Joshua 9: What the Passage Says

The Chapter in a Sentence

Kings west of the Jordan join forces to fight Israel. The people of Gibeon take a different route: they disguise themselves as travelers from a distant land, with worn-out gear and moldy bread, and trick Joshua into a peace treaty sworn by an oath. Three days later Israel discovers the Gibeonites are near neighbors, but the leaders keep the oath rather than break it. Joshua confronts the Gibeonites and makes them woodcutters and water carriers for the congregation and for the altar of the LORD.

Claim by Claim

1. 9:1
   • All the kings on this side of the Jordan heard of what had happened.
   • These kings were in the hill country, in the lowland, and along all the coast of the Great Sea toward Lebanon.
   • The kings included the Hittite, the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite.
2. 9:2
   • They gathered themselves together to fight against Joshua and against Israel.
   • They acted with one accord.
3. 9:3
   • The inhabitants of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and to Ai.
4. 9:4
   • The inhabitants of Gibeon acted with cunning.
   • They went and provisioned themselves as envoys.
   • They took worn-out sacks for their donkeys.
   • They took wineskins that were old, split open, and mended.
5. 9:5
   • They wore worn-out and patched sandals on their feet.
   • They wore worn-out garments.
   • All the bread of their provision was dry and crumbled.
6. 9:6
   • They went to Joshua at the camp at Gilgal.
   • They said to Joshua and to the men of Israel that they had come from a distant land.
   • They asked them to make a covenant with them.
7. 9:7
   • The men of Israel said to the Hivite that perhaps they dwelt among them.
   • The men of Israel asked how they could make a covenant with them.
8. 9:8
   • They said to Joshua that they were his servants.
   • Joshua asked them who they were.
   • Joshua asked them where they came from.
9. 9:9
   • They told Joshua that his servants had come from a very distant land.
   • They said they came because of the name of the LORD his God.
   • They said they had heard the report of him.
   • They said they had heard all that he did in Egypt.
10. 9:10
    • They said they had heard all that he did to the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the Jordan.
    • They named those kings as Sihon king of Heshbon and Og king of Bashan.
    • They said Og was at Ashtaroth.
11. 9:11
    • They said their elders and all the inhabitants of their land spoke to them.
    • They said their elders told them to take provisions in their hand for the journey.
    • They said their elders told them to go to meet the Israelites.
    • They said their elders told them to say that they were the Israelites' servants.
    • They said their elders told them to ask the Israelites to make a covenant with them.
12. 9:12
    • They said their bread was hot when they packed it from their houses on the day they set out to go to the Israelites.
    • They said the bread was now dry.
    • They said the bread had become crumbled.
13. 9:13
    • They said the wineskins were new when they filled them.
    • They said the wineskins had split open.
    • They said their garments and their sandals had worn out because of the very long journey.
14. 9:14
    • The men took some of their provisions.
    • The men did not ask at the mouth of the LORD.
15. 9:15
    • Joshua made peace with them.
    • Joshua made a covenant with them to let them live.
    • The leaders of the congregation swore an oath to them.
16. 9:16
    • Three days passed after they made the covenant with them.
    • The Israelites heard that the Gibeonites were their neighbors.
    • The Israelites heard that the Gibeonites dwelt among them.
17. 9:17
    • The children of Israel set out and came to the Gibeonites' cities on the third day.
    • Their cities were Gibeon, Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kirjath-jearim.
18. 9:18
    • The children of Israel did not strike them.
    • The reason was that the leaders of the congregation had sworn to them by the LORD, the God of Israel.
    • All the congregation murmured against the leaders.
19. 9:19
    • All the leaders said to all the congregation that they had sworn to the Gibeonites by the LORD, the God of Israel.
    • The leaders said that they therefore could not touch them.
20. 9:20
    • The leaders said this is what they would do to them: let them live.
    • The leaders said this was so that wrath would not be upon them because of the oath they had sworn to them.
21. 9:21
    • The leaders said to them that the Gibeonites should live.
    • The leaders said the Gibeonites should be hewers of wood and drawers of water for all the congregation.
    • The Gibeonites became hewers of wood and drawers of water, as the leaders had said to them.
22. 9:22
    • Joshua summoned the Gibeonites.
    • Joshua asked them why they had deceived him and Israel by saying they were very far from them.
    • Joshua said that they in fact dwelt among the Israelites.
23. 9:23
    • Joshua said they were now cursed.
    • Joshua said none of them would ever cease to be servants.
    • Joshua said they would be hewers of wood and drawers of water for the house of his God.
24. 9:24
    • The Gibeonites answered Joshua.
    • They said it had been plainly told to them that the LORD his God had commanded his servant Moses to give the Israelites all the land.
    • They said the LORD had commanded that all the inhabitants of the land be destroyed from before the Israelites.
    • They said they greatly feared for their lives because of the Israelites.
    • They said that is why they did this thing.
25. 9:25
    • They said they were now in Joshua's hand.
    • They told Joshua to do to them whatever seemed good and right in his eyes.
26. 9:26
    • Joshua did so to them.
    • Joshua delivered them from the hand of the children of Israel.
    • The children of Israel did not kill them.
27. 9:27
    • Joshua on that day made them hewers of wood and drawers of water for the congregation.
    • Joshua made them hewers of wood and drawers of water for the altar of the LORD.
    • They remain so to this day.
    • This was at the place which he would choose.

Words Worth Explaining

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

9:1

The Great Sea is the Mediterranean. The six names are the peoples already living in Canaan, listed here as a standard set rather than as a precise ethnic map; each was organized around its own walled towns under local kings rather than as a single nation. "West of the Jordan" translates a Hebrew phrase meaning literally "across the Jordan," whose direction depends on where the speaker stands.

9:3

Jericho and Ai were the two towns Israel had just captured and destroyed (chapters 6 and 8). Gibeon lay a few miles further into the hill country, in the obvious path of the next advance, which is why its people acted first.

9:4

Wineskins were whole animal hides sewn shut; with age they grow brittle and split, so cracked, restitched skins were visible proof of a long journey. The Hebrew of the first half of this verse is uncertain: the same consonants can be read as "acted as envoys" or "took provisions for themselves," and translators are divided.

9:5

Mold is the fuzzy gray stuff that grows on old bread. It showed the bread had been packed a long time ago.

9:6

Gilgal was Israel's base camp near the Jordan, close to Jericho. A "peace agreement" is a treaty sworn before the gods of both parties; such treaties were held to be permanent and unbreakable, and typically placed the weaker side under the protection and authority of the stronger.

9:7

The Hivites are one of the peoples of the land listed in verse 1. The question matters because Israel had been commanded to make no treaty at all with the peoples living in Canaan; a treaty with a genuinely distant nation was permitted.

9:8

"We are your servants" is diplomatic language, not a confession of slavery: it is the formal way a weaker party offers to become a subject people under a stronger one.

9:9

Notice what the Gibeonites mention and what they leave out. Egypt and the victories east of the Jordan are old news that could plausibly have traveled a long way. Jericho and Ai happened weeks ago and a few miles off; mentioning them would reveal that the speakers live close enough to have heard.

9:10

These were Israel's victories east of the Jordan, before crossing into Canaan. Sihon and Og were kings of territory in what is now Jordan and southern Syria; naming them shows the Gibeonites are up to date on very recent news, which sits oddly with their claim to have come from far away.

9:11

"Elders" were the senior heads of families and clans who governed a town collectively. They had recognized authority to negotiate agreements binding on the whole community, so the envoys are claiming to speak with full official backing.

9:14

The Hebrew says literally that the men "took from their provisions." This may mean they inspected the stale bread as evidence, or that they ate a meal with the strangers, since sharing food was a customary way of sealing an agreement; the wording allows both. "Asking the LORD" refers to the formal procedure of putting a yes-or-no question to God through a priest, the standard way of deciding matters of this weight.

9:15

An oath sworn in the name of a god called that god to witness the promise and to punish whoever broke it. This is why the agreement holds in what follows even once the deception is exposed.

9:17

The four towns formed a single allied group. Gibeon lay roughly twenty miles from the camp at Gilgal, about six miles from the later site of Jerusalem, so the pretended long journey had in fact been a walk of a day or two.

9:18

"The community" is the whole assembly of Israel, the people gathered as a body able to hold its leaders to account.

9:20

"Anger" here means the punishment expected to fall on people who break an oath sworn in God's name; the leaders are describing a consequence, not a mood.

9:21

Cutting wood and carrying water was the lowest and heaviest household labor, normally the work of women, slaves, or resident foreigners. The pair of tasks was a set phrase in Hebrew for the bottom rung of the social order.

9:23

A curse in this setting is a formal legal pronouncement fixing a permanent status, not an insult or a spell. "The house of my God" means the sanctuary, at this stage the portable tent shrine, so the Gibeonites become its permanent labor force.

9:24

The command referred to is the instruction, given through Moses, to devote the peoples of Canaan to destruction rather than to treaty or tribute. The Gibeonites are arguing that they deceived Israel only because surrender by ordinary means was not open to them.

9:25

"We are in your hands" means you decide what happens to us. They were not going to fight back.

9:27

"They still do this today" is the voice of the book's writer, looking back from a later time. "The place the LORD would choose" refers to the single central sanctuary site, which is not named here; readers of a later period understood it as Jerusalem.