Joshua, vi., 20.
A procession of priests is said to have walked round the fortifications of Jericho, and when they blew with their trumpets “the walls fell down flat.”
Judges, iii., 31.
Shamgar, we are told, slew 600 of the Philistines with an ox-goad. Doeg, the Edomite (1 Sam., xxii., 18), “with his own hand,” slew in one day 85 persons “who wore a linen ephod,” besides “all the men and women, children and sucklings, asses, oxen, and sheep,” of the town of Nob. Abishai, David’s brother-in-law (2 Sam., xxiii., 18), slew 300 with his own spear; but Adino, the Eznite, (v. 8), slew with his own hand in one battle 800 men (!) Impossible as these statements undoubtedly are, they dwindle into insignificance before the exploit attributed to Samson (Judges, xv., 16), who, “with a new jawbone of an ass,” slew 1000 Philistines (!!). A thousand men laid low by one with no other instrument than an ass’s jaw (!!); but the marvel does not end here, for when Samson had thrown away his weapon, “there came water from a hollow place in the jaw,” and the thirsty Samson drank thereof to revive his fainting spirit.
Ruth, iv., 21, 22.
Boaz was great grandfather of David, and the mother of Boaz was Rahab the harlot. In this brief space is to be crowded all the events recorded in the book of Joshua, the book of Judges, the book of Ruth, and part of the First Book of Samuel, a period of about 400 years.
Take a familiar case. George III. was grandfather of our Queen, and he was grandson of George II. This exactly corresponds with the text; but 400 years would carry us back not to George II., but to Edward IV. What would be thought of an historian who said that Edward IV. was the father of Queen Victoria’s great grandfather? But the statement referred to is identical thereto.
1 Kings, xx., 30.
We are informed by the writer of the book of Kings that some of the routed host of Benhadad fled to Aphek, when a wall fell, and by its fall crushed to death 27,000 of them (!).