Joshua 6:22-25 meaning

Joshua 6:22-25 concludes the defeat of Jericho.

In the previous sections, the Israelites marched silently around Jericho for six days, once per day, and seven times on the seventh day. On the seventh circuit and at the sound of the rams’ horns, the people shouted, and the walls of Jericho collapsed. They gladly took the city and destroyed everything in it except for the valuable metals, which they kept to use in worship ceremonies. However, the Israelites did not kill Rahab the harlot or her family.

Early in the book, Joshua sent two men from Shittim to scout Jericho to gather information about the movement and troop sizes of their enemy and their general preparedness for the battle. Upon their arrival, they lodged at the house of a prostitute named Rahab to keep a low profile and remain unnoticed. Unfortunately, the king of Jericho heard about their visit and sent his messengers to Rahab’s house to halt the scouts’ mission. Rahab hid the men and redirected the king’s messengers (Joshua 2:1-4). Because she saved the scouts, they, in turn, swore to spare her and her family’s lives when they returned to destroy Jericho (Joshua 2:15-21).

In Joshua 6:22-25, Joshua spoke to the men who had spied out the land. He said, Go into the harlot’s house and bring the woman and all she has out there, as you have sworn to her (Joshua 6:22). Joshua urged the spies to remember their vow to Rahab because of her faith, which she demonstrated in her words and deeds (Hebrews 11:31). She was not an enemy to Israel, but a friend. So, the young men who were spies went in and brought Rahab and her father and her mother and her brothers and all she had (v. 23). They brought out all her relatives and placed them outside the camp of Israel. Rahab’s allegiance to the true God caused her and her family to escape the destruction of the city.

Once the Israelites placed Rahab and her household in a safe place near the camp, they burned the city with fire, and all that was in it (v. 24). The people obeyed Joshua’s command. They destroyed the city. Only the silver and gold, and articles of bronze and iron, they put into the treasure of the house of the LORD (v. 24). These metal implements were “holy to the LORD” (cf. v. 17). For this reason, they would go into the treasury of the house of the LORD to be used in the temple during worship time.

The Israelites were eager to remove Jericho as an obstacle to inheriting the Promised Land. They destroyed its inhabitants. However, Rahab and her father’s household and all she has, Joshua spared (v. 25). Joshua protected her because of her kind treatment of the scouts. It seems implied that she had renounced her Canaanite gods and trusted Israel’s God, since she sided with God’s people. Thus, the author of Joshua informs us, she has lived in the midst of Israel to this day. The prepositional phrase to this day refers to the time the writer penned this book. The Israelites showed reciprocal loyalty to her because she hid the messengers whom Joshua sent to spy out Jericho. God rewards everyone according to his deeds because “there is no partiality with Him” (Romans 2:11). Rahab is considered one of the first Gentiles grafted into Israel. Being adopted or grafted into God’s family is one of the gifts God gives to those who have faith in Him (Romans 11:17, Ephesians 2:12-13).