The Garden of Eden: Stories from the first nine books of the Old Testament

by George Hodges

So General Joshua sent two men to go as spies to Jericho. They were to enter very quietly into the city, without letting anybody know who they were, and, having found out all they could, they were to come back and report. So they went to Jericho and found a lodging place, and began to look about. They saw that the town had a wall around it, and that the gate was shut every evening as the sun went down. And they could see at a glance that the people were rich. But the men of Jericho discovered the spies and told the king, and the king sent to their lodging place to take them.

But the woman of the house, whose name was Rahab, was very good to the spies. Her house was by the city wall, and on the flat roof there were stalks of flax drying in the sun. So when the pursuers came knocking at the door, Rahab hid the spies under the flax, and sent off the pursuers on a vain search. And when they were gone she took a stout rope and let down the spies out of her window down the wall, and while the pursuers ran one way toward the river, the spies ran another way toward the hills, and so escaped.

And Rahab said, “We have all heard about you here. We know how you came over the Red Sea, and how the Lord is with you; and we are all afraid. When you take the town, have pity on me and on my father and mother and on my brothers and sisters, and save us alive.”

And the spies said, “Bind a scarlet line in this window by which we escape, and when we come back with the army of Israel we will spare all who are in this house.”

Then they climbed down the rope, and away they went to the hills, where they stayed three days till the pursuit was over. And they returned to Joshua, and said, “The Lord has delivered the city into our hands. They are all afraid of us.”

Then Joshua sent his captains among the people to tell them what to do. “The priests,” he said, “shall go down first into the river, and the people shall follow.” So the priests went, carrying the Ark of the Covenant; that is, the great chest in which were the Ten Commandments cut in stone, as Moses brought them down from Sinai. And as they went, it was like the Red Sea over again. They marched across as if the river had been a sandy road. And in the middle of the river stood the priests with the Ark till all the people were gone over. And they took twelve stones out of the river where the priests had stood, and built an altar with them on the other side, and thanked God that He had brought them at last into the good land which He had promised to their fathers.

The next thing to do was to take Jericho. At first, the men of Jericho came out to fight, but they soon ran back and hid behind their walls and locked their gate. And the Children of Israel made a camp around the city so that nobody went out or came in.

And Joshua said, “Form a procession: first the armed men, then seven priests with trumpets, then the Ark, and then the people. And march around the city. Let the priests blow their trumpets, but let all the rest of you keep silence. Let nobody speak a word, until I tell you to shout. Then shall ye shout!” So they marched around the city, and the people of Jericho looked on from the walls in great amazement. And the next day, they did it a second time; and the third day a third time, and so on for six days.

At last, on the seventh day, the Children of Israel rose up very early, just as the sun came up over Mount Pisgah. And that day they went around and around the city seven times. And it came to pass at the seventh time, when the priests blew with the trumpets a longer and louder blast than ever, Joshua cried to the people, “Shout! for the Lord hath given you the city.” And all the people shouted with a great shout. And the walls fell flat, and the armed men marched straight in and took the city.

Indeed, the walls were already falling that day when the spies climbed down over them hand under hand on Rahab’s rope. For the true walls of a city are the stout hearts of its citizens, and these had failed for fear. Thus the Children of Israel began the conquest of the Promised Land. But they spared the people who were in the house which had a line of scarlet bound in the window on the broken wall.