by owning Him as the God who seeth and knoweth all sin, however deeply hidden? It was in the language of

sorrow, not of anger, that Joshua adjured him. It wrung from Achan a full admission of his crime. How

miserable the whole thing must have sounded in his own ears, when he had put the facts of his sin into

naked words; how paltry the price at which he had sold himself, when it was brought into the broad sunlight

and "laid out before the Lord," in the sight of Joshua and of all Israel. One thing more only remained to be

done. They led forth the wretched man, with all his household, and all that belonged to them, and all Israel

stoned him.  86 And then they burned the dead body,87 and buried all beneath a heap of stones, alike as a

memorial and a warning. But the valley they called that of "Achor," or trouble - while the echoes of that

story sounded through Israel's history to latest times, in woe and in weal, for judgment and for hope (Isaiah

65:10; Hosea 2:15).

The sin of Israel having been removed, God once more assured Joshua of His presence to give success to

the undertaking against Ai. In pledge thereof He was even pleased to indicate the exact means which were

to be used in reducing the city. A corps of 30,000 men was accordingly detailed, of whom 5000 were placed

in ambush on the west side of Ai,88 where, under shelter of the wood, their presence was concealed from Ai,

and, by the intervening hill, from Bethel. While the main body of the Israelites under Joshua were to draw

away the defenders of Ai by feigned flight, this corps was at a given signal to take the city, and after having

set it on fire, to turn against the retreating men. Such was the plan of attack, and it was closely adhered to.

"The ambush" lay on the west of Ai, while the main body of the host pitched north of the city, a valley

intervening between them and Ai. Next, Joshua moved into the middle of that valley. Early the following

morning the king of Ai discovered this advance of the Israelitish camp, and moved with his army to the

"appointed place," 89 right in front of "the plain," which, as we know from the description of travelers, was

covered by olive trees.

The battlefield was well chosen, since Ai occupied the vantage-ground on the slope, while an advance by

Israel would be checked and broken by the olive plantation which they would have to traverse. Joshua and

all Israel now feigned a retreat, and fled in an easterly direction towards the wilderness. Upon this, all the

people that were in Ai, in their eager haste to make the victory decisive, "allowed themselves to be called

away" 90 to pursue after Israel, till they were drawn a considerable distance from the city.

The olive plantation now afforded those who had lain in ambush shelter for their advance. The preconcerted

signal was given. Joshua, who probably occupied a height apart, watching the fight, lifted his spear. As the

outposts of the ambush saw it, and reported that the signal for their advance had been given, a rush would

be made up the steep sides of the hill towards the city. But the signal would also be perceived and

understood by the main army of Israel, and they now anxiously watched the result of movements which they

could not follow. They had not long to wait. Above the dark green olive trees, above the rising slopes,

above the white walls, curled slowly in the clear morning air the smoke of the burning city. Something in the

attitude and movements of Israel must have betrayed it, for "the men of Ai looked behind them," only to see

that all was lost, and no means of escape left them. And now the host of Israel "turned again," while those

who had set Ai on fire advanced in an opposite direction. Between these two forces the men of Ai were

literally crushed. Not one of them escaped from that bloody plain and slope. The slaughter extended to the

district around. Finally, the king of Ai was put to death, and his dead body "hanged upon a tree till

eventide." 91

But of what had been Ai "they made a Tel (or heap) for ever." Never was Scripture saying more literally

fulfilled than this. For a long time did modern explorers in vain seek for the site of Ai, where they knew it

must have stood. "The inhabitants of the neighboring villages," writes Canon Williams, to whom the merit

of the identification really belongs, "declared repeatedly and emphatically that this was Tel, and nothing

else. I was satisfied that it should be so when, on subsequent reference to the original text of Joshua 8:28, I

found it written, that 'Joshua burnt Ai, and made it a Tel for ever, even a desolation unto this day!' There are

many Tels in modern Palestine, that land of Tels, each Tel with some other name attached to it to mark the

former site. But the site of Ai has no other name 'unto this day.' It is simply et-Tel - the heap 'par excellence.'"