99 Fun Facts About Book of Joshua

Who, holding a drawn sword near Jericho, answered 'Neither' when Joshua asked whose side he was on?

The commander of the Lord's army told Joshua to take off his sandals because the ground was holy, the order Moses had heard at the burning bush. Joshua fell facedown and asked what message he had for his servant.

What event let a fugitive in Joshua's cities of refuge finally go home?

The death of the high priest opened every city of refuge at once, a rule Numbers 35 spells out as well. Joshua set towns apart on both sides of the Jordan for anyone who killed 'accidentally and unintentionally'.

What job did Joshua give the Gibeonites 'for the house of my God' after their ruse was exposed?

Woodcutters and water carriers was a curse that still honoured the oath: the Gibeonites lived on, serving the altar 'at the place the Lord would choose'. Saul's later attack on them brought a three-year famine in 2 Samuel 21.

What did the Lord hurl on the Amorites fleeing Gibeon, killing more of them than Israel's swords did?

Large hailstones fell on the road down from Beth Horon to Azekah, on the same day Joshua asked the sun to stand still. The text calls it the one day the Lord 'listened to a human being'.

What did Joshua hold out toward Ai, not drawing back his hand until the city had fallen to the ambush?

A javelin held out until the ambush was done recalls Moses' raised hands at Rephidim, where Israel won only while his arms stayed up. The men hidden west of Ai rushed in, took the town and set it on fire.

What did the Gibeonites show Joshua as proof of a long trip, with cracked wineskins and worn sandals?

Dry, moldy bread had been 'warm when we packed it', the Gibeonites claimed, and the Israelites sampled the provisions without asking the Lord. Three days later they learned the 'distant' visitors lived next door.

Which tribe received no territory from Joshua, the Lord's food offerings being its inheritance instead?

Levi got towns to live in but no tribal land, because 'the Lord, the God of Israel, is their inheritance'. The other tribes gave up those towns out of their own allotments.

Which tribes, given land east of the Jordan by Moses, still had to cross over armed?

Reuben, Gad and half of Manasseh sent their fighting men across while wives and children stayed behind, then went home in Joshua 22 with a blessing and 'great wealth'. Joshua called it keeping Moses' command.

Which two kings east of the Jordan, beaten under Moses, open Joshua's roll call of conquered rulers?

Sihon and Og, the Amorite rulers of Heshbon and Bashan, had fallen to Moses, and their land went to the tribes that settled east of the river. Og is called one of the last of the Rephaites.

What did Joshua set up at Gilgal, Israel's first camp in Canaan, to mark the Jordan crossing?

Twelve stones, one carried out of the riverbed by a man from each tribe, were meant to make children ask 'What do these stones mean?' and hear how Israel crossed on dry ground.

What did Joshua's priests carry into the Jordan, halting its flow the moment their feet touched the water's edge?

The ark of the covenant went first, and the priests stood firm in the riverbed until the whole nation had crossed, with the river at flood stage.

What did the Lord tell Joshua to make to circumcise the men born in the wilderness, at Gibeath Haaraloth?

Flint knives did the job for a generation born on the march, since none of the boys born after Egypt had been circumcised. Gibeath Haaraloth means 'hill of the foreskins'.

What did Joshua's oath say it would cost the man who dared to rebuild Jericho's foundations and gates?

His firstborn and youngest sons were exactly what Hiel of Bethel lost when he rebuilt Jericho in Ahab's day: Abiram as he laid the foundations, Segub as he set up the gates, 1 Kings 16 reports.

Where, at a spot whose name means 'trouble', was Achan punished for taking Jericho's devoted things?

The Valley of Achor takes its name, the book says, from Joshua's words 'Why have you brought this trouble on us?', and Hosea later promises God will turn it into 'a door of hope'. A pile of rocks marked the spot 'to this day'.

What did the Lord permit at Ai that he had forbidden at Jericho, once Achan's theft had been punished?

Keeping plunder and livestock was now allowed 'for yourselves', unlike at Jericho, where everything was devoted to the Lord and Achan's hidden robe, silver and gold cost him his life. Ai itself was burned to a heap of ruins.

On which mountain did Joshua build an altar that no iron tool had touched, and copy out the teaching of Moses?

Mount Ebal was the mountain of the curses, with Mount Gerizim opposite for the blessings, and half the people stood facing each as Joshua read every word of the law. Women, children and foreigners were all there.

The Gibeonites who tricked Joshua into a treaty belonged to which of the peoples Israel was told to drive out?

The Hivites of Gibeon were the one people who made peace, the book notes, because the Lord hardened every other city's heart to fight. Gibeon itself was 'an important city, like one of the royal cities', larger than Ai.

Where did the five Amorite kings hide after Gibeon, until Joshua had large rocks rolled over the entrance?

A cave at Makkedah held the kings while Joshua finished the pursuit, and afterwards it became their tomb, sealed with large rocks that remained 'to this day'. Makkedah itself fell the same day.

Where did Jabin's northern alliance, 'as numerous as the sand on the seashore', camp before Joshua struck?

The Waters of Merom is where Joshua fell on 'a huge army' with horses and chariots without warning, then chased the survivors all the way to Greater Sidon.

Which city, formerly 'the head of all these kingdoms', was the only one built on a mound that Joshua burned?

Hazor was singled out for burning while the other mound cities were looted and left standing, yet Judges 4 has another Jabin reigning in Hazor in Deborah's day. Its ruins, Tel Hazor, are a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

What was Joshua ordered to do to the horses of the northern kings, whose chariots he was to burn?

Hamstring them was the order, crippling the animals rather than keeping them, a step commentators read as stopping Israel from trusting in a chariot force of its own. David did the same to Hadadezer's horses in 2 Samuel 8.

In which three Philistine cities alone did Anakites survive once Joshua had cleared them from the hill country?

Gaza, Gath and Ashdod kept a remnant of the giants, a detail often linked to Goliath 'of Gath' in 1 Samuel. Caleb had driven the three sons of Anak out of his own hill-country city.

Which city, formerly Kiriath Arba and once home of the Anakites, did Joshua give Caleb as his inheritance?

Hebron went to Caleb, who at eighty-five claimed he was as strong as the day Moses sent him to spy out the land. Arba, the city's namesake, 'was the greatest man among the Anakites'.

Who captured Kiriath Sepher and so won Caleb's daughter Aksah, later becoming the first judge of Israel?

Othniel son of Kenaz, Caleb's younger brother, took the town also called Debir and reappears in Judges 3 as the deliverer who beat Cushan-Rishathaim. The land then had peace for forty years.

What did Aksah ask her father Caleb to add to her Negev land, getting both the upper and lower ones?

Springs of water were the 'special favor' she asked for after getting off her donkey, and the scene is repeated almost word for word in Judges 1. A field in the dry south was little use without them.

Which people did the tribe of Judah fail to dislodge from Jerusalem, where they still lived 'to this day'?

The Jebusites held Jerusalem until David captured the fortress of Zion in 2 Samuel 5 and made it his capital. The city sat right on the border between Judah's land and the next tribe's.

Whose five daughters, with no brothers to inherit, won land of their own from Joshua and the priest?

Zelophehad's daughters, Mahlah, Noah, Hoglah, Milkah and Tirzah, had first won their case before Moses in Numbers 27, and Joshua honoured the ruling with tracts of land west of the Jordan. Numbers 36 then made them marry within their tribe.

What did Joshua tell Joseph's tribes to do when they complained one allotment was too small?

Clear the forested hill country was the answer, and Joshua added that they could drive out the Canaanites of the plain even though those had 'chariots fitted with iron'. Their numbers, he said, were their strength.

At which town did Joshua set up the tent of meeting and parcel out land to the seven tribes still without any?

Shiloh stayed Israel's sanctuary for generations, until the Philistines captured the ark in Samuel's day. Three surveyors from each tribe first walked the land and wrote it up 'town by town, in seven parts'.

Which tribe's lot fell between Judah and the tribes of Joseph, its towns including Jericho, Bethel and Jerusalem?

Benjamin drew the first lot cast at the tent of meeting and got a narrow strip of twenty-six towns, among them Gibeah, Saul's future home, and Mizpah. Paul later boasted of belonging to it.

Which tribe's inheritance lay inside Judah's territory, because Judah's portion was 'more than they needed'?

Simeon drew the second lot and was folded into the south of Judah, with Beersheba among its towns, and in time the tribe was apparently absorbed by its host. Jacob had foretold its people would be scattered in Israel.

Which tribe, having lost its territory in Joshua 19, attacked Leshem and renamed the town after its ancestor?

Dan moved north after losing its coastal land, and Judges 18 retells the raid with the town called Laish, giving Israel its proverbial span 'from Dan to Beersheba'. Samson was born in the old Danite territory.

Which Ephraim hill town did Israel give Joshua as his own inheritance, once every tribe had its share?

Timnath Serah was the town Joshua asked for, which he built up and settled, and where he was buried 'north of Mount Gaash'. Judges 2 spells it Timnath Heres, usually read as 'portion of the sun'.

Which city of refuge east of the Jordan lay in Bashan, in the half-tribe of Manasseh's land?

Golan in Bashan gave its name to the Golan Heights, the plateau Israel captured from Syria in the Six-Day War of 1967.

What came with each of the forty-eight towns the other tribes gave the landless tribe in Joshua 21?

Pasturelands for their livestock came with every town, since the tribe held no farmland of its own. Even Caleb's city was split: the town went to the priests, the fields and villages to Caleb.

Which priest headed the delegation sent to confront the eastern tribes over the altar they built by the Jordan?

Phinehas, the priest who had speared a couple at Peor in Numbers 25, heard the builders out and went home satisfied, and the assembly that had gathered for war stood down. He was allotted a town of his own in Ephraim.

Why did the eastern tribes say they built an altar by the Jordan?

As a witness, not for sacrifice: the builders feared their children would one day be told 'you have no share in the Lord', and named the altar 'A Witness Between Us'. KJV readers know it simply as Ed.

Which ancestor does Joshua name as worshipping other gods 'beyond the Euphrates' before God led Abraham away?

Terah, father of Abraham and Nahor, is the idol-worshipper in Joshua's speech, a detail Genesis never states outright. Joshua then tells the people to throw away the gods their ancestors served beyond the river.

What did God say he sent ahead of Israel to oust the two Amorite kings, not 'your own sword and bow'?

The hornet is the agent Joshua credits, echoing Exodus 23 and Deuteronomy 7, where God promises to send hornets ahead of Israel. Some translations read it as terror or panic rather than an insect.

Which words open Joshua's best-known line, spoken in his farewell to Israel?

As for me and my household, we will serve the Lord, Joshua said, and when the people swore to do the same he warned them 'You are not able to serve the Lord', a holy and jealous God. They insisted anyway.

At which town, where Jacob once bought land from Hamor's sons, did Joshua gather the tribes for his final address?

Shechem was where Joseph's bones, carried up from Egypt, were finally buried, and where Joshua set up a large stone under an oak to 'hear' the people's pledge. Jacob had buried his household's foreign gods under the oak there.

Whose burial at Gibeah, on land given to his son, makes up the very last verse of the Book of Joshua?

Eleazar, Aaron's son and the priest who had shared out the land with Joshua, closes the book, the third burial in four verses after Joshua's own and Joseph's bones. His son's town lay in the hill country of Ephraim.

From which camp east of the Jordan did Joshua secretly send two spies to look over Jericho?

Shittim, 'the acacias', was the camp where Israel had fallen for the Moabite women in Numbers 25, and the spies slipped out from there as quietly as possible. The whole nation later moved from it to the Jordan's bank.

What was Joshua told to keep 'always on your lips' and to meditate on 'day and night'?

The Book of the Law was the condition for success, 'so that you may be careful to do everything written in it', and Joshua later read all of it aloud to the whole assembly. Psalm 1 uses the same 'day and night' image.

Which command does the Lord repeat to Joshua in the book's first chapter, echoed by the people?

Be strong and courageous comes three times from God in Joshua 1 and once more from the tribes, who add a death sentence for anyone who disobeys their new leader. Moses had used the same words to him in Deuteronomy 31.

Which festival did Israel keep at Gilgal on the plains of Jericho, days after crossing the Jordan?

The Passover was kept on the fourteenth day of the month, four days after the crossing, and the manna stopped the day after Israel first ate the produce of Canaan.

At which town 'in the vicinity of Zarethan' did the Jordan's water pile up in a heap while Israel crossed?

Adam, far upstream, is where the flow stopped, which is why the riverbed ran dry all the way down to the Dead Sea and Israel could cross opposite Jericho.

Which Canaanite city did the tribe of Ephraim fail to clear, its people instead 'required to do forced labor'?

Gezer stayed Canaanite until a Pharaoh burned it and handed it to his daughter, Solomon's wife, as a wedding gift, 1 Kings 9 says. Solomon then rebuilt it.

In his farewell, Joshua says one Israelite routs how many enemies, 'because the Lord your God fights for you'?

A thousand per man is the boast, echoing Moses' song in Deuteronomy 32, but Joshua adds a warning: ally with the nations left and they become 'whips on your backs and thorns in your eyes'.

Which woman of Jericho hid Joshua's two spies on her roof and was spared when the city fell?

Rahab made the spies swear to spare her family, and Joshua kept the oath: her parents, brothers and all her relatives were led out alive before Jericho was burned.

What did Joshua command to stand still over Gibeon while Israel routed five Amorite kings?

The sun stopped in the middle of the sky for about a whole day, and the book adds that there was never a day like it before or after.

What were the trumpets made of that priests blew as Joshua's army marched around Jericho?

Rams' horns are still sounded today as the shofar, blown in synagogues at the Jewish New Year, and seven priests blew them ahead of the ark on every circuit.

What did Joshua's army do after the last long trumpet blast that brought Jericho's wall down?

They raised a great shout, ending days of enforced silence: Joshua had forbidden the marchers to utter a single word until he gave the order.

On which day of marching around Jericho did Joshua's army see the city walls collapse?

The seventh day brought seven circuits instead of one, with seven priests blowing seven trumpets: the number runs through the whole story.

Which food that had fed Israel for forty years stopped once Joshua's people ate Canaan's crops?

Manna ceased once the people had eaten unleavened cakes and roasted grain grown in Canaan, straight after their first Passover in the new land.

Which New Testament name is the Greek form of the Hebrew name Joshua, used in the Septuagint?

Jesus is the English form of Iesous, the Greek rendering of Yehoshua, a name usually taken to mean 'Yahweh is salvation'.

What did the woman who hid Joshua's spies tie in her window so Israel would spare her house?

A scarlet cord in the window marked the one house in Jericho to be left alone, on condition that her whole family stayed indoors.

Which book, closing with the death of Moses on Mount Nebo, comes directly before the Book of Joshua?

Deuteronomy ends with Moses dying in sight of a land he may not enter, and Joshua opens with God telling his successor to cross the Jordan.

Which book, opening just after Joshua's death, directly follows the Book of Joshua in the Bible?

Judges opens with the words 'After the death of Joshua' and shows the unity of his generation breaking down into cycles of defeat and rescue.

Which people did Joshua defeat at Rephidim while Moses stood on a hilltop with his hands held up?

The Amalekites gained ground whenever Moses lowered his hands, so Aaron and Hur sat him on a rock and held them up until evening.

Which exodus miracle did the woman who hid Joshua's spies say had terrified everyone in Jericho?

The Red Sea drying up was still the talk of Jericho a generation later: she told the spies the news had left no courage in anyone.

Under what did the woman of Jericho hide Joshua's two spies when the king's men came looking?

Stalks of flax were laid out on her roof, and while the men lay beneath them she sent the king's search party off toward the Jordan fords.

What does the Book of Joshua say the hearts of Canaan's kings did when the Jordan dried up?

Melted is the book's favourite word for fear: it is used of Jericho before the spies, and of Israel itself after its first defeat at Ai.

At which camp near Jericho did Joshua circumcise the men born in the wilderness and keep Passover?

Gilgal sounds like the Hebrew for 'roll', and the book ties the name to God's words there: the reproach of Egypt had been rolled away.

Who was the father of Joshua, an Ephraimite whose name follows 'son of' in the book's first verse?

Nun means 'fish' in Aramaic, which gave the rabbis a pun: the son of the man named for a fish would lead Israel into the land.

Which soothsayer, once rebuked by his own donkey, does Joshua 13 list among those Israel killed?

Balaam had been hired by Moab's king to curse Israel and ended up blessing it instead, yet the book still counts him among the slain.

How does Caleb, at eighty-five, describe his strength when he asks Joshua for his inheritance?

The same as at forty, he says: as fit for war as on the day Moses sent him to spy, and ready to take on the fortified towns of the Anakim himself.

From whom did Joshua's cities of refuge shelter a person who had killed someone by accident?

The avenger of blood was the victim's nearest relative, charged with taking a life for a life, and the town's elders were forbidden to hand a fugitive over.

What did Joshua tell his army chiefs to put on the necks of the five captured Amorite kings?

Their feet on royal necks was a show of total victory, and Joshua turned it into a promise that every enemy of Israel would meet that fate.

Which lost book does Joshua 10 name as the source of its poem about the battle at Gibeon?

Jashar, a title meaning 'the upright', is cited once more in the Bible, as the home of David's lament for Saul and Jonathan, and no copy of it survives.

Which king of Jerusalem led four other Amorite kings against Gibeon for making peace with Joshua?

Adoni-Zedek feared Gibeon's defection because it was a large city full of fighting men, so he attacked the turncoats instead of Israel.

What did Joshua do with Ai's captured king once the city had been burned to the ground?

Joshua hanged him on a tree until evening, then had the body cut down and laid under a cairn at the gate of the burned city.

What does the Hebrew name of Ai, the second city destroyed in Joshua's conquest of Canaan, mean?

The heap of ruins is what Ai means, and the story ends with Joshua making the town exactly that, so scholars often read the tale as explaining the name.

What did Joshua's leaders neglect to do before swearing a treaty with the disguised Gibeonites?

Ask the Lord's counsel is the step they skipped: the leaders trusted their own eyes, and three days later learned the visitors lived a short march away.

Where had Achan hidden the robe, silver and gold he stole from the fallen city of Jericho?

Buried inside his tent, with the silver at the bottom, is where Joshua's runners found the loot once Achan had owned up to the theft.

From which distant land had the fine robe come that Achan could not resist taking at Jericho?

Babylonia is called Shinar in the Hebrew text, the land of the Tower of Babel, so the robe was a costly import as well as forbidden loot.

How did Joshua first react to Israel's shock defeat at Ai, before lying face down until evening?

He tore his clothes while the elders threw dust on their heads, and God's reply was blunt: get up, because someone in Israel has stolen.

From which desert camp does the aged Caleb remind Joshua that Moses sent him to spy out the land?

Kadesh Barnea is where Caleb says his fellow spies frightened the people while he held firm, and why he now claims the land promised to him.

Which ravine beside Jerusalem, later a byword for hell, does Joshua 15 name on Judah's border?

The Valley of Hinnom became Gehenna in Greek, the word the Gospels use for the place of fiery punishment.

What did old Joshua warn the remaining nations would be in Israel's eyes if the people intermarried?

Thorns in your eyes, along with a snare, a trap and a scourge in your sides, was his picture of what compromise with the remaining peoples would bring.

Which phrase does Joshua use for his own coming death in his farewell speech to Israel's leaders?

The way of all the earth is also how King David describes his death to Solomon, and both men spend their last words urging loyalty to God.

Which highland region does Joshua's farewell say God gave Esau, while Jacob's family went to Egypt?

Mount Seir, between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Aqaba, became the heartland of Edom, the nation descended from Esau that Israel was told to leave alone.

Which tribe's territory in Joshua 19 ran up the coast as far as the cities of Tyre and Sidon?

Asher received a coastal strip running north from Mount Carmel, twenty-two towns with their villages, on the edge of Phoenicia.

Which sea does the Book of Joshua call the Great Sea, one border of the land allotted to Judah?

The Mediterranean was the largest water the Israelites knew; the Salt Sea, Judah's eastern border in the same chapter, is the one now called the Dead Sea.

In the Hebrew Bible, the Book of Joshua is the first book of which major division, after the Torah?

The Prophets, or Nevi'im, opens with four narrative books that Jewish tradition calls the Former Prophets, where Christian Bibles shelve Joshua as history.

Which title, borne by Moses throughout the Book of Joshua, is given to Joshua only at his death?

Servant of the Lord marks the handover as complete: Joshua opens the book as Moses' assistant and closes it holding his master's title.

What does Joshua 21 say became of every good promise the Lord had made to Israel?

Not one of them failed, the narrator says once the land is shared out, and Joshua repeats the claim to the whole nation in his farewell.

Which British archaeologist's 1950s dig at Jericho found its walls fell long before Joshua's time?

Kathleen Kenyon redated the collapsed walls that John Garstang had tied to the conquest, and found the town deserted in the era usually given for Joshua.

Among the medieval Nine Worthies, Joshua and King David stand beside which Jewish rebel leader?

Judas Maccabeus completed the trio of Jewish heroes, set beside three pagans and three Christians as models of chivalry for medieval knights.

Where did the woman who sheltered Joshua's spies tell them to hide for three days from the search?

On the mountain the two men waited while their pursuers combed the road to the Jordan fords and came back with nothing.

Where did Joshua order Jericho's silver, gold, bronze and iron to go when the city was destroyed?

The Lord's treasury received every piece of metal because Jericho, the first city to fall, was treated as an offering devoted wholly to God.

In which season, with the river bursting its banks, does Joshua 3 set the crossing of the Jordan?

Harvest time is the narrator's aside: the Jordan was in full flood at the very moment the priests stepped in and the flow stopped.

How did Joshua's army reach besieged Gibeon in time to take the five Amorite kings by surprise?

By marching all night uphill from his base camp, Joshua fell on the besiegers suddenly and threw them into a panic.

What did Joshua first reply when the assembled tribes swore they would never forsake the Lord?

You cannot serve him, Joshua said, because God is holy and jealous; only when the people insisted did he accept their oath.

Which fortified city of the five-king alliance held out until the second day of Joshua's assault?

Lachish is the only southern city said to need a second day, and a neighbouring king who marched to its rescue was destroyed with his whole army.

Below which peak did Baal Gad stand, the northern limit of the land Joshua conquered?

Mount Hermon closes the book's summary of the conquest, which sweeps from Mount Halak in the far south to Baal Gad in the valley of Lebanon.

What does God say, through Joshua, that Israel now eats from in Canaan without ever having planted?

Vineyards and olive groves round off a list of unearned gifts in the speech: land Israel never worked for and cities it never built.

Which pair of foods does Joshua 5 use to describe the land sworn to Israel's ancestors?

Milk and honey is the Bible's stock phrase for Canaan's plenty, first spoken to Moses from the burning bush.

What penalty did the tribes pledge in Joshua 1 for anyone who rebelled against Joshua's commands?

Execution was their own proposal, made as they promised to obey Joshua in everything exactly as they had obeyed Moses.