After spending time in Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy last week — learning some of the laws and norms that God commanded the Israelites to institute once they had entered the promised land — our time this week will focus on the Israelites’ entry into that promised land and some of the thorny theological questions that come with it.

As Deuteronomy and the wider Pentateuch come to a close, the people are grappling with questions of future leadership: Moses learns that he will not be the one to lead the people into this new land, with Joshua being named as his successor — all while questions of whether Israel should be ruled by a king linger. Nonetheless, Joshua soon proves himself to be a worthy successor to Moses, and the books of Joshua and Judges largely deal with how the Israelites conquer and subdue the wider land of Canaan under Joshua’s leadership, followed by a series of judges (akin to tribal chieftains) over a time period spanning several hundred years (circa 1,350 to 1,050 BCE, although scholarly estimates vary).

The Israelites’ conquering of this land is portrayed in the biblical text as the fulfillment of the covenant promises given to Abraham, but it can also be quite hard to stomach the divinely sanctioned violence seen throughout Joshua and Judges. Living in a time of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and Israel’s invasion of Gaza has left us all too aware of the horrors of war and the suffering inflicted on everyday people. We cannot forget that those unspoken stories lie behind the texts of Joshua and Judges too.

Although we’ll end this week by covering a few of the more noteworthy judges in Deborah and Samson, it eventually becomes clear that a wider political change is needed — setting the stage for Israel to transition from largely tribal leadership to a united monarchy, a topic that we will cover in greater detail next week.

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