Spying in the Bible 19 - c.1000 BC to 970 BC

David Keeps on Spying On

After his plan is accepted, Hushai told his priest contacts about it. The priests and their sons were known to be loyal to David, so they were being watched by the current administration’s spies and they knew it. They would have been safe enough if they stayed out of the internal struggle because it would be bad for public opinion to kill priests and their families. However, if they were caught being spies, the charge of treason and would have been justification enough to execute them. Therefore, to be more covert, they sent a servant girl to deliver the message to their sons, who were in a different town. There precautions were not enough though, and a spy caught the sons getting the message from the girl and told Absalom about it. The two sons know they had been discovered, so they hid with some sympathizers, who were also in the spy network, and together, they all formed an underground intelligence pathway to David in exile (2 Samuel 17:15-22).

Hushai told Zadok and Abiathar, the priests, “Ahithophel has advised Absalom and the elders of Israel to do such and such, but I have advised them to do so and so. Now send a message at once and tell David, ‘Do not spend the night at the fords in the wilderness; cross over without fail, or the king and all the people with him will be swallowed up.’”

Jonathan and Ahimaaz were staying at En Rogel. A female servant was to go and inform them, and they were to go and tell King David, for they could not risk being seen entering the city. But a young man saw them and told Absalom. So the two of them left at once and went to the house of a man in Bahurim. He had a well in his courtyard, and they climbed down into it. His wife took a covering and spread it out over the opening of the well and scattered grain over it. No one knew anything about it. When Absalom’s men came to the woman at the house, they asked, “Where are Ahimaaz and Jonathan?”

The woman answered them, “They crossed over the brook.” The men searched but found no one, so they returned to Jerusalem.

After they had gone, the two climbed out of the well and went to inform King David. They said to him, “Set out and cross the river at once; Ahithophel has advised such and such against you.” So David and all the people with him set out and crossed the Jordan. By daybreak, no one was left who had not crossed the Jordan.

Later, when Absalom was executing his plan and going after his father, David’s men, who knew he was coming ended up capturing and killing him, thus ending the fight over the throne (2 Samuel 18:9,14-15).

Now Absalom happened to meet David’s men. He was riding his mule, and as the mule went under the thick branches of a large oak, Absalom’s hair got caught in the tree. He was left hanging in midair, while the mule he was riding kept on going.... So [Joab] took three javelins in his hand and plunged them into Absalom’s heart while Absalom was still alive in the oak tree. And ten of Joab’s armor-bearers surrounded Absalom, struck him and killed him.

Absalom was not the only enemy of David to spy on him. Indeed, David writes throughout his psalms about spies sent against him from his enemies.

O Lord, lead me in your righteousness because of those who spy on me. Make your way in front of me smooth. (Psalm 5:8)

Teach me your way, O Lord. Lead me on a level path because I have enemies who spy on me. (Psalm 27:11)

My enemies spy on me. Pay them back with evil. Destroy them with your truth! (Psalm 54:5)

All day long my enemies spy on me. They harass me. There are so many fighting against me. (Psalm 56:2)

They come together to spy on me—watching my every step, eager to kill me. (Psalm 56:6)

God will come to meet me. He will let me gloat over those who spy on me. (Psalm 59:10)

For my enemies talk about me, and those who spy on me plot together. (Psalm 71:10)

My eyes gloat over those who spy on me. My ears hear the cries of evildoers attacking me. (Psalm 92:11)

Spying in the Bible 18 - c.1000 BC

David Keeps Keeping At It

Later, after fleeing, David sets up his own espionage campaign against his son to reclaim his throne. When he left Jerusalem, some priests had gone with him and taken the Ark of the Covenant. David told them to take it back and basically claim that their calling as priests took precedence over politics and that they were not going to be involved in who sat on the throne. In reality, that was just a cover story for their return because David tasked them to be informants and pass messages on to him (in 2 Samuel 15:25,27-29).

Then the king said to Zadok, “Take the ark of God back into the city. If I find favor in the Lord’s eyes, he will bring me back and let me see it and his dwelling place again....” The king also said to Zadok the priest, “Do you understand? Go back to the city with my blessing. Take your son Ahimaaz with you, and also Abiathar’s son Jonathan. You and Abiathar return with your two sons. I will wait at the fords in the wilderness until word comes from you to inform me.” So Zadok and Abiathar took the ark of God back to Jerusalem and stayed there.

When David and his loyal party had successfully made it out of Jerusalem and up a nearby mountain, Hushai, one of David’s advisors, met up with them. David told him to go back and pretend to be loyal to Absalom, while really being a mole in the usurpers government. He gave Hushai the names of the priests to contact to get the intelligence messages out. Hushai accepted the mission and infiltrated Absalom’s government as a mole (2 Samuel 15:32-37, 16:16-19).

When David arrived at the summit, where people used to worship God, Hushai the Arkite was there to meet him, his robe torn and dust on his head. David said to him, “If you go with me, you will be a burden to me. But if you return to the city and say to Absalom, ‘Your Majesty, I will be your servant; I was your father’s servant in the past, but now I will be your servant,’ then you can help me by frustrating Ahithophel’s advice. Won’t the priests Zadok and Abiathar be there with you? Tell them anything you hear in the king’s palace. Their two sons, Ahimaaz son of Zadok and Jonathan son of Abiathar, are there with them. Send them to me with anything you hear.” So Hushai, David’s confidant, arrived at Jerusalem as Absalom was entering the city....

Then Hushai the Arkite, David’s confidant, went to Absalom and said to him, “Long live the king! Long live the king!”

Absalom said to Hushai, “So this is the love you show your friend? If he’s your friend, why didn’t you go with him?”

Hushai said to Absalom, “No, the one chosen by the Lord, by these people, and by all the men of Israel—his I will be, and I will remain with him. Furthermore, whom should I serve? Should I not serve the son? Just as I served your father, so I will serve you.”

Once Absalom arrived in Jerusalem, he asked his most trusted advisor Ahithophel what he should do. He followed the advice he received and slept with all of David’s concubines to show that he had taken his father’s place and that he had no respect for his father. Then, Absalom asked Ahithophel how to kill David, and he responded by advising to do it quickly and get it over with. Hushai, David’s mole, convinced Absalom to follow a different plan and amass an army to go after David, since David was so well protected. However, Hushai really recommended this because it would take longer and give his spy network enough time to get the word to David and have him retreat to safety. Absalom chose Hushai’s advice and when Ahithophel saw his advice was not taken, he went home and hanged himself (2 Samuel 17:1-2,7-8,11-12,14).

Ahithophel said to Absalom, “I would choose twelve thousand men and set out tonight in pursuit of David. I would attack him while he is weary and weak. I would strike him with terror, and then all the people with him will flee....”

Hushai replied to Absalom, “The advice Ahithophel has given is not good this time. You know your father and his men; they are fighters, and as fierce as a wild bear robbed of her cubs. Besides, your father is an experienced fighter; he will not spend the night with the troops....

“So I advise you: Let all Israel, from Dan to Beersheba—as numerous as the sand on the seashore—be gathered to you, with you yourself leading them into battle. Then we will attack him wherever he may be found, and we will fall on him as dew settles on the ground. Neither he nor any of his men will be left alive....”

Absalom and all the men of Israel said, “The advice of Hushai the Arkite is better than that of Ahithophel.” For the Lord had determined to frustrate the good advice of Ahithophel in order to bring disaster on Absalom.

Spying in the Bible 17 - 1039 BC to c.1000 BC

David Keeps At It

After a while as king, David again unwittingly became involved in another spying episode, this time with the Ammonites. David sent a delegation of envoys to the Ammonites, who did not trust the ambassadors and thought they were spies. Given the history of the two countries, it is easy to see why they came to that conclusion. When the Israelites originally entered the Promised Land they sent spies into Ammonite territory to invade them. Also David had shown his willingness to use spies in how he came to take the throne. This shows that from ancient times, ambassadors have been accused of spying and treated with mistrust (1 Chronicles 19:10-14 and also almost verbatim in 2 Samuel 10:1-4).

In the course of time, Nahash king of the Ammonites died, and his son succeeded him as king. David thought, “I will show kindness to Hanun son of Nahash, because his father showed kindness to me.” So David sent a delegation to express his sympathy to Hanun concerning his father.

When David’s envoys came to Hanun in the land of the Ammonites to express sympathy to him, the Ammonite commanders said to Hanun, “Do you think David is honoring your father by sending envoys to you to express sympathy? Haven’t his envoys come to you only to explore and spy out the country and overthrow it?” So Hanun seized David’s envoys, shaved them, cut off their garments at the buttocks, and sent them away.

Another espionage plot involving David is recorded later, but this time, it was an internal threat and betrayal from David’s third son Absalom. Absalom began by the use of subversion, which is use of illegal actions to undermine the military, economic, psychological, political strength, or morale of a regime. He does this when he tells people that the his father, the king, won’t see them and he wishes that he could help them, but claims he just is not given the authority he needs to help. This undermines his father’s regime with the people (2 Samuel 15:1-4).

In the course of time, Absalom provided himself with a chariot and horses and with fifty men to run ahead of him. He would get up early and stand by the side of the road leading to the city gate. Whenever anyone came with a complaint to be placed before the king for a decision, Absalom would call out to him, “What town are you from?” He would answer, “Your servant is from one of the tribes of Israel.” Then Absalom would say to him, “Look, your claims are valid and proper, but there is no representative of the king to hear you.” And Absalom would add, “If only I were appointed judge in the land! Then everyone who has a complaint or case could come to me and I would see that they receive justice.”

Then, Absalom continues his underhanded, secret coup by pretending to be humble and a mere servant of the people. He did this because just undermining the king’s authority is not enough for a full coup. He also has to become popular so that when he starts his revolt the people would not only want to get rid of the current king, but would also want to replace him with Absalom (2 Samuel 15:5-6).

Also, whenever anyone approached him to bow down before him, Absalom would reach out his hand, take hold of him and kiss him. Absalom behaved in this way toward all the Israelites who came to the king asking for justice, and so he stole the hearts of the people of Israel.

Absalom continues to disenfranchise the people of the king and win them over for four years, showing remarkable patience and fortitude. When he decided his subversion campaign has been successful, he deceives his father into letting him travel to Hebron where he sends secret messenger to his covert friends throughout the tribes to incite a hostel coup against David. While he was in Hebron, Absalom also invited important people within the government, including David’s councilor and persuaded them to join his conspiracy (2 Samuel 15:7-12).

At the end of four years, Absalom said to the king, “Let me go to Hebron and fulfill a vow I made to the LORD. While your servant was living at Geshur in Aram, I made this vow: ‘If the LORD takes me back to Jerusalem, I will worship the LORD in Hebron.’”

The king said to him, “Go in peace.” So he went to Hebron.

Then Absalom sent secret messengers throughout the tribes of Israel to say, “As soon as you hear the sound of the trumpets, then say, ‘Absalom is king in Hebron.’” Two hundred men from Jerusalem had accompanied Absalom. They had been invited as guests and went quite innocently, knowing nothing about the matter. While Absalom was offering sacrifices, he also sent for Ahithophel the Gilonite, David’s counselor, to come from Giloh, his hometown. And so the conspiracy gained strength, and Absalom’s following kept on increasing.

David still had loyal subjects willing to spy for him. One such person told David of the conspiracy, allowing him to escape (2 Samuel 15:13-14).

A messenger came and told David, “The hearts of the people of Israel are with Absalom.”

Then David said to all his officials who were with him in Jerusalem, “Come! We must flee, or none of us will escape from Absalom. We must leave immediately, or he will move quickly to overtake us and bring ruin on us and put the city to the sword.”

Spying in the Bible 16 - c.1100 BC to 1039 BC

David and his Goliath Spy War

After Sampson, more judges came and went until the last judge ruled, who was Samuel. Around this time the Third Intermediate Period began in Egypt, where weak Pharaohs, who had little influence ruled from Tanis. During Samuel’s rule, the Israel continued to fight the Philistines, and at one point around c. 1068 BC, the Philistines even captured the Ark of the Covenant, which they returned after seven months out of fear of God. Samuel had grown old and appointed his two sons as his successors, but they were both corrupt, and the people did not want to be ruled by them. Also, after around three hundred years of hard times and oppression in the Promised Land, Israel asked for a king to lead them to a final victory over the Philistines. Samuel warned the people against having a king, but eventually relented and anointed Saul, a thirty year old Benjamite, as the first king of Israel in c. 1048 BC. And so God’s people rejected his direct rule and Israel was transformed from a theocracy to a monarchy.

When Saul became king of Israel, he appointed his cousin Abner as commander of the army and began his campaigns against the enemies of Israel. After driving out invaders, God commanded Saul to attack and completely destroy their neighbors to the south, the Amalekites, along with all of their possessions. This was to be retribution for the Amalekites attacking the Israelites when they were fleeing slavery in Egypt. However, during his campaign against the Amalekites, Saul did not obey God’s command to destroy them and all of their possessions. Because of his disobedience, God rejected Saul as king and sent Samuel to secretly anoint David as the next king. At this point David was a young shepherd boy from the tribe of Judah, but his life afterward was filled with war, deception, and espionage.

During the Philistines campaign against Israel, when Saul was king, David, the little shepherd boy, killed their champion Goliath with a sling and a stone. From that point forward David achieved a high rank in the army and became a national hero by defeating the Philistines in battle after battle. He also became best friends with King Saul’s son, Jonathan, and was even engaged to marry the king’s daughter, Michal. However, Saul became jealous of David and began worrying about a coup, so he tried to kill David, who escaped. After Samuel had died, Saul missed his council and wanted to know if he would be able to defeat the Philistines, so he went to a medium in Endor to summon Samuel’s spirit to ask if his military campaign would succeed. Here is another example of trying to get military intelligence from a metaphysical source. It is also another example of how Saul had abandoned the ways of the Lord. In the battle against the Philistines that he had sought intelligence for, Saul and all of his sons, except the oldest Ish-Boseth, were killed.

After Saul died, David returned from his exile and was crowned king of the tribe of Judah, but Abner named Saul’s oldest son, Ish-Bosheth, king of the northern tribes. A civil war began between the north and the south and David named Joab as the commander of his army. Abner, who was one of the most powerful men in the country then started making enemies. During one battle Abner killed Joab’s brother and Joab never forgave him. Also, Ish-Bosheth was worried about Abner’s ambition and did not want to become a puppet of Abner, so he falsely accused him of impropriety with Saul’s concubine to keep him in check. This backfired, though, and caused Abner to defect and become a spy for David’s side (2 Samuel 3:6-12).

During the war between the house of Saul and the house of David, Abner had been strengthening his own position in the house of Saul. Now Saul had had a concubine named Rizpah daughter of Aiah. And Ish-Bosheth said to Abner, “Why did you sleep with my father’s concubine?”

Abner was very angry because of what Ish-Bosheth said. So he answered, “Am I a dog’s head—on Judah’s side? This very day I am loyal to the house of your father Saul and to his family and friends. I haven’t handed you over to David. Yet now you accuse me of an offense involving this woman! May God deal with Abner, be it ever so severely, if I do not do for David what the LORD promised him on oath and transfer the kingdom from the house of Saul and establish David’s throne over Israel and Judah from Dan to Beersheba.” Ish-Bosheth did not dare to say another word to Abner, because he was afraid of him.

Then Abner sent messengers on his behalf to say to David, “Whose land is it? Make an agreement with me, and I will help you bring all Israel over to you.”

At this point, Abner became a defector in place and spied on the north, while retaining his position of authority in it. Abner then made an agreement with David and subversively began to convince the elders to the northern tribes to back David instead of Ish-Bosheth (2 Samuel 3:17-19,21).

Abner conferred with the elders of Israel and said, “For some time you have wanted to make David your king. Now do it! For the LORD promised David, ‘By my servant David I will rescue my people Israel from the hand of the Philistines and from the hand of all their enemies.’”

Abner also spoke to the Benjamites in person. Then he went to Hebron to tell David everything that Israel and the whole tribe of Benjamin wanted to do.... Then Abner said to David, “Let me go at once and assemble all Israel for my lord the king, so that they may make a covenant with you, and that you may rule over all that your heart desires.” So David sent Abner away, and he went in peace.

After meeting with David, Abner went back to the tribal leaders go get them together and pledge their allegiance to David. However, Joab accused Abner of being a triple agent. This was a reasonable cover story for Joab because Abner had made Ish-Boseth king and then turned on him. How could they really know that this was not an elaborate plot? Also, since he had met with David, he could have gathered valuable intelligence that he was taking back to their northern enemies. However, Joab made up this false accusation as an excuse to kill Abner in retribution for Abner killing Joab’s brother during the war (2 Samuel 3:24-27).

So Joab went to the king and said, “What have you done? Look, Abner came to you. Why did you let him go? Now he is gone! You know Abner son of Ner; he came to deceive you and observe your movements and find out everything you are doing.”

Joab then left David and sent messengers after Abner, and they brought him back from the cistern at Sirah. But David did not know it. Now when Abner returned to Hebron, Joab took him aside into an inner chamber, as if to speak with him privately. And there, to avenge the blood of his brother Asahel, Joab stabbed him in the stomach, and he died.

When David found out what had happened, he mourned for Abner and cursed Joab, but kept Joab in his same position. At this point it was politically very important for the tribal elders to know he did not kill Abner, who had been a spy for him. The tribal leaders had not yet sworn their allegiance to him and if they thought he would betray those who defected to him, they might not have backed him as king. He did convince them he had nothing to do with the assassination, so most of the tribal leaders did go over to David’s side. When this happened, the two tribal leaders who had remained loyal to Ish-Bosheth, realized their side had lost, so they killed Ish-Bosheth while he slept and brought his head to David. David was not impressed with them for killing a man in his sleep or for changing sides after they knew they had lost, so he had them executed. At this point, after having ruled Judah for seven years, David became king of all of Israel and the nation had a period of prosperity. Around this time the Iron Age I ended and the Iron Age II began.

Spying in the Bible 15 - c.1100 BC

It's a Trap! Sampson, a Honey Trap!

The fact that Sampson fell for a honey trap in the first place and still wanted the woman as his wife afterward gave the Philistines very useful intelligence about Samson, that they later used against him when he was with a prostitute (Judges 16:1-3).

One day Samson went to Gaza, where he saw a prostitute. He went in to spend the night with her. The people of Gaza were told, “Samson is here!” So they surrounded the place and lay in wait for him all night at the city gate. They made no move during the night, saying, “At dawn we’ll kill him.”

But Samson lay there only until the middle of the night. Then he got up and took hold of the doors of the city gate, together with the two posts, and tore them loose, bar and all. He lifted them to his shoulders and carried them to the top of the hill that faces Hebron.

Being in Gaza, away from his home, Samson would have needed a place to spend the night. Since brothels were also inns for lodging, Samson would have spent the night at the house of prostitutes, just like Joshua’s spies stayed with Rahab when spying on the Promised Land. However, unlike the spies, the text here also implies that Samson slept with the prostitute, which does not seem out of character for him, since he had a weakness for women. At any rate, given the fact that this is a place to lodge and Samson would have nowhere else to go, it was logical for the Philistines to assume he would stay there all night.

Indeed Samson should have stayed at the prostitute’s all night, and it is not clear why he got up in the middle of the night. Maybe God prompted him to leave, or maybe he heard the Philistines outside, or maybe he figured out they would be after him. Given Samson’s history with the Philistines, he should have known that it would be dangerous to visit Gaza, which was in their territory, and that he would have been recognized and reported immediately, which he was.

When he left, Samson took the city gates with him. It was a military custom at the time for armies that conquered a city to carry the doors and bars of gates as a sign of triumph, so maybe his whole trip to Gaza was to taunt the Philistines and to show them he could go there and get out while evading their capture. Whatever the reason he went there, the incident once again shows Samson’s hubris, his weakness for Philistine women, and the Philistine’s cunning and desire to capture him. It is not surprising then, the Philistines set a Honey Trap for Samson when they saw the opportunity for it, nor is it a surprise that we fell for it (Judges 16:4-5).

Some time later, [Samson] fell in love with a woman in the Valley of Sorek whose name was Delilah. The rulers of the Philistines went to her and said, “See if you can lure him into showing you the secret of his great strength and how we can overpower him so we may tie him up and subdue him. Each one of us will give you eleven hundred shekels of silver.”

First of all, Delilah was what is referred to in espionage tradecraft as a Swallow, which is a female agent who uses sex as a tool. The recruitment of Delilah, was facilitated with money, which is another tool of recruitment for co-opting informants. This is a contrast to the tool of threatening, which the Philistines used in the first honey trap with Samson’s fiancé. This shows Philistines were aware of different methods of asset recruitment and used the one that would work best with the individual, or the one that was more appropriate for the situation.

The second thing to note is that eleven hundred shekels each seems like a strange amount to offer for her services, but Judges 3:3 mentions how there were five principalities in Philistine at the time, so there would have been five rulers. 1 Samuel 6:4 also states that later, there were five rulers of the Philistines. The total sum, they offered her, then, was a round fifty five hundred shekels, which was a very large amount at that time. This recruitment method worked and Delilah agreed to the plot (Judges 16:6-9).

So Delilah said to Samson, “Tell me the secret of your great strength and how you can be tied up and subdued.”

Samson answered her, “If anyone ties me with seven fresh bowstrings that have not been dried, I’ll become as weak as any other man.”

Then the rulers of the Philistines brought her seven fresh bowstrings that had not been dried, and she tied him with them. With men hidden in the room, she called to him, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!” But he snapped the bowstrings as easily as a piece of string snaps when it comes close to a flame. So the secret of his strength was not discovered.

The Philistines were cautious and smart to have the men hidden in the room in case Delilah failed, which she did. Samson was also smart to not give away his secret. However, Delilah did not get paid until she delivered Samson, so she was motivated to keep on trying as well. She was very persistent and asked him two more times, and he lied to her two more times. The Philistines were still cautious and patient during the times and on the fourth time, Samson finally gave in to her request and so he was captured (Judges 16:15-21).

Then she said to him, “How can you say, ‘I love you,’ when you won’t confide in me? This is the third time you have made a fool of me and haven’t told me the secret of your great strength.” With such nagging she prodded him day after day until he was sick to death of it.

So he told her everything. “No razor has ever been used on my head,” he said, “because I have been a Nazirite dedicated to God from my mother’s womb. If my head were shaved, my strength would leave me, and I would become as weak as any other man.”

When Delilah saw that he had told her everything, she sent word to the rulers of the Philistines, “Come back once more; he has told me everything.” So the rulers of the Philistines returned with the silver in their hands. After putting him to sleep on her lap, she called for someone to shave off the seven braids of his hair, and so began to subdue him. And his strength left him.

Then she called, “Samson, the Philistines are upon you!”

He awoke from his sleep and thought, “I’ll go out as before and shake myself free.” But he did not know that the LORD had left him.

Then the Philistines seized him, gouged out his eyes and took him down to Gaza. Binding him with bronze shackles, they set him to grinding grain in the prison.

While Sampson was in prison, his hair began to grow back, as did his strength. One day the Philistines were having large festival and brought Samson out of prison for entertainment. They leaned him against the pillars of the temple for support. With his strength returned, Samson pushed the pillars, making the whole temple collapse killing himself and the three thousand people on the roof, including the rulers. This action destroyed basically all of the leadership of the Philistines and turned the tide in the occupation of Israel, whom they eventually expelled from their land, but the two nations remained at war. The story of Ruth takes place during this period after Sampson, when the two nations were at war.

Spying in the Bible 14 - 1379 BC to c.1100 BC

Judge Dread

During the roughly three hundred year period of judges, Israel was the only true theocracy the world has ever seen, where God, Himself ruled the nation as the head of the state. Other nations that are or have been ruled by religious leadership or clergy are more accurately referred to as ecclesiocracies. However, the people rebelled against God’s law that Moses had implemented, even after God had delivered them out of slavery in Egypt and gave them their own nation in the Promised Land. God punished his people by letting neighboring nations occupy them and oppress them off and on throughout this period of judges (Judges 2:10,12,14,18-19a).

After that whole generation had been gathered to their ancestors, another generation grew up who knew neither the LORD nor what he had done for Israel.... They forsook the LORD, the God of their ancestors, who had brought them out of Egypt. They followed and worshiped various gods of the peoples around them. They aroused the LORD’s anger.... In his anger against Israel the Lord gave them into the hands of raiders who plundered them....

Whenever the LORD raised up a judge for them, he was with the judge and saved them out of the hands of their enemies as long as the judge lived; for the LORD relented because of their groaning under those who oppressed and afflicted them. But when the judge died, the people returned to ways even more corrupt than those of their ancestors.

About a hundred years into the time of the Judges, during the Egyptian nineteenth dynasty, Ramses II (also known as Ramses the Great) was Pharaoh of Egypt and was waging a war with the Hittites on the southern border of Israel. During this war, the famous battle of Kadesh was waged in c. 1286 BC. Kadesh is the same place the Israelites stayed on their journey out of Egypt before wandering around the desert. Records of this battle contain the earliest surviving original record of espionage and the first non-Biblical record of spying in history.

Before the battle of Kadesh, the Hittite king sent two spies into the Egyptian army’s camp pretending to be Hittite army deserters to give the Egyptians false intelligence. They tried to convince Ramses that the Hittite army was still very far away, when they were actually very close. Ramses believed their story and as a result, some of the Egyptian army was caught in an ambush. However, Ramses had captured two more Hittite spies and tortured them to get information from them. From this Ramses found out about the ambush, so he sent in a larger reserve of his army to go help the part of the army that was being ambushed. In the end, Egypt ended up winning the battle.

Less than a hundred years later, the Bronze Age ended and the Iron Age I began, which lasted from c. 1200 BC to c. 1000 BC. This also corresponded to the twentieth dynasty of Egypt, which was the last dynasty of the New Kingdom and started the decline in power of the Egyptian Pharaohs. During this time, the Philistines had taken control of Israel and were oppressing the people. One of the Judges that God raised up from the tribe of Dan, around c. 1100 BC was Samson, who was involved with a series of very interesting spying cases involving various women. Sampson had been prophesied to come about 800 years earlier (Genesis 49:16-18).

One day, when Samson was still a young man, he saw a beautiful young Philistine woman, fell in love with her, and his troubles began. That woman became a co-opted informant for the Philistines against Samson and the Israelites. Co-opted means that she was a national of a country (a Philistine), but not an officer or employee of their intelligence service, who assisted that service on a temporary or regular basis. She ended up helping the Philistines, not out of national pride, but out of fear from their threat to kill her and her family if she did not help. This was the first time, but not the last, that Samson fell for a honey trap (Judges 14:2,5-6a,8,11-18).

When [Samson] returned, he said to his father and mother, “I have seen a Philistine woman in Timnah; now get her for me as my wife.”...

Samson went down to Timnah together with his father and mother. As they approached the vineyards of Timnah, suddenly a young lion came roaring toward him. The Spirit of the Lord came powerfully upon him so that he tore the lion apart with his bare hands.... Some time later, when he went back to marry her, he turned aside to look at the lion’s carcass, and in it he saw a swarm of bees and some honey....

When the people saw him, they chose thirty men to be his companions. “Let me tell you a riddle,” Samson said to them. “If you can give me the answer within the seven days of the feast, I will give you thirty linen garments and thirty sets of clothes. If you can’t tell me the answer, you must give me thirty linen garments and thirty sets of clothes.”

“Tell us your riddle,” they said. “Let’s hear it.”

He replied, “Out of the eater, something to eat; out of the strong, something sweet.”

For three days they could not give the answer.

On the fourth day, they said to Samson’s wife, “Coax your husband into explaining the riddle for us, or we will burn you and your father’s household to death. Did you invite us here to steal our property?”

Then Samson’s wife threw herself on him, sobbing, “You hate me! You don’t really love me. You’ve given my people a riddle, but you haven’t told me the answer.”... She cried the whole seven days of the feast. So on the seventh day he finally told her, because she continued to press him. She in turn explained the riddle to her people.

Before sunset on the seventh day the men of the town said to him, “What is sweeter than honey? What is stronger than a lion?”

Samson said to them, “If you had not plowed with my heifer, you would not have solved my riddle.”

Sampson then became very angry at being tricked, killed thirty men in a nearby town, and stripped them of their clothes to pay his debt. Later that fall, he went back and asked for his wife, but her father had given her away to another man, thinking Samson would not want her after her betrayal. To get revenge on losing his wife, he caught three hundred foxes, tied them in pairs, lit them on fire, and let them loose in the Philistine’s farm land to burn their grain fields, vineyards, and orchards. In retribution, the Philistines killed the woman Samson wanted to marry and her family. He retaliated again by killing many of the Philistines in a series of battles, essentially starting an all-out war. Samson then became the leader of the Israelites as a judge, and ruled them for twenty years.

Spying in the Bible 13 - 1406 BC to 1379 BC

Invaders

After Joshua died, the Israelites continued their conquest and settlement of the Promised Land. To do so, they also continued to employ methods of espionage that they had learned under the leadership of Moses and Joshua. They cast lots again to determine who would begin the first military campaign. The tribe of Judah was chosen to go first and they made a deal with the tribe of Simeon, who drew to go second. They combined armies to help each other, since their lands were located together (Judges 1:1-3).

After the death of Joshua, the Israelites asked the LORD, “Who of us is to go up first to fight against the Canaanites?”

The LORD answered, “Judah shall go up; I have given the land into their hands.” The men of Judah then said to the Simeonites their fellow Israelites, “Come up with us into the territory allotted to us, to fight against the Canaanites. We in turn will go with you into yours.” So the Simeonites went with them.

The Benjamites went third and took their land including Jericho and Jerusalem, which had mostly been conquered already. Joshua 10 explains how all five kings in the region were defeated and killed during that campaign. The Amarna Tablets are letters found in Amarna Egpyt dating back to this period in history. Some letters have been found from the Canaanites that were asking Amenhotep IV (Akhenaten) for help from the Hebrew invaders. Specifically, one letter came from the Governeor of Jerusalem to Pharoah Akhenaten request aid from Egypt in fighting the Hebrews because all of the kings in the region had been killed, which he did not appear to answer. Interestingly, Amenhotp IV (Akhenaten) was an eighteenth dynasty Pharaoh who was well known for being the first monotheistic Pharaoh.

The fourth and fifth tribes to continue their military conquests were the tribes of Joseph, which were Ephraim and the other half of the tribe of Manasseh. They also combined their armies to team up, but took a page out of Joshua’s book by sending spies first. These spies used the same tactic used earlier during Joshua’s campaign as well by recruiting a local person as an informant and promising to spare him and his family in return for the intelligence that he provided (Judges 1:22-25).

Now the tribes of Joseph attacked Bethel, and the LORD was with them. When they sent men to spy out Bethel (formerly called Luz), the spies saw a man coming out of the city and they said to him, “Show us how to get into the city and we will see that you are treated well.” So he showed them, and they put the city to the sword but spared the man and his whole family.

Next went the tribes of Zebulun, Asher, Naphtalites, and Issachar, who took their lands in the north, but not much is mentioned about those campaigns in the Bible. Lastly, went the tribe of Dan, who had a difficult time with conquering and settling their land. The Danites tried to take their allotted land by themselves, but could not defeat the current occupants. After that failure, they went to conquer Leshem (also known as Laish), which was a different, adjacent, part of the land that was not specifically designated for them (Joshua 19:47).

When the territory of the Danites was lost to them, they went up and attacked Leshem, took it, put it to the sword and occupied it. They settled in Leshem and named it Dan after their ancestor.

The Danites then used Leshem as a base for their continued campaign to take their allotment. To begin, five spies were sent ahead to plan out the attack. The fact that there were five spies probably meant that they were representatives from the five families that would take over that specific land once conquered (Judges 18:1a-2a,7-10).

And in those days the tribe of the Danites was seeking a place of their own where they might settle, because they had not yet come into an inheritance among the tribes of Israel. So the Danites sent five of their leading men from Zorah and Eshtaol to spy out the land and explore it. These men represented all the Danites. They told them, “Go, explore the land.” ...

So the five men left and came to Laish, where they saw that the people were living in safety, like the Sidonians, at peace and secure. And since their land lacked nothing, they were prosperous. Also, they lived a long way from the Sidonians and had no relationship with anyone else.

When they returned to Zorah and Eshtaol, their fellow Danites asked them, “How did you find things?”

They answered, “Come on, let’s attack them! We have seen the land, and it is very good. Aren’t you going to do something? Don’t hesitate to go there and take it over. When you get there, you will find an unsuspecting people and a spacious land that God has put into your hands, a land that lacks nothing whatever.”

The tasking in this campaign, was again very minimalistic, being to simply “explore the land.” The intelligence that they brought back from this trip was also very useful. Not only did they report that the land was good, but they commented on the state of mind of the people, when they said they were “unsuspecting.” These people had surely heard of the Israelites exploits, but being outside of the Promised Land, they probably assumed they would not be attacked. Knowing that the army has the element of surprise is a very useful advantage.

The other piece of intelligence that was brought back was unlike anything seen so far in the Bible, but just as valuable. The spies reported they had no support close by and no relationships with any of the other people in the region, so if they were attacked by surprise, they would be unable to get reinforcements or backup from anywhere. This sort of tactical information is very important and based on it, they had a successful campaign. After all of this happened, and after the tribes of Joseph finished their campaigns and recovered, the Danites got help from them to take their originally designated land (Judges 1:34-35).

The Amorites confined the Danites to the hill country, not allowing them to come down into the plain. And the Amorites were determined also to hold out in Mount Heres, Aijalon and Shaalbim, but when the power of the tribes of Joseph increased, they too were pressed into forced labor.

After almost three decades of war, in c. 1379 BC the Promised Land had been conquered and God appointed Judges to help govern the people, which they did for around three hundred years.

Spying in the Bible 12 - 1406 BC (3)

Joshua's Intriguing Intrigue (3)

Once the Israelite army reached Jericho and The Angel of the Lord appeared to Joshua and told him God’s plan of attack for Jericho. Therefore, God Himself helped to complete the Analysis and Production of the intelligence and then Joshua does the Dissemination and Explanation step by communicating the plan to the Israelites (Joshua 5:13-14;6:2-7).

Now when Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, “Are you for us or for our enemies?”

“Neither,” he replied, “but as commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.” Then Joshua fell facedown to the ground in reverence, and asked him, “What message does my Lord have for his servant?”...

Then the Lord said to Joshua, “See, I have delivered Jericho into your hands, along with its king and its fighting men. March around the city once with all the armed men. Do this for six days. Have seven priests carry trumpets of rams’ horns in front of the ark. On the seventh day, march around the city seven times, with the priests blowing the trumpets. When you hear them sound a long blast on the trumpets, have the whole army give a loud shout; then the wall of the city will collapse and the army will go up, everyone straight in.”

So Joshua son of Nun called the priests and said to them, “Take up the ark of the covenant of the Lord and have seven priests carry trumpets in front of it.” And he ordered the army, “Advance! March around the city, with an armed guard going ahead of the ark of the Lord.”

The last step in the Intelligence cycle is Evaluation and Feedback. The evaluation and feedback of the intelligence was obviously positive, since it enabled the Israelites to succeed in their mission and take the city of Jericho. The feedback also led to another tasking and requirement of the spies to save Rahab and her family from the city, initiating the cycle again. That is why it is called a cycle. Frequently once the final intelligence is evaluated feedback comes in the form of follow on requirements and missions based on what was learned from the first campaign. The spies then fulfilled their mission and Rahab and her family joined the Israelites and lived with them (Joshua 6:22-23).

Joshua said to the two men who had spied out the land, “Go into the prostitute’s house and bring her out and all who belong to her, in accordance with your oath to her.” So the young men who had done the spying went in and brought out Rahab, her father and mother, her brothers and sisters and all who belonged to her. They brought out her entire family and put them in a place outside the camp of Israel.

As can be seen, spying should be done by professionals without ulterior motives in secret, with minimal oversight by only their management, who makes the decisions. The spies should not have policy input. The spies should be given minimal instructions and operational flexibility enough to get the job done. By giving the spies that operational flexibility, Joshua also had the responsibility to follow through with the promise they made to Rahab, which he did honor. The one and only failure of the mission, was by a soldier named Achan. The Lord, through Joshua, had given explicit instructions not to pillage the city or take artifacts from it, which Achan secretly did and it caused problems later.

Spying in the Bible 11 - 1406 BC (2)

Joshua's Intriguing Intrigue (2)

Unfortunately, because Jericho had been expecting the invasion, they had spies throughout their land watching for just such an event as this and the Israelite spies were discovered. Thus being discovered, they were reported to government officials after their cover was blown. Fortunately, because Rahab was convinced the city would fall to the invaders, and being a shrewd business woman, she agreed to help the spies in return for saving her and her family. Rahab was what is referred to as an informant, which means she was a person who wittingly or unwittingly provides information to an agent, clandestine service, or the police; a non-recruited person who has provided specific information and is cited as a source. In modern colloquial terminology, Rahab would be known as a “rat”, “stoolpigeon”, or “narc.” The spies agree to the conditions and successfully escaped (Joshua 2:2-5b,8-9b,12-15).

The king of Jericho was told, “Look, some of the Israelites have come here tonight to spy out the land.” So the king of Jericho sent this message to Rahab: “Bring out the men who came to you and entered your house, because they have come to spy out the whole land.”

But the woman had taken the two men and hidden them. She said, “Yes, the men came to me, but I did not know where they had come from. At dusk, when it was time to close the city gate, they left. I don’t know which way they went.”

Before the spies lay down for the night, she went up on the roof and said to them, “...Now then, please swear to me by the LORD that you will show kindness to my family, because I have shown kindness to you. Give me a sure sign that you will spare the lives of my father and mother, my brothers and sisters, and all who belong to them—and that you will save us from death.”

“Our lives for your lives!” the men assured her. “If you don’t tell what we are doing, we will treat you kindly and faithfully when the LORD gives us the land.”

So she let them down by a rope through the window, for the house she lived in was part of the city wall.

In these verses it is interesting to note that the phrase “hid them” is actually singular. Rahab probably hid the spies individually and separately to increase the odds that one of them would escape captivity and make it back to their camp. The agreement made between the spies and Rahab was independent of any moral or religious stipulations or judgments. There were no conditions of repentance or conversion and nowhere in the Bible are there any judgments made about the spies getting help or information from a prostitute. Neither is there any indication that anyone ever questioned the authenticity or the validity of the information, given the source.

Indeed it has long been recognized in the intelligence world that amoral and criminal sources are acceptable, and often the best sources. That is because one of the major sources of intelligence has always been human intelligence, or HUMINT. Having sources of information behind enemy lines is a key component in finding out information about an enemy. This was especially true in Biblical times, which was before espionage was heavily aided by technology as it is today. There were no satellites, wire taps, or eavesdropping devices, or hacking into computer systems back then.

After completing their mission and escaping the enemy, the two spies returned to the Israelite camp and went straight to Joshua to debrief him on their mission giving them the raw intelligence. They did not report to the whole assembly of the people. Their intelligence consisted of telling Joshua “everything that happened to them” as well as the mental state of the people, which is the information they received from Rahab (Joshua 2:23-24).

Then the two men started back. They went down out of the hills, forded the river and came to Joshua son of Nun and told him everything that had happened to them. They said to Joshua, “The Lord has surely given the whole land into our hands; all the people are melting in fear because of us.”

The first major military hurdle for the Israelites is how to get to Jericho, since they have to cross the Jordan River over into enemy territory. Joshua begins the next step of Analysis and Production of the raw intelligence that the spies brought him to come up with a plan of how to approach Jericho and then tells the military leaders who, in turn, tell the people in the first part of the Disseminates and Explanation step of the Intelligence Cycle. The method of getting there was also an important PSYOP tactic to frighten the enemy by showing them that God was helping them (Joshua 3:2-4a,14-16;5:1).

After three days the officers went throughout the camp, giving orders to the people: “When you see the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, and the Levitical priests carrying it, you are to move out from your positions and follow it. Then you will know which way to go, since you have never been this way before.”...

So when the people broke camp to cross the Jordan, the priests carrying the Ark of the Covenant went ahead of them. Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during harvest. Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water’s edge, the water from upstream stopped flowing. It piled up in a heap a great distance away, at a town called Adam in the vicinity of Zarethan, while the water flowing down to the Sea of the Arabah (that is, the Dead Sea) was completely cut off. So the people crossed over opposite Jericho....

Now when all the Amorite kings west of the Jordan and all the Canaanite kings along the coast heard how the Lord had dried up the Jordan before the Israelites until they had crossed over, their hearts melted in fear and they no longer had the courage to face the Israelites