Joshua: Consciousness Journey to Inner Promised Land

📖 Navigate Chapters in Joshua

Central Theme

The Book of Joshua reveals the principle that the promised land is a state of consciousness to be occupied, not a distant historical territory to be won by outward means. The drama opens with Moses' death and Joshua's commissioning, signaling the shift from preparatory revelation to active assumption. Crossing the Jordan is the inward passage from wandering in memory to stepping into a deliberately assumed identity; the ark, the stones, the circumcision and the Passover are all imaginal rites that mark the inner transition. The miracles and victories are psychological: walls fall, suns stand still, and kings are routed when imagination is sustained by will and feeling. The recurring command to be strong and courageous points to the single-hearted resolve required to persist in an inner assumption until it hardens into fact.

Joshua holds a unique place in the canon as the operational manual of imaginative conquest. Where other books reveal what God is, Joshua shows how God — human imagination — is employed to occupy and inhabit the desired self. The allotment of the land to the tribes, the cities of refuge, and the covenant at Shechem are the map, the safeguards, and the final choice every mind must make. This book teaches that divine power is not external vindication but an interior mastery: to claim one’s inheritance is to discipline thought, purge the accursed belief, and distribute one’s faculties under the guidance of an awakened will.

Key Teachings

Joshua teaches that every outer conquest corresponds to an inner technique of attention and assumption. The first instruction to Joshua — arise, go over Jordan — is the command to act imaginatively in the face of sensory opposition. The ark going before the people is the presence of the living imagination leading attention; when attention steps into the water it parts, for the stream of doubt yields to the settled placement of mind. The memorial stones and repeated rituals are not primitive religion but conscious anchors: write the law upon the heart, set aside signs that will call the mind back to the assumed state until it becomes memory.

The accounts of Jericho and Ai show method and error. Jericho falls by persistent, disciplined imaginal rehearsals — the circling, the trumpets, the silence and then the shout — a pattern of repeated feeling and directed expectancy. Ai falls only after confronting hidden disloyalty; the episode of Achan exposes how a single theft of attention or a covetous belief can undo a whole campaign. Confession, exposure, and removal of the accursed thing restore progress. Rahab’s scarlet thread is simple: recognition of the higher imagination and a visible sign of fidelity saves what would otherwise be lost.

The many cities unconquered or left to serve under tribute reveal the truth that some habitual states are not eradicated but subordinated until they yield service. The allotment of land by tribes is psychological bookkeeping: assign what faculty dwells where, cultivate it, and accept responsibility for its stewardship. The cities of refuge teach merciful containment for actions performed in ignorance; they remind us that unintentional deeds require sanctuary until a higher judgment is assumed. Finally, the covenant at Shechem is the book’s thesis: choose this day whom you will serve — the fleeting senses or the creative imagination — and bind your life to that choice.

Consciousness Journey

The inner journey in Joshua begins with the death of Moses, the symbolic end of preparatory belief, and the emergence of Joshua, the mature faculty of directed imagination. This move from follower to executor maps the moment when revelation becomes practice. Crossing Jordan represents the decisive act of placing attention beyond the old confines; the waters stop because the mind has stopped wavering. The encampment at Gilgal, the rite of circumcision and the observance of Passover mark the inauguration of a new law within — a cutting away of fleshly doubt and the reception of a promised identity.

The march around Jericho outlines the discipline of repetition and silence. For six days the imaginal act is private and rhythmic; on the appointed seventh day the shout — the felt conviction of the wish fulfilled — collapses the barrier. Contrast this with Ai, where strategy fails because of concealed desire. The valley of Achor is the place of trouble that becomes a doorway: the exposure of the thief, the public confession, and removal transform setback into spiritual clearing. Victory thus alternates with purgation until the inner landscape bears the order of truth.

As the narrative proceeds through campaigns and allotments, the psyche learns to recognize which beliefs must be destroyed, which can be burnt away, and which are to be integrated. The unresolved Canaanites in certain cities are the remaining complexes that require time or tribute. The building of altars, the setting up of stones, and the appointment of cities of refuge are stages of stabilization: create memorials, allocate safe spaces, and administer mercy to the unintentional. The book culminates in Shechem where the individual makes a solemn covenant; Joshua’s death points to the completion of the cycle — the new man has assumed the land and leaves behind a settled inheritance of consciousness for those who will follow.

Practical Framework

Begin each day as Joshua: receive a clear commission. Define one inner territory you will possess — a role, a feeling, an outcome — and imagine having it fulfilled with sensory detail for a fixed interval. Use an ark-like image to precede your enactment: a brief, vivid scene of yourself already acting as the fulfilled state, then proceed through your day with that image as leader. Create memorial stones: write concise statements of accomplishments and moments when the imagination worked, and place them where your attention will see them as reminders to reinforce the new state.

Adopt the Jericho method for larger intentions. Choose a practice to repeat daily for several days, increasing intensity toward a culminating act of conviction. Keep the discipline simple, rhythmic and secret while building expectancy; then permit a confident affirmation that the thing is done. When resistance appears, follow the way of Achan: bring the hidden belief to light, confess it in clear terms, and remove its hold by refusing its authority. Allocate inner faculties as Joshua divided the land: name the powers within you — courage, reasoning, affection — and assign each a place of residence in your life by specific imaginative acts and duties. Finally, make a Shechem covenant each week: a solemn, written pledge to serve the creative imagination above sense and to return to it whenever you stray. Persist with feeling; faith is the bridge between assumption and manifestation.

Crossing Into the Inner Promised Land

The Book of Joshua is the inward conquest of consciousness, a continuing drama in which the death of one way of seeing makes room for the decisive assumption that one can be and possess what imagination declares. Moses, the servant, has fallen asleep; his death is the end of an external reliance, the termination of a leadership that pointed to law and deliverance as something done to us. In the moment that follows, Joshua rises as the principle of willing, the epidermal action of imagination taking command. He is the will that says arise and go over the Jordan, the movement that crosses from conditional wandering into possession. This opening transition is the first great inner revolution: assumption replaces appeal, doing replaces pleading, and the promise becomes an inner fact to be walked into by steady faith.

The Jordan is the psychological river that divides the wilderness of doubt from the land that flows with milk and honey. Every crossing in this book is an image of the single crossing each man must make when imagination instructs feeling to accept the fulfilled desire as already true. The ark of the covenant borne by the priests is not a wooden box but the sanctified attention; the priests are the disciplined faculties that lift the object of desire into the conscious direction of the will. When their feet touch the waters and the stream stands piled like a heap, time gives way to a new order: the subjective act arrests objective evidence and compels circumstances to follow. The miracle here is not horror at supernaturalism but the undeniable law that a changed inner fact will alter outer events if feeling and assumption are maintained.

Rahab of Jericho is a precious figure because she represents the receptive, the faculty within that recognizes the power of the imaginal act and allies with it. Her scarlet cord is the single thread of faith, the mark of identification that saves a part of the psyche from destruction. Jericho itself is the great wall of the habitual imagination, the repeated fortress of limiting belief that encircles our world. The procession of priests, the seven trumpets, the seven days, and the final shout are the slow, disciplined sounding of the inner instrument until the wall of falsehood collapses. Observe the discipline: silence for six days, unbroken focus, and on the seventh day a louder, fuller affirmation. This is the method of imagination made manifest. It is not violence but sustained inner ritual that topples the fortress of the past.

The taking of Jericho followed by the complete dedication of spoil to the Lord teaches the absolute necessity of consecrating the new acquisition to the creative power that brought it forth. To take and to retain without consecration invites decay and internal contradiction. Rahab remains because she aligned herself with the new state; others who persist in the old imaginings are consumed when the new identification is rightly asserted. From this we learn that salvation is not partial but total: the part of us that yields to faith is saved and becomes the progenitor of the new world within.

The failure at Ai reveals the subtlety that even after a triumphant crossing, one hidden contradiction will undo the army. Achan is not merely a man who stole; he is the secret covetousness, the private treasure hoarded and hidden which betrays the community of imagination. His taking of the accursed thing becomes the unseen dissonance that causes the psyche to fail in battle. Here the book teaches, with grave solemnity, that the unconscious garnish of dishonesty or split desire will overturn public victory. Joshua's mourning, the uncovering, the confession, and the punitive cleansing are not about external punishment but about the necessary exposure and removal of inner impurity. Until that hidden belief is brought out, the mind cannot stand before its enemies. After the removal, courage returns; the ambush of Ai is set; strategy and imagination join and the city falls when the spear is stretched. The spear is the pointed intention of focus; when imagination stretches it, the ambush rises and the inner enemy is routed.

The rite of circumcision at Gilgal is a symbolic recircumcision of attention. It is the cutting away of old habits, the shedding of reproach. Gilgal means rolling away; it is the place where the reproach of Egypt is lifted. Circumcision here is not genital ritual but an inward chastening, a carefully chosen surgical act of the will upon the fleshy, allowing the man to be whole and whole-hearted as he enters the land. Only when manna ceases and the people eat the old corn of the land are they freed from dependence on the miraculous provision that sustained them in the wilderness. This is the shift from expectation to possession, from waiting to harvesting, and it signifies health in consciousness: the bodily nature begins to reflect the inner covenant.

Throughout the conquests, the divine voice saying be strong and of good courage repeats like a mantra that is less a command from without and more an insistence of the creative imagination. Joshua is told, as Moses was told, that I will not fail thee nor forsake thee. God in this story is precisely the human imagination that assures the man who will act upon it that it is with him. The promise does not guarantee ease; it guarantees presence. The land is given not because of mere brute force but because the person has entered a new state and lives faithfully in it.

The sun standing still is the arrest of time by sustained attention. When Joshua speaks to the sun and it delays its course, the narrative is not a physics lesson but an image: concentration can suspend the apparent rules of duration. A day in imagination, ripe with feeling, is not measured by clocks. When one who knows the method commands time through assumption, feats impossible to the reason become the common occurrences of an inner life. The book is teaching that attention can extend its moments until the appointed vengeance is executed and the victory completed.

Gibeon, the deceitful treaty, is a caution against half-assumptions and deals made with the appearance of humility. The Gibeonites represent the feigning of poverty of imagination to gain favor. The leaders' haste to make a covenant without consulting the inner voice produces a binding that imposes servitude. In psychological terms this is the bargain a part of us strikes with lower imaginations to avoid confrontation, exchanging freedom for apparent security. The story makes clear that a false assumption, however cleverly enacted, becomes a chain. The remedy is honesty to the imagining; the wise do not forge a pact with that which is not honest.

As Joshua advances, the list of kings and cities becomes the map of inner enemies, the armies of doubt, fear, shame, and the ancient giants of the psyche. Each conquest is an inner discipline: to oust the Amorite is to abolish amorous confusions; to smite Hazor is to reduce that central tower of intimidation. The burning of cities that stood in strength and the leaving of none remaining speak to the totality necessary to eradicate a habit. Partial victories invite relapse; only the decisive occupation of the territory of thought secures rest.

The distribution of the land among the tribes is profound psychology. Each tribe is a faculty, an attribute of the mind that must be apportioned its right domain. To give inheritance by lot is to allow the imagination to assign itself its rightful work and to order tendencies in a way that each part may be known and served. The Levites receive no land because their inheritance is the LORD; the priesthood is not territory but service. Cities of refuge are the merciful accommodations for those who kill unwittingly; they are the inner houses of mercy where unintentional errors may be sheltered from the avenger of blood until judgment and priestly intercession. This signifies that conscience and compassion must moderate the law when the offender is ignorant, showing the imagination as both judge and savior.

Caleb and his asking for Hebron at an advanced age teach that the spirit of conviction does not grow stale with years. Caleb is the inner persisting faith that, even when old, claims the mountain of expectation. He is the example that the right assumption never declines in potency with time. Hebron, his gift, remains the reward of wholeness that comes to those who wholly follow the Lord their God, meaning the imagination they choose to make their own.

The episode of the altar built by the trans-Jordan tribes reveals the perennial anxiety about divided loyalties. The great altar which alarms the others is not rebellion but the attempt to make a visible sign that will secure identity across generations. When mistaken, it raises suspicion. Yet the explanation offered by those builders shows an important lesson: sometimes the imagination erects symbols to preserve covenantal recognition for the children to come. The reconciliation that follows is the admission that the same God abides on both sides of Jordan, and that the test of intention distinguishes rebellion from reverence.

Finally, Joshua gathers the tribes at Shechem and rehearses the great story of deliverance. Shechem is the place of shoulder-blade, the point at which the spiritual man takes up the burden of deliberate choice. When Joshua declares choose you this day whom you will serve, he enjoins the congregation of faculties to an act of volition. The stone set up becomes the witness to memory, the monument of that choice which will speak to future occasions of forgetfulness. Joshua dies in the border of his inheritance. His death is not defeat but the consummation of a life lived under the rule of creative imagination. The transition intimates that one state completes and another completes us, and the legacy of victory passes to those elders who knew the works of the Lord.

The entire book closes as a testament that imagination is the active God within us. From the crossing of Jordan to the final covenant in Shechem every chapter prescribes method: prepare the heart, sanctify attention, remove the inner accursed thing, persist in the imaginal act, consecrate the harvest, and distribute the faculties rightly. There is a stern warning against compromise and a tender provision for the unwary. The narrative teaches that the inner land can be possessed and that fear need not govern the one who uses imagination as the arbiter of reality.

This is not the history of remote men but the biography of the soul. The victories and failures are our own. Joshua is the will that conquers; Rahab is the faith that acknowledges the better power; Achan is the hidden desire that betrays the people; the cities are the strongholds of thought; and the ark is the lifted attention that calls the waters to stand firm. The lesson is simple and inexorable: imagination creates reality, and only by entering wholly into the state of the wish fulfilled and governing the faculties with righteous intention does the promised land become the natural field of experience. Walk, then, as Joshua walked; assume and abide in the inner victory, and the outward world will yield to the you that you have imagined.

Common Questions About Joshua

Do Jericho’s walls fall through imaginal persistence?

Jericho’s walls are the entrenched walls of limitation in consciousness: habits, fears, and contrary opinions that surround the inner city of desire. They fall not by force of argument but by imaginal persistence that creates a new interior state until the old structure collapses. The seven circuits and final shout are symbolic of repeated, rhythmic assumption and an emotional release that dislodges old belief. Practically, one fashions a vivid scene of already having the desire fulfilled, rehearses it daily with feeling, and refuses to entertain rebutting thoughts. Each repetition weakens the old wall until it yields. The collapse is inevitable once the imagination has been steadily occupied with the end, because the subconscious accepts the impressed feeling and remakes outer conditions to match.

Is crossing the Jordan a symbol of decisive assumption?

Yes, crossing the Jordan is the decisive assumption of the promised state, the singular step from hoping to knowing. The river represents the current reality of unbelief and sensory evidence; stepping into its waters as a united people signifies the willful entry into the reality of the fulfilled desire. It is not a tentative glance toward promise but an act of faith performed in imagination with confident feeling. Practically one imagines the crossing with complete conviction, feeling the certainty and composure of one who has already arrived, allowing no debate with opposing facts. This decisive assumption is repeated until the subconscious accepts it as true, whereupon circumstances conform. The lesson: act once in imagination with the consummated feeling and let the inner act settle; reality will follow.

What daily routines from Joshua fit Neville’s approach?

Joshua suggests a simple ritual of preparation, assumption and persistence that can be adopted as daily routines: begin with quiet preparation to define your promised scene, then 'cross the Jordan' mentally by entering that scene with full sensory detail and feeling as if the desire is accomplished. Remove inner obstacles by identifying and 'circumcising' limiting beliefs, letting them go. Conduct short, rhythmic repetitions of the fulfilled scene during the day and a longer, vivid imagining before sleep, the night watch where the subconscious accepts impressions. Keep a mental march of gratitude and expectant feeling rather than argument with present facts. Finish each day by dwelling calmly in the end, refusing to think the contrary, and awaken with a brief reaffirmation of the assumed state to maintain continuity until manifestation appears.

How does ‘be strong and courageous’ translate to practice?

The injunction to be strong and courageous is an instruction to maintain a single, unwavering assumption despite appearances. Strength is the refusal to be moved by circumstance; courage is persistence in the imaginal act when facts contradict the promise. In practice it means choosing a clear end, constructing a vivid scene that implies its fulfillment, and rehearsing it with feeling daily, especially at night before sleep. When doubts arise, one gently returns to the assumed state rather than arguing with them. Speak inward affirmations that align with the chosen state, visualize with sensory detail, and act outwardly as though the inner reality is present. Over time this disciplined inner conduct becomes habitual courage, and the outer world reorganizes around that inner strength.

How does Neville interpret Joshua’s conquest as possessing a state?

Joshua’s conquest, read psychologically, is the dramatization of taking possession of an inner condition by sustained assumption. The battles are not external wars but successive expulsions of fear, doubt and inherited limitations from the imagination, and Joshua is the willful assumption that directs this process. To possess a state means to live in the end as if the desire is already fulfilled, to dwell in the consciousness of victory until the outer reflects that inner occupation. Practically this requires defining the promised scene with sensory detail, entering it in imagination, and persisting in that feeling state until powerfully impressed upon the subconscious. The narrative shows stages: preparation, crossing, circumcision of lingering unbelief, marching until the inner citadels dissolve. Possession is a sustained living in the imagined reality rather than waiting for external evidence.