Joshua 8: The fall of Ai and the renewal of the covenant.

The events of this chapter - and their spiritual meaning for us - follow on from the previous chapter. After their first setback at Ai, the Children of Israel take the city of Ai by using a clever ruse. Joshua chose thirty thousand men for the battle. The plan was for five thousand of them to hide near the city, while he led the main army to attack the city. Then, Joshua and his forces would pretend to run away, pursued by the men of Ai. Those who had hidden were then to come out, go into the city, and set it on fire. The men of Ai would see this and run back, get ambushed, and be caught between Joshua’s two armies.

It all happened as planned, and Israel took Ai. (See Arcana Caelestia 1557). As with Jericho, everything in Ai was commanded to be destroyed, except that in this case the livestock and the city’s spoils were to be kept. The whole city was burned and its king was hanged on a tree until sunset and then his body was thrown down at the city entrance with a great heap of stones put over it.

The basic spiritual meaning of any battle in the Bible such as this, is to show how a heavenly principle can and will overcome a hellish or evil attack, especially for us, during some temptation - when we seek to resist and fight back.

Evil is only strong in illusion and fear-mongering; when the light of what is true shines on evil it gets shown for what it is. (Heaven and Hell 49)

The city’s name “Ai” means “a heap”. The word gets used several times in the text of the chapter. A heap implies rubble and rubbish. Cities sometimes look noble and well-planned; in Ai’s case it was the very opposite - a heap, a ruin. (Heaven and Hell 586[2])

While Jericho generally represents our wrong thinking, which first stands in the way of our regeneration and spiritual will, Ai represents our evil emotions and our selfish passions. Both of them must fall before we can make further progress.

Joshua chooses a large number to go against a relatively few in Ai, who nevertheless all rush out to fight Israel. “There was not a man left in Ai or Bethel who did not go out after Israel. Thus they left the city open.” (Joshua 8:17)

Joshua’s tactic of drawing out the men of Ai means our challenge to evil - by confronting it with the truths and commandments we know and obey. Joshua’s pretence of fleeing away draws Ai out in glee, interpreting the flight as a real retreat. Then everything turns, and Joshua’s men go forward representing the power of the truth, the Word and our persuasion of their effectiveness in winning. (Arcana Caelestia 6344[4])

Ai’s men see their city on fire, for other Israelites entered Ai and set it ablaze. This represents the self-condemnation of evil, of hell, when it is exposed to what is true, heavenly and of God. But Joshua’s men, lying in ambush and waiting for the moment, represent our keen observation of how our selfish desires work to cause havoc in us. They are 5,000. Symbolically, in the Bible, five or its multiples always stand for a small amount - but enough to use.

Hanging the king of Ai stands for our need to put down the controlling power of any evil which stirs us. And all Ai is destroyed, because all evil must be turned against and refused.

Then, and only then, Joshua remakes the covenant with the Lord God; he builds an altar, he writes a copy on stones of the Law of Moses in the presence of all Israel, the priests stand in two groups in front of two mountains, then Joshua reads the words of blessing and cursing and all the Law of Moses.

After we resist any evil and its temptation, we must re-hear and re-affirm the truth that this was the Lord’s victory, not ours, and re-dedicate ourselves to the life the Lord gives us. (True Christian Religion 13[2])

3167. 'And to [her] mother' means to natural truth also, that is to say, spiritual things passed from the rational to it, even as they passed to natural good, dealt with just above. This is clear from the meaning of 'a mother' as the Church, which by virtue of truth is called 'a mother', dealt with in 289, 2717. So that people may know how spiritual things pass to natural good and to natural truth as a result of truth being introduced into good in the rational, a brief description must be given here. Everyone has an internal and an external, his internal being called the internal man, and his external the external man. But few know what the internal man is and what the external. The internal man is one and the same as the spiritual man, and the external man one and the same as the natural man. The spiritual man depends for understanding and wisdom on things that belong to the light of heaven, whereas the natural depends for its understanding and wisdom on things that belong to the light of the world. Regarding those two kinds of light, see 3138. For in heaven none but spiritual things exist, whereas in the world none but natural exist. The human being was created in such a way that in him spiritual things and natural things, that is, his spiritual man and his natural man, should accord with each other or make one. But in that case the spiritual man ought to have control over the things in the natural, and the natural man ought to obey, like a servant his master.

[2] Through the Fall however the natural man started to raise itself above the spiritual man and so turn Divine order itself upside down. As a consequence the natural man separated itself from the spiritual, and spiritual things could not reach it any longer except so to speak through chinks to provide the ability to think and speak. But so that spiritual things might flow in once more into the natural man this had to be regenerated by the Lord, that is, truth from the natural man had to be introduced and joined to good in the rational. When this happens spiritual things have access to the natural man, for now the light of heaven flows in and illuminates things in the natural man, and causes what is there to receive light. The goods there receive the warmth that the light conveys, which is love and charity, whereas the truth receives rays of light, which is faith. It is in this way that spiritual things pass from the rational into natural good and truth. Natural good in that case consists in all the delight and satisfaction gained from having service to the spiritual man as the end in view, and so service to the neighbour, more so to one's country, more so still to the Lord's kingdom, and above all to the Lord. And natural truth consists in all doctrinal teaching and factual knowledge which have wisdom, that is, the performance of those things, as the end in view.