Achan (biblical figure)
Achan (; ), the son of Carmi, a descendant of Zimri, the son of Zerah, of the tribe of Judah, is a figure who appears in the Book of Joshua in the Hebrew Bible in connection with the fall of Jericho and conquest of Ai. His name is given as Achar (עָכָר֙ ‘Āḵār) in . Account in the Book of Joshua According to the narrative of Joshua chapter 7, Achan pillaged an ingot of gold, a quantity of silver, and a "beautiful Babylonian garment" from Jericho, in contravention of Joshua's directive that "all the silver, and gold, and vessels of brass and iron, are consecrated unto the Lord: they shall come into the treasury of the Lord" (). The Book of Joshua claims that this act resulted in the Israelites being collectively punished by God, in that they failed in their first attempt to capture Ai, with about 36 Israelites lost (). The Israelites used cleromancy (the sacred Lots Urim and Thummim) to decide who was to blame, and having identified Achan, they sacrificed him to Yahweh as well as his sheep, other livestock and his children to death. Their remains were burnt by the Israelites, according to the text, and stones piled on top. Yahweh was pleased by this and his anger eased. Interpretation The narrative states that the location for this punishment of Achan, which lies between Jericho and Ai, became known as the vale of Achor in memory of him. This narrative is probably an etiological myth providing a folk etymology for Achor, at the point in the narrative where the vale of Achor is necessarily crossed. One item to note however is that the text describes the garment that Achor stole as Babylonish; (from Shinar) the time of the Israelite invasion is usually dated to the 15th or 12th century BC, but between 1595 BCE and 627 BCE Babylon was under foreign rule. For this reason, a few textual scholars believe that this part of the Achor narrative was written during the 7th century BC or later, but many Biblical scholars believe the judge Samuel may have put together this account from historical books from that time. It is not certain, however, that the whole Achor narrative dates from this time, as textual critics believe that the Achor narrative may have been spliced together from two earlier source texts; the words in the first part of Joshua 7:25, "all Israel stoned him with stones" (וירגמו אתו) show a different style and tradition from those at the end of the verse: "and they burned them in fire, and they stoned them with stones" (וישרפו אתם באש ויסקלו אתם באבנים). The repetition, the switching from "him" to "them", and switching of the Hebrew verb for "to stone", indicate that this story may be an amalgam from two different sources. Rabbinic The Jewish exegetes, Rashi, Gersonides, and others, maintain that the stoning (Josh. vii. 25) was inflicted only on the beasts, and that the sons and daughters were brought