"We're Here, We're Clear, We're Awful" (The Bible 6-7)
- Simon Fallice
- Mar 18
- 10 min read
Updated: Mar 26
OK, the Moses books are over and it's time for some new blood. The book of Joshua is weird. It reads like everyone thinks the Bible reads, being largely a list of stupid names and being hard to follow, while at the same time being horrible. God's people have some serious bloodlust. But first, a recap!
PREVIOUSLY:
God really wants to build an army and invade Canaan. Doesn't say why.
His chosen people, the Israelites, keep letting Him down.
Camped on the outskirts, they send spies in. All but two advise against invading, because there are giants.
God is like, well don't bother then - and prepares to abandon them and find someone else.
Moses reminds Him they had a deal.
God is like, UGH, FINE, those two spies can go in but the rest of you can go swivel.
Moses reminds Him He'll still need an army.
God is like, ...I know... Right you lot, you have forty years, get making some kids before you die.
He then takes an entire book to remind them what bitches they are.
Forty years later, one of those spies, Joshua, prepares to lead the new generation to the promised land.
And now, the thrilling continuation!
1) THE HORROR BEGINS (JOSHUA 1-10)
From the land of Shittim, Joshua sends two spies across the Jordan to Jericho. Mindful of what happened last time, they know that actual reconnaissance is the last thing they should be doing. So instead they go to a prostitute's house for a bit, get interrupted by the King's men and slink away, then return and tell everyone they will definitely win and God is brilliant.
God parts the river and the Israelites cross. Once firmly exposed in enemy territory, God decides now is the time for impromptu circumcisions. This goes much better than it could have, and to walk it off, He has them circle the city walls for a week, while Josh blows a massive goddamned horn. On the seventh day the Walls of Jericho fall and their first conquest is complete. And by conquest I mean massacre, as every man, woman, child and beast are put to the sword. That prostitute was spared because she's righteous (read: the only person they actually spoke to).
The next city (Ai) isn't quite the same cakewalk, because God has quietly abandoned them. When 36 men are killed and the battle lost, they ask Him what the hell. He reveals that one of them took some of the Jericho loot for himself, so He's done a Sergeant Hartman and collectively punished them all. The Pyle in question is identified and stoned to death.
With God back on-side, the second slaughter is complete. The people of the next city along (Gibeon) are understandably shitting it by now - so they hatch a plan. They dress in rags and approach the Israelites saying they're diplomats from a far-off land and want to make an alliance. "Well, we had to wait 40 years and watch our parents die for this privilege but sure, just waltz over and join us..."
Seeing no need to consult God, they make a "covenant of peace". A few days later, the con is revealed and everyone holds their breath, waiting for God to throw His toys out the pram and kill people again - but this time He's quite chill. He just quietly reminds Joshua that agreements must be honoured but there are ways around them. So the Gibeonites are made slaves, which suits everyone.
2) "THE LAND IS OURS! ON PAPER ANYWAY..." (JOSHUA 11-24)
They go on to decimate a further 29 cities and by crikey do we hear about them all, including of course Jarmuth, Shimronmeron and Hazor. God then tells Joshua he's getting old. He's less than halfway through, but God wants all of Canaan divvied up for the record before he dies. He therefore needs to stop fighting and focus on the admin.
The Israelites split into tribes, each responsible for conquering their own assigned land. Caleb, the other suck-up spy from Numbers, asks for and receives the city of Hebron, ruled by 3 giants. Presumably this is the biblical equivalent of a mid-life crisis, and the 85-year-old steams in and wipes them out.
Other tribes get stuck in too. But Ephraim and Manasseh, sons of Dreamcoat Joseph, complain that they're basically royalty and deserve more. Joshua tells them he isn't finished his paperwork but they're welcome to go and invade the parts he hasn't assigned yet. (In fact, seven tribes don't seem interested in their lots and he has to keep prodding them to go get their war on, and he could have easily given them theirs - but I think it's the principle of the thing.) Instead they keep grumbling. They don't even bother to murder the Canaanites in their own cities, taking them as slaves instead. Who knows what God will make of this when He can be bothered looking...
By the end of the book, they've captured so much territory they start to get confused. There's already an "East" and "West", and when the Eastern tribes build their own big temple in solidarity, the West thinks they're rebelling and there's almost a civil war. Again, no word from God on this, but it's sorted and it's fine.
On his deathbed, Joshua reminds the people not to mess this up. God has been absent for a while now, but you never know.
3) "A HERO SHALL RISE..." (JUDGES 1-8)
Before Judges begins proper, we get a few more comedy names as the Israelites continue their sacking of cities and kings. Among them, Adonibezek of Bezek, whose thumbs and big toes they slice off - but he did this to other kings so he's fine with it.
Then we get to the meat of it. I didn't realise this at first, but Judges actually begins with a tl;dr. A pattern that will repeat throughout the book - and indeed through RPGs until the end of time. Now they're comfortable, the Israelites start worshipping other gods again, so God withdraws His support. The Canaanites attack - they cry for help - God raises a hero of legend (a "judge") to guide them to victory - the hero dies, Israel forgets about God again and are a bit more insufferable than they were before - and the cycle continues until they're just awful.
Actually, that's all you need to know - but some of the stories are quite fun, so do read on!
Judge number 4 is a woman (Deborah), though obviously in a supporting role. She's helped by a guy, who's helped by God. But the fact that she's there at all is deemed so remarkable, there's a whole chapter repeating the story of their victory in song form.
Number 5 is Gideon, a reluctant hero who repeatedly tests God to prove Himself before he'll do anything. At one point he gets a fleece (Gideon's Fleece? That sounds like a thing) and asks God to make it wet, then dry again, then wet again. Remember when Moses' brother and sister asked God if they can talk to Him directly and He struck them with leprosy for being so cheeky? For some reason He takes this crap from Gideon all day long.
Gideon raises an army of 32,000 to go and fight 135,000. God has him whittle this army down to just 300 men, and says they're to be armed with nothing but oil lamps. He's decided He wants the glory of this victory for Himself.
Israel tries to make Gideon king but he refuses, saying God is the only king. Humble indeed - except he then settles down with a harem of wives and a concubine, commissions a golden idol for people to worship, and calls one of his seventy children Abimelech, which literally means "my father is king!" It's such breathtaking arrogance that it would later inspire a new religion. (Gideon's Bibles are the ones that litter hotel rooms across America.)
4) THE LEGEND CONTINUES (JUDGES 9-12)
"And it came to pass, as soon as Gideon was dead, that the children of Israel turned again, and went a whoring after Baalim, and made Baalberith their God." Of course. So who's next?
It's Abimelech! Once his father is dead, he murders sixty-nine of his seventy brothers, with the youngest escaping never to be heard from again. He's crowned king but soon goes on to destroy the city and burn a thousand people alive. He attacks another city but is stopped short when a woman caves his skull in with a rock. OK, so not Abimelech. What was the point of this man?!
Judges 7 and 8 are competent and not much happens. Then for their eighth relapse, the Israelites outdo themselves and start worshipping every god they've ever heard of. They're attacked - say sorry - receive their next hero, who is...
Jephthah! Or Jeff. Jeff is the classic hero setup - outcast for being the son of a prostitute, he grows mighty and becomes the outlaw warlord of a foreign clime. Under attack, his homeland begs him to return, and he does so on condition that he can rule the place when he wins. Even though this is the ninth cycle and God was about to help him anyway, he volunteers that he will go home and burn to ashes the first thing that comes out to greet him if they win. Yes, Jeff ends up having to burn his daughter.
He quashes a civil war and then dies. There are 3 further judges and 25 years of peace. The 13th and final Judge you may have heard of...
5) SAMSON (JUDGES 13-16)
Yes, it's Samson. Him with the hair! It's unclear why it's taken so long, but Sam-13 is set to be the Daddy; the super hero of legendary legend as God gets serious. His virgin mother is visited by an angel and told as much. As part of the deal he's not allowed to cut his hair, drink alcohol or touch dead bodies. I don't think anyone actually tells him this, and God only cares about the first one anyway, because he does the other two a lot and nothing happens. For instance, after he kills that lion with his bare hands, he goes back to look inside the corpse and finds it full of bees and honey, which he feeds to his parents without explanation. Read that sentence again. Isn't the Bible just ace.
And it gets better. He's set to marry a Philistine woman against all advice, but goes on a seven-day bender, argues with her friends, and ends up going off to kill some people instead. The bride is quickly married to someone else, which makes him angry. So he gathers 300 jackals, ties them tail-to-tail in pairs, secures flaming torches at the knots, and sends them screeching off to burn some Philistine farmland. In retaliation, the Philistines murder the (Philistine) bride and her father for some reason. In retaliation, he slaughters more Philistines. In retaltiation, the Philistines invade his city and kill some Israelites, demanding Samson's surrernder. In retaliation, Samson makes a show of allowing himself to be tied up and taken captive, then bursts free like The Hulk and hacks a thousand men to death with a donkey's jawbone.
Now a national hero, there's a 20-year period of peace. Albeit one in which Samson makes regular whoring trips to Philistine and sometimes rips the place up. The Philistines then enlist Delilah to take him down. She gets him to reveal his secret, his hair is cut (not by her, it turns out), and that's the end of Magic Sam. They blind him and make him a slave, but amazingly they forget about his hair - which grows back just enough that he's able go out in a blaze of glory, levelling a big temple and taking thousands with him.
6) SURPRISE! IT WAS ALL A WASTE OF TIME (JUDGES 17-21)
Despite God's best efforts, the Israelites are now worse than ever. To illustrate this, we're told of Micah, who steals money from his mum to fund creation of his own religion with false idols and priests and everything, which is itself stolen wholesale by a bunch of conmen and relocated to a nearby town once they've slaughtered its whole population. Pretty much going out of their way to break that covenant in all the ways they can. Then elsewhere, a concubine is raped to death, triggering a massive civil war.
The aftermath of this is mental. The tribe who harboured the rapists is decimated, down to just 600 hobbling, homeless men. Everyone vows to keep their women away from them. But then they start to feel bad. This is an Israelite tribe after all, and with no women they will soon be wiped out. But by some twisted logic, they don't want to go back on their vow. So they check who among them didn't join the fighting, and they send their women across to them as sex slaves. When the men ask for more, they decide they can still keep the vow by manufacturing kidnap. They literally tell these thirsty fucks where their daughters will be, and agree to look the other way when they're snatched. Let no one say the Israelites don't keep their word, sometimes, in the worst way.
X X X X X X X
OK, that's another two books down. I know the past is a foreign country but bloody hell. Was everybody insane? If even half of this is based in truth, it's shocking. And bear in mind, these are the good guys. Guided by God. We're not told what was so bad about the Canaanites, or indeed the people wiped out in the Flood, but clearly this is more what He had in mind.
Speaking of Genesis, I can't stop thinking about Eden. Remember, there's supposed to be a locked gate somewhere guarded by kickass angels and a fiery, floating sword spinning 360 - but nobody mentions it. If someone like Samson can rip cities apart just for fun, you'd think he'd at least have a go at getting in. What's the worst that could happen? OT life is horrible. But as with that boo box in Hook, I'll just have to let it go. I think this plot device has served its function. Now I want to know what miraculous turnaround could possibly make the Israelites and their God the goodies.
Next up: Ruth!
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