It happened at the end of three days after they had made a covenant with them, that they heard that they were their neighbors, and that they lived among them.
"All the congregation murmured ..."  (Joshua 9:18).  Why did the people murmur?  Matthew Henry wrote that the Israelites desired the prey, or booty, that they would receive from the slaughter of the Gibeonites, being much more "jealous for their profits than for fulfilling God's Word."[26] Adam Clarke went even further and declared that Israel's murmuring was due solely to the fact of their being deprived of the spoil of the Gibeonites. "Israel at that time had fallen under the full control of the predatory spirit."[27]  We cannot find any adequate grounds for denying such opinions as these, and it is possible that the sinful, greedy spirit which began at this time to dominate Israel was the true reason why God allowed the nation to be so shamefully deceived.