“Come up and help me attack Gibeon,” he said, “because it has made peace with Joshua and the Israelites.” – Joshua 10:4

Today’s Scripture Reading (December 1, 2015): Joshua 10

Maybe one of the more humorous Winston Churchill quotes was made on the eve of Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union. The Western Allies were a little schizophrenic in their opinion of Joseph Stalin, the leader of the Soviet Union, during World War II. None of them trusted him. And yet, they also recognized their need for Stalin and the Soviet Union to stand with them against Hitler’s Nazi Germany. On Stalin’s side, the lack of trust was reciprocated. Stalin greatly feared that the West would negotiate a secret peace with Germany leaving the Soviet Union to stand alone against Germany. If things had been different and the Soviet Union less in need of the West, it doesn’t take much of an imagination to see a three way war developing in Europe with the Western Allies, Germany and the Soviet Union all standing against each other. If that had happened, the war may not have ended with the fall of Germany – the fighting may have just continued as East met West on the Battlefield.

But that wasn’t the reality. The Western Allies and the Soviet Union needed each other – and so out of a deep distrust a momentary friendship was built maybe proving the ancient Arabic proverb – the enemy of my enemy is my friend. As Germany prepared to invade the Soviet Union, Churchill quipped to his personal secretary John Colville - "if Hitler invaded Hell, I would make at least a favorable reference to the Devil in the House of Commons."

Politically our friendships are often developed around who our friends are. I am not sure the world has ever really graduated out of Junior High or Middle School. Who you are friends with matters. The idea that the enemy of my enemy is my friend is often experientially true, but so is its opposite, the friend of my enemy is my enemy. This is what complicates the current situation in the Middle East. Russia and the West have a common enemy in the Islamic State which should make them at least nominal friends, but Russia has also had close ties to Syria, with whom the West has struggled. So the real question becomes this - which situation is stronger?

For the enemies of Israel, the city states in Canaan were made friends by their common enemy. No matter what the conflict may have been between the city states prior to the arrival of Israel, after Israel’s arrival they were united against a common enemy. The problem was that Gibeon was too close to Israel in physical distance to ignore them. And so they sought out a peace treaty with Israel in order to protect themselves. Gibeon didn’t feel that they could trust the alliance of city states against Israel, so they took matters into their own hands. (Note that in World War II, this was exactly what the Soviet Union feared that the Western Allies would do.) But the treaty changed the proverb. Gibeon had been a friend because the city states and Gibeon had a common enemy. But now that Gibeon had made peace with Israel, Gibeon’s relationship with Israel made them a target. Gibeon was wagering their future that Israel was more able to defend them than the rest of Canaan could against Israel.  

Tomorrow’s Scripture Reading: Joshua 11