Page:An Exposition of the Old and New Testament (1828) vol 2.djvu/39

Rh was thus distinguished, and had her life given her for a prey. All her kindred were saved with her; like Noah she believed to the saving of her house; and thus faith in Christ brings salvation to the house, Acts 16. 31. Some ask, how her house, which is said to have been upon the wall, ch. 2. 15. escaped falling with the wall; we are sure it did escape, for she and her relations were safe in it: either though it joined so near to the wall as to be said to be upon it, yet it was so far off as not to fall either with the wall or under it; or rather that part of the wall on which her house stood, fell not. Now being preserved alive, 1. She was left for some time without the camp to be purified from the gentile superstition, which she was to renounce, and to be prepared for her admission as a proselyte. 2. She was in due time incorporated with the church of Israel, and she and her posterity dwelt in Israel, and her family was remarkable long after. We find her the wife of Salmon, prince of Judah, mother of Boaz, and named among the ancestors of our Saviour, Matt 1. 5. Having received Israelites in the name of Israelites, she had an Israelite's reward. Bishop Pierson observes, that Joshua's saving Rahab the harlot, and admitting her into Israel, was a figure of Christ's receiving into his kingdom, and entertaining there, the publicans and the harlots, Matt. 21, 31. Or it may be applied to the conversion of the Gentiles.

V. Jericho is condemned to a perpetual desolation, and a curse pronounced upon the man that at any time hereafter should offer to rebuild it, v. 26. Joshua adjured them, that is, the elders and people of Israel, not only by their own consent, obliging themselves and their posterity never to rebuild this city, but by the divine appointment; God himself having forbidden it under the severe penalty here annexed. 1. God would hereby show the weight of a divine curse; where it rests there is no contending with it nor getting from under it; it brings ruin without remedy or repair. 2. He would have it to remain in its ruins a standing monument of his wrath against the Canaanites, when the measure of their iniquity was full; and of his mercy to his people, when the time was come for their settlement in Canaan. The desolations of their enemies were witnesses of his favour to them, and would upbraid them with their ingratitude to that God who had done so much for them. The situation of the city was very pleasant, and probably, its nearness to Jordan was an advantage to it, which would tempt men to build upon the same spot; but they are here told it is at their peril if they do it. Men build for their posterity, but he that builds Jericho, shall have no posterity to enjoy what he builds; his eldest son shall die when he begins the work, and if he take not warning by that stroke to desist, but will go on presumptuously, the finishing of his work shall be attended with the funeral of his youngest, and we must suppose all the rest cut off between. This curse, not being a curse causeless, did come upon that man who long after rebuilded Jericho, 1 Kings 16. 34. but we are not to think it made the place ever the worse when it was built, or brought any hurt to them that inhabited it. We find Jericho afterward graced with the presence, not only of those two great prophets Elijah and Elisha, but of our blessed Saviour himself, Luke 18. 35· 19. 1. Matt 20. 29. Note, It is a dangerous thing to attempt the building up of that which God will have to be destroyed. See Mal. 1. 4.

Lastly, All this magnified Joshua and raised his reputation, v. 27. it made him not only acceptable to Israel, but formidable to the Canaanites, because it appeared that God was with him of a truth: the Word of the Lord was with him, so the Chaldee, even Christ himself, the same that was with Moses. Nothing can more raise a man's reputation, nor make him appear more truly great, than to have the evidences of God's presence with him.

CHAP. VII. More than once we have found the affairs of Israel, then when they were in the happiest posture, and gave the most hopeful prospects, perplexed and embarrassed by sin, and a stop thereby put to the most promising proceedings. The golden calf, the murmuring at Kadesh, and the iniquity of Peor, had broken their measures and given them great disturbance; and in this chapter we have such another instance of the interruption given to the progress of their arms by sin. But it being only the sin of one person or family, and soon expiated, the consequences were not so mischievous as of those other sins; however it served to let them know that they were still upon their good behaviour. We have here, I. The sin of Achan in meddling with the accursed thing, v. 1. II. The defeat of Israel before Ai thereupon, v. 2..5. III. Joshua's humiliation and prayer on occasion of that sad disaster, v. 6..9. IV. The directions God gave him for the putting away of the guilt, which had provoked God thus to contend with them, v. 10..15. The discovery, trial, conviction, condemnation, and execution, of the criminal, by which the anger of God was turned away, v. 16..26. And by this story it appears that, as the law, so Canaan itself, made nothing perfect, the perfection both of holiness and peace to God's Israel is to be expected in the heavenly Canaan only.

UT the children of Israel committed a trespass in the accursed thing: for Achan, the son of Carmi, the son of Zabdi, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, took of the accursed thing: and the anger of the was kindled against the children of Israel. 2. And Joshua sent men from Jericho to Ai, which is beside Beth-aven, on the east side of Beth-el, and spake unto them, saying, Go up and view the country. And the men went up and viewed Ai. 3. And they returned to Joshua, and said unto him, Let not all the people go up; but let about two or three thousand men go up and smite Ai; and make not all the people to labour thither; for they are but few. 4. So there went up thither of the people about three thousand men: and they fled before the men of Ai. 5. And the men of Ai smote of them about thirty and six men: for they chased them from before the gate even unto Shebarim, and smote them in the going down; wherefore the hearts of the people melted, and became as water.

The story of this chapter begins with a ''but. The Lord was with Joshua, and his fame was noised through all that country; so the foregoing chapter ends, and it left no room to doubt but that he would go on as he had begun, conquering and to conquer''. He did right, and observed his orders in every thing. But the children of Israel committed a trespass, and so set God against them; and then even Joshua's name and fame, his wisdom and courage, could do them no service. If we lose our God, we lose our friends, who cannot help us unless God be for us. Now here is,

I. Achan sinning; v. 1. Here is only a general mention made of the sin, we shall afterward have a more particular account of it from his own mouth. The sin is here said to be taking of the accursed thing, in disobedience to the command, and in defiance of the threatening, ch. 6. 18. In the sacking