Joshua 9 Study Notes

9:1-2 The phrase when all the kings heard is identical to that in 5:1. There the kings heard about God’s drying up the Jordan River, and it struck fear in their hearts. In 9:1 the text does not specify what the kings heard, but their reaction is different. Instead of fearing Israel, they formed a unified alliance to fight against the nation. What caused this change? It was the defeat of Israel at Ai that gave the Canaanites hope that they could defeat the people of God. The sin of Achan had far-reaching effects just as all sin does (Rm 5:12-14; 8:9-20). If Achan had not sinned, perhaps Israel’s advance into the promised land would have been much easier and far less violent.

9:3 The inhabitants of Gibeon reacted differently, however. They did not seek to destroy Israel but to join it.

9:4-5 Because Israel had been commanded to destroy all peoples in Canaan (Dt 20:16-18), Gibeon wanted it to look like they did not live nearby.

9:6 Gilgal here may be different from the Gilgal of 4:19-20 and 5:9-10. It was probably located in the hill country, perhaps near Mount Ebal. Gibeon was a city north of Jerusalem in the territory of the tribe of Benjamin, a few hours journey by foot. The word for treaty (Hb berith) is the same as that for “covenant”; it recalls the experience of Joshua and the Israelites at Mount Ebal (8:30-35).

9:7 The connection of Gibeon with the Hivites implies that this group may have been a recent addition to the region, coming originally from north of Palestine in Syria (see note at 3:10).

9:8 The self-designation by the Gibeonites as Israel’s servants implies that they accepted a relationship of a vassal nation to the people of God.

9:9-10 The confession of the Gibeonites most closely resembles that of Rahab in 2:9-11. Their expression of faith in God was based on God’s historic acts of redemption toward his people. The Gibeonites mentioned the same acts of redemption as Rahab did—the work of God in Egypt and against Sihon and Og.

9:11 The governance of Gibeon by elders rather than a king implies a different form of rule than what was common in Canaan at the time, and this may have been part of the deception.

9:12-13 The Israelites rely on their own perceptions and inferences rather than on God.

9:14 The note that Israel did not seek the Lord’s decision, as well as absence of any mention of Joshua in the initial negotiations, all spell trouble.

9:15 That Joshua established peace with the Gibeonites demonstrates his own complicity in the actions. The reference to “peace” and the swearing of an oath by the leaders of the community bound Israel into a treaty relationship with the Gibeonites that could not be broken.

9:16 The phrase three days may suggest a literal three days such as seems to occur in 1:11; 2:16,22, or it may imply an indeterminate period of more than a second day.

9:17 Having discovered the ruse of the Gibeonites, the Israelites set out on the third day and reached the Gibeonite cities on that same day. Like Gibeon, Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kiriath-jearim lie a few miles north of Jerusalem and are close by one another in the territory that would later be assigned to the tribe of Benjamin.

9:18-19 The two references to the oath that the leaders had made surround the statement that the whole community grumbled against the leaders. The verb grumble and this refers elsewhere almost exclusively to the complaints of the Israelites against Moses’s leadership and against God. Its appearance here may suggest the same negative attitude of Israel as that in the wilderness generation. However, this grumbling against the leaders had a point because the present leadership did not seek God’s counsel, and they thereby foolishly bound Israel to a treaty with a Canaanite people group.

9:20 The leaders were unwilling to violate their oath and thereby compound their wrongdoing with a second sin.

9:21 Deuteronomy 29:11 implied that aliens living in the land of Israel should fulfill the roles of woodcutters and water carriers.

9:22-23 Joshua pronounced a curse against the Gibeonites for causing Israel to disobey God’s command to destroy all the inhabitants of Canaan who did not leave the land.

9:24-26 How the Gibeonites knew of God’s promise is not known (Ex 32:13; Dt 11:25; 19:8), but Rahab also had such knowledge (Jos 2:9). That the Gibeonites became Israel’s servants meant that they were responsible to Israel and that Israel was also responsible for Gibeon. Note Gibeon’s appeal to whatever you think is right (lit “as is good and as is right in your eyes”) is the same appeal Jeremiah uses in Jr 26:14-15. Apparently the animosity between Israel and Gibeon continued into Saul’s day (2Sm 21:1-9).

9:27 The deliverance of a people such as the Gibeonites is not unique to Joshua. In the ancient world, many peoples offered themselves as slaves rather than face extinction at the hands of a superior army. The establishment of the Lord’s altar at the place he would choose duplicates Dt 12:5 and the command that Israel should worship God only at the place where he directed they should build an altar.