Two closing addresses are ascribed to Joshua, one an exhorta tion similar to the homilies in secondary portions of Deuteronomy ; cf. Moses in Deut. xxviii. seq., and Samuel's last address in I Sam. xii.), which virtually excludes the other (xxiv.), where Joshua assembles the tribes at Shechem (Shiloh, in the Septua gint) and passes under review the history of Israel from the days of heathenism (before Abraham was brought into Canaan) down through the oppression in Egypt, the exodus, the conquest in East Jordan and the occupation of Canaan. A few otherwise unknown details are to be found (xxiv. 2, II seq. 14). The address (which is extremely important for its representation of the religious con ditions) presupposes the complete subjugation of the Canaanites. A solemn covenant, whereby the people agree to cleave to Yahweh alone, is commemorated by the erection of a stone under the oak by the sanctuary of Yahweh (for the tree with its sacred pillar, see Gen. xxxv. 4; Judges ix. 6). The people are then dismissed. and the book closes in ordinary narrative style with the death of Joshua and his burial in his inheritance at Timnath-serah in Mt. Ephraim (cf. xix. 49 seq.) ; the burial of Joseph in Shechem ; and the death and burial of Eleazar the son of Aaron in the "hill of Phinehas." Both Joshua xxiii. and xxiv. are closely connected with the very complicated introduction to the era of the "judges" in Judges ii. 6 seq., and ii. 6-9 actually resume Joshua xxiv. 28 seq., while the Septuagint appends to the close of Joshua the beginning of the story of Ehud (Judges iii. 12 seq.). Both Judges i.–ii. 5 and chap. xvii.–xxi. are of post-Deuteronomic insertion, and they rep resent conditions analogous to the older notices embedded in the later work of P (Judges i. 21, X1X. 10-12, cf. Joshua, xv. 63). Moreover, P in its turn shows elsewhere definite indications of different periods and standpoints, and the fluid state of the book at a late age is shown by the presence of Deuteronomic elements in Joshua xx., not found in the Septuagint, and by the numerous and often striking readings which the latter recension presents.
The value of the book of Joshua is primarily religious; its con viction of the destiny of Israel and its inculcation of the unity and greatness of the God of Israel give expression to the philos ophy of Israelite historians. As an historical record its value must depend upon a careful criticism of its contents in the light of biblical history and external information. Its description of the conquest of Canaan comes from an age when the event was a shadow of the past. It is an ideal view of the manner in which a Divinely appointed leader guided a united people into the promised land of their ancestors, and, after a few brief wars of extermination (x.–xii.), died leaving the people in quiet possession
of their new inheritance (xi. 23; xxi. 44 seq.; xxiii. 1). To this there is, as Moore points out (Ency. Bib. col. 2608 n.2), an in structive parallel in the Greek legends of the Dorian invasion of the Peloponnesus (the "return" of the Heracleidae, the partition of the land by lot, etc.). On the other hand the earlier inhabitants were not finally subjugated until Solomon's reign (I Kings ix. 20) ; Jerusalem was taken by David from the Jebusites (2 Sam. v.), and several sites in its neighbourhood (including Gibeon, 2 Sam. xxi. 2), together with important fortresses like Gezer, Me giddo and Taanach, were not held by Israel at the first. There are traces of other conflicting traditions representing independent tribal efforts which were not successful, and the Israelites are even said to live in the midst of Canaanites, intermarrying with them and adopting their cult (Judges i.–iii. 6). From a careful consid eration of all the evidence, both internal and external, biblical scholars are now almost unanimous that the more finished picture of the Israelite invasion and settlement cannot be accepted as a historical record for the age. It accords with this that the elab orate tribal-lists and boundaries prove to be of greater value for the geography than for the history of Palestine, and the attempts to use them as evidence for the early history of Israel have involved numerous additional difficulties and confusion.
The prominence of Joshua as military and religious leader, and especially his connection with Shechem and Shiloh, have sug gested that he was a hero of the Joseph tribes of central Palestine (viz. Ephraim and Manasseh). But he probably had no place in the oldest narratives of the exodus; and only later sources add him to Caleb (Num. xiv. 3o; the reference in Deut. i. 38 is part of an insertion), or regard him as the leader of all the tribes (Deut. iii. 21, 28). As an attendant of Moses at the tent of meet ing he appears in quite secondary passages (Exod. xxxiii. 7–I I ; Num. xi. 28). His defeat of the Amalekites is in a narrative (Exod. xvii. 8-16) which belongs more naturally to the wilder ness of Shur, and it associates him with traditions of a movement direct into south Palestine which finds its counterpart when the clan Caleb (q.v.) is artificially treated as possessing its seats with Joshua's permission.