Myth #87:

Joshua captured Jerusalem.

The Myth: Therefore the five kings of the Amorites, the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, the king of Lachish, the king of Eglon, gathered themselves together, and went up, they and all their hosts, and encamped before Gibeon, and made war against it….And all these kings and their land did Joshua take at one time, because the LORD God of Israel fought for Israel. (Josh. 10:5, 42)

The Reality: The Israelites failed to capture Jerusalem until at least the time of King David, approximately 1000 B.C., approximately two to three hundred years after Joshua.

The five kings allied against Israel at Gibeon included the kings of Jerusalem, Hebron, Lachish, Eglon, and Jarmuth. Joshua chased their armies, trapped the kings (who hid in a cave) and then killed the monarchs. The text says that Joshua followed up the royal executions by going against their territories and capturing all of them. But the conquest of Jerusalem remains questionable. The verses describing the campaign specifically mention the defeat of Hebron, Lachish, and Eglon, but have no specific reference to the capture of Jarmuth and Jerusalem. There is only a general claim that the territories of all those kings were captured. Yet , a little later in Joshua, the text says, “As for the Jebusites the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the children of Judah could not drive them out: but the Jebusites dwell with the children of Judah at Jerusalem unto this day” (Josh. 15:63). When this day was we don’t know, but Jerusalem was in the territory of Benjamin and the Judahites didn’t live there until at least the time of King David, some three centuries after the time of Joshua.

In Judges 1:8, however, we have a specific claim that Joshua did capture Jerusalem and set the city on fire. Yet only a few verses later, Judges also says, “ And the children of Benjamin did not drive out the Jebusites who dwelt in Jerusalem; so the Jebusites have dwelt with the people of Benjamin in Jerusalem unto this day” (Judges 1:21).

So the Bible attributes the same failure to both Judah and Benjamin. Neither captured the city, which lies on the Benjamin side of the border between Benjamin and Judah, nor drove out the inhabitants. To add to the confusion, another biblical passage tells of the capture of Jerusalem in the time of King David, who made it his capital city.

And the king and his men went to Jerusalem unto the Jebusites, the inhabitants of the land: which spake unto David, saying, Except thou take away the blind and the lame, thou shalt not come in hither: thinking, David cannot come in hither. Nevertheless David took the strong hold of Zion: the same is the city of David. (2 Sam. 5:6–7)

In the time of David, then, the Jebusites still lived in Jerusalem, but not the Judahites or Benjaminites, down to that day at least. This suggests that any passages about Israelites living in Jerusalem with the Jebusites “to this day” was written well after David became king and Israelites moved into the city. These several biblical passages leave little doubt that Joshua never captured Jerusalem.