Straight White American Jesus It's in the Code ep 183: “Genocide Joshua”
Mar 11, 2026
A close reading of how a modern politician recasts biblical violence as a model for masculine strength. Questions about the ethics of commands to destroy entire peoples come up. The conversation examines textual problems, ancient context, and strategies used to sanitize or allegorize brutal passages. It probes how dehumanizing language and authoritarian rhetoric normalize violence.
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Joshua As Hawley’s Warrior Exemplar
- Josh Hawley invokes the biblical Joshua as the quintessential warrior model to teach 'authentic manhood'.
- Dan Miller summarizes Joshua: leader after Moses tasked with entering the promised land and leading military conquest against its inhabitants.
The Conquest Is Not Historically Accurate
- Archaeology and history show the biblical 'conquest' wasn't a sudden, complete military takeover but a prolonged process of migration and cultural merging.
- Miller notes this undermines reading Joshua as a straightforward historical model for modern action.
Joshua’s Commands Amount To Ethnic Cleansing
- The book of Joshua repeatedly commands the Israelites to "utterly destroy" the land's inhabitants, amounting to literal ethnic cleansing in the text.
- Miller explains the Hebrew concept harem as consecration requiring the removal or destruction of those seen as polluting the land.
