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Chapter 2 gives us an account of the scouts that were sent out to Jericho to spy out the cities defenses and records the story of Rahab, a harlot, who befriended the Israelite spies.
Joshua was camped at Shittim. It was in the Valley of the Acacias, a desolate valley where only the shittah tree would grow. It was east of the Jordan in Moab at the north end of the Dead Sea. From here, Joshua sent two men to spy out the land west of the Jordan especially the city of Jericho.
They arrived at Jericho and entered an Inn that was run by a prostitute named Rahab. Word gets to the King of Jericho that two Israeli spies were in town so he sends some officers to capture them. By the time they get to Rahab's Inn, she has hidden the spies under some piles of flax on the roof which had been put there to dry in the sun. Not finding the spies, the officers continue their search outside the city toward the Jordan River.
After the officers had left, Rahab went up to talk to the spies. Led of the Spirit, she knew that God was going to give the land of Canaan including Jericho to the Israelites. She knew that God was going to destroy the city of Jericho, so she made a deal. Since her house was located on the city's wall, she would lower them down to the ground by a rope in return for a guarantee from the spies that when the city was destroyed, she, her father and mother, her brothers and sisters and their families would be allowed to live. They agreed on the condition that all these people would be assembled in her house and that her house would be marked by a scarlet cord hanging down from the window through which they had escaped. (Notice the parallel between this and the Passover. The house marked by the "scarlet cord" was passed over by the Angel of death as was the house marked by the blood on the door jam in Egypt.)
She lowered them down and told them to escape to the mountains and stay there for 3 days. By that time the officers searching for them would have returned to the city. In three days they came down out of the mountains and returned across the Jordan and reported their findings to Joshua. "The Lord will certainly deliver the land to us." "All the people of Canaan are scared to death of us."
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