Joshua 2: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

Joshua sends two spies from Shittim to look over the land, especially Jericho, and they stay at the house of Rahab, a prostitute. When the king of Jericho sends men to seize them, Rahab hides the spies under flax on her roof and tells the searchers the men have gone and to pursue them quickly. She tells the spies that news of Israel has left the people of the land weak with fear, and she asks them to swear to spare her family; they agree, on the conditions that she tie a scarlet cord in her window, keep her family inside the house, and say nothing about their mission. The spies hide in the hills for three days and then return to Joshua with their report.

Claim by Claim

1. 2:1
   • Joshua son of Nun sent out two men from Shittim.
   • The two men were sent as spies.
   • They were sent secretly.
   • Joshua told them to go view the land, and Jericho.
   • The two men went.
   • The two men came into the house of a prostitute.
   • The prostitute's name was Rahab.
   • The two men lay down there.
2. 2:2
   • The king of Jericho was told that men had come there that night.
   • The report said the men were of the children of Israel.
   • The report said the men had come to search out the land.
3. 2:3
   • The king of Jericho sent word to Rahab.
   • The king ordered Rahab to bring out the men who had come to her and entered her house.
   • The king said the men had come to search out the whole land.
4. 2:4
   • The woman took the two men.
   • The woman hid them.
   • The woman said that the men did come to her.
   • The woman said she did not know where they were from.
5. 2:5
   • The woman said the men went out at the time the gate was to be shut, when it was dark.
   • The woman said she did not know where the men had gone.
   • The woman told them to pursue after the men quickly.
   • The woman said they would overtake the men.
6. 2:6
   • Rahab had brought the men up to the roof.
   • Rahab had hidden them among the stalks of flax.
   • The stalks of flax had been laid out by her on the roof.
7. 2:7
   • The men pursued after them along the road to the Jordan, toward the fords.
   • The gate was shut after the pursuers had gone out.
8. 2:8
   • The two men had not yet lain down.
   • Rahab came up to them on the roof.
9. 2:9
   • Rahab said to the men that she knew the LORD had given them the land.
   • Rahab said that terror of them had fallen upon the inhabitants.
   • Rahab said that all the inhabitants of the land were melting away because of them.
10. 2:10
    • Rahab said they had heard how the LORD dried up the water of the Red Sea before them when they came out of Egypt.
    • Rahab said they had heard what the Israelites did to the two kings of the Amorites beyond the Jordan, Sihon and Og.
    • Rahab said the Israelites utterly destroyed Sihon and Og.
11. 2:11
    • Rahab said that when they heard, their hearts melted.
    • Rahab said no courage remained in any man because of the Israelites.
    • Rahab said the LORD their God is God in heaven above and on the earth beneath.
12. 2:12
    • Rahab asked the men to swear to her by the LORD.
    • Rahab said she had shown them kindness.
    • Rahab asked that they also show kindness to her father's house.
    • Rahab asked them to give her a true token.
13. 2:13
    • Rahab asked that they save alive her father and her mother.
    • Rahab asked that they save alive her brothers and her sisters.
    • Rahab asked that they save alive all that belonged to them.
    • Rahab asked that they deliver their lives from death.
14. 2:14
    • The men answered her that their own life would be given in place of theirs.
    • The men's pledge was conditioned on her not telling their business.
    • The men said that when the LORD had given them the land, they would deal kindly and truly with her.
15. 2:15
    • Rahab let the men down by a rope through the window.
    • Her house was in the wall of the city.
    • She lived in the wall.
16. 2:16
    • Rahab told them to go to the hill country.
    • Rahab said this was lest the pursuers meet them.
    • Rahab told them to hide there three days until the pursuers returned.
    • Rahab said that afterward they could go their way.
17. 2:17
    • The men said to her that they would be blameless of the oath she had made them swear.
18. 2:18
    • The men said they were coming into the land.
    • The men told her to bind a line of scarlet thread in the window through which she let them down.
    • The men told her to gather her father, her mother, her brothers, and all her father's household to her in the house.
19. 2:19
    • The men said that whoever goes out of the doors of her house into the street, his blood would be on his own head.
    • The men said they would be guiltless in that case.
    • The men said that whoever is with her in the house, his blood would be on their head if any hand is laid on him.
20. 2:20
    • The men said that if she told their business, they would be free of the oath she had made them swear.
21. 2:21
    • Rahab said, according to your words, so be it.
    • Rahab sent them away.
    • The men departed.
    • Rahab bound the scarlet line in the window.
22. 2:22
    • The men went and came to the hill country.
    • The men stayed there three days until the pursuers returned.
    • The pursuers searched all along the road.
    • The pursuers did not find them.
23. 2:23
    • The two men returned.
    • The two men came down from the hill country.
    • The two men crossed over.
    • The two men came to Joshua son of Nun.
    • The two men told Joshua all that had happened to them.
24. 2:24
    • The men said to Joshua that the LORD had given all the land into their hands.
    • The men said that all the inhabitants of the land were melting away because of them.

Words Worth Explaining

Every language note in this chapter, gathered. These explain what a word meant, never what it means for the reader.

2:1

Shittim ("Acacia Grove") was Israel's camp on the plains of Moab, east of the Jordan and several miles from the river. Jericho was the walled city on the west side that guarded the crossings, the first obstacle for anyone entering the land from that direction. A prostitute's house doubled as a place where a stranger could take lodging without being asked to account for himself, which is why the spies went there.

2:2

A Canaanite king ruled one city and the farmland around it, not a country. The king of Jericho commanded that single town, which is why news of two strangers reached him the same night.

2:4

"I wist not" is old English for "I did not know." The same verb appears as "wot" in the next verse.

2:5

City gates were shut at nightfall and not opened again until morning; no one could enter or leave in between. Rahab's story is that the men slipped out just before the gate closed, so the pursuers still have a chance of catching them on the road.

2:6

Flax is the plant linen is made from. The stalks were soaked, then spread out on flat rooftops to dry, in bundles deep enough to hide a person under. Roofs in this region were flat and were used as work and storage space.

2:7

The Jordan could only be crossed on foot at certain shallow places, called fords. By racing to them, the pursuers were trying to cut the spies off from the only route back to their own people.

2:9

"Your terror is fallen upon us" means the dread of you has come over us, not that the Israelites felt terror.

2:10

The Hebrew name of the sea is "yam suph," literally "sea of reeds." Sihon and Og were kings whose territory lay east of the Jordan; Israel had defeated them shortly before this, so news of it would have been recent. "Utterly destroyed" translates a term meaning to devote a place to God for destruction, nothing was kept as plunder.

2:11

"Our hearts did melt" is a standard Hebrew expression for nerve failing, not for grief or pity.

2:12

To swear "by the LORD" was to call that god as witness and enforcer of the promise; Rahab, a Canaanite, deliberately invokes Israel's God, the one the oath-takers cannot evade. The word translated "kindness" (Hebrew *chesed*) means loyal, faithful dealing between parties who owe each other something, a favor given creates a claim to one in return. A "true token" is a tangible pledge or agreed sign, not just a verbal assurance.

2:13

"My father's house" is the standard term for the extended household: parents, brothers and sisters with their spouses and children, and any dependents attached to them. Rahab is asking for the whole unit to be spared, not just her immediate relatives.

2:14

"Our life for yours" is an oath formula: may our lives be forfeit if yours are lost. KJV "if ye utter not" means "if you do not tell," since "utter" meant to make something public.

2:15

In cities of this period some houses were built into or against the fortification wall itself, sometimes in the space between an outer and inner wall. Rahab's window therefore opened onto the outside of the city, letting the men bypass the shut gate entirely.

2:16

"The mountain" is the hill country immediately west of Jericho, a steep limestone escarpment riddled with caves. It is in the opposite direction from the river, so the pursuers heading east for the fords would not cross their path.

2:17

The men's sentence is left unfinished here; the conditions that complete it follow in the next verses, in effect, "we will be free of this oath unless you do the following."

2:18

The scarlet cord is a marker visible from outside, so attacking troops would know which house to leave alone. Scarlet dye made it stand out against the wall.

2:19

"His blood shall be upon his head" is a legal formula: responsibility for the death rests on the dead person himself, and no one else can be held liable for it. The second half reverses the formula, if someone inside the house is killed, the liability falls on the two men.

2:20

"Quit of" means released from, discharged of any obligation.

2:23

"Passed over" here means crossed back over the Jordan to the Israelite camp at Shittim.

2:24

"Delivered into our hands" is an ordinary Hebrew idiom for handing something over into someone's power. What the spies report is Rahab's own account of the city's nerve, which is the only information they actually came back with.