Caleb

I have come to one of my favourite Bible characters – Caleb. Oh dear! In looking up Caleb's history, I found there are 11 entries in my Bible Dictionary. They look interesting, so I will have to check them all, won't I?

Caleb was of the tribe of Judah. Now Judah is listed in the Glossary of Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures (by Mary Baker Eddy) as: "A corporeal material belief progressing and disappearing; the spiritual understanding of God and man appearing" (p. 589:23). A good line to be in!

There were twelve men sent to check out the land of Canaan from the wilderness of Paran, on the east side of the Sinai Peninsula. Two of the twelve gave the enterprise the go-ahead – they could see that it was possible to take the land. Caleb “stilled the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it” (Numbers 13: 30). However, the men who went with him thought they were not strong enough to do the job. So the journey to the Promised Land had to take the longer route.

Caleb and Joshua were the only ones of the group to enter the Promised Land – the others died in the wilderness.

But Joshua forgot that God's promise included Caleb, and he was ignored when the land was divided up. Really the whole of Caleb's story is encapsulated in Joshua Chapter 14. He put his case to Joshua and received what was due to him. Hebron was his inheritance.

Joyce Voysey

Geography and kingdoms

How about the list of “kings of the country which Joshua and the Children of Israel smote on this side Jordan...”! We then have a list of the kings: Josh. 13:9-24. That's 32 kings. 

The area we are reading about is very small – Israel to-day, we are told, measures 420 km x 115 km. But the area Joshua took over didn't include all that area. 

I think of the distance between the Gold Coast and Brisbane as being about 100 km. Take that north for 420 km you might get to Bundaberg. How many cities, towns, villages would that hold? And how about having 32 kings set up in that area?

The web site at https://images.app.goo.gl/FW9vuhGoWt68hoVk9 might give you a map. (Ed. You can spot Jericho just north of the Dead Sea and Ai a little to the north west of Jericho.)

Joyce Voysey

Ed. Interesting that they were all kings. I wonder about their queens. And how many people constituted each kingdom? With travel being mostly on foot, it's probable that people kept to their own little part of the world.

Cheerful employment

Warfare and conflict are usually distasteful topics; we'd rather have peace. Yet, as we read in Joyce's recent post, Joshua's story embraces a swag of conquests which involved both warfare and conflict. What lessons may be learned?

Mary Baker Eddy, the discoverer and founder of Christian Science, writes that 'the warfare with oneself is grand'. The whole sentence reads: 'Be of good cheer; the warfare with one's self is grand; it gives one plenty of employment, and the divine Principle worketh with you, — and obedience crowns persistent effort with everlasting victory' (Miscellaneous Writings 1883-1896, p. 118:24–28)

In this same volume, she writes evocatively of past skirmishes: 'With tender tread, thought sometimes walks in memory, through the dim corridors of years, on to old battle-grounds, there sadly to survey the fields of the slain and the enemy's losses' (ibid, p. xi: 24).

But the battle is not with other people; it is with sin and error, as exemplified in the following passage in the Christian Science textbook by Eddy: 'There is too much animal courage in society and not sufficient moral courage. Christians must take up arms against error at home and abroad. They must grapple with sin in themselves and in others, and continue this warfare until they have finished their course ' (Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures p. 28:32–5).

What, then, was Joshua doing as he and his people fought so many battles? We will probably never know exactly, but we hope they were sorting themselves out, finding their place, learning how to get along with each other, putting down roots and growing shoots, and practising the ten commandments handed down to them by their courageous leader Moses. It wasn't and isn't always easy, but 'the Lord gave them rest...' (Joshua 21: 44)--a little respite on their continuing journey to know and obey God.

Julie Swannell