And now the Lord’s angel✻ removed from Galgal to the place that is called Lamentation. And his message was, I have taken you away from Egypt, and brought you to this land in fulfilment of the promise I made to your fathers, an oath irrevocable.

But you, too, had your part to play; you were to make no terms with the men who dwelt in it, you were to overthrow every altar of theirs. How is it that you have disobeyed my command?

With good reason I have spared them utter destruction, so that there may be enemies at your side, and gods of the enemy, ready to compass your downfall.✻

And all the sons of Israel wept aloud at the angel’s message; that is why the place was called Lamentation.

In this place of tears they offered the Lord sacrifice.

Josue, then, had sent the Israelites home, to enjoy the lands assigned to them.

While he lived, and indeed long after, while those others lived who were old enough to remember the signal mercies shown to them, Israel remained true to the Lord.

But Josue the son of Nun died, after a hundred and ten years spent in the Lord’s service,

and was buried within his own domain at Thamnath-Sare, in the hill-country of Ephraim, on the north side of mount Gaas.

And when all the men of his generation had become a part of their people, a new generation arose, to whom the Lord’s power was still untried, his dealings with Israel still unknown.

And now the sons of Israel defied the Lord to his face, and began to worship the gods of the country-side.

Not for them the Lord God of their fathers, who had rescued them from Egypt; they must have new gods to worship, gods of the nations that dwelt around them; they must challenge the Lord’s anger

by paying court to Baal and Astaroth instead.

Thus angered, the Lord left Israel at the mercy of invaders who plundered them, betrayed them to those enemies of theirs who lived round about. No longer could they make head against their adversaries;

march where they would, the Lord still fought against them, true to his threat, true to the oath he had taken, and it fared ill indeed with them.

Sometimes he would send them chieftains of their own, to rescue them from the invader’s power, but even to these they would not listen;

still they would play the wanton, and worship alien gods; so quick were they to forsake their father’s ways, and disobey the Lord’s known will.

First a chieftain would arise, and the Lord, in his days, would relent; would listen to the plaint of a people in distress, and save them from the threat of destruction;

then, once he was dead, the sons would prove worse than their fathers before them; would pay court to alien gods, and enslave themselves to alien worship; still they would not leave their false imaginings, the rebellious path they trod.

So that the Lord complained in high displeasure, This people of mine have annulled the covenant I made with their fathers, and refuse me obedience;

and I, in return, will spare the nations which Josue left unconquered at his death,

to make proof of Israel still; will they remember and follow the divine commands like their fathers, or not?

At the time, then, the Lord spared all these nations, instead of overthrowing them all at once, and Josue never had the mastery of them.✻