Joshua 10:39-41

Amplified Bible, Classic Edition

³⁹And he took it, with its king and all its towns, and they smote them with the sword and utterly destroyed everyone in it. He left none remaining. As he had done to Hebron and to Libnah and its king, so he did to Debir and its king.

⁴⁰So Joshua smote all the land, the hill country, the South, the lowland, and the slopes, and all their kings. He left none remaining, but utterly destroyed all that breathed, as the ^[a]Lord, the God of Israel, commanded.^(A)

⁴¹And Joshua smote them from Kadesh-barnea even to Gaza, and all the country of Goshen even to Gibeon.

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Footnotes

Joshua 10:40 As the presence of “the Prince of the Lord’s host” (Josh. 5:13-15) indicates, the Lord will take part in this conflict not as an ally or an adversary but as Commander In Chief. It is not Israel’s quarrel, in which they are to ask divine assistance. It is the Lord’s own quarrel, and Israel and Joshua are but a division in His host. The wars of Israel in Canaan are always presented by the Old Testament as “the wars of the Lord.” The conquest of Canaan is too often treated as an enterprise of the Israelites, carried out with great cruelties, for which they claimed divine sanction. The Old Testament presents the matter in an entirely different light. The Lord fights for His own right hand, and Israel is but a fragment of His army. “The sun stood still”(Josh. 10:13), the stars in their courses fought against His foes (Judg. 5:20) (Charles Ellicott, A Bible Commentary).