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Context No. 1089 of 4322 · Joshua

Context · Reflection

Joshua 21:17-26: in context

17Out of the tribe of Benjamin, Gibeon with its pasture lands, Geba with its pasture lands, 18Anathoth with its pasture lands, and Almon with its pasture lands: four cities. 19All the cities of the children of Aaron, the priests, were thirteen cities with their pasture lands. 20The families of the children of Kohath, the Levites, even the rest of the children of Kohath, had the cities of their lot out of the tribe of Ephraim. 21They gave them Shechem with its pasture lands in the hill country of Ephraim, the city of refuge for the man slayer, and Gezer with its pasture lands, 22Kibzaim with its pasture lands, and Beth Horon with its pasture lands: four cities. 23Out of the tribe of Dan, Elteke with its pasture lands, Gibbethon with its pasture lands, 24Aijalon with its pasture lands, Gath Rimmon with its pasture lands: four cities. 25Out of the half-tribe of Manasseh, Taanach with its pasture lands, and Gath Rimmon with its pasture lands: two cities. 26All the cities of the families of the rest of the children of Kohath were ten with their pasture lands.

This continues the list of towns given to the Levites, scattered among the other tribes. Among the priestly cities from Benjamin is Anathoth; among the cities of the Kohathites from Ephraim is Shechem, a city of refuge. The passage keeps counting, four cities here, four there, distributing the priests and Levites across the land with their pasturelands.

One name in this list is worth stopping on: Anathoth, a small priestly town given to the sons of Aaron. Centuries later, Anathoth would be the birthplace of the prophet Jeremiah, and it would also be the town that plotted to kill him, telling him to stop prophesying or die. There is a sobering irony there. A town set apart to serve God, populated by priests whose whole vocation was the things of the LORD, produced a great prophet and then tried to silence him. Proximity to holy things is no guarantee of a holy heart. The people closest to the temple, the ones whose family business was religion, could still turn against the very word of God when it disturbed them. It is a quiet warning against assuming that being raised in the right place, among the right religious institutions, makes one faithful. Anathoth had everything, a priestly heritage, the sacred vocation, and it still hardened against God's messenger. Being given to the LORD as a matter of birth and residence is not the same as belonging to him in the heart.

Do I assume that being near the things of God, raised in the right religious setting, makes me faithful, when Anathoth had all of that and still turned against God's word?

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