Joshua: Chapter 10

The day man spoke

And God listened--

the mouth that binds.

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How binding are the oaths that are entered based on deception, commitments that are not based on facts?

This chapter continues to explore the aftermath of the transformation of the second battle with Ai, in which human action moves to the forfront. If in the previous chapter, the movement to a human-centered model opens the door to deception,  here, the covenant with the Ginonites is put to the test. It is an oath based on a human-centric vision of reality, in which Joshua does not "ask the mouth of God"--and so is tricked by the very wiles he used. 

Here, Joshua decides to "let his hand slacken" from the Gibonites, and he honors his word to the upmost. In commiting fully to the human-based reality, in making in binding, Joshua is able to bind God Himself with words: "And there was no day before it or after it, in which God hearkened to the voice of man."

Honering the partial and problematic human covenant revives the covenant between God and Israel. The first time, there is a fusion between human and divine action. In contrast to the battle with Jericho, it is Joshua who opens the battle. As in the case of Ai, the battle begins with tactics and subterfuge, with Joshua "surprising them" by marching through the night. Yet in contrast to the battle of Ai, this time God pitches in by sending hail on the fleeing Emorites, in a direct echo of the Exodus story. Human and divine action fuse, to create a perfect victory.

Joshua emerges stregthened by this new partnership. No longer must he be continously propped up by God's reassurances of "do not fear do not be dismayed." Now, he can act as the comfortor to the people, echoing God's words to them "do not fear and do not be dismayed, be strong and take courage" (10:25) .

The turn to human action and language here becomes a source of growth rather than of failure.]   

Joshua 9: In Writing

Are you far

or are you within?

Touch the tattered shoe

the crumbling food

switch clothes again and again.

No voice within.

Weave a web of words

to wrap me round

in voice.

Joshua: Chapter 9

Open your mouth

bind yourself with your ongue

in a world of tattered objects

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This chapter begins to unpack  some of the implications of the movement from miracles to tactics that took place in the previous chapter.  If in the aftermath of Jericho, the children of Israel venerated Joshua, here there is an underlying tension between the "man of Israel" and the leadership. The local inhabitants also no longer tremble before Joshua. Rather than "melting" in fear as they hear of the supernatural victories, they unite in a federation to fight tactics with tactics. 

The Gibonites take a differnt approach, and rather than battleing Israel head-on, use the same subterfuge and cunning that Joshua used against Ai--this time against him. "Why did you beguile us?" Joshua cries. not undertsanding that deception and play has become an essential part of the world in which he plays, the battles that he fights. 

In a world defined by human action rather than the all-encompaing reality of God's presence--"for the Land is Mine"--there are many objects, and shadows, but few clear cut realities. The leaders of Israel do not "ask the mouth of God", but rather look to the witness of objects as they "take of their provisions" (9: 14). We move from the previous chapter's focus on the "hand" of human action, to the "mouth" that defines the human reality--regardless of the facts. 

If in the battle of Jericho, Israel was told to remain silent, here, after the battle of Ai, human speech becomes definitive. Joshua and the tribal leaders are bound by their word, despite the fact that their oath was given on the basis of a lie.  "We cannot do anything to them"--the human hand bound by the human oath.

There is a subtle counterpoint here to the story of Jericho, which also ends with the commitment to keep an oath: the scouts search out Rahab, and save her and her family as promised. Here, the battle of Ai ends with the commitment to spare the Gibonitesis as promised. Yet in Jericho, the promise to Rahab was bound by faithfulness: she had to complete her part of the bargain, and not give the spies away. Here, the promise was given under deception. At the closing of the story of Jericho, Rahab is accepted within the encampment, and she comes to dwell "within Israel."; the Gibonites, by contrast, remain in a strange liminal state, intimate outsiders who remain forever apart, yet serve within God's sanctuary, The bonds created arbitrarily by human language are not the full equivallent of bonds rooted in reality.]

Joshua: Chapter 6

Count to seven

seven times

Jubilee of connection

when man made ties dissolve

except for the bonds of the mouth

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"Go view the Land and Jericho" (2:2) Joshua commanded the  scouts, setting up Jericho as the key to the Land, and seperate from it. Now we learn that even as the inhabitants tremble before the incoming Israel, Jericho is "closed and enclosed before the children of Israel" (6:1). The walls, so important for the scouts encounter with Rahab, seperate the city from the countryside--just as in Leviticus 25, the city is seen as a human construct, seperating people from the direct, indelible bond to the "field." 

The conquest of Jericho involves circling this wall, a repetitive cyclic movement that is somehow related to the repetitive cycles of time: the weekly cycle of 6 days plus Shabbat; the seven year cycle of shemita [sabbatical year] ; and the seven times seven cycle of the Yovel / Jubilee--a connection that is emphasized by refering to the shofars carried by the priests as yovel. The nation is to circle the city for six days, one circle a day, with seven priests carrying seven shofarot-yovlot, On the seveneth day. there are seven circles, creating the seven times seven pattern of Yovel. 

The laws of the Jubilee (Leviticus 25)  establish that the Land is God's, with humanity only granted the right of usage. Cities finction as small, humanity-centered bubbles, which allow people to cling to their ownership, even as the Jubillee dissolves it. Here, the sounding of the Yovel literally disolves the walls, merging the city with the land outside--and ending the protection of its inhabitants.

The land returns to God's ownership, becoming herem (forbidden, set aside) for human usage. The city is given to Israel to destroy, but not to possess.

Yet even as the human bonds of ownership are disolved, the bonds  of language stands. The people are commanded to be silent throughout the week of circling Jericho, the only sound the impersonal call of the Shofar. Yet at the moment the walls dissolve, the people are permitted to speak. And human speech is binding. The oath sworn to Rahab must be kept "as you swore to her" (6: 22); Joshua "swears" (6:26) not to rebuild the city. The saving of Rahab "she and all who are with her" is set up as a counter to the destruction of the city "she and all within her." The human bonds of language parallel God's unbreakable possesion of the land.]