Historical Background
The era of the exodus is normally dated to the Late Bronze Age (c. 1550–1200 BC). A more precise date for the events recorded in the book of Joshua depends upon when one chooses to date the exodus (see the article “The Timing of the Exodus”). Extra-Biblical texts that illuminate the history of the Late Bronze Age in Palestine are few. Prominent among them are the Amarna letters, which comprise communication from the governors and petty kings of city-states in Palestine to Pharaoh that inform him of the political situation they are facing.
Literary Form
The search for comparisons between the book of Joshua and other ancient Near Eastern literature include annals of military campaigns, suzerain-vassal treaties, itineraries of Egyptian campaigns, Egyptian scribal exercises recounting visits to Canaan, Hittite instructions for the royal bodyguard and for the border fort commanders, Hittite boundary descriptions in treaties, personal names, town lists among the West Semitic archives of Alalakh and Ugarit, cultic calendars from Emar, Old Babylonian laws, rhetorical forms in the Amarna letters from Canaan and other literary sources. However, none of these encompasses the overall form of the book of Joshua. The most productive source for comparison with the book of Joshua is the genre of land grants. These differ from treaties and particularly from suzerain-vassal treaties in that treaties focus on the rights of the suzerain, whereas land grants emphasize the rights of the vassal.
In the West Semitic world, of which Abram and later Israel were a part, there are land grants from Late Bronze Age Ugarit and from Middle Bronze Age Alalakh. One Alalakh grant (see the article “Land Grants”) describes the gift from one king to another of a city along with its villages and lands. The gift is thus a city-state or kingdom rather than a parcel of land. In fact, this text describes the legal deeding of the kingdom of Alalakh to the king who would begin a dynasty at the site. It is this text that provides the closest parallel to the overall structure to the book of Joshua. Joshua resembles the royal grant of Alalakh (and others) in that the text itself functions as the actual grant from God to the tribes of Israel. ◆
Key Concepts
• God, not their own strength, gives Israel the land. Victory belongs to the Lord.
• Destruction of the Canaanites and Amorites is punishment for their sin.