in their main features are easily recognizable. The story of the
conquest (i.-xii.) is told by the prophetic document JE, while the
geographical section on the distribution of the land (xiii.-xxii.)
belongs in the main to the priestly document P. Joshua, in common
with Judges, Samuel (in part) and Kings, has also been very plainly
subjected to a redaction known to criticism as the Deuteronomic,
because its phraseology and point of view are those of Deuteronomy.
This redactional element, which, to any one fresh from the study of
Deuteronomy, is very easy to detect, is more or less conspicuous in
all of the first twelve chapters, but it is especially so in chs. i.
and xxiii., and it would be well worth the student's while to read
these two chapters very carefully, in order to familiarize himself
with the nature of the influence of the Deuteronomic redaction upon
the older prophetico-historical material. Very significant, e.g.,
are such phrases as "the land which Jehovah your God giveth you to
possess," i. 11, Deuteronomy xii. 1: equally so is the emphasis upon
the law, i. 7, xxiii. 6, and the injunction to "love Jehovah your
God," xxiii. 11.

The most serious effect of the Deuteronomic influence has been to
present the history rather from an ideal than from a strictly
historical point of view. According to the redaction, e.g., the
conquest of Canaan was entirely effected within one generation and
under Joshua, whereas it was not completely effected till long after
Joshua's death: indeed the oldest source frankly admits that in many
districts it was never thoroughly effected at all (Jud. i. 27-36). A
typical illustration of the Deuteronomic attitude to the history is
to be found in the statement that Joshua obliterated the people of
Gezer, x. 33, which directly contradicts the older statement that
Israel failed to drive them out, xvi. 10. The Deuteronomist is, in