(More Bible Studies Available @ www.marktabata.com)
To Receive These (And Other) Free Bible Studies And Updates Via Email, Contact Mark Tabata @ 606-216-1757 (Text Message) Or hazardhomecoc@gmail.com (Email)
Ruth 2:12-The LORD repay your work, and a full reward be given you by the LORD God of Israel, under whose wings you have come for refuge.”
We have learned that the command of God to the Jewish people to “utterly destroy” the Canaanites did not mean to annihilate them or commit genocide. Instead, they were to remove them from the land. This raises some other important questions. One is whether or not Joshua was being dishonest in his claims to “utterly destroy” the Canaanites.
The short answer is “no.”
The misunderstanding is not due to what Joshua wrote, but to our misunderstanding of the context in which he wrote. Those in his day and age would have had no trouble understanding what he said. Indeed, as we will see, Joshua (when using the “utterly destroy” language) was simply adapting to the common warfare rhetoric of his day and age that was also employed by other nations around him.
Copan documents:
“Just as we might say that a sports team “blew their opponents away” or “slaughtered” or “annihilated” them, the author (editor) likewise followed the rhetoric of his day. Joshua’s conventional warfare rhetoric was common in many other ancient Near Eastern military accounts in the second and first millennia BC. The language is typically exaggerated and full of bravado, depicting total devastation. The knowing ancient Near Eastern reader recognized this as hyperbole; the accounts weren’t understood to be literally true.4 This language, Egyptologist Kenneth Kitchen observes, has misled many Old Testament scholars in their assessments of the book of Joshua; some have concluded that the language of wholesale slaughter and total occupation—which didn’t (from all other indications) actually take place—proves that these accounts are falsehoods. But ancient Near Eastern accounts readily used “utterly/completely destroy” and other obliteration language even when the event didn’t literally happen that way. Here’s a sampling:5 • Egypt’s Tuthmosis III (later fifteenth century) boasted that “the numerous army of Mitanni was overthrown within the hour, annihilated totally, like those (now) not existent.” In fact, Mitanni’s forces lived on to fight in the fifteenth and fourteenth centuries BC. • Hittite king Mursilli II (who ruled from 1322–1295 BC) recorded making “Mt. Asharpaya empty (of humanity)” and the “mountains of Tarikarimu empty (of humanity).” • The “Bulletin” of Ramses II tells of Egypt’s less-than-spectacular victories in Syria (around 1274 BC). Nevertheless, he announces that he slew “the entire force” of the Hittites, indeed “all the chiefs of all the countries,” disregarding the “millions of foreigners,” which he considered “chaff.” • In the Merneptah Stele (ca. 1230 BC), Rameses II’s son Merneptah announced, “Israel is wasted, his seed is not,” another premature declaration. • Moab’s king Mesha (840/830 BC) bragged that the Northern Kingdom of “Israel has utterly perished for always,” which was over a century premature. The Assyrians devastated Israel in 722 BC. • The Assyrian ruler Sennacherib (701–681 BC) used similar hyperbole: “The soldiers of Hirimme, dangerous enemies, I cut down with the sword; and not one escaped.” You get the idea.” (Paul Copan, Is God A Moral Monster? Making Sense Of The Old Testament God, 171-172 (Kindle Edition); Grand Rapids, Michigan; Baker Books)
Joshua was hardly alone in using the language of “utterly destroy” in his time. As we see from his contemporaries, Joshua’s use of such terminology simply didn’t mean to commit genocide. Another researcher has pointed out:
“Now we need to know that Israel’s practice of herem was not in itself unique. Texts from other nations at the time show that such total destruction in war was practised, or at any rate proudly claimed, elsewhere. But we must also recognize that the language of warfare had a conventional rhetoric that liked to make absolute and universal claims about total victory and completely wiping out the enemy. Such rhetoric often exceeded reality on the ground. Admittedly this does not remove the problem, since the reality was still horrible at any level. But it enables us to allow for the fact that descriptions of the destruction of “everything that lives and breathes” were not necessarily intended literally. Even in the Old Testament itself this phenomenon is recognized and accepted. So, for example, we read in the book of Joshua that all the land was captured, all the kings were defeated, all the people without survivors (such as Rahab) were destroyed (e.g., Josh. 10: 40–42, 11: 16–20). But this must have been intended as rhetorical exaggeration, for the book of Judges (whose final editor was undoubtedly aware of these accounts in Joshua) sees no contradiction in telling us that the process of subduing the inhabitants of the land was far from completed and went on for considerable time, and that many of the original nations continued to live alongside the Israelites. The key military centres–the small fortified cities of the petty Canaanite kingdoms–were wiped out. But clearly not all the people, or anything like all the people, had in actual fact been destroyed by Joshua. Even in the Old Testament itself, then, rhetorical generalization is recognized for what it is. So when we are reading some of the more graphic descriptions, either of what was commanded to be done or of what was recorded as accomplished, we need to allow for this rhetorical element. This is not to accuse the biblical writers of falsehood, but to recognize the literary conventions of writing about warfare.” (J. H. Wright, The God I Don’t Understand: Reflections on Tough Questions of Faith, 88 (Kindle Edition): Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan)
Yet another example of the use of such terminology from other nations contemporary with Joshua comes from the Hittites. They had their own form of herem which was comparable to the “utterly destroy ” language of the Bible.
What do we learn from them?
“The common English translations of the Hebrew word ḥerem (ASV “utterly destroy”; NIV “destroy totally”; CEB “place under the ban”; NET “utterly annihilate”; ESV “devote to destruction”) are misleading because they imply that the word specifies something that happens to the object (that is, it is destroyed). Alternatively, we suggest that the word actually refers to the removal of something from human use. 1 The emphasis is not on the object but on everyone around the object; “no one shall make use of this.” 2 When ḥerem objects are destroyed, the purpose of the destruction is to make sure that nobody can use it, but not all ḥerem objects are destroyed. Most notably, Joshua 11: 12-13 reports that all of the northern cities were ḥerem, yet Joshua destroys only one of them (Hazor). Likewise, a field that is ḥerem is not destroyed but becomes the property of the priests (Lev 27: 21). Destruction, when it occurs, is a means to an end. A Hittite document describes the devotion of a city in terms comparable to the Hebrew ḥerem, complete with imprecations against rebuilders reminiscent of Joshua 6: 26: 3 Tešub [a storm god] my lord . . . handed it over to me and I have desolated it and [made it sacred]. As long as heaven and earth and mankind will be, in future no son of man may inhabit it! [I have offered] it to Tešub my lord, together with fields, farmyards, vineyards. . . . [Let] your bulls Šeri and Hurri [make it] their own grazing-land. . . . He who nevertheless will inhabit it and will take the grazing-land away from the bulls of Tešub . . . let him be averse party to Tešub my lord. 4 Ḥerem may often involve destruction, but “destruction” is not the essential meaning of ḥerem because not everything that is ḥerem is destroyed. Ḥerem occurs first, and because the thing is ḥerem, therefore the thing must be [blank], where [blank] is typically (but not always) some variant of “destroyed.” The comparison with the Hittite document here demonstrates what ḥerem signifies (removal from human use) and why therefore the destruction is necessary. The Hittite king Mursili levels a rebellious city and offers the site to the god Tešub as a pasture for his bulls. Because the god is using the site as a pasture, nobody else can use it for anything; this is the thrust of the imprecation directed at “[ whoever] . . . will take the grazing-land away from the bulls”: An area is granted in absolute ownership to the God but in it no temple was permitted to be build [sic], no economic activity was allowed to be carried on; on the contrary, the exploitation of the banned area was deemed as an “abomination” (natta ara) to the deity, the perpetrator of such an abomination was handed over to the divine judgment and put to death. 5 Compare this judgment with the accusation in Joshua 7: 15, where violating the ban is “an outrageous thing in Israel,” 6 and also Joshua 7: 25, where Yahweh brings trouble on Achan. 7 The imprecation of the Hittite document is aimed at anyone who makes use of the site that has been set aside for the use of the deity. It is not aimed at the citizens of the town. Thus we see the following sequence of events: 1. The necessity of the town’s military defeat is determined. In the Hittite document, the reason is rebellion; in the case of Israel it is so the residents will not “become barbs in [Israel’s] eyes and thorns in [Israel’s] side” (Num 33: 55). 2. The town is attacked by the army, and the defenders are defeated. The battle is not a consequence of the ḥerem; ḥerem happens after the battle is over. 3. The site is declared ḥerem (forbidden from human use). 4. Violators of the ban (actual or hypothetical) are punished. Of course, ḥerem in the Old Testament is not limited to cities. There are four distinct categories of things that can be ḥerem: inanimate objects, including plots of land; living individuals (people or animals); abstractions representing communities of people; and cities. What specifically happens to these varies depending on how they might be used and therefore on how that use might be prevented.” (John H. Walton, J. Harvey Walton, The Lost World of the Israelite Conquest: Covenant, Retribution, and the Fate of the Canaanites, 169-172 (Kindle Edition): Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press)
The challenge before us today is found in filtering the words of the Bible from the vantage point of our culture, thousands of years removed from when those Books were written. However, when we interpret the Books of the Bible that employ the language of “utterly destroy” in the context of their own day and age, we see that the Bible does not have God ordering the Hebrews to commit genocide.
Lord, thank You for every blessing. Thank You for coming to save us. We praise You! Amen.