A Lesson in Belief.

Moving forward from Moses, Aaron, the Tabernacle of Testimony, and the Ark of the Covenant, we encounter Joshua. You probably hear the name of Joshua and think, "the Battle of Jericho". From a historical standpoint, that battle would have been a test of belief indeed. So how contextually supported is the story of Jericho and the life of Joshua in Scripture?

"I Lift My Hands" by Chris Tomlin

Old Testament References to Joshua:

• Numbers 14:36-38, "The LORD spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, 'How long shall I bear with this evil congregation who are grumbling against Me?' . . . 'Surely you shall not come into the land in which I swore to settle you, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun' . . . 'Your sons shall be shepherds for forty years in the wilderness, and they will suffer for your unfaithfulness, until your corpses lie in the wilderness. According to the number of days which you spied out the land, forty days, for every day you shall bear your guilt a year, even forty years, and you will know My opposition. I, the LORD, have spoken, surely this I will do to all this evil congregation who are gathered together against Me. In this wilderness they shall be destroyed, and there they will die.' As for the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land and who returned and made all the congregation grumble against him by bringing out a bad report concerning the land, even those men who brought out the very bad report of the land died by a plague before the LORD. But Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh remained alive out of those men who went to spy out the land."
• Joshua - Portrayed as a historical man, not simply a figurative one.
• Why would God speak to historical Moses and Aaron about a merely imaginary Joshua?
• Why mention the father of a merely figurative Joshua?
• Why would it be written in Scripture that the Lord swore He would punish Israel for forty years for their guilt, if the story of the spies, including Joshua, was fake?
• Where in Scripture do you find an imaginary plague from the Lord? If the plague was real, must not Joshua have been a real (not merely figurative) Israelite?
• Deut. 31:14-26, "Then the LORD said to Moses, 'Behold, the time for you to die is near; call Joshua, and present yourselves at the tent of meeting, that I may commission him.' So Moses and Joshua went and presented themselves at the tent of meeting. The LORD appeared in the tent in a pillar of cloud, and the pillar of cloud stood at the doorway of the tent. The LORD said to Moses, 'Behold, you are about to lie down with your fathers; and this people will arise and play the harlot with the strange gods of the land' . . . 'Now therefore, write this song for yourselves, and teach it to the sons of Israel; put it on their lips, so that this song may be a witness for Me against the sons of Israel' . . . So Moses wrote this song the same day, and taught it to the sons of Israel. Then He commissioned Joshua the son of Nun, and said, 'Be strong and courageous, for you shall bring the sons of Israel into the land which I swore to them, and I will be with you.' It came about, when Moses finished writing the words of this law in a book until they were complete, that Moses commanded the Levites who carried the ark of the covenant of the LORD, saying, 'Take this book of the law and place it beside the ark . . . '"
• Joshua - Portrayed as a historical man, not simply a figurative one.
• Why would the Lord speak to a historical Moses just before his death about an imaginary Joshua succeeding him?
• Where in Scripture does the Lord commission an imaginary man for leadership?
• Why would an imaginary Joshua be recorded in the real law of Moses, which was kept beside the real Ark of the Covenant?
• How could a merely imaginary man lead the real sons of Israel into a new land?
• Joshua 6:26-27, "Then Joshua made them take an oath at that time, saying, 'Cursed before the LORD is the man who rises up and builds this city Jericho; with the loss of his firstborn he shall lay its foundation, and with the loss of his youngest son he shall set up its gates.' So the LORD was with Joshua, and his fame was in all the land."
• Joshua - Portrayed as a historical man, not simply a figurative one.
• Where in Scripture are curses merely imaginary?
• Why associate a specific city with an imaginary curse?
• If the curse in Joshua 6 was real, how could Joshua be merely figurative?
• Joshua 19:49-50, "When they finished apportioning the land for inheritance by its borders, the sons of Israel gave an inheritance in their midst to Joshua the son of Nun. In accordance with the command of the LORD they gave him the city for which he asked, Timnath-serah in the hill country of Ephraim. So he built the city and settled in it."
• Joshua - Portrayed as a historical man, not simply a figurative one.
• Why write of the real sons of Israel apportioning land to a merely imaginary Joshua?
• Why specify the city given to Joshua and its location in the territory of Ephraim, if Joshua was a simply figurative character?
• Judges 2:6-10, "When Joshua had dismissed the people, the sons of Israel went each to his inheritance to possess the land. The people served the LORD all the days of Joshua, and all the days of the elders who survived Joshua, who had seen all the great work of the LORD which He had done for Israel. Then Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the LORD, died at the age of one hundred and ten. And they buried him in the territory of his inheritance in Timnath-heres, in the hill country of Ephraim, north of Mount Gaash. All that generation also were gathered to their fathers; and there arose another generation after them who did not know the LORD, nor yet the work which He had done for Israel."
• Joshua - Portrayed as a historical man, not simply a figurative one.
• Why write of "all the days of Joshua", if Joshua never lived?
• Why reference "the elders who survived Joshua", if Joshua never lived?
• Why name Joshua as the "servant of the Lord", if he was an imaginary character who never actually served the Lord?
• Why specify the age of Joshua at his death if he never lived?
• Why specify the burial place of an imaginary man?
• I Kings 16:33-34, "Ahab also made the Asherah. Thus Ahab did more to provoke the LORD God of Israel than all the kings of Israel who were before him. In his days Hiel the Bethelite built Jericho; he laid its foundations with the loss of Abiram his firstborn, and set up its gates with the loss of his youngest son Segub, according to the word of the LORD, which He spoke by Joshua the son of Nun."
• Joshua - Portrayed as a historical man, not simply a figurative one.
• Why specify who rebuilt Jericho and who died, if the curse wasn't real?
• Why write of how the curse of a merely figurative man came to pass?
• How would the "word of the Lord" be given through an imaginary man?
• I Chron. 7:20-27, "The sons of Ephraim were Shuthelah and Bered his son, Tahath his son, Eleadah his son, Tahath his son, Zabad his son, Shuthelah his son, and Ezer and Elead whom the men of Gath who were born in the land killed, because they came down to take their livestock. Their father Ephraim mourned many days, and his relatives came to comfort him. Then he went in to his wife, and she conceived and bore a son, and he named him Beriah, because misfortune had come upon his house. His daughter was Sheerah, who built lower and upper Beth-horon . . . Elishama his son, Non his son and Joshua his son. Their possessions and settlements were Bethel with its towns, and to the east Naaran, and to the west Gezer with its towns, and Shechem with its towns as far as Ayyah with its towns, and along the borders of the sons of Manasseh, Beth-shean with its towns, Taanach with its towns, Megiddo with its towns, Dor with its towns. In these lived the sons of Joseph the son of Israel."
• Joshua - Portrayed as a historical man, not simply a figurative one.
• Why specify legacies of people in a genealogy attributed to the tribe of Ephraim, if these people never lived?
• Why include a merely figurative Joshua in the genealogy of the real tribe of Ephraim?

New Testament References to Joshua:

• Acts 7:44-47, "The high priest said, 'Are these things so?' And he [Stephen] said, 'Hear me, brethren and fathers! The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran' . . . 'Our fathers had the tabernacle of testimony in the wilderness, just as He who spoke to Moses directed him to make it according to the pattern which he had seen. And having received it in their turn, our fathers brought it in with Joshua upon dispossessing the nations whom God drove out before our fathers, until the time of David. David found favor in God’s sight, and asked that he might find a dwelling place for the God of Jacob. But it was Solomon who built a house for Him.'"
• Joshua - Portrayed as a historical man, not simply a figurative one.
• Why would Stephen defend himself before the antagonistic high priest by referencing a figurative character? How would this be a good defense for Stephen?
• Why would Stephen insert an imaginary character into a story including the historical Abraham and Moses?
• Why would Stephen bring a merely imaginary Joshua into the story of how their real "God drove out" the Canaanite nations before them? Wouldn't referencing an imaginary character in this story be considered blasphemous by the high priest?
• Hebrews 3:16-4:11, "For who provoked Him when they had heard? Indeed, did not all those who came out of Egypt led by Moses? And with whom was He angry for forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose bodies fell in the wilderness? And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who were disobedient? So we see that they were not able to enter because of unbelief . . . For He has said somewhere concerning the seventh day: 'AND GOD RESTED ON THE SEVENTH DAY FROM ALL HIS WORKS'; and again in this passage, 'THEY SHALL NOT ENTER MY REST.' Therefore, since it remains for some to enter it, and those who formerly had good news preached to them failed to enter because of disobedience, He again fixes a certain day, 'Today,' saying through David after so long a time just as has been said before,
              'TODAY IF YOU HEAR HIS VOICE,
              DO NOT HARDEN YOUR HEARTS.'
  For if Joshua had given them rest, He would not have spoken of another day after that. So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His. Therefore let us be diligent to enter that rest, so that no one will fall, through following the same example of disobedience."
• Joshua - Portrayed as a historical man, not simply a figurative one.
• Why would an imaginary Joshua be referenced in writing of the yet observed (at least by Jews) seventh day sabbath and the final Sabbath rest promised to believers?
• Why at all consider whether Joshua gave the sons of Israel true rest, if Joshua never led Israel into a land of their own?
• Why write of some "following the same example of disobedience", if the story of Joshua being exempted from Israel's punishment of forty years' wandering in the wilderness was merely figurative and not a real example from which to learn?