King James Version · Entering the land
Joshua 9
Touch any underlined name to see who or where it is. Tap a verse number to see where it is taken up elsewhere.
And it came to pass, when all the kings which were on this side Jordan, in the hills, and in the valleys, and in all the coasts of the great sea over against , the , and the , the , the , the , and the , heard thereof; That they gathered themselves together, to fight with and with Israel, with one accord. And when the inhabitants of heard what had done unto and to , They did work wilily, and went and made as if they had been ambassadors, and took old sacks upon their asses, and bottles, old, and rent, and bound up; And old and clouted upon their feet, and old garments upon them; and all the bread of their provision was dry and mouldy. And they went to unto the camp at , and said unto him, and to the men of Israel, We be come from a far country: now therefore make ye a league with us. And the men of Israel said unto the , Peradventure ye among us; and how shall we make a league with you? And they said unto , We are thy servants. And said unto them, Who are ye? and from whence come ye? And they said unto him, From a very far country thy servants are come because of the name of thy : for we have heard the fame of him, and all that he did in , And all that he did to the two kings of the , that were beyond Jordan, to king of , and to king of , which was at . Wherefore our and all the inhabitants of our country spake to us, saying, Take victuals with you for the journey, and go to meet them, and say unto them, We are your servants: therefore now make ye a league with us. This our bread we took hot for our provision out of our houses on the day we came forth to go unto you; but now, behold, it is dry, and it is mouldy: 13And these bottles of , which we filled, were new; and, behold, they be rent: and these our garments and our are become old by reason of the very long journey. And the men took of their victuals, and asked not at . And made peace with them, and made a league with them, to let them live: and the princes of sware unto them. And it came to pass at the end of three days after they had made a league with them, that they heard that they were their neighbours, and that they dwelt among them. And the journeyed, and came unto their cities on the third day. Now their cities were , and , and , and Kirjath–jearim. And the smote them not, because the princes of had unto them by of Israel. And all murmured against the princes. But all the princes said unto all , We have unto them by of Israel: now therefore we may not touch them. This we will do to them; we will even let them live, lest be upon us, because of the which we sware unto them. And the princes said unto them, Let them live; but let them be hewers of wood and drawers of water unto all ; as the princes had promised them. And called for them, and he spake unto them, saying, Wherefore have ye beguiled us, saying, We are very far from you; when ye among us? Now therefore ye are , and there shall none of you be freed from being bondmen, and hewers of wood and drawers of water for the house of my . And they answered , and said, Because it was certainly told thy servants, how that thy commanded his servant to give you all the land, and to destroy all the inhabitants of the land from before you, therefore we were sore afraid of our lives because of you, and have done this thing. And now, behold, we are in thine hand: as it seemeth good and right unto thee to do unto us, do. 26And so did he unto them, and them out of the hand of the , that they slew them not. And made them that day hewers of wood and drawers of water for , and for the of , even unto this day, in the place which he should choose.
The 1611 translation, public domain. Its original printing included the Apocrypha, which is why the deuterocanonical books can be read here. Notes and cards are EKLI’s own.
The world at this moment · Entering the land, 1250 BC to 1200 BC ›
Israel crossing into Canaan and contending with fortified city-states, each with its own king, in a land Egypt had recently dominated and was now losing its grip on.
- The collapse
- The whole eastern Mediterranean is coming apart. Within about fifty years the Hittite empire falls, its capital burns, the Mycenaean palaces are destroyed, Ugarit is wiped out mid-correspondence, and Egypt is fighting for its life against seaborne invaders. Nobody fully knows why. Drought, earthquake, migration, and the failure of interlocking trade are all in the explanation.
- Egypt
- Still strong enough to record a victory over a people called Israel on a stone monument around 1207 BC, the earliest mention of the name outside the Bible. But Egyptian control of Canaan is slipping, and within a generation it is gone.
- Canaan
- Not a country but dozens of walled towns, each with its own king, its own god, and its own quarrel with the next valley. This is why the book of Joshua reads as a list of kings rather than a war with a nation.
- Further afield
- Iron is beginning to replace bronze across the region, partly because the tin trade that made bronze possible has broken down. The Olmec are building San Lorenzo. The Zhou are about to overthrow the Shang in China.