Again and again is the assertion made that the account of Joshua's great miracle is a quotation from the Book of Jashar, for which the Book of Joshua is not accountable; and those who so assert are called upon again and again for proof, and called upon in vain. For the hundredth time, perhaps, I saw it not long ago in a newspaper report of a sermon on the Book of Joshua, and here is the form which it took:

      The question is not, Could God cause the sun and moon to stand still, but did God do this at the request of Joshua? The Scriptures do not say so. The passage is simply a poetic way of saying the Israelites won their victory before the setting of the sun; that before the day closed, the five kings, with their armies, were overthrown. This is not a prayer. It is not a direct address to Jehovah. It is expressly declared to be a quotation from the Book of Jasher.

      It is difficult to see how a man with the Book of Joshua open before him could make these statements. The text says:

      Then spake Joshua unto Jehovah in the day when Jehovah delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel; and he said in the sight of Israel,

Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; And thou, Moon, in the valley of Aijalon. And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, Until the nation had avenged themselves of their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jashar? [418]

      This is all that is said to have been written in the Book of Jasher; and if this were all that is said of the matter, the account might be fairly said to be a quotation from Jasher; but would this free the author of the Book of Joshua from responsibility? If the story was untrue, would he not be propagating a falsehood by quoting it with tacit endorsement?

      But the quotation is not made with tacit endorsement. The author of Joshua immediately adds, on his own responsibility, these emphatic words: "And the sun stayed in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about the space of a whole day. And there was no day like that before it or after it, that Jehovah hearkened to the voice of a man: for Jehovah fought for Israel."

      I would request the next gentleman who tries to explain away this great miracle, to tell us why, after quoting from another author a poetic account of a great miracle, the author of Joshua deliberately attested in the plainest and most unpoetic words the truth of the poetic assertions. Why, unless he either believed the story to be true, or wanted to deceive his readers. And I would also suggest that if a man can not believe this story, it would be more candid to bluntly say so, than to try to make out that the author of Joshua does not tell it. Neither Joshua nor his biographer stands in need of any such defense.

[SEBC 418-419]