Joshua 7-12

Joshua 7:1-12:24 Appetite for Destruction

“ He has written a great sermon to rally Israel to the new possibility of salvation, through obedience to the ancient covenant of YHWH, and hope in the new David, King Josiah.” - Frank M. Cross - Frank M. Cross - Frank M. Cross

A Brief History of (Supposed) Biblical Time

Book of Joshua - History or What? - Importance of Dtr - Importance of Narrator

Josiah and the Dtr - Reflection on of Dtr - Re-Conquering of Israel -Connections to Joshua

Postcolonial Critical Objections to Historical Model

Joshua and the Dtr

Major Themes

Narrator’s Omnipotence and Disclosure

Parallels and Narrative Structures

Etiologies

National and Class Distinctions

Josiah’s Shadow

Setting the Scene

Ai, Achan, and Parallels

Narrative Components

Narrator’s Omnipotence

Corporate Guilt

Process of Judgement and YHWH’s Power

Reflection of Josiah’s Reforms

Ch. 7: Elimination of Achan

8:1-29, Ai Destroyed

8:30-8:35, Mt. Ebal Interlude

9:1-27, The Gibeonites

Main Themes

Narrative History

Etiology

Fractured Canaanite Society

Tribes vs Kings

Deuteronomistic Idealizations

Chapter 10: The South

Parallels in Structure

War Oracle from YHWH (10:8, 11:6)

Joshua Attacks by Surprise (10:9, 11:7)

YHWH On Israel’s Side (10:10-14, 11:8)

Joshua Kills Kings, Destroys Towns (10:16-39, 11:10-15)

Summary of Destruction (10:40-43, 11:16-20)

Parallels in Themes

Struggle Against Highlanders

Struggle Against Lowlanders

11:1-15, The North

11:16-12:24, Final Tally

Take Aways

Holy War and Modern Sensibilities

Central Authority

Class Wars

History and Narrative

One More Thing...

History Written by the Victors

But what is history? And what is the Deuteronomistic History?

DH as Palimpsest?

“ Albrecht Alt and Martin Noth drew the conclusion that these accounts were originally local traditions from the end of the second millennium BCE; their purpose was to explain the settlement of the tribe of Benjamin. Later, a Judean editor would have collected and revised these etiologies, applying to them a pan-Israelite perspective.” - Thomas Romer

Romer asks... “ Should we speak of a Deuteronomistic ‘movement,’ a Deuteronomistic ‘party,’ or a Deuteronomistic ‘school,’ or are there other terms to be preferred?”

“ The people of Josiah’s kingdom were unfamiliar with the modern understanding of the nation, and Josiah’s kingdom never developed into one... Is it possible to understand space without applying the discourse of nationalism that equates identity and authority of the land with the centralized power? Is it possible to imagine Josiah in an alternative space from the one constructed by the West?” -Uriah Kim

“ It is not the historian who stages events, weaving them together to form a plot, but History itself. History is the playwright, coordinating facts into a coherent sequence: the historian narrating what happened is merely a copyist or amanuensis. He is a spectator like anyone else and, whatever he may think of the performance, he does not question the stage conventions.” - Paul Carter, The Road to Botany Bay