How big was the army of the Israelites at the time of Joshua

The Bible says that the Israelites numbered 600,000 fighting menwhich, if true, would have been easily the most powerful fightingforce in the late Bronze Age. Archaeologists say that the Hebrewnations never reached this combined size until Iron Age II.

Another View:

The biblical stories are no more than that. The 600,000 of militaryage, with families and slaves would have meant 3 million people and10 million animals to find food and water for in the Sinai Desertfor forty years. It is an absurdity. The skeletons of both peopleand animals which would litter the countryside are also absent. Andhow the families of the original flight to Egypt greww from about70 people to those numbers in another fabrication.

Modern historical opinion rests on it being just a few thousand whoreturned to Palestine. For that matter, there were several thousandHebrews employed by the Egyptians as border guards on the borderwith Nubia, and this move could have been returnees after theircontract was over, which was dressed up into the exaggerated story.Difficult to come to any conclusion other than the biblical storyis impossible.