Test #4: Israel as a Nation
Did God endorse genocide? (chapter 5)
The first 5 articles in this series have explored what seems to be the main theme of the Torah: the knowledge of good and evil as the key to the righteousness of God. We looked at some main characters and how they received and learned about justice and mercy. We could also look at minor characters like Cain and Abel, Enoch, Noah, and Joseph. But you get the idea.
Now we come to the “problem” that many people ask about. They hear God’s instructions about conquering the Promised Land and see a problem about genocide. But now we know it is a question of how accurately the Israelites understand God and how fully they are willing to trust him.
Israel was called to be a kingdom of priests
Exodus 19:3-6 (CSB) Moses went up the mountain to God, and the Lord called to him from the mountain: “This is what you must say to the house of Jacob and explain to the Israelites: ‘You have seen what I did to the Egyptians and how I carried you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. Now if you will carefully listen to me and keep my covenant, you will be my own possession out of all the peoples, although the whole earth is mine, and you will be my kingdom of priests and my holy nation.’ These are the words that you are to say to the Israelites.”
After delivering the Israelites from slavery in Egypt, the Lord invited them to join in the covenant he had made with Abraham, to be a nation of priests to the rest of the world. He promised to teach them his knowledge of good and evil, his ways of justice and mercy, so they could represent him to the nations around them. They would be given the Ten Commandments and other laws to show them how to pass the test of trust. They would pass their knowledge and faith on to their neighbors.
As they travelled in the wilderness, they had many tests about their trust in God. Most of the tests they failed because they wanted to choose their own versions of good and evil. Just before Moses is succeeded by Joshua to lead them into the land, they were told the secondary purpose of God bringing them into it: to punish the evil of the current inhabitants.
Deuteronomy 7:1-6 (CSB) “When the Lord your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess, and he drives out many nations before you—the Hethites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations more numerous and powerful than you—and when the Lord your God delivers them over to you and you defeat them, you must completely destroy them. Make no treaty with them and show them no mercy. You must not intermarry with them, and you must not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons, because they will turn your sons away from me to worship other gods. Then the Lord’s anger will burn against you, and he will swiftly destroy you. Instead, this is what you are to do to them: tear down their altars, smash their sacred pillars, cut down their Asherah poles, and burn their carved images. For you are a holy people belonging to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be his own possession out of all the peoples on the face of the earth.
A new test would come when they entered the Land. The Canaanite peoples were sinners who deserved the death penalty. Generations of them had failed the test of trust. Their societies were filled with human-on-human violence. They worshiped man-made gods instead of the Creator. Their wickedness had reached its full level. Even the young children were sinners by inheritance from their ancestors—all the way back to Adam and Eve.
It would involve warfare
The nature of the people being evicted required some fighting. Precedents were already included in the narrative of God’s people. These skirmishes gave an expectation of how the coming battles would go—God would be their warrior.
When a coalition of armies from city-states in Mesopotamia attacked a coalition of city-states in Canaan, Abraham’s family were part of the collateral damage (Genesis 14). Abraham organized his agricultural workers and servants with make-shift weapons. They chased down the victorious army, defeated them with God’s help, and recovered the people and booty they had stolen.
When Moses led the Israelites into the wilderness after the Exodus, they were attacked by armies of Amalekites. Joshua quickly organized the men as untrained soldiers without armor or swords to protect God’s people (Exodus 17). As long as Moses raised his hands in prayer, the Israelites were winning; when Moses’ hands dropped from weariness, they were losing.
The book of Joshua confirms that God, not the Israelite soldiers, won the land and punished the sinners. The Israelites were basically superfluous extras in the battle. (Reading the book of Joshua is your homework.)
The Test
The test was to see if the Israelites could know good and evil as God does. When put in the position of carrying out God’s justice on sinners, would they understand just punishment and undeserved mercy?
Would they see the Canaanites and other tribes as worthless, less than humans, deserving of no respect? Or would they realize, “They are like us in many ways: created in God’s image; sinful because of not trusting God; under condemnation because of their choice of evil; spiritually in need of God’s life within them; still loved by God enough to receive his merciful forbearance of punishment.”
This is the first generation of people who actually possessed God’s Word in writing. Moses wrote the Torah just before he died (Deuteronomy 31). For the first time people not only knew stories about the past, but they also knew God’s interpretation of what happened and why.
In this way, they were in a similar state that we are.
In the course of history God has held times of judgment on sinners. The final judgment is still to come. In the life of Joshua’s people the sacrifice of Jesus Christ was still to come.
The conquest was one of those preliminary judgments. Their attempts at genocide of entire peoples were half-hearted. It was them passing the test--almost. They understood what God wanted—that condemned people would have a chance to be saved. They carried out warfare against those who rejected God. They welcomed those who humbled themselves to seek the God of Israel.
The conquest was incomplete. God allowed two options for enemies who did not turn the him in repentance. Such people could have been destroyed in battle or driven into exile. The Israelites’ failure to do either of these left a large contingent of spiritual enemies who would be “thorns in their sides” and “snares for their faith” for generations to come.
There is more to this story. There was more to this test. Thank you for reading and thinking along with me.