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Chapter 10 deals with the conquest of the kings and kingdoms of the southern part of Canaan. The armies of Israel had defeated Jericho by a miracle, the Amorites by a reversal of God's judgment and Gibeon by surrender. By now the people were becoming impatient, they wanted to take the whole country, but God had said back in Exodus, that He would deliver Canaan to the Israelites, little by little. Joshua was patient and waited on the Lord.
Soon the Lord was ready to deliver some of Canaan to the Israelites. Five kings of Canaan banded together and made war against the Gibeonites, the people that Joshua had made a treaty with. Honoring the treaty, Joshua led his army against the combined armies of the 5 kings and defeated them.
As they ran from the Israelites, God sent down great hailstones that killed more of them than the swords of the Israelites. The five Kings of the Amorites were:
These 5 cities were south and west of Jerusalem within 50 miles of the people of Israel. They banded together to defeat the Gibeonites, so Joshua was honor bound to defend them since the Gibeonites were now their servants.
With daylight running out in the battle, Joshua caused the sun and moon to stop and this gave him more time (a hold day). It is believed that this battle took place in the middle of summer. In that area at that time of the year, there was approx. 14 hours of daylight. We can assume that on that day there was 28 hours of daylight, sufficient time for Joshua to defeat the armies of the five kings.
The five kings, themselves, escaped and hid in a cave at Mak-ke-dah. Joshua found out where they were and had stones placed at its entrance and posted a guard there. After the battle was over, Joshua had the kings released and hanged until evening when they were cut down and put back into the cave and the opening covered with stone. Before Joshua returned to Gilgal he had conquered most of the southern part of Canaan.
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