independent_thinker2002 said:
When Joshua was in the desert and god "stopped the sun".
Here is a link of the books you think are in the bible(look under "Other Apocrypha"):
http://www.sacred-texts.com/chr/apo/
Right, the books under that section are not included but all of the what we call Deuterocanonical ones are except for Bel and Dragon and the other one.
The book of Joshua's purpose is to illustrate God's plan of giving the Jews the land that he had promised them to inherit. The preference to the Book of Joshua in my Bible reads:
"Their (The Jews) occupation of the country is begun with the crossing of the Jordan and the conquest of Jericho, in both of which the Lord intervenes on their behalf."
Then at the end it reads,
"The entire history of the conquest of the Promised Land is a prophecy of the spiritual conquest of the world through the Church under the leadership of Jesus the Messiah."
So that's basically the meaning of this book according to our interpretation of it, we view it as a prelude to the greater conquest of Jesus Christ through spiritual means.
About when God stopped the sun, I guess you're referring to Joshua's Victory against the Amorites? This is something God did for Joshua at his request, it symbolizes how God answers peoples' requests if they pray to him and ask him for help. The whole poem here was originally written in both the Book of Jashar and the Book of the Wars of the Lord. I'm not sure if they still have the Book of Jashar but the Book of the Wars of the Lord is kind of like a very old collection of Jewish songs that we thought existed at one time but has long since been lost. I suspect the Book of Jashar was probably lost a long time ago, too, but don't quote me on that.
Continuing on...the mention of the Sun being halted could have been due to the fact that Joshua and the Isrealites observed a day that seemed much longer than usual. It is also highly possibly that Joshua prayed for an abrupt obscuration of the sun, which would have stopped the Amorites from advancing on his troops. What could have occurred was that hailstorm came and obscured the sun, at least from full view. Hence the reference to, "Great stones from the sky." So the Jews were probably observing bad weather, basically.