Joshua 9:9

"And they said unto him, From a very far country thy servants are come because of the name of Jehovah thy God: for we have heard the fame of him, and all that he did in Egypt, and all that he did to the two kings of the Amorites, that were beyond Jordan, to Sihon king of Heshbon, and to Og king of Bashan, who was at Ashteroth. And our elders and all the inhabitants of our country spake to us saying. Take provisions in your hand for the journey, and go to meet them, and say unto them, We are your servants, and now make yea covenant with us. This our bread we took hot for our provision out of our houses on the day we came forth to go unto you; but now, behold, it is dry, and is become mouldy: and these wine-skins, which we filled, were new; and, behold, they are rent: and these our garments and our shoes are become old by reason of the very long journey. And the men took of their provision, and asked not counsel at the mouth of Jehovah. And Joshua made peace with them, and made a covenant with them, to let them live: and the princes of the congregation sware unto them."

"We are come because of the name of Jehovah your God ..." This was a falsehood, because it implied their willingness to worship Jehovah. "We have heard of the fame of Jehovah, what he did in Egypt. etc ..." This, of course, was true, but by no means was it the "whole truth." They had also heard of what Jehovah had done to Jericho and Ai, but, as pretended citizens of a very distant place, they lived so far away that the news of Jericho and Ai had not yet reached them! This was skillful lying at its very most efficient level. They mentioned here only what they would have heard about if indeed that had lived "very far away."[16] Their presenting themselves as ambassadors, that is, representatives of other peoples, was true. Gibeon was the leader of a league of cities. The three elements of their deception: (1) the truth, that they had indeed heard of Jehovah and of his works; (2) hypocrisy by pretending that they intended to worship Jehovah; and (3) outright falsehood, that they came from a very far off, that the worn state of their clothes was due to the length of their journey, etc. Their clothing, their shoes, the wineskins, and the hot bread, all of which they said were fresh and new when they left home - all of that was an outright falsehood! Israel allowed themselves to be deceived by the artful presentation of the Gibeonites.

The mention of "Ashteroth" (Joshua 9:10) appears to be another contribution to the deception. Ashteroth was some 20 miles east of Galilee;[17] and their mention of it was probably intended to show their familiarity with places and events far removed from Palestine. As Plummer said, "This entire deception was carried on "with consummate astuteness."[18] Of course, such a skilled and artful deception could not have been conceived and executed except under the urgency of the most critical necessity. "The kind of necessity that precipitated this deception could never have existed in a forger or a interpolator, thus giving us a sign of the genuineness of this narrative."[19]

Textual criticism reaches some kind of a climax of blindness in the complaint of Longacre that there must be two "different versions" of this story woven together here, since "two different reasons" are given for Israel's making a covenant with the Gibeonites![20] Lindsay identified these as: (1) Israel was deceived; and (2) they did not ask counsel of Jehovah! Anyone should be able to discern that these are not two different reasons but one. Israel was deceived, and the reason they were deceived is that they did not ask counsel of Jehovah.

"And the men took of their provision ..." (Joshua 9:14). This means that Israel was completely deceived and that they ate a covenant meal with the Gibeonites, thus making a treaty with them. "The men," mentioned here, were the princes of Israel, the leaders of the people. Their eating of the provisions of the Gibeonites was not a casual thing at all, because, "This seems to refer to the meal that was a part of the treaty-making process in those days."[21] After the princes of Israel had made a treaty and sealed it with a covenant meal, it was too late to back out of the agreement when they later discovered the deception.

We must not try to excuse Israel's failure here. "They were guilty of excessive credulity and culpable negligence in not asking the will of God through the High Priest and the Urim and Thummin, before making any such agreement.[22] God's children are instructed to be "wise as serpents ... harmless as doves." "The child of God is no less in danger today, and needs to be aware of our arch-deceiver who is Satan."[23] "This may have been a full vassal treaty of the pattern of those times, because it certainly included, as events showed, the protection of the vassals against their enemies."[24]