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Rahab. The life of Rahab is a picture of our own salvation, showing anyone can move from misery into the light. Rahab is one of the most remarkable women in the Hebrew Scriptures. She was a Canaanite prostitute who lived ca 1406 B.C. in Jericho, converted to Judaism and was in the lineage of Christ. She was an intelligent and “street smart ...
Apr 4, 2024 · The walls of Jericho crumbled, and the city fell, just as God had promised. Amid the chaos and destruction, Rahab’s home stood untouched. The scarlet cord waving from her window, a sign of her faith, marked her home as a place of refuge.
- Brad Simon
- A Canaanite Harlot Faithful to The God of Israel
- Upending of Power Structures Motif
- Knowledge Is Power, Whatever The Source
- The Awe of The harlot…
- …And The Fear of God
- Rahab as A Model of Teshuva
- The Greater The Sin, The Greater The Repentence
- From One Extreme to Another
- Personal Change Or Change of circumstances?
When Joshua takes over as leader from Moses and prepares to cross the Jordan and attack the city of Jericho, he first sends two spies to examine the city, who go to the home of a prostitute named Rahab. Surprisingly, when the king of Jericho sends officers to her house to look for the Israelite spies, Rahab hides them under straw on her roof. She l...
On one level, the Rahab story is one in a long line of biblical stories of God working through the “underdog” or the powerless. In Genesis, Jacob, the younger tent-dwelling son, becomes the namesake of the people Israel, not his elder, warrior brother Esau. In fact, it was his mother Rebekah, not his father Isaac, who favored Jacob and successfully...
Josephus, who as we saw earlier, understands Rahab as a simple tavernkeeper and not a prostitute, embellishes the story with a description of all the spying the men did before they turned in for the night at Rahab’s tavern (Ant. 5:5–7, Brill ed.): This addition has no basis in the text, which describes their appearance at Rahab’s house without any ...
The assumption of Rahab’s strategic importance brought with it the concomitant desire to explain: What made her so popular? Thus, the rabbis posit that she must have been unbelievably beautiful. For example, the Babylonian Talmud (Meg 15a) states: The other three are all pious Jewish women, from the first of the Jewish people to the heroine of the ...
In Joshua 2:9–11, as Rahab explains to the spies why she saved them, and recounts what she has learned about the God of Israel, she says that her people have heard of the feats accomplished by God, Joshua 5:1, from three chapters later, relays a very similar fact. The kings of the Amorites have heard about God’s many feats, The point is the same, b...
Rahab welcomes the wonders God does for Israel, and decides to join the Israelite camp. For the rabbis, this meant that she converted to Judaism. In fact, the rabbis claim that this once childless harlot marries Joshua himself, and gives birth to a line of prophets and priests. Bavli Megillah 14b lists 8 prophets as her descendants, with the possib...
By positing a completely new life for Rahab after her conversion, the rabbis reinforce a simple story of the extremes of good and evil, portraying Rahab as a Canaanite prostitute who morphs into an Israelite woman of valor (Midrash Mishlei 31:22). In fact, Sifrei Zuta, (Beha’alotecha10:29) begins its praise of Rahab by highlighting her depravity: B...
Rahab’s dual roles as the ultimate sinner/outsider andas the profoundly faithful ticket to Israelite success make her short biblical story interesting to many interpreters – Jewish and Christian, ancient and modern – each piecing together a character broad enough to contain all of these truths in one way or another. Ancient interpreters who see in ...
But if we read this biblical story and the midrash that surrounds it with attention to Rahab herself, in the context of her life as we can best imagine it, do we indeed witness a personal transformation from sinful to good? Has Rahab herself changed, or does the arrival of the spies simply allow her an opportunity to express the faith she seems alr...
Jun 17, 2020 · The home of Rahab the harlot was collocated in the wall of Jericho (Josh 2:15), and her home also opened to the top of the city wall, where she had hid the spies (Josh 2:8). The spies commanded her to stay in her home when the conquest of the city was to occur (Josh 2:19).
Who was Rahab? 1 Rahab the prostitute hid three Hebrew spies sent by Joshua to see how strong the walls of Jericho were. (Joshua 2:1-7) In doing so, she saved their lives. 2 She then helped them escape. (Joshua 2:15-24) In return, they promised that when the city was attacked, Rahab and her family would be spared.
The Israelites destroyed everything and everyone in Jericho, “But Rahab the prostitute, with her family and all who belonged to her, Joshua spared” (Joshua 6:25). Digging Deeper: The Unlikely Story of Rahab. The story of Rahab describes one of Israel’s early saviors, a woman, a foreigner, a Canaanite.
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Rahab (/ ˈreɪhæb /; [1] Hebrew: רָחָב, Modern: Raẖav, Tiberian: Rāḥāḇ, "broad", "large", Arabic: رحاب, a vast space of a land) was, according to the Book of Joshua, a Gentile and a Canaanite woman who resided within Jericho in the Promised Land and assisted the Israelites by hiding two men who had been sent to scout the city prior to their attac...
