Lives of Scripture

Jobab, king of the city of Madon in northern Canaan, was one of many kings summoned into a defensive alliance by Jabin, king of Hazor, once word spread of Joshua's victories in southern Canaan (Joshua 11:1-3). Jabin sent to Jobab and to the kings of Shimron and Achshaph, and to Canaanite, Amorite, Hittite, Perizzite, Jebusite, and Hivite rulers throughout the hill country, lowlands, and region below Mount Hermon. Together they mustered a coalition army "as numerous as the sand on the seashore," with a great number of horses and chariots, and camped at the waters of Merom to make war against Israel (11:4-5). The LORD told Joshua not to fear them: "tomorrow at this time I will deliver all of them slain before Israel; you shall hamstring their horses and burn their chariots with fire" (11:6). Joshua's forces attacked the coalition suddenly, and the LORD gave Israel the victory -- Israel struck them down, pursued the survivors, hamstrung their horses, and burned their chariots exactly as commanded (11:7-9). Joshua then turned on Hazor itself, killing its king and burning the city, and "took all the cities of these kings, and all their kings, and struck them with the edge of the sword" (11:10-12). Jobab's kingdom, like the rest of the coalition, was swept into this decisive judgment on Canaan's resistance -- Scripture records no words or individual act of his beyond joining the doomed alliance against Israel's God-given inheritance of the land.