EXAMPLES FROM THE WEB FOR JOSH
She told him yaller; an' Josh had him go right to work on't next day.
Cyrus he was goin' by Josh's, an' he didn't see no smoke from the settin'-room stove.
An' when Josh come in, 'Mandy she took a cinnamon-rose out of her dress, an' offered it to him.
An' Josh he got kind o' fretful to her, an' she to him, an' 'Mandy was all honey an' cream.
He's gone in for the whole hog, but he 'ain't growed to it, as Old Josh had.
Take, for example, some of the apothegms of "Josh Billings."
Josh leaned over the gunwale, and reported that there was no fender out.
The reader may recall Josh Billings's remark on the subject.
The name is registered four hundred years before that in Josh.
There can scarcely be a doubt that it is the Parah, belonging to the tribe of Benjamin, in Josh.
WORD ORIGIN
"to make fun of, to banter," 1845, American English, probably from the familiar version of the proper name Joshua, but just which Joshua, or why, is long forgotten. Perhaps it was taken as a typical name of an old farmer. The word was in use earlier than the career of U.S. humorist Josh Billings, pseudonym of Henry Wheeler Shaw (1818-1885), who did not begin to write and lecture until 1860; but his popularity after 1869 may have influence that of the word.
Related: Joshed; joshing.