elder-schmelder,
Your observation illustrates the careful attitude that needs to be taken with these ancient writings.
One must recognise the frequent use of hyperbole throughout these writings. While we might look at something for literal and technical precision, we need to cast our mind into culture of the time that the piece was written, as well as at the political ambitions of those writer(s).
The 9th chapter of Exodus was cobbled together from several sources. Verses 1-7 and 13-34 (which you refer to) come from the source now known as E. These writers were priests of Israel (as against Judah), so these passages were created after Judah and Israel had separated, and they were concerned with Israel. If you wish to know more about E, the other sources and the person who likely combined these sources, I suggest the book, "Who Wrote the Bible?" by Richard Elliott Friedman.
And after all this, we need to recogise that the original writings underwent subsequent editing, where further changes were introduced to suit the understandings at the times of the editors. Does that mean we do not know what the original writers actually wrote? Is it possible to unscramble an omelette?
Some suggest that the Israelites always were the hill-dwellers of Canaan and that these stories of Moses/Joshua were created to say they were living in a God-given land. These were the objectives of the stories, rather than being concerned about technical precisions such as you observed. There are no archaeological evidences for a large group wandering the desert, which would have been the case if they had wandered about it for 40 years, and the ruins of Jericho do not support the Biblical account.
So please read those words at Exodus 9 while keeping these external contexts ever in mind.
Doug
