. It is a history of the settlement, and of Joshua's
share in the settlement.
And the fact that it has this character is a testimony to its
authenticity. Had it been a work of much later date, it is not likely
that it would have been confined within such narrow limits. It would
in all likelihood have presented a much larger view of the state and
progress of the nation than the existing book does. The fact that it
is made to revolve so closely round Joshua seems to indicate that
Joshua's personality was still a great power; the remembrance of him
was bright and vivid when the book was written. Moreover, the lists of
names, many of which seem to have been the old Canaanite names, and to
have dropped out of the Hebrew history because the cities were not
actually taken from the Canaanites, and did not become Hebrew cities,
is another testimony to the contemporary date of the book, or of the
documents on which it is founded.
3. If we examine carefully Joshua's character as a soldier, or rather
as a strategist, we shall probably find that he had one defect. He
does not appear to have succeeded in making his conquests permanent.
What he gained one day was often won back by the enemy after a little
time. To read the account of what happened after the victory of Gibeon
and Bethhoron, one would infer that all the region south of Gibeon
fell completely into his hands. Yet by-and-by we find Hebron and
Jerusalem in possession of the enemy, while a hitherto unheard-of king
has come into view, Adonibezek, of Bezek, of whose people there were
slain, after the death of Joshua, ten thousand men (Judg. i. 4). With
regard to Hebron we read first that Joshua "fought against it and took
it, and smote it with the edge of the sword, and the king thereof, and
all the cities thereof, and all the souls that were therein; he left
none remaining, but destroyed it utterly, and all the souls that were
therein" (Josh. x. 37). Yet not long after, when Caleb requested
Hebron for his inheritance, it was (as we have seen) on the very
ground that it was strongly held by the enemy: "if so be the Lord will
be with me, then I shall be able to drive them out, as the Lord said"
(xiv. 12). Again, in the campaign against Jabin, King of Hazor, while
it is said that Hazor was utterly destroyed, it is also said that
Joshua did not destroy "the cities that stood on their mounds" (xi.
13, R.V.); accordingly we find that some time after, another Jabin was
at the head of a restored Hazor, and it was against him that the
expedition to which Barak was stimulated by the prophetess Deborah was
undertaken (Judg. iv. 2). Whether Joshua miscalculated the number and
resources of the Canaanites in the country; or whether he was unable
to divide his own forces so as to prevent the re-occupation and
restoration of places that had once been destroyed; or whether he
over-estimated the effects of his first victories and did not allow
enough for the determination of a conquered people to fight for their
homes and their altars to the last, we cannot determine; but certainly
the result was, that after being defeated and scattered at the first,
they rallied and gathered together, and presented a most formidable
problem to the tribes in their various settlements. There is no reason
for resorting to the explanation of our modern critics that we have
here traces of two writers, of whom the policy of the one was to
represent that Joshua was wholly victorious, and of the other that he
was very far from successful. The true view is, that his first
invasion, or run-over, as it may be called, was a complete success,
but that, through the rallying of his opponents, much of the ground
which he gained at the beginning was afterwards lost.
4. The great service of Joshua to his people (as we have already
remarked) was, that he gave them a settlement. He gave them--Rest.
Some, indeed, may be disposed to question whether that which Joshua
did give them was worthy of the name of rest. If the Canaanites were
still among them, disputing the possession of the country; if savage
Adonibezeks were still at large, whose victims bore in their
mutilated bodies the marks of their cruelty and barbarity; if the
power of the Philistines in the south, the Sidonians in the north, and
the Geshurites in the north-east was still unbroken, how could they be
said to have obtained rest?
The objection proceeds from inability to estimate the force of the
comparative degree. Joshua gave them rest in the sense that he gave
them homes of their own. There was no more need for the wandering life
which they had led in the wilderness. They had more compact and
comfortable habitations than the tents of the desert with their slim
coverings that could effectually shut out neither the cold of winter,
nor the heat of summer, nor the drenching rains. They had brighter
objects to look out on than the scanty and monotonous vegetation of
the wilderness. No doubt they had to defend their new homes, and in
order to do so they had to expel the Canaanites who were still
hovering about them. But still they were real homes; they were not
homes which they merely expected or hoped to get, but homes which they
had actually gotten. They were homes with the manifold attractions of
country life--the field, the well, the garden, the orchard, stocked
with vine, fig, and pomegranate; the olive grove, the rocky crag, and
the quiet glen. The sheep and the oxen might be seen browsing in
picturesque groups on the pasture grounds, as if they were part of the
family. It was an interest to watch the progress of vegetation, to
mark how the vine budded, and the lily sprang into beauty, to pluck
the first rose, or to divide the first ripe pomegranate. Life had a
new interest when on a bright spring morning the young man could thus
invite his bride:--
"Rise up my love, my fair one, and come away.
For, lo, the winter is past,
The rain is over and gone;
The flowers appear on the earth;
The time of the singing of birds is come,
And the voice of the turtle is heard in our land;
The fig tree putteth forth her green figs,
And the vines with the tender grape give a good smell."
This, as it were, was Joshua's gift to Israel, or rather God's gift
through Joshua. It was well fitted to kindle their gratitude, and
though not yet complete or perfectly secure, it was entitled to be
called "rest." For if there was still need of fighting to complete the
conquest, it was fighting under easy conditions. If they went out
under the influence of that faith of which Joshua had set them so
memorable an example, they were sure of protection and of victory.
Past experience had shown to demonstration that none of their enemies
could stand before them, and the future would be as the past had been.
God was still among them; if they called on Him, He would arise, their
enemies would be scattered, and they that hated Him would flee before
Him. Fidelity to Him would secure all the blessings that had been read
out at Mount Gerizim, and to which they had enthusiastically shouted,
Amen. The picture drawn by Moses before his death would be realized in
its brightest colours: "Blessed shalt thou be in the city, and blessed
shalt thou be in the field. Blessed shall be the fruit of thy body,
and the fruit of thy ground, and the fruit of thy cattle, the increase
of thy kine, and the flocks of thy sheep. Blessed shall be thy basket
and thy store. Blessed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and blessed
when thou goest out."
But here a very serious objection may be interposed. Is it
conceivable, it may be asked, that this serene satisfaction was
enjoyed by the Israelites when they had got their new homes only by
dispossessing the former owners; when all around them was stained by
the blood of the slain, and the shrieks and groans of their
predecessors were yet sounding in their ears? If these homes were not
haunted by the ghosts of their former owners, must not the hearts and
consciences of the new occupants have been haunted by recollections of
the scenes of horror which had been enacted there? is it possible that
they should have been in that tranquil and happy frame in which they
would really enjoy the sweetness of their new abodes?
The question is certainly a disturbing one, and any answer that may be
given to it must seem imperfect, just because we are incapable of
placing ourselves wholly in the circumstances of the children of
Israel.
We are incapable of entering into the callousness of the Oriental
heart in reference to the sufferings or the death of enemies.
Exceptions there no doubt were; but, as a rule, indifference to the
condition of enemies, whether in life or in death, was the prevalent
feeling.
Two parts of their nature were liable to be affected by the change
which put the Israelites in possession of the houses and fields of the
destroyed Canaanites--their consciences and their hearts.
With regard to their consciences the case was clear: "The earth is the
Lord's, and the fulness thereof; the world, and they that dwell
therein." God, as owner of the land of Canaan, had given it, some six
hundred years before, to Abraham and his seed. That gift had been
ratified by many solemnities, and belief in it had been kept alive in
the hearts of Abraham's descendants from generation to generation.
There had been no secret about it, and the Canaanites must have been
familiar with the tradition. Consequently, during all these centuries,
they had been but tenants at will. When, under the guidance of
Jehovah, Israel crossed the Red Sea and the army of Pharaoh was
drowned, a pang must have shot through the breasts of the Canaanites,
and the news must have come to them as a notice to quit. The echoes of
the Song of Moses reverberated through the whole region:--
"The peoples have heard, they tremble:
Pangs have taken hold of the inhabitants of Philistia.
Then were the dukes of Edom amazed;
The mighty men of Moab, trembling taketh hold of them:
All the inhabitants of Canaan are melted away.
Terror and dread falleth upon them;
By the greatness of Thine arm they are as still as a stone;
Till Thy people pass over, O Lord,
Till the people pass over which Thou hast purchased.
Thou shalt bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of Thine
inheritance
The place, O Lord, which Thou hast made for Thee to dwell in,
The sanctuary, O Lord, which Thy hands have established.
The Lord shall reign for ever and ever."
It was well known, therefore, that, so far as Divine right went, the
children of Israel were entitled to the land. But even after that, the
Canaanites had a respite and enjoyed possession for forty years.
Besides, they had been judicially condemned on account of their sins;
and, moreover, when they first came into the country, they had
dispossessed the former inhabitants. At last, after long delay, the
hour of destiny arrived. When the Israelites took possession they felt
that they were only regaining their own. It was not they, but the
Canaanites, that were the intruders, and any feeling on the question
of right in the minds of the Israelites would rather be that of
indignation at having been kept out so long of what had been promised
to Abraham, than of squeamishness at dispossessing the Canaanites of
property which was not their own.
Still, one might suppose there remained scope for natural pity. But
this was not very active. We may gather something of the prevalent
feeling from the song of Deborah and the action of Jael. It was not an
age of humanity. The whole period of the Judges was indeed an "iron
age." Gideon, Jephthah, Samson, were men of the roughest fibre. Even
David's treatment of his Ammonite prisoners was revolting. All that
can be said for Israel is, that their treatment of enemies did not
reach that infamous pre-eminence of cruelty for which the Assyrians
and the Babylonians were notorious. But they had enough of the
prevailing callousness to enable them to enter without much discomfort
on the homes and possessions of their dispossessed foes. They had no
such sentimental reserve as to interfere with a lively gratitude to
Joshua as the man who had given them rest.
Probably, in looking back on those times, we fail to realize the
marvellous influence in the direction of all that is humane and loving
that came into our world, and began to operate in full force, with the
advent of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. We forget how much darker
a world it _must_ have been before the true light entered, that
lighteth every man coming into the world. We forget what a gift God
gave to the world when Jesus entered it, bringing with Him the light
and love, the joy and peace, the hope and the holiness of heaven. We
forget that the coming of Jesus was the rising of the Sun of
Righteousness with healing in His wings. Coming among us as the
incarnation of Divine love, it was natural that He should correct the
prevailing practice in the treatment of enemies, and infuse a new
spirit of humanity. Even the Apostle who afterwards became the Apostle
of Love could manifest all the bitterness of the old spirit when he
suggested the calling down of fire from heaven to burn up the
Samaritan village that would not receive them. "Ye know not what
manner of spirit ye are of, for the Son of man came not to destroy
men's lives, but to save them." Who does not feel the humane spirit of
Christianity to be one of its brightest gems, and one of its chief
contrasts with the imperfect economy that preceded it? It is when we
mark the inveteracy of the old spirit of hatred that we see how great
a change Christ has introduced. If it was the great distinction of
Christ's love that "while we were yet enemies, Christ died for us,"
His precept to us to love our enemies ought to meet with our readiest
obedience. Not without profound prophetic insight did the angel who
announced the birth of Jesus proclaim, "Glory to God in the highest,
on earth peace, good-will to men."
Alas! it is with much humiliation we must own that in practising this
humane spirit of her Lord the progress of the Church has been slow and
small. It seemed to be implied in the prophecies that Christianity
would end war; yet one of the most outstanding phenomena of the world
is, the so-called Christian nations of Europe armed to the teeth,
expending millions of treasure year by year on destructive armaments,
and withdrawing millions of soldiers from those pursuits which
increase wealth and comfort, to be supported by taxes wrung from the
sinews of the industrious, and to be ready, when called on, to scatter
destruction and death among the ranks of their enemies. Surely it is a
shame to the diplomacy of Europe that so little is done to arrest
this crying evil; that nation after nation goes on increasing its
armaments, and that the only credit a good statesman can gain is that
of retarding a collision, which, when it does occur, will be the
widest in its dimensions, and the vastest and most hideous in the
destruction it deals, that the world has ever seen! All honour to the
few earnest men who have tried to make arbitration a substitute for
war.
And surely it is no credit to the Christian Church that, when its
members are divided in opinion, there should be so much bitterness in
the spirit of its controversies. Grant that what excites men so keenly
is the fear that the truth of God being at stake, that which they deem
most sacred in itself, and most vital in its influence for good is
liable to suffer; hence they regard it a duty to rebuke sharply all
who are apparently prepared to betray it or compromise it. Is it not
apparent that if love is not mingled with the controversies of
Christians, it is vain to expect violence and war to cease among the
nations? More than this, if love is not more apparent among Christians
than has been common, we may well tremble for the cause itself. One of
the leaders of German unbelief is said to have remarked that he did
not think Christianity could be Divine, because he did not find the
people called Christians paying more heed than others to the command
of Jesus to love their enemies.
5. One other service of Joshua to the nation of Israel remains to be
noticed: he sought with all his heart that they should be a
God-governed people, a people that in every department of life should
be ruled by the endeavour to do God's will. He pressed this on them
with such earnestness, he commended it by his own example with such
sincerity, he brought his whole authority and influence to bear on it
with such momentum, that to a large extent he succeeded, though the
impression hardly survived himself. "The people served the Lord all
the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders that outlived
Joshua, who had seen all the great work of the Lord that He had
wrought for Israel." Joshua seemed always to be contending with an
idolatrous virus which poisoned the blood of the people, and could not
be eradicated. The only thing that seemed capable of crushing it was
the outstretched arm of Jehovah, showing itself in some terrible form.
While the effect of that display lasted the tendency to idolatry was
subdued, but not extirpated; and as soon as the impression of it was
spent, the evil broke out anew. It was hard to instil into them ruling
principles of conduct that would guide them in spite of outward
influences. As a rule, they were not like Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
or like Moses who "endured as seeing Him who is invisible."
Individuals there were among them, like Caleb and Joshua himself, who
walked by faith; but the great mass of the nation were carnal, and
they exemplified the drift or tendency of that spirit--"The carnal
mind is enmity against God."
Still Joshua laboured to press the lesson--the great lesson of the
theocracy--Let God rule you; follow invariably His will. It is a rule
for nations, for churches, for individuals. The Hebrew theocracy has
passed away; but there is a sense in which every Christian nation
should be a modified theocracy. So far as God has given abiding rules
for the conduct of nations, every nation ought to regard them. If it
be a Divine principle that righteousness exalteth a nation; if it be a
Divine command to remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy; if it be a
Divine instruction to rulers to deliver the needy when he crieth, the
poor also and him that hath no helper, in these and in all such
matters nations ought to be divinely ruled. It is blasphemous to set
up rules of expediency above these eternal emanations of the Divine
will.
So, too, churches should be divinely ruled. There is but one Lord in
the Christian Church, He that is King of kings, and Lord of lords.
There may be many details in Church life which are left to the
discretion of its rulers, acting in accordance with the spirit of
Scripture; but no church should accept of any ruler whose will may set
aside the will of her Lord, nor allow any human authority to supersede
what He has ordained.
And for individuals the universal rule is: "Whatsoever ye do in word
or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks unto God
and the Father by Him." Each true Christian heart is a theocracy--a
Christ-governed soul. Not ruled by external appliances nor by
mechanical rules, nor by the mere effort to follow a prescribed
example; but by the indwelling of Christ's Spirit, by a vital force
communicated from Himself. The spring of the Christian life is
here--"Not I, but Christ liveth in me." This is the source of all the
beautiful and fruitful Christian lives that ever have been, of all
that are, and of all that ever shall be.
THE END.
_Printed by Hazell, Watson, & Viney, Ld., London and Aylesbury._
* * * * *
Transcriber's note:
Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).
Small capital text has been replaced with all capitals.
The carat character (^) indicates that the following letter is
superscripted (example: D^2).
Variations in spelling, punctuation and hyphenation have been retained
except in obvious cases of typographical error.
Page 75: "who have never been required to work"--The transcriber has
added "been".
The cover for the eBook version of this book was created by the
transcriber and is placed in the public domain.