The Berean Table

Field	Detail
Pericope	Joshua 11:1–23
Theme	The LORD fights for His people, judges hardened sin, and keeps every promise, giving a rest that points beyond Joshua to Christ.

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Opening Prayer

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Closing Prayer

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Timeline Context

Place in the Book. Joshua 11 closes the account of the conquest that began at the Jordan (Joshua 3–4). Chapters 1–5 prepare the people; chapters 6–8 take the central highlands at Jericho and Ai; chapter 9 records the Gibeonite treaty; chapter 10 describes the southern campaign against the coalition led by Adoni-zedek of Jerusalem. Chapter 11 turns north and then, from verse 16, steps back to survey the whole war. Chapter 12 lists the defeated kings as an appendix, and from chapter 13 onward the book turns from taking the land to dividing it. The closing words of 11:23, “And Joshua gave it for an inheritance to Israel according to their tribal allotments. And the land had rest from war” (Joshua 11:23), are the hinge on which the two halves of the book turn.

The Northern Campaign. The pattern of chapter 10 is repeated almost exactly: news of Israel’s victories reaches a king, a coalition forms, the LORD speaks a word of assurance, Joshua marches swiftly, the enemy is routed and pursued, the cities are taken, and the royal city is dealt with. The difference is scale. Jabin of Hazor summons kings from the hill country of Galilee, the Jordan rift south of the Sea of Galilee (Chinneroth), the coastal lowland, the heights of Dor and the region under Mount Hermon (vv. 1–3). For the first time the enemy fields chariotry in force (v. 4), and the rendezvous at the waters of Merom lies at the northern edge of the land (v. 5).

Historical Setting.

• Date. On the chronology of 1 Kings 6:1 and Judges 11:26, favored by Keil, the entry into Canaan falls around 1406 BC and the northern war some years later. Many scholars prefer a thirteenth-century date. Matthew Henry’s heading dates the chapter to about 1450 BC on the older reckoning. Reformed interpreters differ here, and the chapter’s teaching does not depend on settling it.
• Duration. “Joshua made war a long time with all those kings” (v. 18). Caleb was forty at Kadesh-barnea and eighty-five at the allotment (Joshua 14:7, 10); with thirty-eight of those years spent in the wilderness (Deuteronomy 2:14), the war lasted about seven years. Josephus says five. Gill, Keil and Poole all record the calculation.
• Hazor. The largest city of Canaan, commanding the trade route north of the Sea of Galilee. The Pulpit Commentary notes that it appears in the Egyptian campaign lists of Thutmose III. The older commentators (Keil, Barnes) wrote before the site was securely identified; it is now generally placed at Tell el-Qedah, where excavators have found a massive destruction by fire. The dating of that burn layer is disputed and is best not pressed into service for either chronology.
• Jabin. The same name reappears for a later king of Hazor who oppressed Israel in the days of Deborah (Judges 4:2), which is why Barnes and the Pulpit Commentary take it as a dynastic title. Hazor was rebuilt by the Canaanites after Joshua, later fortified by Solomon (1 Kings 9:15), and finally taken by Tiglath-pileser (2 Kings 15:29).
• Political Situation. Canaan was a patchwork of city-states under local kings, nominally within Egypt’s sphere. That fragmentation, as the Pulpit Commentary and Poole both observe, meant the coalitions formed piecemeal rather than all at once.

Surrounding Events and Their Significance.

• Before. The southern victory of chapter 10 ended with the refrain that “the LORD fought for Israel” (Joshua 10:14). Chapter 11 opens with the kings of the north hearing of it (v. 1), just as Rahab (Joshua 2:10–11), the Amorite kings (Joshua 5:1) and the Gibeonites (Joshua 9:3) had heard before them. Hearing forces a response: some, like Rahab and Gibeon, seek peace; the rest take up arms.
• After. Chapter 12 lists thirty-one kings. Chapter 13 opens with the LORD’s word that “there remains yet very much land to possess” (Joshua 13:1), so that the whole land of 11:23 is a conquest in principle to be completed in practice.

Redemptive-Historical Placement. Joshua 11 fulfills the promise of the land made to Abraham (Genesis 15:18–21) at the time God had set, when the iniquity of the Amorites had become complete (Genesis 15:16). It fulfills the Mosaic commands concerning the nations (Deuteronomy 7:1–5; 20:16–18), and the book says so three times in this chapter alone (vv. 12, 15, 20). Yet the rest it records is provisional. Hebrews 4:8 reads Psalm 95 as proof that Joshua’s rest could not be the final one, and so this chapter becomes a signpost toward the Sabbath rest that remains for the people of God in Christ (Hebrews 4:9–10).

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Historical-Grammatical Study

Genre. Joshua 11 is historical narrative in the Former Prophets. Verses 1–15 are battle narrative following the pattern of chapter 10; verses 16–23 are a summary that surveys the land (vv. 16–17), reflects on the length of the war (v. 18), explains the theology behind it (vv. 19–20), records a supplementary episode (vv. 21–22) and closes with a formal conclusion (v. 23). The summary is written from the standpoint of fulfilled promise, and its repeated refrain, “just as the LORD commanded Moses” (v. 20), shows that the narrator is interpreting events, not only recording them.

Key Hebrew Terms.

• The Hebrew verb ʿaqar (vv. 6, 9) means to uproot and specifically to hamstring, cutting the tendon above the hock so that a horse is permanently lamed. The same verb describes Simeon and Levi’s cruelty in Genesis 49:6 and David’s treatment of captured chariot horses in 2 Samuel 8:4.
• The Hebrew verb charam (vv. 11, 12, 20, 21) means to devote to destruction, placing a city or people under the ban as belonging wholly to the LORD in judgment; its noun is Hebrew cherem. In verses 11, 12, 20 and 21 the narrator uses it of the northern cities and the Anakim.
• The Hebrew verb chazaq in verse 20, to harden (literally, to make strong), is the same verb God used when He told Joshua, “Be strong and courageous” (Joshua 1:6), and repeated it in Joshua 1:7 and 1:9, and when He hardened Pharaoh’s heart at the sea (Exodus 14:17). The one God who strengthens His servant for faithful obedience also confirms the obstinate in their resistance.
• The Hebrew noun techinnah in verse 20, rendered “should receive no mercy” (v. 20), means favor or supplication. Gill notes the reading that the Canaanites were not given a spirit of supplication; the point in either case is that no plea for grace was made or granted.
• The Hebrew phrase in verse 15, “He left nothing undone” (v. 15), uses sur with davar: literally, he did not turn aside a word. Keil renders it “he put not away a word, i.e., left nothing undone” (Keil and Delitzsch, on 11:15). Obedience is measured against every word of the command.
• The Hebrew noun tel in verse 13 means a mound; “the cities that stood on mounds” (v. 13) were the ancient cities standing on their own accumulated ruins, left intact for Israel to occupy (Deuteronomy 6:10–11).
• The Hebrew verb shaqat in verse 23 means to be quiet or to have rest. It recurs as the refrain of the book of Judges (Judges 3:11, 30; 5:31) and marks the ending of hostilities, not the end of every enemy.
• The Hebrew noun nachalah in verse 23 is the inheritance, the family portion received as a gift. Its partner machaloqeth, division or allotment, anticipates the distribution of chapters 13–21.
• The Hebrew name Chalaq, Mount Halak (v. 17), means smooth or bald. Calvin mentions both proposed senses, division and smoothness, and leaves the reader free to choose; it marks the southern limit toward Seir, balanced by Baal-gad under Hermon in the north.

Syntax and Narrative Structure.

• Verse 6 is emphatic in Hebrew: the pronoun I stands forward, a point Keil and the Pulpit Commentary both observe. The promise reads, “tomorrow at this time I will give over all of them, slain, to Israel” (v. 6). The victory is attributed first to the LORD (v. 8) before Israel’s striking and pursuit are described.
• Verses 12, 15 and 20 form a chain of three references to Moses’ command. The first concerns the ban, the second Joshua’s complete obedience, and the third the LORD’s hardening. The narrator wants the reader to see that nothing in the war was improvised.
• Verse 13 distinguishes Hazor from the other cities. Israel burned three cities in the conquest (Jericho, Ai, Hazor); the rest were preserved for habitation.
• Verses 21–22 are, in Keil’s words, “introduced in a supplementary form” (Keil and Delitzsch, on 11:21). The phrase at that time points back to the long war of verse 18, not forward from verse 20.

Ancient Near Eastern Background.

• Chariot warfare. Horse-drawn chariots were the elite arm of Late Bronze Age armies, used by Egypt and the Canaanite city-states on open ground. Israel had none. The Pulpit Commentary notes that the battle must have been fought on level ground where chariots could operate, and Barnes that the sudden attack denied them room to deploy.
• Hyperbolic conquest language. Ancient royal annals commonly describe victories in totalizing terms (none remaining, all the land). Joshua uses such language (vv. 8, 14, 23) while the book itself records peoples remaining (Joshua 13:1–6; 15:63; 16:10) and Anakim surviving in Philistine cities (v. 22). Keil, Poole, Barnes and the Pulpit Commentary all read verse 23 as decisive conquest rather than total occupation.
• The ban. Other ancient peoples practiced forms of devotion to destruction. What sets Israel’s apart is that the ban is commanded by the LORD for a specific judicial purpose, at a specific time, in a specific land, and threatened against Israel itself if it becomes like the nations (Deuteronomy 13:12–18; Joshua 7:11–12).

Covenantal Themes and Patterns.

• Promise kept. The land sworn to the patriarchs is given (Genesis 15:18–21; Joshua 21:43–45).
• Obedience in the chain of command. The LORD commands Moses, Moses commands Joshua, Joshua obeys (v. 15): the covenant mediator is faithful to the Word he received.
• Judgment and mercy. The hardening of verse 20 stands beside the exception of Gibeon (v. 19) and, behind it, Rahab (Joshua 6:25). Judgment is not the whole story; the door of mercy stood open to those who sought it.
• Holy war and rest. Deuteronomy links conquest with rest (Deuteronomy 12:9–10; 25:19). Joshua 11:23 announces that rest in its first installment and prepares for the later Scriptures that point to a greater one (Psalm 95:11; Hebrews 4:8–9).

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Expanded Outline

Section 1 — The Northern Kings Gather at Merom (Joshua 11:1–5)

Key Insight

The chapter opens with a king who hears. “When Jabin, king of Hazor, heard of this, he sent to Jobab king of Madon, and to the king of Shimron, and to the king of Achshaph” (v. 1). The victories of chapter 10 had been reported across the land, and the report demanded a response. Rahab heard and believed (Joshua 2:10–11); the Gibeonites heard and sought peace, however deviously (Joshua 9:3, 9); Jabin heard and reached for his sword. The same news of the LORD’s deeds becomes, as Paul would later say of the gospel, a fragrance from life to life for some and from death to death for others (2 Corinthians 2:15–16).

Jabin’s summons reaches the whole north: the hill country of Galilee, the Arabah south of Chinneroth, the lowland, Naphoth-dor on the coast, and “the Hivites under Hermon in the land of Mizpah” (v. 3). Canaanites, Amorites, Hittites, Perizzites and Jebusites, peoples with their own rivalries, unite against a common enemy. Matthew Henry draws the lesson: “Thus are the children of this world more unanimous, and therein wiser, than the children of light” (Matthew Henry, Commentary, on 11:1–9). He is echoing Luke 16:8 and turning it into a rebuke of the church, whose divisions often make her weaker than her enemies’ alliances.

Yet the timing of the coalition is itself a mercy. Had the northern kings joined Adoni-zedek in chapter 10, Israel would have faced the whole of Canaan at once. Calvin sees the hand of God in the delay: “He therefore kept the many nations, whose interest it was to have rushed hastily to arms, in a state of lethargy and amazement, until the chosen people had been animated by signal victories, to carry on the wars which still remained” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:1). God did not spare His people conflict, but He measured it, strengthening their faith through smaller battles before the greater one came (1 Corinthians 10:13). Matthew Poole makes the same point about the fragmentation of Canaan itself, calling it “a remarkable instance of the wisdom and goodness of Divine Providence” (Poole, Commentary, on 11:1).

The host that gathers is described in terms borrowed from the patriarchal promise: “in number like the sand that is on the seashore, with very many horses and chariots” (v. 4). God had promised Abraham offspring as the sand on the seashore (Genesis 22:17); here the enemies of Abraham’s seed muster a multitude of the same proportions. For the first time Israel faces massed chariotry, the tank corps of the Late Bronze Age, on ground chosen to suit it. “And all these kings joined their forces and came and encamped together at the waters of Merom to fight against Israel” (v. 5). The Hebrew merom means height; the enemy has occupied the high ground in every sense.

The scene anticipates a pattern that runs through Scripture. “The kings of the earth set themselves, and the rulers take counsel together, against the LORD and against his Anointed, saying” (Psalm 2:2), and the church in Acts saw that psalm fulfilled when Herod, Pilate, the Gentiles and the peoples of Israel gathered against Jesus (Acts 4:25–27). At the end of the age Satan will gather the nations for battle, and “their number is like the sand of the sea” (Revelation 20:8). Every such coalition has the same end. The multitude at Merom, like the multitude at Calvary and the multitude at the last battle, gathers only to be overthrown by the LORD who fights for His people and for His Christ.

Application

This section trains us to read opposition with the eyes of faith. When hostility gathers against Christ and His people, whether in the culture, the workplace or our own families, it is not a sign that God has lost control. The same providence that kept the northern kings idle until Israel was ready still governs the timing and the size of our trials (1 Corinthians 10:13; 1 Peter 5:10).

• Expect the gospel to divide. The same news that brought Rahab to faith brought Jabin to war. Do not be surprised when faithful witness provokes resistance as well as repentance (John 15:18–20).
• Refuse to measure God’s power by the enemy’s numbers. Horses and chariots impressed the eye, but the LORD had already decided the outcome (Psalm 33:16–17). A believer facing a diagnosis, a lawsuit or a hostile majority may say with Elisha that “those who are with us are more than those who are with them” (2 Kings 6:16).
• Let the enemy’s unity shame our divisions. If Canaanites and Hittites could lay aside their quarrels, Christians who share one Lord, one faith and one baptism should be eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit (Ephesians 4:3–6). Practically, that may mean reconciling with a fellow church member before the next Lord’s Day, or refusing to join gossip that weakens a congregation.
• Remember that God measures the fight. Earlier, smaller victories were preparation. Recall what God has already done for you before you face the next battle (Psalm 77:11–12).

A warning against misapplication: this passage does not teach that every group opposing a Christian’s opinions is a Canaanite coalition to be defeated. The enemies of Christ’s kingdom are ultimately spiritual (Ephesians 6:12), and many who oppose the gospel today will be brothers and sisters tomorrow, as Rahab was. We pray for opponents and seek their salvation (Matthew 5:44; 1 Timothy 2:1–4); we do not cast them as the objects of our own holy war.

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Section 2 — Do Not Be Afraid: Horses Hamstrung and Chariots Burned (Joshua 11:6–9)

Key Insight

Against the largest army Israel had yet faced, the LORD speaks: “Do not be afraid of them, for tomorrow at this time I will give over all of them, slain, to Israel” (v. 6). It is the same word Joshua had heard at his commissioning (Joshua 1:9), before Ai (Joshua 8:1) and before Gibeon (Joshua 10:8). Why must it be repeated? Calvin answers: “For unless new nourishment is every now and then given to faith, they forthwith faint and fall away” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:6). Faith does not live on yesterday’s promise; it must be fed again for each new conflict, and God in kindness feeds it (Lamentations 3:22–23).

The promise is precise. Tomorrow at this time fixes the hour, and the emphatic Hebrew I places the victory in God’s hand before Israel lifts a sword. Then comes a surprising command: “You shall hamstring their horses and burn their chariots with fire” (v. 6). The Hebrew ʿaqar means to cut the hamstring, laming the animal permanently. Israel is not to capture the most advanced military technology of the age and turn it to her own use. She is to destroy it.

The reason lies in the law of the king: “Only he must not acquire many horses for himself or cause the people to return to Egypt in order to acquire many horses” (Deuteronomy 17:16). Calvin explains the purpose: “It was indeed necessary that they should serve as soldiers, and fight strenuously with the enemy, but still they were to depend only on the Lord, to consider themselves strong only in his might, and to recline on him alone” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:6). The command removes both the object of fear and the temptation to trust. Matthew Henry puts it vividly: “Let Israel look upon their chariots but as rotten wood designed for the fire, and their horses of war as disabled things, scarcely good enough for the cart” (Matthew Henry, Commentary, on 11:1–9). What terrified Israel the night before was, in God’s sight, already kindling.

“So Joshua and all his warriors came suddenly against them by the waters of Merom and fell upon them” (v. 7). Faith is not passive. Joshua marched swiftly, as he had at Gibeon (Joshua 10:9), and attacked before the chariots could deploy. Yet the narrator immediately credits the outcome to God: “And the LORD gave them into the hand of Israel” (v. 8). The rout carried the pursuit to Great Sidon on the northwest coast and to the Valley of Mizpeh in the east.

Then comes the test of obedience after victory: “And Joshua did to them just as the LORD said to him: he hamstrung their horses and burned their chariots with fire” (v. 9). It would have been easy to reason that captured chariots might be useful. Joshua kept the command to the letter, and later kings who did not became a warning. Solomon multiplied horses from Egypt (1 Kings 10:26–29), and the prophets rebuked those who “rely on horses” (Isaiah 31:1).

The command points forward to the King who would bring peace. “He burns the chariots with fire” (Psalm 46:9), sings the psalmist of the LORD, and Zechariah foresees the King who comes humble on a donkey and declares, “I will cut off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem” (Zechariah 9:10). Jesus fulfilled that entry (Matthew 21:5) and won His decisive victory not by chariots but by a cross, where “He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame, by triumphing over them in him” (Colossians 2:15).

Application

This section confronts our instinctive reliance on the chariots of our own day. The things that make us feel secure (savings, credentials, influence, health, technology, a strong church budget) are not evil in themselves, but they easily become rivals to trust in God. “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God” (Psalm 20:7).

• Identify your chariots. Ask what you would feel most exposed without. That is often where your trust quietly rests (Jeremiah 17:5–8).
• Hamstring what competes with God. Obedience sometimes means deliberately giving up an advantage that would feed self-reliance: giving generously when you could hoard, declining a shortcut that compromises integrity, or refusing the influence that comes with flattery (Matthew 6:19–21; Proverbs 30:8–9).
• Feed faith for each new battle. Joshua needed the promise again. Return daily to God’s Word, especially before a hard conversation, a medical appointment or a difficult decision, and let a specific promise speak into it (Psalm 119:81).
• Act promptly in obedience. Joshua marched suddenly. Faith that trusts God’s promise does not delay what He has commanded (Psalm 119:60).
• Obey after the victory. The temptation to keep the chariots came after the battle was won. Guard against spiritual carelessness when things go well (Deuteronomy 8:11–14).

A warning against misapplication: this passage does not forbid Christians from using means, planning wisely or possessing resources. Nehemiah prayed and posted a guard (Nehemiah 4:9), and Paul used his Roman citizenship (Acts 22:25). The command to hamstring the horses was a specific word to Israel at a specific moment. The abiding principle is not the rejection of means but the refusal to trust them. Treating poverty or recklessness as spiritual is its own form of pride.

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Section 3 — Hazor Burned and Nothing Left Undone (Joshua 11:10–15)

Key Insight

With the field army broken, Joshua “turned back at that time and captured Hazor and struck its king with the sword, for Hazor formerly was the head of all those kingdoms” (v. 10). The king who organized the coalition could not escape its consequences. Hazor alone of the northern cities was burned (vv. 11, 13), joining Jericho (Joshua 6:24) and Ai (Joshua 8:28). Calvin explains why: Hazor “was destroyed by fire, because it had held forth the torch which enkindled the war” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:12).

The other cities “that stood on mounds” (v. 13) were left standing. God had promised Israel “great and good cities that you did not build” (Deuteronomy 6:10), and here that promise begins to be fulfilled. The spoil and livestock were also given to Israel (v. 14), unlike Jericho, whose spoil was wholly devoted to the LORD (Joshua 6:18–19), and like Ai (Joshua 8:2, 27). Achan’s sin had been to seize what God had not yet given; here God gives freely what He withheld before.

The heaviest words of the chapter follow: “every person they struck with the edge of the sword until they had destroyed them, and they did not leave any who breathed” (v. 14). The ban (Hebrew cherem) was not an outburst of ethnic hatred. Scripture presents it as a judicial sentence, delayed for centuries until “the iniquity of the Amorites” (Genesis 15:16) was complete, executed because of “the wickedness of these nations” (Deuteronomy 9:5), and threatened in equal measure against Israel if she became like them (Deuteronomy 8:19–20). Achan and his household had already fallen under it (Joshua 7:24–26). And it was not a closed door: Rahab the Canaanite was spared by faith (Joshua 6:25; Hebrews 11:31), and Gibeon by submission (v. 19).

Twice the narrator stresses that this was commanded: “just as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded” (v. 12). Calvin presses the point that Joshua was not acting on his own initiative: “Joshua did not give loose reins to his passion, when he slew all from the least to the greatest” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:12). The war was a revealed act of divine judgment, and Joshua was its instrument, not its author.

Then comes the summary of Joshua’s whole career: “Just as the LORD had commanded Moses his servant, so Moses commanded Joshua, and so Joshua did. He left nothing undone of all that the LORD had commanded Moses” (v. 15). The word passes from the LORD to Moses to Joshua without loss. Matthew Henry observes, “Joshua was himself a great commander, and yet nothing was more his praise than his obedience” (Matthew Henry, Commentary, on 11:15). Saul would later lose his kingdom by partial obedience in the same kind of war (1 Samuel 15:22–23).

Joshua’s complete obedience is a faint outline of the obedience of the greater Joshua. Jesus said, “My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to accomplish his work” (John 4:34), and at the end He could pray, “I glorified you on earth, having accomplished the work that you gave me to do” (John 17:4). He too left nothing undone. And the judgment that fell on Hazor is a preview of the judgment every sinner deserves. At the cross Christ bore that judgment in the place of all who take refuge in Him (Galatians 3:13; 1 Peter 2:24), so that the ban which fell on Canaan need not fall on anyone who, like Rahab, turns to the LORD.

Application

This section calls us to take God’s holiness and our obedience seriously at the same time. The judgment on Hazor is sobering, and it should be. God is not indifferent to evil, and a day is coming when He will judge the world in righteousness by the Man He has appointed (Acts 17:30–31). The right response is not embarrassment about God’s justice but repentance and flight to Christ, the only refuge from it (Romans 5:9).

• Fear God rightly. The same God who judged Canaan warned Israel that He would judge them for the same sins. Let the severity of God drive you to His kindness (Romans 11:22).
• Obey completely, not selectively. Joshua left nothing undone. Ask where you are practicing partial obedience: attending worship but withholding forgiveness, giving money but guarding your tongue poorly, reading Scripture but ignoring what it says about your marriage (James 1:22–25).
• Receive what God gives and refuse what He withholds. Israel took the spoil of the northern cities because God gave it, just as Achan was judged for taking what God had withheld. Contentment with God’s timing guards against grasping (Philippians 4:11–12).
• Rest in Christ’s perfect obedience. Your obedience will always be incomplete. Christ’s is not, and it is credited to all who believe (Romans 5:19).

A crucial warning against misapplication: nothing in this passage authorizes Christians, churches or nations to wage war in God’s name, to treat any people group as devoted to destruction, or to baptize national conflicts as holy war. The ban on Canaan was a unique act of judgment, directly commanded by God through Moses, limited to a particular land and time within the life of Israel as God’s covenant nation. Christ’s kingdom is not of this world (John 18:36); its weapons are the Word and prayer, not the sword (2 Corinthians 10:4; Ephesians 6:17–18). Every attempt to use this chapter to justify crusade, conquest or ethnic violence is a grievous abuse of Scripture.

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Section 4 — The Whole Land Taken over a Long Time (Joshua 11:16–18)

Key Insight

At verse 16 the narrator lifts his eyes from the northern campaign and surveys the whole conquest. “So Joshua took all that land, the hill country and all the Negeb and all the land of Goshen and the lowland and the Arabah and the hill country of Israel and its lowland” (v. 16). The list moves through every kind of terrain: the central highlands, the dry south, the district of Goshen in southern Judah (Joshua 10:41), the Shephelah foothills, the Jordan rift, and the northern hills with their own lowland. The boundaries are then fixed “from Mount Halak, which rises toward Seir, as far as Baal-gad in the Valley of Lebanon below Mount Hermon” (v. 17): from the bald mountain facing Edom in the far south to the slopes of Hermon in the far north. “And he captured all their kings and struck them and put them to death” (v. 17).

The survey is a declaration that God has kept His word. The land promised to Abraham (Genesis 15:18–21) and described to Moses (Numbers 34:1–12) now lies under Israel’s control. Calvin reads the list as evidence that God continued what He had begun: “we here perceive, as in a mirror, that whatever the Lord had promised by Moses was accomplished in reality, and by no dubious event” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:18). The same God who began the work at the Jordan brought it to completion (Philippians 1:6).

Then comes a quiet but important correction: “Joshua made war a long time with all those kings” (v. 18). The Hebrew is literally many days. Chapters 10 and 11 read quickly, and a reader might imagine the conquest took a few weeks. Poole says the verse was added “lest it should be thought that as all these wars are here recorded in a short narration, so they were despatched in a short time” (Poole, Commentary, on 11:18). Caleb’s reckoning suggests about seven years (Joshua 14:7, 10).

Why a long war? God had said so in advance: “The LORD your God will clear away these nations before you little by little. You may not make an end of them at once, lest the wild beasts grow too numerous for you” (Deuteronomy 7:22). But Calvin sees a deeper purpose in the slower pace: “the Lord exercised his people variously, that he might give a brighter display of his manifold grace, which usually loses its value in our eyes, if it is exhibited only in one and the same way” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:18). Swift victories at Jericho and Beth-horon displayed one aspect of God’s power; long, patient campaigns displayed another. Both were grace, and a people that had only known one would have understood God less.

The long war of Joshua anticipates the way Christ’s kingdom advances. The decisive victory has been won, and all authority in heaven and on earth has been given to Him (Matthew 28:18). Yet “At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him” (Hebrews 2:8). “For he must reign until he has put all his enemies under his feet” (1 Corinthians 15:25). Between the decisive victory and the final rest lies a long campaign in which the church, like Israel, learns to trust the same Lord through varied trials. The King who began the conquest will finish it.

Application

This section teaches patience in the long campaigns of the Christian life. Most growth in grace is not a single dramatic victory but many days of faithful warfare. Sanctification, like the conquest, is decisive in principle and gradual in practice (2 Corinthians 3:18; Philippians 3:12–14).

• Expect a long war with sin. A besetting sin rarely falls in one battle. Do not conclude that God has abandoned you because a struggle continues for years; keep fighting with His weapons (Romans 8:13; Galatians 5:16–17).
• See God’s grace in the slow seasons. Calvin notes that God displays His manifold grace in varied ways. The years of caring for an aging parent, of praying for a prodigal child or of serving a small congregation are not wasted time; they display God’s faithfulness in a form that sudden victories cannot (James 1:2–4).
• Survey what God has already done. Verses 16–17 pause to list the ground taken. Take time to recall specifically how God has worked in your life and church, and give thanks (Psalm 103:2).
• Trust God’s timing. Little by little was God’s plan, not Israel’s failure. Do not demand instant results from God in your ministry, your children or your own heart (Habakkuk 2:3).

A warning against misapplication: the gradual nature of the conquest is not an excuse for spiritual complacency. Israel’s later failure to finish the task was sin, not patience (Judges 1:27–2:3). God’s slow work is not our permission to be slow in obedience; it is His assurance that He will not abandon a long fight He has begun.

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Section 5 — No Peace but Gibeon: The Hardening of the LORD (Joshua 11:19–20)

Key Insight

“There was not a city that made peace with the people of Israel except the Hivites, the inhabitants of Gibeon. They took them all in battle” (v. 19). The exception is telling. Gibeon sought peace, however deceptively (Joshua 9), and was spared. Rahab sought mercy and was spared. The door was not bolted from Israel’s side against those who came in submission. Yet city after city chose war, even after watching Jericho, Ai and the southern coalition fall.

The narrator explains why: “For it was the LORD’s doing to harden their hearts that they should come against Israel in battle, in order that they should be devoted to destruction and should receive no mercy but be destroyed, just as the LORD commanded Moses” (v. 20). The Hebrew chazaq is the verb used of Pharaoh’s heart (Exodus 14:17) and, strikingly, of Joshua’s courage (Joshua 1:9). The LORD strengthened His servant to obey and confirmed the Canaanites in their resistance.

This hardening was not the corruption of innocent hearts. The Canaanites’ iniquity had been accumulating for centuries (Genesis 15:16; Leviticus 18:24–25). Matthew Henry draws the parallel with Egypt: “As Pharaoh’s heart was hardened by his own pride and wilfulness first, and afterwards by the righteous judgment of God, to his destruction, so were the hearts of these Canaanites” (Matthew Henry, Commentary, on 11:16–23). Poole explains the mode: “It was the design of God’s providence not to soften their hearts to a compliance with the Israelites, but to give them up to their own animosity, pride, confidence, and stubbornness” (Poole, Commentary, on 11:20). God did not create their pride; He withheld the grace that would have humbled it and handed them over to what they already loved (Romans 1:24).

Calvin insists that this is more than bare permission, and that it fulfills a purpose: “And it was wonderfully arranged by the secret providence of God, that, being doomed to destruction, they should voluntarily offer themselves to it, and by provoking the Israelites be the cause of their own ruin” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:20). Two truths stand together without contradiction. The Canaanites acted voluntarily; God’s purpose stood behind their action. “So then he has mercy on whomever he wills, and he hardens whomever he wills” (Romans 9:18).

This verse is among the hardest in Joshua, and Scripture does not ask us to resolve every tension. It asks us to fear and to flee. The words “should receive no mercy” (v. 20) stand in the starkest contrast to the invitation of the gospel. Through Christ, the greater Joshua, sinners are told to “draw near to the throne of grace, that we may receive mercy” (Hebrews 4:16). Jesus promises, “whoever comes to me I will never cast out” (John 6:37). The Gibeonites came to Joshua and lived; every sinner who comes to Christ lives. The warning of verse 20 is therefore also an invitation: “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts” (Psalm 95:7–8).

Application

This section calls for trembling and for tenderness. The hardening of the Canaanites is a warning that persistent resistance to God can become a settled condition from which there is no return. It is also a summons to respond now, while the door of mercy stands open (2 Corinthians 6:2).

• Do not presume on God’s patience. Each rejected warning makes the next rejection easier. If you are resisting a clear call of God to repent, to trust Christ or to obey, respond today (Hebrews 3:12–13).
• Keep your heart soft through the means of grace. Regular hearing of the Word, prayer, confession of sin and fellowship with believers are God’s appointed means of tenderness (Hebrews 3:13; 10:24–25).
• Pray for hardened people rather than writing them off. Only God knows who is finally hardened. Rahab lived in Jericho; the persecutor Saul became the apostle Paul (1 Timothy 1:13–16). Keep praying and witnessing.
• Humble yourself before God’s sovereignty. When Scripture speaks of God hardening hearts, the right response is awe and worship, not argument (Romans 9:20; 11:33–36).
• Hear the invitation inside the warning. The words no mercy in verse 20 make the offer of mercy in Christ shine brighter. Let the severity of this verse send you back to the throne of grace with thanksgiving, knowing that you have received what the Canaanites refused to seek (Hebrews 4:16).

A crucial warning against misapplication: this passage must never be used to conclude that a particular person is beyond God’s reach, nor to excuse our own hardness by blaming God. Those who fear they have been hardened show by that very fear that they have not been. God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked (Ezekiel 33:11), and no one who comes to Christ will be turned away.

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Section 6 — The Anakim Cut Off (Joshua 11:21–22)

Key Insight

“And Joshua came at that time and cut off the Anakim from the hill country, from Hebron, from Debir, from Anab, and from all the hill country of Judah, and from all the hill country of Israel. Joshua devoted them to destruction with their cities” (v. 21). The phrase at that time reaches back to the long war of verse 18; this is not a new campaign after the northern one but a supplementary report placed here for emphasis.

Why single out the Anakim? Because forty years earlier they had been the reason Israel refused to enter the land. The spies had returned saying, “we saw the descendants of Anak there” (Numbers 13:28), and “we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them” (Numbers 13:33). That report of giants cost a generation its inheritance (Numbers 14:28–35). Now the very people whose size had terrified Israel are cut off from their strongholds in Hebron, Debir and Anab. Calvin sees the design: “The less credible it seemed that they could be warred against with success, the more illustriously was the divine power displayed” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:21). What unbelief had declared impossible, faith now saw accomplished.

Matthew Henry puts it in four words: “Giants are dwarfs to Omnipotence” (Matthew Henry, Commentary, on 11:16–23). Spurgeon, preaching on God’s promise to Joshua, says the same with characteristic force: “Surely, in the Presence of God, Anakim become dwarfs, strongholds become as a lodge in a garden of cucumbers and chariots of iron are as thistle-down upon the hillside driven before the blast!” (Spurgeon, Sermon No. 1214, Strengthening Medicine for God’s Servants). The problem at Kadesh-barnea had never been the size of the Anakim. It had been the size of Israel’s view of God (Numbers 14:9).

Hebron was later given to Caleb, who asked for it precisely because “the Anakim were there, with great fortified cities” (Joshua 14:12), and he drove out the sons of Anak (Joshua 15:13–14). Poole explains that the work Caleb carried out is credited to Joshua here “as the general of the army” (Poole, Commentary, on 11:21), the commander receiving the credit for the campaign as a whole. It is fitting that the two spies who trusted God at Kadesh were the ones who saw the giants fall.

Verse 22 adds a note of realism: “There was none of the Anakim left in the land of the people of Israel. Only in Gaza, in Gath, and in Ashdod did some remain” (v. 22). The remnant fled to the Philistine cities of the coastal plain. Generations later, a giant named “Goliath of Gath” (1 Samuel 17:4) came out to defy the armies of the living God, and a shepherd boy from Judah struck him down, declaring that “the battle is the LORD’s” (1 Samuel 17:47).

That pattern reaches its fulfillment in Christ, the Son of David. The last and greatest enemy that remains after every other conquest is death itself. “The last enemy to be destroyed is death” (1 Corinthians 15:26). Jesus shared our flesh and blood “that through death he might destroy the one who has the power of death, that is, the devil” (Hebrews 2:14). The giants that remained in Gath could not stand before David; the giant that remains for every believer cannot stand before the risen Christ.

Application

This section confronts the giants that loom in our lives: fears, besetting sins, hostile circumstances and the prospect of death. The lesson is not that giants are small, but that God is great, and that the size of our problems is measured wrongly whenever God is left out of the calculation.

• Name your Anakim. What obstacle makes you feel like a grasshopper? A diagnosis, an addiction, a broken marriage, a hostile workplace, the fear of death? Bring it specifically before God in prayer (Philippians 4:6–7).
• Remember Kadesh-barnea. Unbelief cost Israel forty years. Do not let fear of a giant keep you from obeying what God has clearly commanded, whether that is an honest confession, a hard conversation or a costly act of generosity (Hebrews 3:19).
• Follow Caleb’s example. Caleb asked for the hardest territory because he trusted God’s promise. Ask God for courage to take on the difficult assignment rather than avoiding it (Joshua 14:10–12).
• Face death in Christ’s victory. Death is the last giant, but it is a defeated one. Let the resurrection shape how you grieve, how you face illness and how you prepare to die. Speak of that hope at the bedside and the graveside (1 Thessalonians 4:13–14; 1 Corinthians 15:54–57).

A warning against misapplication: this passage does not promise that faith will remove every difficulty in this life, nor that believers will always win visible victories over illness or opposition. Some giants remained in Gath for generations. The promise is that God is greater than every enemy and that the final victory is certain, not that every battle in this age ends in outward triumph (Hebrews 11:35–40).

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Section 7 — The Land Had Rest from War (Joshua 11:23)

Key Insight

The chapter and the first half of the book conclude with a single verse of three clauses: “So Joshua took the whole land, according to all that the LORD had spoken to Moses. And Joshua gave it for an inheritance to Israel according to their tribal allotments. And the land had rest from war” (v. 23). Each clause is a gift of God’s faithfulness.

Taken. The first clause is qualified by its own measuring line: according to all that the LORD had spoken to Moses. God had promised a gradual conquest (Exodus 23:30), and the book will soon say that “there remains yet very much land to possess” (Joshua 13:1). Keil explains that the conquest was of such a character that “the power of the Canaanites was broken, their dominion overthrown, and their whole land so thoroughly given into the hands of the Israelites” (Keil and Delitzsch, on 11:23), so that the remnants could no longer dispute possession. Calvin says that “while Joshua was still alive, a certain specimen of the promise was exhibited, making him feel perfectly secure in dividing the land by lot” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:23). The land was truly Israel’s, though not yet wholly occupied.

Given. “Joshua gave it for an inheritance to Israel” (v. 23). The Hebrew nachalah is an inheritance, not a wage. Israel did not earn Canaan; she received it as a gift of grace from the God who swore it to her fathers (Deuteronomy 9:4–6). Joshua acts here as mediator, distributing to each tribe its allotted portion, as chapters 13–21 will describe in detail. The New Testament speaks of the same gift in its fullness: “after destroying seven nations in the land of Canaan, he gave them their land as an inheritance” (Acts 13:19), and believers are born again “to an inheritance that is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading, kept in heaven for you” (1 Peter 1:4).

Rest. “And the land had rest from war” (v. 23). The Hebrew shaqat means quiet, the cessation of hostilities. It is the rest promised in Deuteronomy 12:9–10, a real and precious gift. Yet it was not final. Judges uses the same verb for periods of rest that ended in renewed oppression (Judges 3:11). Gill looks through the earthly rest to a greater one: “and so it became a land of rest, as the heavenly Canaan will be to the spiritual Israel and church of God, after their militant state is ended” (Gill, Exposition, on 11:23).

Hebrews makes this explicit: “For if Joshua had given them rest, God would not have spoken of another day later on. So then, there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God” (Hebrews 4:8–9). Joshua gave rest from war in Canaan; Jesus, whose name is the Greek form of Joshua (Iēsous), gives rest to the soul now, “Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28), and will give eternal rest when the last enemy is destroyed (Revelation 14:13). The land at rest in Joshua 11:23 is a signpost pointing past itself to Him.

Application

This section invites us to receive God’s gifts as gifts and to rest in the One who gives true rest. It also keeps us honest: the rest we know now is real but partial, and the final rest is still ahead.

• Receive your inheritance as grace. Everything you have in Christ, forgiveness, adoption, the Spirit, the hope of glory, is inheritance, not wages. Let that shape both your humility and your joy (Ephesians 1:11–14).
• Enter Christ’s rest by faith today. Rest is not first a vacation or a quiet schedule but ceasing from the effort to justify yourself and resting in Christ’s finished work (Hebrews 4:3, 10). Practically, that may mean confessing a sin you have been trying to atone for by your own efforts.
• Honor the Lord’s Day as a foretaste. The weekly Sabbath rest of the church is a present sign of the eternal Sabbath. Guard it as a gift rather than resenting it as a rule (Isaiah 58:13–14; Hebrews 10:25).
• Hold present rest loosely and future rest firmly. Seasons of quiet in family, church or nation are gifts from God, but they are not final. Set your hope fully on the rest that cannot be lost (1 Peter 1:13).

A warning against misapplication: the rest of verse 23 is not a promise of trouble-free circumstances for believers now. Israel’s rest was followed by further battles, and the Christian life involves warfare until the end (Ephesians 6:10–13). Nor does rest mean passivity; Hebrews urges us to strive to enter that rest (Hebrews 4:11). Rest in Christ is the security from which faithful labor flows.

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Cross References

Comparative Gospel Study

Not Applicable as Direct Comparison — Joshua is Old Testament historical narrative, not Gospel narrative. However, Joshua 11:1–23 anticipates key Gospel themes:

• The stronger man who plunders the strong. Jabin was the strongest king of the north, the head of all those kingdoms (v. 10), and Joshua broke his power and took his city. Jesus describes His own ministry the same way: a stronger man comes upon the strong man, overcomes him, takes away his armor and divides his spoil (Luke 11:21–22). Joshua’s victory over Hazor foreshadows Christ’s victory over Satan’s kingdom, won not by chariots but by the finger of God (Luke 11:20).

• The humble King without chariots. Israel hamstrung the horses and burned the chariots (v. 9), refusing the instruments of worldly power. When Jesus entered Jerusalem as King, He came humble and mounted on a donkey, fulfilling Zechariah 9:9 (Matthew 21:4–5), the very prophecy that goes on to promise the cutting off of chariot and war horse (Zechariah 9:10). His kingdom advances by the Word and the Spirit, not by the sword (John 18:36).

• Mercy to a Canaanite in the region of Sidon. Israel’s pursuit reached Great Sidon (v. 8), and no Canaanite city there sought peace. Centuries later a Canaanite woman from the district of Tyre and Sidon came crying for mercy, and Jesus commended her great faith and healed her daughter (Matthew 15:21–28). Where the northern cities hardened themselves (v. 20), she humbled herself, and the Canaanite who seeks mercy from the Son of David finds it.

• Hardening and judgment in the ministry of Jesus. Joshua 11:20 attributes the Canaanites’ obstinacy to the LORD’s judicial hardening. John applies Isaiah’s words about blinded eyes and hardened hearts to those who saw Jesus’ signs and still did not believe (John 12:37–40). In both cases hardening is God’s righteous response to persistent unbelief, and in both cases a remnant believes (John 12:42).

• Rest for the weary. Joshua gave Israel rest from war (v. 23). Jesus offers a deeper rest: rest for the souls of all who labor and are heavy laden and come to Him (Matthew 11:28–29). Immediately afterward Matthew records Jesus’ claim to be Lord of the Sabbath (Matthew 12:8), the One in whom the rest of Joshua and the Sabbath of creation reach their goal.

Old Testament Connections

Pentateuch

• The promise of the land. God promised Abraham the land from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates and named its peoples (Genesis 15:18–21), but only after “the iniquity of the Amorites” (Genesis 15:16) was complete. Joshua 11 is the fulfillment of that promise at God’s appointed time.
• Little by little. God promised to drive out the nations gradually (Exodus 23:29–30; Deuteronomy 7:22), which explains the “long time” (v. 18) of Joshua’s wars and the remaining land (Joshua 13:1).
• The law of the king and horses. Deuteronomy 17:16 forbids multiplying horses, and Joshua’s hamstringing of the horses (v. 9) applies its principle.
• The ban. Deuteronomy 7:1–5 and 20:16–18 command the devotion of the Canaanite cities to destruction, which Joshua carries out “just as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded” (v. 12).
• Hardening. The hardening of the Canaanites (v. 20) repeats the pattern of Pharaoh (Exodus 4:21; 9:12; 14:17) and of Sihon king of Heshbon (Deuteronomy 2:30).
• The Anakim. The giants who terrified the spies (Numbers 13:28, 33) and prompted Israel’s refusal to enter (Numbers 14:1–4) are cut off (vv. 21–22), vindicating the faith of Joshua and Caleb (Numbers 14:6–9).
• Rest and inheritance. Moses promised rest from enemies in the land of inheritance (Deuteronomy 12:9–10; 25:19), and verse 23 records its first installment.

Historical Books

• Hazor rebuilt. A later Jabin reigned in Hazor and oppressed Israel until Deborah and Barak defeated his forces (Judges 4:2–24). Israel’s failure to hold the land allowed the enemy to return.
• The remnant of giants. Goliath of Gath (1 Samuel 17:4) and other giants of Gath (2 Samuel 21:15–22) descend from the Anakim who survived in Philistia (v. 22).
• David and the horses. David hamstrung most of the chariot horses he captured (2 Samuel 8:4), while Solomon multiplied horses from Egypt (1 Kings 10:26–29) and fortified Hazor (1 Kings 9:15).
• Rest fulfilled and forfeited. Joshua 21:43–45 declares that the LORD gave Israel rest on every side and that not one word failed. Judges then records repeated rest and repeated apostasy (Judges 2:11–19; 3:11). Solomon’s reign brought a fuller rest (1 Kings 5:4; 8:56), yet it too was lost.
• Partial obedience. Saul lost his kingdom for incomplete obedience in a war of the ban (1 Samuel 15:1–23), a sharp contrast to Joshua, who “left nothing undone” (v. 15).

Wisdom Literature

• Trust not in chariots. “Some trust in chariots and some in horses, but we trust in the name of the LORD our God” (Psalm 20:7). “The war horse is a false hope for salvation, and by its great might it cannot rescue” (Psalm 33:17). The victory at Merom is these psalms in narrative form.
• God burns the chariots. Psalm 46:9 celebrates the LORD who makes wars cease and burns chariots with fire, universalizing Joshua’s act at Merom.
• The victory belongs to the LORD. Proverbs 21:31 summarizes the theology of verses 6–9: human preparation is legitimate, but the outcome is God’s.
• The conquest remembered in praise. Psalm 44:1–3 confesses that Israel did not win the land by its own sword, a text Calvin quotes at verse 16. Psalm 78:54–55 and Psalm 135:10–12 recall the kings struck down and the land given as a heritage.
• Today, do not harden. Psalm 95:7–11 warns against hardened hearts and speaks of God’s rest, the passage Hebrews uses to show that Joshua’s rest was not final.

Major Prophets

• Woe to those who rely on horses. Isaiah 31:1 condemns Judah for trusting Egypt’s horses and chariots rather than the Holy One of Israel, the error Joshua 11:6–9 forbids.
• Swords into plowshares. Isaiah 2:4 foresees the day when the nations will learn war no more, the final fulfillment of the burned chariots.
• The heritage and the nations. Jeremiah 3:19 calls the land a pleasant heritage God gave to His sons, and Jeremiah 12:14–16 warns the neighbors who touch Israel’s inheritance while promising them a place among God’s people if they learn His ways, judgment and mercy together as in Joshua 11:19–20.
• Hardening in judgment. Isaiah 6:9–10 speaks of God hardening a rebellious people’s hearts in judgment, the pattern of Joshua 11:20 applied to Israel itself.
• The inheritance renewed. Ezekiel 47:13–23 envisions the land divided again among the tribes in a restored order, including the sojourners, extending the inheritance theme of verse 23.

Minor Prophets

• Horses and chariots cut off. Micah 5:10 announces that in that day the LORD will cut off Israel’s horses and destroy her chariots, purging His people of false trust.
• The humble King who speaks peace. Zechariah 9:9–10 foresees the King on a donkey who cuts off the chariot from Ephraim and the war horse from Jerusalem and speaks peace to the nations.
• Not by might. Zechariah 4:6 declares that God’s work is accomplished not by might nor by power but by His Spirit.
• Renouncing horses. Hosea 14:3 records repentant Israel’s confession that they will not ride on horses or trust the work of their hands.

New Testament Fulfillment

Gospels and Acts

• Jesus, the greater Joshua. The name Jesus is the Greek form of Joshua (Matthew 1:21). Where Joshua gave rest from war, Jesus gives rest to the soul (Matthew 11:28–29) and binds the strong man (Luke 11:21–22).
• The humble King. Jesus enters Jerusalem without chariots, fulfilling Zechariah 9:9 (Matthew 21:4–5), and declares that His kingdom is not of this world (John 18:36).
• The coalition against the Anointed. The church in Acts applies Psalm 2 to the alliance of Herod, Pilate, Gentiles and peoples against Jesus (Acts 4:25–28), echoing the coalition of kings at Merom.
• The conquest retold. Paul’s sermon at Pisidian Antioch summarizes the conquest: “And after destroying seven nations in the land of Canaan, he gave them their land as an inheritance” (Acts 13:19). Stephen notes that the tabernacle entered with Joshua when Israel dispossessed the nations (Acts 7:45).
• Mercy to Canaanites. The Canaanite woman of the region of Tyre and Sidon receives mercy (Matthew 15:21–28), and the gospel later reaches Tyre and Sidon (Acts 21:3–4; 27:3).

Paul’s Epistles

• Spiritual warfare. Paul describes the Christian’s warfare as a struggle not against flesh and blood but against spiritual powers (Ephesians 6:12), fought with weapons that “are not of the flesh but have divine power to destroy strongholds” (2 Corinthians 10:4).
• Christ’s triumph. Christ disarmed the rulers and authorities at the cross (Colossians 2:15) and must reign until all His enemies are under His feet (1 Corinthians 15:25), the last being death (1 Corinthians 15:26).
• Hardening and mercy. Romans 9:17–18 cites Pharaoh as the paradigm of God’s sovereign hardening, and Romans 11:7–10, 25 speaks of a partial hardening of Israel that serves God’s purpose of mercy to the nations.
• Inheritance. Believers are heirs of the world through the righteousness of faith (Romans 4:13), heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ (Romans 8:17), sealed with the Spirit as guarantee of the inheritance (Ephesians 1:13–14).
• Warning from Israel’s history. Paul uses the wilderness and conquest generation as examples for the church (1 Corinthians 10:1–13).

General Epistles and Revelation

• Rest not given by Joshua. Hebrews 3:7–4:11 is the central New Testament commentary on the rest of Joshua 11:23: Joshua did not give the final rest (Hebrews 4:8), and a Sabbath rest remains for the people of God (Hebrews 4:9).
• Faith that conquered kingdoms. Hebrews 11:30–33 lists Jericho, Rahab and those “who through faith conquered kingdoms” (Hebrews 11:33).
• An imperishable inheritance. Peter describes the believer’s inheritance as imperishable, undefiled and unfading, kept in heaven (1 Peter 1:3–5).
• Rahab’s works of faith. James holds up Rahab as one justified by a living faith (James 2:25), the Canaanite who sought mercy when the cities of Joshua 11 did not.
• The final battle and the final rest. Revelation depicts the nations gathered for battle, their number like the sand of the sea (Revelation 20:8), consumed by fire from heaven (Revelation 20:9). The Rider called Faithful and True judges and makes war in righteousness (Revelation 19:11), and those who die in the Lord rest from their labors (Revelation 14:13).

Redemptive-Historical Context

Creation. God created the world as a place of rest, completing His work and resting on the seventh day (Genesis 2:1–3). Humanity was placed in a garden-land to enjoy God’s presence and exercise dominion under Him (Genesis 2:15). The promised land of Joshua is a renewed Eden in miniature, a place where God’s people dwell with Him in rest.

Fall. Sin shattered that rest. Humanity was expelled from the garden (Genesis 3:23–24), and the earth filled with violence (Genesis 6:11). The Canaanite city-states of Joshua 11, with their idolatry and corruption (Leviticus 18:24–28), represent the world in rebellion against its Creator. Their hardening (v. 20) shows the end of persistent rebellion: God gives the unrepentant over to what they have chosen (Romans 1:24).

Redemption. God’s answer to the fall was a promise: a seed of the woman who would crush the serpent (Genesis 3:15), a family through whom all nations would be blessed (Genesis 12:3), and a land where that family would dwell (Genesis 15:18–21). Joshua 11 advances this plan decisively. The land promised to Abraham is taken, the enemies who threatened Israel’s existence are broken, and the inheritance is distributed. God’s faithfulness is displayed so clearly that the book can later say, “Not one word of all the good promises that the LORD had made to the house of Israel had failed; all came to pass” (Joshua 21:45).

Yet Joshua 11 also establishes patterns that recur throughout redemptive history:

• God fights for His people (Exodus 14:14; Joshua 10:14), and victory belongs to Him rather than to human means (Psalm 20:7).
• Judgment and mercy run together. The same conquest that judges Canaan spares Rahab and Gibeon.
• Fulfillment comes in installments. The land is taken in principle and possessed gradually; rest is given and yet remains.
• Obedience matters. Joshua’s faithfulness is praised, and later failures cost Israel dearly.

Christ and the New Covenant. All of this points to Jesus, whose very name is Joshua. He is the greater Joshua who wins the decisive victory over sin, Satan and death (Colossians 2:15; Hebrews 2:14–15), who left nothing undone of all the Father gave Him to do (John 17:4; 19:30), and who gives His people an inheritance and a rest that Joshua could only foreshadow (Hebrews 4:8–10). In the new covenant the battle is spiritual (Ephesians 6:12), the people of God are gathered from every nation (Revelation 7:9), and the inheritance is the renewed creation (Romans 8:17–23; Matthew 5:5).

Already and Not Yet. Believers live between the decisive victory and the final rest. Christ has already triumphed and reigns at the Father’s right hand (Ephesians 1:20–22), and believers already enter His rest by faith (Hebrews 4:3). Yet “At present, we do not yet see everything in subjection to him” (Hebrews 2:8). Like Israel after Joshua 11:23, the church enjoys real rest while enemies remain and land is still to be possessed. The Christian life is therefore both peaceful and militant: resting in Christ’s finished work and fighting the good fight of faith (1 Timothy 6:12).

Consummation. The rest of Joshua 11:23 will be completed when Christ returns. The last enemy, death, will be destroyed (1 Corinthians 15:26); the nations gathered against God will be consumed (Revelation 20:9); and the people of God will inherit the new heavens and new earth, where God dwells with them and there is no more mourning, crying or pain (Revelation 21:1–4). Then the Sabbath rest that remains for the people of God (Hebrews 4:9) will be fully and forever enjoyed.

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Systematic Theology Connection

The Providence of God

Joshua 11 is a sustained demonstration that God governs history down to its timing and details. The northern kings acted on their own initiative when Jabin “heard of this” (v. 1), yet their coalition formed only after Israel had been strengthened by earlier victories. The LORD fixed the hour of battle, “tomorrow at this time” (v. 6), gave the enemy into Israel’s hand (v. 8), and set the pace of the whole conquest, little by little (v. 18; Deuteronomy 7:22).

The Westminster Confession teaches that God “doth uphold, direct, dispose, and govern all creatures, actions, and things, from the greatest even to the least” (WCF 5.1). The Shorter Catechism defines providence as God’s “most holy, wise and powerful preserving and governing all his creatures, and all their actions” (WSC 11). The Belgic Confession likewise confesses that God rules all things “in such a way that nothing happens in this world without God’s orderly arrangement” (Belgic Confession, Art. 13).

How the passage demonstrates the doctrine:

• Over rulers. The decisions of kings and the formation of alliances fall under God’s government (Proverbs 21:1; Daniel 2:21).
• Over means. God used Israel’s swift march (v. 7) and ordinary military action while ensuring the result (v. 8). The Confession notes that God “in his ordinary providence, maketh use of means, yet is free to work without, above, and against them, at his pleasure” (WCF 5.3).
• Over timing. The long war (v. 18) was part of God’s wise plan, not a delay in it.
• For His church. The Confession adds that providence “after a most special manner, it taketh care of his church, and disposeth all things to the good thereof” (WCF 5.7), which is precisely what Calvin and Poole saw in the staggered coalitions.

Practical implications: believers need not fear the coalitions that gather against them, since their timing and extent are under God’s hand (Romans 8:28; Matthew 10:29–31). The doctrine calls for diligent use of means without trust in them, as Joshua marched swiftly yet credited the LORD.

Divine Hardening and Reprobation

Joshua 11:20 is one of the clearest Old Testament statements of God’s judicial hardening: “For it was the LORD’s doing to harden their hearts that they should come against Israel in battle, in order that they should be devoted to destruction and should receive no mercy” (v. 20). The Canaanites hardened themselves in pride, and God confirmed them in it, as He did Pharaoh and Sihon (Exodus 9:12; Deuteronomy 2:30), in righteous judgment on long-accumulated iniquity (Genesis 15:16).

The Westminster Confession describes exactly this: “As for those wicked and ungodly men whom God, as a righteous Judge, for former sins, doth blind and harden, from them he not only withholdeth his grace whereby they might have been enlightened in their understandings, and wrought upon in their hearts” (WCF 5.6). It adds that God “gives them over to their own lusts, the temptations of the world, and the power of Satan, whereby it comes to pass that they harden themselves, even under those means which God useth for the softening of others” (WCF 5.6). Rahab and Gibeon saw the same evidence and were softened.

Behind the hardening lies the decree. The Confession teaches that God was pleased “to pass by; and to ordain them to dishonor and wrath for their sin, to the praise of his glorious justice” (WCF 3.7). The Canons of Dort speak of God “permitting them in His just judgment to follow their own ways” (Canons of Dort, I.15). The words for their sin are essential: reprobation is not the cause of sin but the just judgment upon it. God is never the author of sin (WCF 3.1; James 1:13).

Practical implications:

• Humility. Any softness of heart toward God is His gift, not our achievement (Ezekiel 36:26; 1 Corinthians 4:7).
• Urgency. God’s patience should not be presumed upon; “Today, if you hear his voice” (Psalm 95:7).
• Caution. The Confession itself counsels that this “high mystery of predestination is to be handled with special prudence and care” (WCF 3.8). We are never to pronounce another person reprobate, but to preach the gospel to all.

The Justice and Holiness of God

The ban on Hazor and the northern cities (vv. 11–14) confronts the reader with the justice of God. Scripture does not present the conquest as ethnic aggression but as the execution of a sentence long delayed. The Amorites’ iniquity was allowed to grow for four centuries (Genesis 15:16); the land itself was said to vomit out its inhabitants for their abominations (Leviticus 18:24–25); and Israel was told plainly that the land was given not for her righteousness but “because of the wickedness of these nations” (Deuteronomy 9:5).

The Westminster Confession describes God as “most loving, gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth” (WCF 2.1) and, in the same sentence, as “most just, and terrible in his judgments, hating all sin, and who will by no means clear the guilty” (WCF 2.1). Joshua 11 displays both sides. God’s long-suffering delayed judgment for centuries; His justice finally fell. Even then mercy was extended to Rahab and to Gibeon.

The same justice is impartial. The ban fell on Achan and his household when Israel sinned (Joshua 7:11–12, 24–26), and God warned that Israel would perish like the nations if she followed their gods (Deuteronomy 8:19–20). The justice that struck Hazor is the justice that will judge the whole world at the last day (WCF 33.1; Acts 17:31).

How the passage points to Christ: the judgment that fell on Canaan is a preview of the final judgment, and the only refuge from that judgment is the cross, where God’s justice was satisfied in the substitution of His Son (Romans 3:25–26). At the cross justice and mercy meet: God is just in punishing sin and the justifier of those who have faith in Jesus.

Practical implications: the justice of God should produce reverent fear (Hebrews 10:31; 12:28–29), not embarrassment. It should make us grateful that our own guilt has been borne by Christ (Isaiah 53:5–6). It should also make us patient in the face of present injustice, since God will judge rightly in His time (Romans 12:19; Revelation 19:11).

The Law of God and the Judicial Laws of Israel

Joshua is praised because “He left nothing undone of all that the LORD had commanded Moses” (v. 15), and the ban was carried out “just as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded” (v. 12). Reformed theology answers clearly that they are not, and it explains why.

The Westminster Confession distinguishes the moral law, which binds all people at all times (WCF 19.5), from the judicial laws God gave Israel as a body politic, laws which “expired together with the State of that people; not obliging any other now, further than the general equity thereof may require” (WCF 19.4). The command to devote the Canaanite cities to destruction belonged to Israel’s unique position as a theocratic nation entering a land under a specific divine sentence. It expired with that order, and it was never a general principle for all nations.

The Confession also guards against self-appointed zeal: “Good works are only such as God hath commanded in his holy Word, and not such as, without the warrant thereof, are devised by men, out of blind zeal, or upon any pretense of good intention” (WCF 16.1). Joshua had a direct command; no one since has had his commission. When the Confession permits civil magistrates to “wage war, upon just and necessary occasion” (WCF 23.2), it speaks of ordinary justice exercised by the state, not of a holy war waged by the church or in God’s name.

What does abide is the principle of full obedience. Joshua’s refusal to edit God’s command models the obedience of faith that believers owe the moral law, now as a rule of life rather than a covenant of works (WCF 19.6; Romans 8:3–4). And Joshua’s obedience points to Christ, who fulfilled all righteousness perfectly for His people (Matthew 3:15; 5:17).

Practical implications:

• Read Old Testament commands in their covenant setting. Ask what they meant for Israel and how they are fulfilled in Christ (Hebrews 8:13).
• Refuse every appeal to Joshua to justify violence in the name of Christ (John 18:36).

The Kingly Office of Christ

Joshua 11 shows a leader who breaks the power of hostile kings, captures their cities, gives his people their inheritance and brings rest. Each of these is a shadow of Christ’s kingly work. The Shorter Catechism states it precisely: “Christ executeth the office of a king, in subduing us to himself, in ruling and defending us, and in restraining and conquering all his and our enemies” (WSC 26).

How the passage illustrates each element:

• Conquering enemies. Joshua struck down Jabin and “captured all their kings” (v. 17). Christ has disarmed the rulers and authorities (Colossians 2:15) and must reign until He has put all His enemies under His feet (1 Corinthians 15:25).
• Defending His people. The LORD’s word, “Do not be afraid of them” (v. 6), is the voice of the divine King defending His own. Christ promises that the gates of hell will not prevail against His church (Matthew 16:18).
• Ruling by His word. Joshua’s authority rested entirely on the command of God given through Moses (v. 15). Christ rules His church by His Word and Spirit (Matthew 28:18–20).
• Giving the inheritance. Joshua distributed the land (v. 23); Christ gives His people an eternal inheritance (1 Peter 1:4; Matthew 25:34).

The Shorter Catechism’s exposition of the second petition asks “that Satan’s kingdom may be destroyed; and that the kingdom of grace may be advanced, ourselves and others brought into it, and kept in it; and that the kingdom of glory may be hastened” (WSC 102). That prayer captures the shape of Christ’s reign in the present age: a kingdom advancing through a long campaign, like Joshua’s, toward a certain consummation.

Practical implications: believers can face every enemy, spiritual or temporal, with confidence in their King (Romans 8:37–39). Christ’s kingship also demands submission: the King who conquers His enemies first subdues His people to Himself (Psalm 110:3). And it shapes prayer, as we ask for the advance of His kingdom and the hastening of His return (Revelation 22:20).

Sanctification and the Christian’s Warfare

The long war of verse 18 and the remnant of Anakim in verse 22 illustrate the Reformed understanding of sanctification. The decisive victory was won, yet enemies remained and had to be driven out over many days. The Christian life has the same shape.

The Westminster Confession teaches that in those effectually called “the dominion of the whole body of sin is destroyed, and the several lusts thereof are more and more weakened and mortified” (WCF 13.1). Yet sanctification is “imperfect in this life, there abiding still some remnants of corruption in every part; whence ariseth a continual and irreconcilable war, the flesh lusting against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh” (WCF 13.2).

The Confession adds the note of hope: “In which war, although the remaining corruption, for a time, may much prevail; yet, through the continual supply of strength from the sanctifying Spirit of Christ, the regenerate part doth overcome” (WCF 13.3). Joshua’s victories came through the LORD’s repeated word of assurance (v. 6); the believer’s progress comes through the continual supply of the Spirit (Galatians 5:16–25; Philippians 2:12–13).

How the passage applies:

• Decisive and progressive. The power of the Canaanites was broken, yet the land had to be occupied little by little. Sin’s dominion is broken in regeneration (Romans 6:14), yet its remnants must be put to death daily (Romans 8:13; Colossians 3:5).
• No peace with the enemy. Henry notes that the rest of verse 23 was a peace from the Canaanites, not with them. The believer does not make treaties with sin (Romans 13:14).
• Long obedience. Joshua made war a long time. Growth in grace is measured in years, not moments (2 Peter 3:18).

Practical implications: do not despair over the persistence of sin, and do not make peace with it. Use the means of grace, fight in the Spirit’s strength, and look for the day when the war will end in perfect holiness (1 John 3:2).

The Covenant of Grace and the Faithfulness of God’s Promises

Verse 23 declares that Joshua took the whole land “according to all that the LORD had spoken to Moses” (v. 23), and the book later adds that “Not one word of all the good promises that the LORD had made to the house of Israel had failed; all came to pass” (Joshua 21:45). The conquest is the fulfillment of promises made to Abraham (Genesis 15:18–21), reaffirmed to Moses (Exodus 3:8), and now kept.

Reformed theology sees in these promises one covenant of grace administered in different ways across redemptive history. The Westminster Confession teaches that under the law the covenant “was administered by promises, prophecies, sacrifices, circumcision, the paschal lamb, and other types and ordinances delivered to the people of the Jews, all foresignifying Christ to come” (WCF 7.5), and that “There are not therefore two covenants of grace, differing in substance, but one and the same, under various dispensations” (WCF 7.6). The land and its rest were among those types. They were real gifts to Israel, and they also foresignified the greater inheritance in Christ.

How the passage reveals the doctrine:

• Faithfulness. God kept His word to the patriarchs even across centuries and through Israel’s unbelief at Kadesh-barnea (Numbers 14).
• Grace. The land was given as an inheritance (Hebrew nachalah), not earned (Deuteronomy 9:4–6).
• Typology. The rest of Joshua pointed to the Sabbath rest that remains (Hebrews 4:8–9), and the land pointed to the renewed earth promised to Abraham’s seed (Romans 4:13).
• Mediation. Joshua, as covenant mediator, gave the inheritance; Christ is the Mediator of a better covenant (Hebrews 8:6; 9:15).

Practical implications: God’s faithfulness in Joshua 11 is the ground of assurance for believers now. If He kept His promises to Israel through centuries of delay and rebellion, He will keep His promises in Christ, all of which are Yes in Him (2 Corinthians 1:20). Believers can therefore rest their hope on His Word, wait patiently for what is not yet seen (Romans 8:24–25), and teach their children to remember His faithfulness (Psalm 78:4–7).

Glorification and the Eternal Rest of the Saints

The final words of the chapter, “And the land had rest from war” (v. 23), anticipate the final state of God’s people. Hebrews insists that Joshua’s rest was not the last word (Hebrews 4:8) and that “there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God” (Hebrews 4:9). That rest is entered by faith now (Hebrews 4:3) and enjoyed fully in glory.

The Shorter Catechism describes the believer’s final condition: “At the resurrection, believers, being raised up in glory, shall be openly acknowledged and acquitted in the day of judgment, and made perfectly blessed in the full enjoying of God to all eternity” (WSC 38). The Confession adds that on the last day “shall the righteous go into everlasting life, and receive that fullness of joy and refreshing, which shall come from the presence of the Lord” (WCF 33.2).

How Joshua 11 illustrates glorification:

• Rest after war. Israel’s rest came only after the long war; the saints’ rest comes after their warfare is accomplished (2 Timothy 4:7–8; Revelation 14:13).
• Every enemy removed. The Anakim, the last and greatest enemies, were cut off; in glory the last enemy, death, will be destroyed (1 Corinthians 15:26, 54–55).
• Inheritance received. Each tribe received its allotment; each believer will receive the inheritance reserved in heaven (1 Peter 1:4), and supremely God Himself (Revelation 21:3).
• Unbroken rest. Israel’s rest was interrupted again and again in Judges. The rest of glory will never be broken (Revelation 21:4; 22:5).

Practical implications: the hope of glory gives perspective to present suffering (Romans 8:18; 2 Corinthians 4:17), strength to persevere in the fight against sin (1 John 3:3), and comfort in bereavement (1 Thessalonians 4:13–18). It also sets the direction of Christian life: we are pilgrims, not settlers, seeking the better country (Hebrews 11:13–16).

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Reformed Theology

Reformed theology reads Joshua 11 within the one covenant of grace that runs from the promise of Genesis 3:15 to the new creation. The conquest is not an isolated episode of ancient warfare but a chapter in God’s unfolding plan to bring a people into His presence and rest. The Westminster Standards express this unity when they teach that under the law the one covenant was administered through promises, types and ordinances that pointed to Christ to come (WCF 7.5), and the land and its rest were among those types.

Typology: land and rest. The Reformed tradition follows Hebrews in reading the land as a real gift and a type. Calvin, commenting on Hebrews 4:8, says that “the land of Canaan was not otherwise so much valued except for this reason, because it was an image and a symbol of the spiritual inheritance” (Calvin, Commentary on Hebrews, on 4:8). Geerhardus Vos developed this into a biblical-theological method, arguing that Old Testament institutions such as the land embody spiritual realities in provisional, earthly form that point forward to their eschatological fulfillment. G. K. Beale traces how the land promise expands in the New Testament to the whole renewed earth (Romans 4:13; Matthew 5:5).

Joshua and Jesus. Joshua the son of Nun, a faithful servant who left nothing undone (v. 15), foreshadows Jesus, the Son who accomplished the Father’s work perfectly (John 17:4). Joshua gave rest from war; Jesus gives the Sabbath rest that remains (Hebrews 4:9). Sinclair Ferguson often stresses that Christ is the true and better Joshua who leads His people not merely into a land but into the presence of God.

The ban and intrusion ethics. Meredith Kline argued that the conquest represents an intrusion of the ethics of final judgment into the ordinary course of history: in Canaan, for a limited time and place, God anticipated the last judgment through His covenant people. This explains why the ban was right when commanded and why it is never to be repeated. The Westminster Confession confirms that Israel’s judicial laws lapsed with the Israelite state and bind no other people except in their general equity (WCF 19.4).

Sovereignty and hardening. On verse 20 the Reformed tradition affirms both divine sovereignty and human guilt. Calvin writes, “In the first place, then, stands the will of God, which must be regarded as the principal cause” (Calvin, Commentary on Joshua, on 11:20), yet he equally insists that the Canaanites acted voluntarily. The Confession’s teaching on judicial hardening (WCF 5.6) and on the passing by of the reprobate “for their sin” (WCF 3.7) is the systematic form of this text. R. C. Sproul frequently distinguished the active softening of the elect from the passive giving over of the reprobate to their own desires, a distinction that fits verse 20 well.

Israel and the church. Reformed theology sees the church as the continuation of the one people of God, now gathered from every nation in Christ (Galatians 3:29; Ephesians 2:19–22). The promises made to Israel are fulfilled in Christ and shared by all who are united to Him, Jew and Gentile alike.

Spiritual warfare. Spurgeon applies the chapter to the believer’s conflicts: “Do your foes come out against you with multitudes of chariots? Let your faith open its eyes and you shall see horses of fire and chariots of fire round about you!” (Spurgeon, Sermon No. 2393, A Comforting Message for the Closing Year). The conquest becomes the pattern of the Christian’s warfare, fought in the Spirit’s strength toward the rest Christ secured.

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Dispensational Theology

Dispensational theology reads Joshua 11 through a consistently literal-grammatical hermeneutic and a sharp distinction between God’s program for Israel and His program for the church. Its central concern with this chapter is the relationship between Joshua’s conquest and the land promise of the Abrahamic covenant.

The land promise. Dispensationalists hold that the Abrahamic covenant (Genesis 12:1–3; 15:18–21) is unconditional and that its land promise must be fulfilled literally to the physical descendants of Abraham. Charles Ryrie argued that a normal, plain reading of these promises requires a future, literal fulfillment for national Israel. On this view Joshua 11:23 records a genuine but partial fulfillment. John Walvoord pointed out that Israel never occupied the full boundaries promised in Genesis 15:18, from the river of Egypt to the Euphrates, and concluded that the complete fulfillment awaits the millennial reign of Christ. Dispensationalists read Joshua 21:43–45 as describing God’s faithfulness in that generation rather than the final and total fulfillment of the land promise.

The land covenant. J. Dwight Pentecost, in Things to Come, distinguished a Palestinian or land covenant (Deuteronomy 29–30) that governs Israel’s enjoyment of the land. Possession of the land, and therefore rest in it, was conditioned on obedience, while ownership rested on the unconditional Abrahamic promise. The rest of Joshua 11:23 was thus real but forfeitable, as Judges shows, and Israel’s final and permanent rest will come only when the nation is regathered and restored under the Messiah (Deuteronomy 30:1–10; Ezekiel 36:24–28; Amos 9:14–15).

Israel and the church. Dispensationalists typically resist reading Canaan as a type of the church’s inheritance in a way that replaces Israel’s future. Hebrews 4 is read as applying the principle of rest to believers now without cancelling the promise of land to national Israel. Older dispensational writers such as C. I. Scofield and J. N. Darby did use Canaan typologically for the believer’s spiritual experience, often connecting Joshua’s battles with the conflict in the heavenly places of Ephesians 6:12, while still maintaining a literal future for Israel.

The ban. Dispensationalists agree with Reformed interpreters that the destruction of the Canaanites belonged to a specific administration of God’s purposes. It was part of God’s dealings with Israel as a theocratic nation under the Mosaic economy and is not a pattern for the church, whose calling in the present dispensation is to proclaim the gospel to all nations (Matthew 28:19–20).

Progressive dispensationalism. Craig Blaising and Darrell Bock have argued for a more holistic view of the kingdom, in which the land promise finds its fulfillment within the renewed creation while still including national Israel. This brings progressive dispensationalism closer to Reformed readings of the eschatological scope of the land, though it retains a distinct future for Israel.

Evaluation. Both traditions affirm that God keeps His promises, that the conquest was a unique act of judgment, and that Christ will return to reign. They differ on whether the land promise is fulfilled typologically in Christ and the new creation, as Reformed theology holds (Hebrews 4:8–9; Romans 4:13), or awaits a literal fulfillment for national Israel in a future millennium.

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Bibliography

Commentaries

• Barnes, Albert. Notes on the Bible. 1834. Joshua 11.
• Calvin, John. Commentaries on the Book of Joshua. Translated by Henry Beveridge. Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1854.
• Calvin, John. Commentaries on the Epistle of Paul the Apostle to the Hebrews. Translated by John Owen. Edinburgh: Calvin Translation Society, 1853.
• Gill, John. Exposition of the Entire Bible. 1746–63. Joshua 11.
• Henry, Matthew. Commentary on the Whole Bible. 1706. Joshua 11.
• Henry, Matthew. Concise Commentary on the Whole Bible. Joshua 11.
• Keil, C. F., and F. Delitzsch. Biblical Commentary on the Old Testament. Vol. 2, Joshua, Judges, Ruth. 1857–78.
• Poole, Matthew. A Commentary on the Holy Bible. 1683–85. Joshua 11.
• Spence, H. D. M., and Joseph S. Exell, eds. The Pulpit Commentary. Joshua 11.

Sermons

• Spurgeon, Charles H. Strengthening Medicine for God’s Servants. Sermon No. 1214. Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit.
• Spurgeon, Charles H. A Comforting Message for the Closing Year. Sermon No. 2393. Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit.
• Spurgeon, Charles H. Caleb: The Man for the Times. Sermon on Numbers 14:24, 1863.

Confessional Standards

• The Westminster Confession of Faith. 1646.
• The Westminster Shorter Catechism. 1647.
• The Belgic Confession. 1561.
• The Canons of Dort. 1618–19.

Reformed Biblical Theology and Doctrine

• Beale, G. K. A New Testament Biblical Theology: The Unfolding of the Old Testament in the New. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2011.
• Ferguson, Sinclair B. The Whole Christ. Wheaton: Crossway, 2016.
• Kline, Meredith G. The Structure of Biblical Authority. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1972.
• Sproul, R. C. Chosen by God. Wheaton: Tyndale House, 1986.
• Vos, Geerhardus. Biblical Theology: Old and New Testaments. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1948.

Dispensational Works

• Blaising, Craig A., and Darrell L. Bock. Progressive Dispensationalism. Wheaton: BridgePoint, 1993.
• Darby, J. N. Synopsis of the Books of the Bible.
• Pentecost, J. Dwight. Things to Come. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1958.
• Ryrie, Charles C. Dispensationalism. Chicago: Moody, 1995.
• Scofield, C. I., ed. The Scofield Reference Bible. New York: Oxford University Press, 1917.
• Walvoord, John F. The Millennial Kingdom. Findlay, OH: Dunham, 1959.

Lexical Resources

• Brown, Francis, S. R. Driver, and Charles A. Briggs. A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament.
• Strong, James. The Exhaustive Concordance of the Bible: Hebrew and Greek Dictionaries.