The Book of Joshua has been widely argued over the years due to the
number of wars and deaths associated with it.
Because of all the battles, people might have overlooked Joshua's very
hard and challenging life. This is the reason why I chose to write my Devar on
Joshua and his life told by the Torah and Haftorah. I also will discuss some key points in his
life such as: how he enters the Torah, his many battles and their tactics, if
he is a prophet or not, Joshua's miracles, and finally his death.
Joshua unexpectedly enters the Torah when Moses
selects him to lead a battle. He enters with no background or family line
provided. The Torah only introduces
Joshua as the Son of Nun. This literally means Joshua the Son of Nothing. Moses chooses Joshua for the battle and the
Canaan Spy Mission, however it seems strange to me to assign such an important
responsibility to someone so new and young, yet Joshua proves himself worthy of
the challenge.
The Book of Joshua is a book of battles. The first
battle mentioned, is The Battle of Jericho and is significant because it is
Joshua's first battle and is an example of where Joshua succeeds and Moses
fails. Joshua gains his men's confidence in his leadership by reading Torah to
them before every battle. His men fight
better, because they know what they are fighting for and for whom. This may be
the reason why the spies that are sent into Jericho, to scout it out, don't
report back to Joshua with lies, nor do they complain to Joshua, as they did 38
years earlier to Moses.
Joshua's next battle, in the Book of Prophets, is
the Battle Ai. The Battle of Ai teaches
Joshua a hard lesson to not be overconfident, in which he is, and he pays
dearly with his men. In the battle of Ai, when Joshua first attacks, he just
sends a few men and, because he is over confident, that strategy fails. The second time, he changes the tactic and
sends a small army to retreat. When the Ai army follows the retreaters, the
rest of the army captures the city of Ai.
Joshua is fierce in war. In the battle against
Jerusalem, Joshua traps 5 kings in a cave, then takes them out, orders his men
to put their feet on the kings' necks, hang them and finally, throw them back
into the cave. Joshua's troops are
small in number and Eli Wiesel, a Jewish book scholar, feels showing mercy
would have been mistaken for weakness.
Joshua had to be ruthless and that may help explain the brutality.
Joshua
never starts war for the sake of war. He
hates war and tries to avoid it. He
sends three letters, to the kings of the cities, three options; evacuate the
land, stay and accept Jewish rule; or stay and fight. As in the city of Gibeon, Joshua makes a
peace treaty, this demonstrated that he is a great tactician and is able to
assess the situation and cope with it, whether to make peace or war. Joshua's
name is even listed with West Point's most famous tacticians and field
commanders. I have read that Modern-day
Israeli generals say that had it not been for their knowledge of Joshua's
tactics, their military operations might have failed.
A question that I am curious about is whether Joshua
is a prophet or not. Joshua is in the
Book of Prophets but his book is a historical prophet book. It only tells of
the history of the Israelites after Moses dies and the conquering of Canaan. In
rough terms, a prophet is a person who talks to God and, Joshua does that.
According to Maimonides, a famous Jewish thinker, " The prophet can furnish a
vision and the theoretical foundations to support it." Joshua, on the other
hand, only did things God instructed him to do, because God willed it. The
Super Naturalists theorists claim, " to be a prophet you just need God's will",
which Joshua had but, the Naturalists other theorists claim " you also need
keen intellect" and, Joshua's military tactics show that he is intelligent. The
difference between Moses as a prophet and Joshua is that Moses talked to God,
himself, like Joshua, but he understands why God asks him to do things, he even
argues with God, not just that it is his will. In my opinion, I think Joshua is
a prophet, possibly not as great as Moses, but he did carry out and translate
God's will.
Joshua performs many impressive miracles in the Book
of Joshua; his most famous is ordering the sun and the moon to stand still so
he can win a battle. What is so spectacular is that the sun and the moon listen
and obey Joshua's command. The force of
the Jordan River to run backwards, so the Israelites can cross in order to go
into Canaan, is another miracle and adds to the reasons why I think Joshua is a
prophet.
Joshua fights wars in God's name, but what did God
want Joshua to do? I think God wants Joshua to rid the people of Canaan and
resettle the Jewish people in the land. But why couldn't God do it for them?
Well, I think God wants the Israelites to want, fight and earn the land for
themselves.
A characteristic of Joshua's personality that
interested me is in the Haftorah, forty-five years later, when Joshua is
dividing the concurred land of Canaan.
Caleb, Joshua's friend and co-spy in the Canaan spy mission, asks Joshua
for a piece of land, saying, "Give me some land because I didn't lie to Moses
about the land". Joshua could have reminded Caleb that he, too, did the same
thing, but chose not to, and granted Caleb's request for land. This act of
kindness and forgiveness are character traits I am always working towards.
In Joshua's final speech, he does not speak of his
war victories and personal achievements. Elie Wiesel, in Five Biblical
Portraits, writes that each war makes Joshua feel more and more sad. Instead, Joshua talks about how the
Israelites have a choice whether to keep practicing Torah or not. And, as Joshua reminds the Jewish people that
we must make a choice to practice Torah, I have made my choice, today. Because, today, I was called up to read from
the Torah, for the first time, as a Bar Mitzvah.
