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the order to the five men with slaughter weapons: “Go ye after him
through the city, and smite: let not your eye spare, neither have ye pity:
slay utterly old and young, both maids, and little children, and women:
but come not near any man upon whom is the mark; and begin at My
sanctuary.”
In the case of Achan’s sin God said to Joshua: “Neither will I
be with you any more, except ye destroy the accursed from among
you.” How does this instance compare with the course pursued by
those who will not raise their voice against sin and wrong, but whose
sympathies are ever found with those who trouble the camp of Israel
with their sins? Said God to Joshua: “Thou canst not stand before
thine enemies, until ye take away the accursed thing from among you.”
He pronounced the punishment which would follow the transgression
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of His covenant.
Joshua then began a diligent search to find out the guilty one. He
took Israel by their tribes, then by their families, and next individually;
and Achan was designated as the guilty one. But that the matter
might be plain to all Israel, that there should be no occasion given
them to murmur and to say that the guiltless was made to suffer,
Joshua used policy. He knew Achan was the transgressor and that he
had concealed his sin and provoked God against His people. Joshua
discreetly induced Achan to make confession of his sin, that God’s
honor and justice might be vindicated before Israel. “And Joshua said
unto Achan, My son, give, I pray thee, glory to the Lord God of Israel,
and make confession unto Him; and tell me now what thou hast done;
hide it not from me.
“And Achan answered Joshua, and said, Indeed I have sinned
against the Lord God of Israel, and thus and thus have I done: When I
saw among the spoils a goodly Babylonish garment, and two hundred
shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold of fifty shekels weight, then I
coveted them, and took them; and, behold, they are hid in the earth in
the midst of my tent, and the silver under it. So Joshua sent messengers,
and they ran unto the tent; and, behold, it was hid in his tent, and the
silver under it. And they took them out of the midst of the tent, and
brought them unto Joshua, and unto all the children of Israel, and laid
them out before the Lord. And Joshua, and all Israel with him, took
Achan the son of Zerah, and the silver, and the garment, and the wedge
of gold, and his sons, and his daughters, and his oxen, and his asses,