Who Says?

And Joshua said to the two men who had spied out the land, “Go into the prostitute’s house and bring the woman and all she has out of there, just as you have sworn to her.”  Joshua 6:22 NASB

As you have sworn – Without the context you won’t see the judicial problem this verse creates.  But once you see it, oh my, it’s scary.

God tells Joshua to destroy Jericho.  The action is implied in the previous verse (“They utterly destroyed everything in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, sheep, and donkey, with the edge of the sword”).  However, Rahab is spared.  Why?

Well, Rahab invoked ḥesed (Joshua 2:12), obligating the spies to show reciprocity in saving her from destruction.   But as we know, the spies extended this obligation to include Rahab’s immediate family—and they added a condition, which, strictly speaking, should never be attached to ḥesed.  Now, when Joshua oversees the total destruction of Jericho, he validates the spies promise, as if he could have done anything else given the circumstances.  But you will notice, from the next verse, that Joshua also extends the scope of ḥesed, including Rahab’s father, mother, brothers, all she had, and all her mišpāḥâ, that is, her clan.  A whole lot of people who were not at all involved in saving the two spies.

Rahab showed respect for God’s purposes.  She acknowledged that the people of Israel would take the land.  She used Hebrew-related vow language.  She projected a relationship with Israel, and, as it turned out, that was precisely God’s intention.  But what about all these others?  How do we know they had any connection with the invading Israelites?  Who were they?  Why were they spared?  Suddenly the promise to Rahab, which has some justification, seems to grow beyond any indication of righteous affiliation.  Nevertheless, ḥesed vows must be honored, and Joshua does just that even though it was the spies who made the promise.  God asked for one thing.  The spies made a small exception.  Joshua enlarged the exception and granted it divine validity.  Everything seemed to turn out just fine.

But a precedent was established.  What God said could be slightly altered.  Not much, and not for the wrong reasons, but altered nevertheless.

Then along came the Gibeonites.  You remember the mistake Joshua made.  “And Joshua made peace with them and made a covenant with them, to let them live; and the leaders of the congregation swore an oath to them” (Joshua 9:15).  The same word, šābaʿ, by which he ratified the spies’ promise to save Rahab.  The unbreakable vow.  Except this time things didn’t work out so well.  In fact, as a result of this vow, even though given under false pretenses, Israel was plagued with what was essentially a rebel population within its land from then on, precisely what God did not want!  Perhaps the precedent, a small shift in fulfilling exactly God’s directions, allowed Joshua to think that another small exception was allowable.  Like Saul and the animals.

What have we learned?  Qohelet wrote it down.  “ . . . and I saw every work of God, I concluded that one cannot discover the work which has been done under the sun” (Ecclesiastes 8:17a).  In other words, you never know how things are going to turn out.  That’s why it’s essential to do precisely what God wants done.  He’s the only One Who actually knows.  Better to avoid a promise than make one under circumstances God doesn’t allow.  But leaders, even great leaders like Joshua, have a tendency to believe they can authorize a change, a tiny change, and it won’t really matter.  But it does, doesn’t it?

Topical Index: vow, authority, Joshua 6:22

You might be interested in the way some Christian commentaries handle this problem.  CLICK HERE.