2. Route from Sinai to B'ney-Jaakan (Kadesh).

3. Route from Kadesh after the sentence of wandering.

4. Route from Kadesh to the Jordan, 40th year.

SECTION III.

TIMES OF JOSHUA AND THE JUDGES.

§ 261. Ir was on the 10th day of the first month that Israel passed through Jordan, Joshua iv. 19. The day was 13 or 14 April, 1546, precisely 40 tropical years from the day of the passage through the Red Sea. After the circumcision of the congregation, the Passover (which had not been kept since the 2nd year, 1585), was celebrated in its season, Sunday, 18 April; and on the following day, on which the first-fruits of harvest were dedicated, the manna ceased, and Israel ate of the old and new fruits of the land, v. 11.

Immediately after the Passover, the siege of Jericho would begin: it was finished in seven days, chap. vi. The war with Ai would occupy but a few days, vii. viii. The convocation on Mount Ebal, in which Joshua read the whole law "before all the congregation of Israel, with the women, and the little ones, and the strangers that were conversant among them," viii. 30-35, would probably take place at the Pentecost.

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§ 262. After this, the war of occupation begins: its history extends from chap. ix. to xi. "All the kings" of Palestine gathered themselves together with one accord." Gibeon, however, by craft obtained a league. Then, five kings of the south form a confederacy against Gibeon, and are miraculously defeated, x. 1-14, taken and killed, ib. 16-27, and the host passes on victoriously from city to city of the south; Makkedah, Libnah, Lachish, Eglon, Hebron, Debir-all share the same fate; of each it is said, "Joshua, and all Israel with him, fought against it, and took it, and the king thereof, and all the cities thereof; and they smote them with the edge of the sword, and utterly destroyed all the souls that were therein; he left none remaining." In these expeditions the Israelites became masters of the whole of the south. "So Joshua smote all the country of the hills, and of the south, and of the vale, and of the springs, and all their kings; he left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the Lord God of Israel commanded. And Joshua smote them from Kadesh-barnea even unto Gaza,

and all the country of Goshen even unto Gibeon." No great length of time was occupied in this series of conquests, for it is added: "And all these kings and their land did Joshua take at one time, because the LORD God of Israel fought for Israel. And Joshua returned and all Israel with him, unto the camp to Gilgal." Comp. v. 15. There can be little doubt, then, that all this belongs to the first year, 1546 B. c.

§ 263. To the following year we must refer the northern expedition, xi. 1—14. The confederated kings of the north raised a vast army at the lake Merom, and were there delivered into the hand of Joshua. Then he went from city to city, and "all the cities of these kings he went and smote with the edge of the sword, and utterly destroyed them."

In these two wars the subjugation of the land was completed. "So Joshua took all that land, the hills and the south country, and all the land of Goshen [all this, in the former expedition, x. 41, and now in this war he took] the valley and the plain and the highlands of Israel and the valley of the same: [so that the conquests now extended] even from the Mount Halak that goeth to Seir, even unto Baalgad in the valley of Lebanon, under Mount Hermon: and all their kings he took, and smote them and slew them." But these northern conquests were not so soon completed as those of the south; for, it is added, “A long time did Joshua make war upon all these kings, DD, v. 18. This war being 'D', brought to an end, it yet remained to dispossess the gigantic highlanders, the Anakim, of their strong-holds in the mountains against these, therefore, the war is now directed. "At that time came Joshua, and cut off the Anakims from the mountains, from Hebron, Debir, Anab, and all the mountains of Israel: Joshua destroyed them utterly with their cities there was none of the Anakims left in the land of the children of Israel: only in Gaza, in Gath, and in Ashdod, there remained." And thus was the conquest of the land completed in five expeditions:-1. Jericho; 2. Ai; 3. The kings of the south; 4. Those of the north; 5. The Anakim in the southern and northern highlands. "So Joshua took the whole land, and Joshua gave it for an inheritance unto Israel according to their divisions by their tribes; and the land rested from war." So ended the wars of Joshua.

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264. Now the time of the expedition against the Anakim is limited by an incidental notice which occurs afterwards. In the history of the partition of lands, which begins at xiv. 1, when the lot of Judah is about to be described (xv. 1—12), it is premised that a certain portion was assigned to the house of Caleb. "Then the children of Judah came unto Joshua in Gilgal; and Caleb, the son of Jephunneh the Kenezite, said unto him, Thou knowest the thing that the LORD said unto Moses, the man of God, concerning me and thee in Kadesh-barnea. Forty years old was I when Moses the servant of the LORD sent me from Kadesh-barnea to espy out the land; and I brought him word again as it was in mine heart. And now, behold, the Lord hath kept me alive, as he said, these forty and five years, even since the Lord spake this word unto Moses, while Israel wandered in the wilderness and now, lo, I am this day fourscore and five years old. Now therefore give me this mountain, whereof the LORD spake in that day; for thou heardest in that day how the Anakims were there, and that the cities were great and fenced; if so be the LORD will be with me, then I shall be able to drive them out, as the LORD said. And Joshua blessed him, and gave unto Caleb the son of Jephunneh Hebron for an inheritance. And the land had rest from war." The time of this incident is the 47th year from the Exode, 1540 B. C. And it must have preceded xi. 21, for there the Anakim are utterly exterminated from the land, from Hebron and Debir by name. speaks of them as being still in those parts; and in xv. 13 we have the story how "he drove out from Hebron the three sons of Anak, Sheshai and Ahiman and Talmai, the children of Anak, and he went up thence to the inhabitants of Debir." Hence it seems, that at the time when the northern conquests were completed, chap. xi, and now the war was to be turned against the Anakim, Caleb and the house of Judah undertook the expulsion of these giants from the southern highlands, while Joshua expelled them from the highlands of Israel, xi. 21. Here then is no inconsistency. Nor is there any contradiction between x. 36-39, where Hebron and Debir were described as taken and utterly destroyed, and this history of Caleb's expeditions, xv. 13 ff. On the contrary, the very

Here Caleb