Bible Commentaries

Types of Christian Warfare

Joshua 11:1-5)

That is a modern speech. The same kings, being spiritually understood, are meeting today in order to fight the Son of God. The kings have almost always been against him,—not the nominal kings only, as the kings of nations and of empires, but the kings of influence, the kings of society, the leaders of public sentiment, influential men—scribes, Pharisees, rulers, and the should-be guides of the people. The enemies of Christ are very many in number. We sometimes attempt to create Christian statistics. It is easier work upon that side than upon the other. Arithmetic is less distressed when called upon to state what good there is in the world, as represented by communities and activities, than when asked to give some dim hint of the evil that prevails. Who can give the statistics of the enemy? We have made some approach towards an enumeration of the persons and activities identified with the cause and kingdom of Jesus Christ, but where are the black books, the tables of figures that would represent the sin, the sorrow, the heartbreak, the baleful purpose, the selfish design, the cruel disposition, and all manner of evil known amongst men? We are told that there are ten thousand little girls upon the streets of London alone whose name is associated with sin. I do not blame them altogether. Judgment must not fall upon them solely. What do they represent? They must be taken in their symbolical character, as well as judged by their real conduct; and so taken, what is the meaning of it all? Who can trace the lines backward? Who can fix those lines in the proper centres and personalities, and identify those who are socially invisible with this infinite degradation? We are told that if all the drunkeries of Britain were set together, they would make a street six hundred miles long, and that street would be a double street, having a return line equal to the first, so that, if stretched out in one continuity, there would be twelve hundred miles representing the traffic which is doing more to destroy the earth than any other traffic which man can originate or invent. But what does this represent? The matter does not begin and end in thronged buildings, in flaming windows, in flowing poison; there is something behind, round about, and until we can get into the atmosphere of the case we shall not be able to state statistically how evil stands. As many as the sand upon the seashore in multitude are they who are busily engaged in propagating evil. The worst of all evil is the respectable evil, the well-dressed wickedness, the haughty, disdainful blasphemy against all good and truth and love. The worst of all evil is in our own hearts. We are prone to go out in quest of statistics that we may represent how other people are breaking the ten commandments and offending the sanctity of Heaven: "first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye." Is there any irony more pitiable, is there any irony less excusable, than our figuring down upon paper, which we shock by the very violence of the figures, how other people are transgressing the law, and saying nothing about our own selfishness, vanity, jealousy, cruelty, and designs to which we dare not give audible expression? "All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his own way." The Lord looked down from heaven to see if there were any that did righteously, and he said, "There is none righteous, no, not one." Nor do we add to our supposed morality by publishing statistics against other people. It is quite true that we ought not therefore to spare other vices which are more public and in a social sense more calamitous than the vices which characterise conventional respectability: it is perfectly true that there ought to be exposure and denunciation and judgment and penalty, and that hell is too good for those who work evil; but the two statements are perfectly compatible: whilst we are indignant, and justly and rightly Joshua 11:6)

Joshua did his work thoroughly. In the twelfth verse we read, "he utterly destroyed them." We want thorough work. We have partially cut down many vices: we have shaved off the top of them, but the root is still there, and, as we have seen before, the vine is the root, not the flower, not the blossom. What would be said of the husbandman who simply took the top off the poisonous tree which was destroying the fertility of his land? We should describe him as thoughtless, foolish, unwise altogether, and exhort him to dig up the root and burn it with unquenchable fire. What would be said of the man who painted himself a healthy colour,—who, without taking note of the internal disease, simply concealed its symptoms under a coating of fine tint that should express to the casual observer real health? We should call him "fool;" we should describe him in the severest terms; we should designate him a madman. But what is that to what we ourselves may be doing,—washing the outside of the cup and platter, while the inside is full of rottenness and dead men's bones? The eyes of judgment will look upon the inside, and many an outside flaw or stain will be forgiven or excused because of the friction of life and the multitudinousness of our relations; but the inside, the interior, that will be judged, and that will be approved or condemned.

Sweet is the last word:—"the land rested from war" ( Joshua 11:23). The tocsin sounded no more; the trumpet was not again heard. The whole earth is to be at peace with God, and therefore at peace with itself. The sword and the spear are to be turned into ploughshare and pruning-hook, and the shiel is to be hung up in the hall—a piece of ancient history, only preserved that it may stimulate to holier thanksgiving and profounder prayer. The land had rest from war. The fiend went abroad no more. Man came to man as brother to brother. Feuds and differences and separations were things of the past. Every man knew the Lord; every man prayed with his brother-man in happy consent. This is a great outlook from the Christian's specular tower: he sees the morning of peace, the day of light, the Sabbath of humanity; and he preaches in that tone—the great, glad, triumphant voice, like the voice of many waters; he says, Peace is coming; the battle-flag is furled; and the world is at last at peace! Towards that end we are moving. We are not ashamed of the issue; we are hoping for it, praying for it, working for it. Ask what the Christian Church is doing, and if in earnest, she is doing this one thing only—fighting for peace, praying against evil; and all she does tends in the direction of "the federation of the world."

Selected Notes

Jabin, king of Hazor.—(1) One of the most powerful of all the princes who reigned in Canaan when it was invaded by the Israelites. His dominion seems to have extended over all the north part of the country; and after the ruin of the league formed against the Hebrews in the south by Adoni-zedek, king of Jerusalem, he assembled his tributaries near the waters of Merom (the lake Huleh), and called all the people to arms. This coalition was destroyed, as the one in the south had been, and Jabin himself perished in the sack of Hazor, his capital, b.c1450. This prince was the last powerful enemy with whom Joshua combated, and his overthrow seems to have been regarded as the crowning act in the conquest of the Promised Land ( Joshua 11:1-14).

(2) A king of Hazor, and probably descended from the preceding. It appears that during one of the servitudes of the Israelites, probably when they lay under the yoke of Cushan or Eglon, the kingdom of Hazor was reconstructed. The narrative gives to this second Jabin even the title of "king of Canaan;" and this, with the possession of nine hundred iron-armed war-chariots, implies unusual power and extent of dominion. The iniquities of the Israelites having lost them the divine protection, Jabin gained the mastery over them; and stimulated by the remembrance of ancient wrongs, oppressed them heavily for twenty years. From this thraldom they were relieved by the great victory won by Barak in the plain of Esdraelon, over the hosts of Jabin, commanded by Sisera, one of the most renowned generals of those times, b.c1285. The well-compacted power of the king of Hazor was not yet, however, entirely broken. The war was still prolonged for a time, but ended in the entire ruin of Jabin, and the subjugation of his territories by the Israelites (Judg. iv.). This is the Jabin whose name occurs in Psalm 83:10.

The question has been raised whether these two Jabins were not one and the same; and the affirmative has by some been assumed as an argument against the authenticity of the narrative in Joshua; while others think that the two narratives may be of events so nearly contemporaneous that they may have happened in the lifetime of the same person. This latter hypothesis, however, cannot possibly be retained; for even supposing that the ordinary chronology, which places the defeat of Sisera one hundred and fifty years after the time of Joshua 11:15

A easy sentence, but a most difficult process.—First of all, here is an assumption that Joshua was a student. How did he know what the Lord had commanded Moses, except by diligent inquiry and stud)?—Not only was Joshua a student, he was a minute or critical student.—He did not take a merely general view of divine commandment, but went into particularity; "he left nothing undone of all that the Lord commanded Moses;" the word "all" is the critical point.—Here is a process of enumeration, weighing, balancing, and allotment: some things are to be done by day and some by night; some things were essentially and others relatively important; Joshua had to study the perspective of the moral outlook, and not to commit folly by the transposition of persons or events.—Not only was Joshua a student, and a critical student, he was a man of active obedience. His life was a process of doing. He found enough to do from the rising of the sun to the going down of the same.—God has left no vacant hours in all the day. God has made benevolent preparation for sleep or rest, but he has also made abundant arrangements for industry and service.—Not only was Joshua a student, a critical student, and a man of active obedience, but he was inspired by the thought that all he did was done under the direction and for the glory of God.—It is something to know that we are working, for what master we are acting, and in view of what reward.—The strength is often found in the motive.—Far behind all outward instrumentality, we find our power in spiritual philosophy, thought, and confidence.—Herein is the supreme value of prayer: it shuts us up in close communion with God; it leads us to the very fountain of power; it clothes us with ineffable dignity.—A blessed thing it is to realise that our whole life-plan is laid down for us.—In the matter of moral purity and action we have nothing to invent; the commandments are all written, and will all be understood by the heart that really wishes to know their meaning.—It is a sign of a false life when a man hesitates on the ground that he really does not know what his duty is. Duty is perfectly and continually plain to the man whose motive is simple. "What doth the Lord thy God require of thee?" "What is written in the law?" "How readest thou?"—There can only be bewilderment in the matter of detail; there can never be any confusion as to the distinction between right and wrong, noble and ignoble, upward and downward.