The Bible in a Year – 14-16 March

If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

14-16 March. Joshua chapters 12 – 21

I have taken three days readings together here, since it takes a full ten chapters (admittedly some of them quite short) to recount the division of the land between the tribes.  And I will admit to having speed-read much of this, as much of it reads like the gazetteer at the back of a road atlas.  What I did find helpful was a map that I found on Wikimedia Commons  showing the areas given to each tribe:

12_Tribes_of_Israel_Map

This file is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license.

Just one particular point occurred to me: as well as the tribal areas and a list of their towns and villages, Joshua makes provision for some towns and their pasture lands to be occupied by the priestly Levites who had no territory of their own as such.  The Levites therefore were spread out across all the tribal areas, and their cities included Kedesh, Hebron, Shechem, Golan, Bezer and Ramoth-in-Gilead, which were the six cities of refuge (for those accused of capital offences, to protect them from vengeance until proper justice could be done).

 

The Levites, then, had no inheritance, but received the tithes of the people. They also had the privilege of being spread out in the community, and with a particular presence where people came for refuge.  There are several resonances there with the tradition of the parish priest in Catholic or Anglican tradition.

 

The priest (at least in the Catholic church) is expected to be celibate, and therefore without descendants. He (or she, in the case of the Anglican church in many countries) is expected to minister out in the community and not only to his or her own ‘flock’ in church. Priests are expected to move around several times during their training and subsequent ministry, and become familiar with all sections of society.  And they are to have a particular concern for the vulnerable: the secrecy of the confessional is traditionally sacrosanct (although in recent times a secular concern for safeguarding has obliged a priest to disclose pastoral secrets in certain circumstances).   The priest’s reward is not financial, and his or her lie will be long and demanding.  But their satisfaction will be in seeing lives transformed and people meeting with God through their sacramental and pastoral ministry.  The main difference between then and now is that priesthood is seen as an individual calling rather than a tribal duty.

 

The Bible in a Year – 13 March

If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

13 March. Joshua chapters 9-11

These chapters tell in summary form what must have been a long campaign (the commentary I am following suggests seven years) of defeating the indigenous peoples of Canaan.  The massive Israelite army swept across the terrified country, capturing one town after another, killing all their inhabitants, with only the ‘kings’ (tribal leaders) singled out as individuals, and either burning or looting the towns.

 

Such a campaign of terror is not unique in human history – think of the Mongolian hordes that swept across Asia, or the Vandals, Goths and Huns who terrorised Europe at various times and whose names live on with different and diluted meanings. Or of course Daesh/Islamic State who have captured several areas of Syria and Iraq in recent years and are only now being driven back, with heavy loss of civilian lives.  What makes Joshua’s reign of terror different is that it was (according to the account we have received) carrying out the will of God.  But isn’t that what Daesh say they are doing?  Were Joshua and his army any better than them?

 

In one way, yes. They made a treaty with the Gibeonites or Hivites.  That was not part of God’s plan, as the Hivites had been on the divine hit list.  But unlike the other tribes whose ‘hearts were hardened’ to resist Joshua’s forces, they acknowledged the power of the God of Israel and responded to the threat by suing for peace.  Admittedly it was done by deception, but from their point of view it was successful and they avoided destruction.  Instead they were made to undertake forced labour as woodcutters and water carriers.    Joshua, to his credit, refused to destroy them when he found out about the deception.  A treaty made in God’s name was not to be broken, whatever happened.  And so when the Hivites themselves came under threat, Joshua had to come to their aid.

 

Treaties are in the news at present.  Most obviously here in Britain with the country about to unilaterally break the Treaty of Rome by leaving the EU. But also with NATO coming under strain, both internally as Turkey and the Netherlands are in a diplomatic row, and externally as Russia threatens member states in the Baltic region.

 

We don’t know from the perspective of 2017 how any of these situations will turn out.  In 30 years time, say, Islamist terrorism and Russian aggression may be history, or they may have led to an irreversible attack on civilisation as we know it.  Britain may have rejoined the EU or at least be in a good trading position with it, or we may be an island nation as insignificant and “out in the cold” (metaphorically if not literally) as Iceland. What we can say though, is that a nation that holds to values of fidelity, openness to strangers and being willing to live at peace with those who do us no harm, is closer to doing God’s will than one that destroys other cultures ‘in the name of God’.

 

 

 

The Bible in a Year – 12 March

If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

12 March. Joshua chapters 5-8

After crossing the river, the hard work of conquest begins.   Most of today’s reading is taken up with the account of the battles to conquer two cities – Jericho (achieved by psychological warfare, plus God’s miraculous flattening of the city walls, but without fighting), and Ai (conquered at the second attempt, following God’s instructions rather than the recommendations of the scouts).

 

But around these victories are accounts of actions of ritual significance – circumcision, Passover, and an appearance of an armed angel before the military campaign, and renewal of the covenant afterwards.  These remind us that Joshua is not just a book of military history, but the account of God claiming the holy land for his own people.  They themselves had to be holy in order to receive it, and so there had to be ceremonies of dedication to God (circumcision), remembrance of God’s previous victories (Passover being a re-enactment of the night before the Exodus), and receiving the law. The vision of an angel was given only to Joshua himself to encourage him as leader.

 

But one man’s sin in hiding booty for his own family was enough to lead to defeat of the whole army.  So the lesson is, that our plans alone, even if we believe them to be in line with Christian teaching, are not enough. We need to be personally close to God in the way we live, the principles we live by, and in our religious communities, if we are to achieve what he calls us to.

 

The Bible in a Year – 11 March

If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

11 March.  Joshua chapters 1-4

Each of these chapters recounts a discrete incident in the story of the beginning of the occupation of Canaan.  Chapter 1 is where Joshua is given command of the nation, a great responsibility.  And even though he has the rare privilege of hearing God’s voice to him personally (as Moses did) still he has to be told four times (thrice by God and once by his own men) “be strong and [very] courageous”.  A leader of a nation, especially in times of war, does need these attributes, and yet a man who is strong, courageous and proud – even nonchalant, as President Trump was when he took office recently – does not make a good leader.   Strength and courage need to be balanced with humility and the ability to take counsel from others.  Such a leader was Joshua.

 

Next comes the story of the spies (or scouts).  Those we encountered in Exodus merely went over the mountain like the proverbial bear “to see what they could see”, and what they saw was tall people who terrified them.  That mistake put back God’s whole plan by 40 years.  This time, the two scouts actually make the acquaintance of a local person.  The fact that she was a prostitute, and one of the enemy at that, is no problem on this occasion.  Whether they availed themselves of her services or not, she is praised in the later books of Hebrews and James as being justified by the actions that enabled God’s plan to come about.  Whether she is the same Rahab named in Matthew’s gospel as the great-great-grandmother of King David is not clear, though she could have been.

 

The scouts actually heard what one of the enemy was saying, namely that her people had heard of the Israelite conquests elsewhere and God’s miracles for them, and were in dread of them. Thus the scouts were able to report back, after she had saved them from imminent danger, that the task ahead, though far from easy, would be less problematic than they may have feared.

 

The crossing of the Jordan was accomplished by faith and God’s miraculous provision in much the same way as the Exodus across the Sea of Reeds.  As with all Biblical miracles, it is not helpful to ask scientific questions too much (was the river dammed by a landslide upstream? Possibly, but we cannot know). But somehow all the people and their flocks managed to get safely across the river in the time of flood. The ark going ahead of them symbolised God’s presence, and that gave them the faith they needed.

 

Finally for today, the twelve stones (one for each tribe) were set up as a memorial of the event.  Memorials are a universal human trend.  Part of my job involves dealing with churches that are no longer needed for worship, and most of them will have many forms of memorial in them, from a formal foundation stone and a war memorial, to individual plaques or monuments to people who have played a leading role in the community at some time. There may also be objects given in memory of someone. The moveable items can be returned to the families who gave them, and other memorials can sometimes be relocated, but it is sad to see a church close and the memory of those who had built and endowed it fade from local history.  Joshua’s stones themselves are presumably long since lost during the last 3000 years, but the memory of the memorial lives on as long as the Bible is read.

 

 

The Bible in a Year. 10 March

If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

10 March. Deuteronomy chapters 32-24

There are two ‘songs’ or poems here, attributed to Moses (although since Moses is referred to in the third person in one of them, we may question the authorship!)

 

The second is easier to deal with since it is a song of blessing. As we saw earlier with Isaac and Jacob blessing their sons at the end of their lives, it is natural for old people to want to see their descendants prosper, to feel that their life has not been in vain if the next generations are doing well for themselves. But for Moses it is more than this, as his life’s calling was to bring the whole Israelite people, all twelve tribes, to this point of being about to cross the Jordan and claim the Promised Land.  Everything depended on them  being obedient to the teaching he had received and passed on.

 

That is why the first song reads as it does, lurching backwards and forwards between a vision of God as loving parent, and of the same God as vengeful and jealous.  For Moses understood the relationship that God had already showed, and would continue to show, to his people.  If they honoured and worshipped him, all would be well and they would prosper. There was no reason not to do so. But whether through human nature, or the influence of other cultures, or the Devil’s temptation – take it as you will – they would constantly turn away from this loving God, who would then both be angry with them (as any parent is angry with a rebellious child) and protective of them in taking vengeance on those who have led them astray.

 

So as Moses climbs the mountain, at the incredible age of 120, to glimpse the promised land before he dies, he has the bittersweet experience of knowing that God would always love and be with his people, but that the people would not always love their God.

 

And so ends the first part of the Bible.  The Law, the Torah, the Pentateuch, the Books of Moses.  The foundation for all that follows, the scriptures that Jews, Christians and Muslims all acknowledge.  Blessed be the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. As it was in the beginning, as now, and ever shall be, world without end, Amen.

 

The Bible in a Year – 9 March

If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

9 March. Deuteronomy chapters 30-31

As Moses completes his summary of the law, he once again presents it as a choice for the people: to obey means blessing, prosperity and life; to disobey (especially in ‘turning to other gods’) means curses, poverty and death.  He does his best to present it, to use a contemporary term, as a “no brainer”, or to put it another way, “what’s not to like about serving God?”  To choose to believe in God and take the commandments seriously is to follow a path that will result in a happier life not only for oneself but for the whole community, because the more people who do, the less hatred, crime and injustice there will be.

 

But it is a choice.  And Moses is all too aware, as is God himself, that in practice the people will, most of the time, choose to ignore God, and follow their own desires.  The scene is set for the next thousand years in which the ‘chosen people’ will rebel and return, again and again.  When Moses prophesies (30:4-5) of exile and return, he may have been given a vision of the exile to Babylon several hundred years in the future, or maybe even the greater diaspora in which the Jewish people would have no home in the promised land for nearly 1900 years.

 

How would he have felt about that?  To be told at the end of forty years of hard work leading the people to this point when they could claim a permanent inheritance, that soon after his death they would forget all he had taught them and go their own way. But always God gives a longer view, a hope that beyond rebellion is the call to return, beyond sin is the promise of forgiveness, beyond betrayal there is the possibility of restoration.  That applies as much to individuals as to the whole nation.  If I turn way from God, I know he will still accept me back, whether it’s the next day or much later in life.  Praise God for his constant love!

The Bible in a Year – 8 March

If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

8 March. Deuteronomy chapters 28-29

The difference between obeying and breaking the covenant between God and his people is set out in the starkest possible terms.  Keep it, and they could expect peace and prosperity.  Break it, and they could expect not only poverty and drought but also defeat in war, diseases and plagues of all kind, and starvation to be point of men eating their babies and women the afterbirth.   Images no doubt intended to frighten the mass of the people into obedience.

 

Is this an image of religion that people still have today?  That we believe if you don’t keep every rule in the Bible you will be punished for it in this life as well as the next?  If so, it is completely wrong. Even in the Old Testament there is much about God’s mercy and patience.  And ever since Jesus came to proclaim God’s gift of undeserved grace, the burden of keeping the law has been lifted, and we are free to “serve him without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him all our days” (Luke 1:74,75).  There will be much more to write about this later in the year when we get there, but for now the message is “do not be afraid” (sometimes said to be the most common phrase in the whole Bible).

Thoughts on the Thurso line

This is a little extra, pulled from a backup disk to be shared with the Geograph community.  Also for anyone else to enjoy, but as always please respect copyright ☻

This is a poem that I wrote over 20 years ago, inspired by a wonderful train journey through the highlands of Scotland.

Thursday Thoughts on the Thurso Line

( 18 July 1996)

 

I took a trip, one summer morning fair,
Along the line to Scotland’s northern strand :
A journey full of history and views,
Of people and their impact on the land.

At Inverness, the Highland Railway’s home,
Three plaques within the station now recall
The challenges that people faced before
To make this journey easy for us all :
To him who built the line so long ago,
One Murdoch Patterson, the Engineer;
To men who struggled through the winter snow
To keep the line across the mountains clear;
And one plaque notes rebuilding of a bridge,
Just six years back, that floods had swept away,
Reminding that the story of this line
Can still be written in our time today.

The Duke of Sutherland’s stone statue stands
high on the top of Beinn a’ Bhragaidh hill.
Another of his ilk helped build this line,
Their castle has its own fine station still.
And one Duke built a castle for his wife,
At Carbisdale close by the Dornoch Firth;
That castle’s now a hostel for the youth
Of many lands : the finest on the earth ?

Along the track the flowers seem to thrive –
In summer bloom, wild roses, pink and white,
With yellow broom, and here and there a glimpse
Of rhododendron, purple in the light.
And higher up where flowers fade away
The line runs through the fir plantations’ green;
When even they are beaten by the clime
The tracts of fern still keep the verdant scene.
Until at last, with valleys left behind
The Floe’s expanse of peat and moss comes on
And wilder still and wetter grows the land
Till burn and loch and bog all merge as one.

At one time all this land belonged to those
Who tried to eke a living from the moor :
The common men and women of the past
Whose deeds are told in Gaelic song and lore.
The Clearances drove out these local folk,
The old proud clans were forced to leave and wail;
They left the empty houses to decay,
With just a few stone walls to tell the tale.

But farmers still can make a living here
With help from Brussels’ welcomed C.A.P.
Without it there would be no cause to stay
And work the land : what would the Highlands be?
And catching fish engages other men:
Two boys stood on the harbour wall to learn
With rod and line; and high up in the hills
The patient salmon-fishers by a burn.
Once, long ago, the fishing boats would sail
From every little harbour far and wide,
But fishing is a big-ship business now,
With small boats rotting high above the tide.

But man is not the master of this land :
This wilder country is the proper lie
Of rabbits, running scared into their holes,
And deer who stand and watch the train go by.
The animals that man has introduced –
The cows, the sheep, the horses in the fields –
Outnumber far the people in the crofts
Who try to farm this land with meagre yields.
Cows graze the lowland grass while summer lasts
And need not fear this year the butcher’s knife,
For though they’re sane, mad humans fear to eat,
Lest eating prime Scotch beef should cost their life.

The moss gives way once more to fertile land,
And walls and homes and roads are seen again.
The Northern coast comes into view at last,
The train returns us to the world of men.
In Thurso there is little time to spare
Before the train wends down its single track :
I go down to the harbour and I know
Ere many years have passed, I will come back.

© Stephen Craven 1996

 

The Bible in a Year – 7 March

If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

7 March. Deuteronomy chapters 24-27

Another collection of laws regulating personal behaviour.  One theme that runs through these, and many such teaching passages in the Bible, is that of the importance of fairness in general and fairness to minority groups and vulnerable people in particular.  Hence the provisions of not keeping a pledged cloak overnight (so that poor or homeless people would not have to sleep in the cold, 24:12); leaving any unharvested olives, grain and grapes for the poor to collect (24:19-21); and not cheating when it comes to weighing out goods (25:13-15).

 

Chapter 27 marks the end of a long section of detailed law, with Moses ordering the laws to be inscribed in plaster on standing stones in the promised land – this is reminiscent of the rules written on the wall in Orwell’s Animal Farm, in which the arrogant pigs who represented unscrupulous political leaders secretly changed the sacred wording by night, with few of the animals noticing.  Whenever laws are established with the intention of being universally and fairly applied, there will  always be those who seek to find a way round them, re-write them to their own advantage, or persuade others that the laws were wrong or inapplicable in the first place. We need to be on our guard and pray for wisdom to discern the difference between applying God’s laws to our own very different society, and ignoring those that should still apply.

 

 

The Bible in a Year – 6 March

If this is your first viewing, please see my Introduction before reading this.

 

6 March. Deuteronomy chapters 21-23

What an odd collection of laws!  Some of those given here are purely practical, like not weaving wool with linen (22:11) – the warp and weft would shrink differently – or not yoking an ox with a donkey (a comical idea – the ox would carry on ploughing while the donkey sat down on the spot, as they do). Others are just good hygiene practice (digging latrines outside the camp, 23:12). But then we get ‘laws’ concerning marriage and sexual relations that seem shocking to us, such as it being OK to rape an unbetrothed virgin and then marry her in return for paying her father a dowry (22:28) – where is her opinion in that? Where are the human rights?  And don’t ask me to read Deuteronomy 23:1 aloud in church!

 

 

So I won’t attempt to comment on those passages. Instead I will look at a law that has Lenten resonances for Christians: “When someone is convicted of a crime punishable by death and is executed, and you hang him on a tree, his corpse must not remain all night upon the tree; you shall bury him that same day, for anyone hung on a tree is under God’s curse.” (21:22-23). This reminds us that Jesus was executed as a criminal, the cross being treated under Jewish law in the same way as a living tree, and therefore his disciples, with the help of Joseph of Arimathea who provided the grave space, laid him to rest the same day, in haste and without time to prepare the body for burial.  The next day after Jesus’ death was a Sabbath anyway, when all ‘work’ was prohibited.  But if they had waited until the next working day to give him a ‘proper’ burial, would they have returned to the tomb and found it empty? Sometimes, following the rules, even if they seem restrictive, can actually lead to blessings.  Perhaps that’s one reason why many people set themselves a particular discipline in Lent, whether in abstinence or additional good works or times of prayer.