Caleb and the Conquest

Abstract

Having now spent the preceding ten chapters investigating King David and the minor figures who surround him, I will pivot here and turn my attention in the next three chapters to a Judahite hero who lived long before David but who is nevertheless closely related to him: Caleb ben Jephunneh. In probing the biblical memories of Caleb’s exemplary deeds, we will see how they evolved in competition with the veneration of King David. A series of biblical passages (from Numbers and Deuteronomy) ascribe to this figure exemplary deeds during the conquest of Canaan. Most importantly, Caleb is remembered as the one who opposed the spies who discouraged Israel from undertaking an invasion of the land. In other accounts (from Joshua and Judges), Caleb dispossesses the formidable Anakites who occupy Hebron, a central place in the kingdom of Judah. In the process of transforming Calebite identity, the biblical authors integrated Caleb into Judahite history. The means they adopted to achieve this integration was war commemoration. By inserting texts in the canonical narrative of Israel’s history of conquest, they amplified this war memory to include tales of the Calebites’ ancestor performing indispensable deeds of valor on the behalf of Judah and of all Israel. As such, this literary supplementation illustrates the relationship between commemoration and national integration that I am exploring in this book.