Yahweh's Strategy for Taking Down Jericho - Jericho was allegedly a city that was surrounded by great walls.  Back in the Bronze Age, the usual method of taking down walled cities was a long and drawn out siege.  Fortunately, the Israelites had the Creator of the Universe to help them take out the town of Jericho.

His strategy?  Seven Israelite priests will blow into ram's horns seven times a day and march around Jericho carrying the Ark of the Covenant, for seven days.  During the entire seven days, the Israelites are instructed to remain silent.  On the seventh day, after the last ram's horn was blown into, and the final lap around the city was made, every Israelite was to shout.  The walls would fall, and the Israelite army was instructed to descend upon the town and kill everyone. 

Everyone except for Rahab, of course. Remember her?  The hooker who hid the Israelite scouts?


How did the strategy work?  Well, according to the Book of Joshua, after seven days they sounded the horn, shouted, and sure enough, the walls fell and the Israelite army "utterly destroyed all that was in the city, both man and woman, young and old, and ox, and sheep, and ass, with the edge of the sword." (Joshua 6:21)


But hey.  That's politics, right?  It's about who you know, and Rahab had the hookups.


One interesting thing about Jericho is that it is a living contradiction.  Joshua said that anyone who tries to rebuild Jericho (Why?  What did they do that was so bad that they killed innocent people, too?) would pay for it with their eldest and youngest child and their descendents will be considered to be cursed by God.  But, Jericho is still around today, and considered to be the longest continuously occupied city. 

Yahweh Demands that Israelites be Circumcised a SECOND Time!!! Ouch!  (Joshua, Chapter 5) - Imagine that you're a soldier in Iraq a few years ago.  You're lined up with a few hundred other men, crouched down behind a ditch and ready to move into Fallujah.  It's expected to be a vicious firefight.  And, for the sake of argument let's pretend that you've already been circumcised at birth.

Then word comes down the line that you're commanding officer requires that all soldiers, even those already circumcised, must get a second circumcision before the battle.  This is basically what happens to the Israelites before they mount their assault on Jericho.  And, I'd imagine that's when some young Israelite soldier coined the term, "WTF?!?"

What's worse is that the Israelites were so numerous that they actually created a "hill of foreskins".  I tried to find an image of a "hill of foreskins", and unfortunately the only image I came up with was the one pictured above, and a bunch of homosexual photos and some weird reference to "docking", which I won't get into here.  Let's just say that some people have way too much time on their hands!

After the men healed, the Captain of Yahweh's angelic host came down to visit Joshua, with a message from the Big Man Himself.  "Take off your shoes, Bub, for you are on Holy Ground."

And that's where Joshua, Chapter 5 ends.  The Book of Joshua is turning into a rather odd tale, with tales of intrigue, spies, supernatural beings, and a hill of foreskins.

There sure are a lot of prostitutes in the Bible (Joshua, Chapter 2) - It's no secret that prostitution is one of the oldest professions.  There will always be a demand for sex, no matter what legal restrictions are put on it. 

In this case, the prostitute becomes a central character in the story, and there's a little foreshadowing to show that she's going to play a part later on as well.

Joshua sent out two scouts to survey the land, and especially Jericho, the walled city.  While in Jericho, the scouts went into a harlot named Rahab's house, where they "came in unto her".  I'm not sure if this means they had sex with her, or if they just stayed the night.  But, it is worded as sex has been worded in previous books, especially with the phrase "came in unto her".

Well Rahab took kindly to these two gentlemen, whether it's because they were good lovers or she really bought into the notion of their god, I can't say.  But she did mention that she has heard of their god Yahweh, and that the people in the region fear the Israelites.  So, maybe she was betting that Jericho would lose the coming invasion.

Rahab's house was located on a part of the wall surrounding Jericho.  She let them rappel down the wall by a scarlet thread.  This thread was to remain on her window to warn the invading Israelites not to hurt anyone inside that house, as per an arrangement she made with the two scouts.

So, we got the making for a pretty interesting war story.  Scouts meeting with sympathizers inside the walls of Jericho, and the ominous fear being felt by its inhabitants, knowing about the coming invasion.  Too bad the authors of Joshua sucked, or perhaps it was the translators.  In any case, there are the elements for a halfway decent story to be told here, and whoever wrote it or translated blew it.  I wonder, does this mean that Shakespeare was a better author than Yahweh?