Living by imagination

 Welcome to the Daily Bible Chapter. My name is James Leroy Wilson and I invite you to join me as I attempt to read the Bible with fresh eyes, as if I don't know anything about it, and without consulting experts on what it "really" means. Let's see where this takes us! 

Joshua 11

I'm reading Young's Literal Translation (YLT) and the New Revised Standard Version (NRSV).

The most curious part is this, which I also noticed in Joshua 10:

16 And Joshua taketh all this land: the hill-country, and all the south, and all the land of Goshen, and the low country, and the plain, even the hill-country of Israel and its low lands.

Goshen is the very same land that the Israelites fled in the Exodus! Sometime in the ensuing decades, the Egyptian Pharaoh must have lost control of that land, and Joshua was able to take it.

Speaking of Pharaoh, it's well-known that the LORD "hardened his heart" when his land was beset with plagues.

Similar phrasing appears in verse 20 regarding the kings in the Canaan area:

For it was the Lord’s doing to harden their hearts so that they would come against Israel in battle, in order that they might be utterly destroyed and might receive no mercy but be exterminated, just as the Lord had commanded Moses.

The inhabitants of Canaan were descendants of Ham (the flesh) and the Israelites were descendants of Shem (the spirit). It makes sense, allegorically speaking, to exterminate the "children of the flesh" who are slaves to external appearance, so that one may live by faith alone. 

Your thoughts are your "children." Thoughts that are based on the senses are children of the flesh; thoughts based on imagination are children of imagination. 

We are to live from our imagination.

James Leroy Wilson writes Daily Miracles, The Daily Bible Chapter, JL Cells, and The MVP Chase. Thanks for your subscriptions and support! You may contact James for your writing, editing, and research needs: jamesleroywilson-at-gmail.com.

(Photo credit: TyshkunVictor)