Category Archives: Old Testament

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Contemporary Christian worship?—Exodus 25

What matters about worship is whom it addresses: the true God. As far as music styles or other features, they often fit the culture addressed. The musical instruments used in Psalm 150:3-5, for example, were also used by Canaanites in their worship. The Israelites used all these same instruments, but the difference was that they worshiped the true and the living God rather than statues.

The same is true for the design of the tabernacle in Exodus. Egyptians built temples differently than Mesopotamians. If one wanted to get to the innermost shrine in a Mesopotamian temple, one might have to go this way and that; in Egyptian temples, the holiest shrine, or holy of holies, was in a line directly from the front entrance, in the furthest rear. The tabernacle looks like the Egyptian model.

Because the Israelites had been slaves in Egypt used in building projects, they knew what Egyptian temples looked like. They would have known about portable tent-shrines used in Egypt and Midian, as well as about the structure of Egyptian temples (and palaces), with an outer court, inner court, and the innermost shrine, which was the holiest place. God chose a design with which the Israelites were familiar so they could understand that the tabernacle they carried through the wilderness was a temple.

Some aspects of the tabernacle parallel other temples, and the parallels communicate true theology about God. In the tabernacle, the most expensive materials were used nearest the ark of the covenant: gold was more expensive than copper, and blue dye than red dye. These details reflect an ancient Near Eastern practice: people used the most expensive materials nearest the innermost sanctuary to signify that their god should be approached with awe and reverence. The tabernacle uses standard ancient Near Eastern symbols to communicate its point about God’s holiness.

Some aspects of the tabernace include both parallels and contrasts, which also communicate theology about God. For instance, some of the furniture of the Tabernacle resembles the furniture of other ancient temples: a table of offerings, an altar, and so forth. Various sacrifices, such as sin offerings and thank offerings, were also used by other cultures, as were purity rules.

But Canaanite, Egyptian and Hittite temples included other features not found in the tabernacle, such as a chest of drawers and bed. Priests would wake their idols in the morning, give them their morning toilet, entertain them with dancing girls, feed them, and eventually put them back to bed at night. There was none of this in the Lord’s temple, for he was not merely an idol dependent on his priests to assist him. Unlike the gods of these peoples’ myths, the God of Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps (Ps 121:3-4).

Some features of the tabernacle contrast starkly with their culture, and in light of the other parallels, these contrasts are all the more obvious. The climax of other ancient Near Eastern and northern African temples was the image of the deity, enthroned on its sacred pedestal in the holiest innermost sanctuary. But there is no image in God’s temple, because he would allow no graven images of himself (Exod 20:4).

Further, many massive Egyptian temples included shrines for tutelary deities flanking the inner sanctuary; but there are no other deities associated with the Lord’s tabernacle, for he would tolerate the worship of no other gods in his sight (Exod 20:3). God communicated his theology to Israel even in the architecture of the tabernacle, and he did so in cultural terms they could understand. (Some of the modern interpretations of the colors and design of the tabernacle are simply guesses that have become widely circulated. The suggestions we offer here represent instead careful research into the way temples were designed in Moses’s day.)

God identified with various elements of local cultures and used them to communicate with people in language that they understood. Where there could be no compromise, however, was in the character of the object of worship, the one true God. As we worship God with all our diverse cultural styles of worship, we need to keep that in mind. We do not need to debate one another over music styles or other features. What we do need to remember is that our true God is holy, to be approached with awe and reverence, with joy and celebration. Let us magnify the name of the Lord!

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Slaughtering the Benjamites II: merciless anarchy—Judges 20:29—21:25

(Continued from Part I, http://www.craigkeener.org/slaughtering-the-benjamites-i-benjamins-depravity-judges-191-2028/)
Judges goes on to narrate the Israelites’ unbridled vengeance against the Benjamites and the continuing, sinful consequences of their overkill. Because Benjamin refused to hand over those who gang-raped a woman to death, the other tribes of Israel make war on the Benjamites. Up till this point, the Benjamites, equipped with long-distance weapons, have been winning the battles. They have consistently repelled the larger forces arrayed against them. Now, however, Israel has a divine promise of victory from the Lord (Judg 20:28).

Total war against Benjamin

In Judges 20:29, 33, 36-38, the Israelite allies set an ambush against the Benjamites. They borrow this strategy most clearly from Joshua’s earlier destruction of the nearby hostile Canaanite town of Ai (Josh 8:2-21), applying this strategy against Benjamin. This time they succeed, putting the Benjamites to flight. Throughout history, cutting down retreating warriors from behind proves much easier than having to face their weapons. Thus in 20:45 the Israelite warriors “caught” and killed five thousand fleeing Benjamite warriors on the road; the verb for violent catching here appears only one other time in the Book of Judges, where the Benjamite rapists forced themselves on the Levite’s concubine (19:25).

To forestall future conflicts, the law earlier prescribed herem—the utter destruction of total war—against enemy Canaanites (Deut 7:2). Israel carried out little of this in the Book of Judges, yet the vengeful Israelites now get so carried away with their victory that they practice herem against Benjamites! The law did prescribe this fate for apostate cities that followed other gods (Deut 13:12-18). But what about for an entire tribe that simply came to the aid of such a city because of clan allegiances? Common as it was in antiquity to kill all males who might grow up to avenge their fathers, the law prohibited killing children for their fathers’ crimes (Deut 24:16). Further, wiping out women and children was herem, not normal punishment.

In the heat of the moment, many hardened warriors, some of whose compatriots have been killed, now slaughter everyone in sight. Only six hundred Benjamite men escape, taking refuge for the next four months (20:47). After these months pass, however, Israelite tempers cool (cf. 20:47). Now many of the Israelites, whose warriors had earlier slaughtered the Benjamites, lament that God has destroyed one of the tribes of Israel (21:3, 15)! (Blaming God for human acts of depravity is not a new invention.) Granted, God is sovereign, but again his involvement here is at a more distant remove, not a direct action. In this narrative, God has ultimately delivered the Benjamite warriors into the other Israelites’ hands (Judg 20:28, 35); but the narrator never says that he commands or approves of this mass slaughter.

Much of Israel, in fact, themselves regretted their actions, as the narrator twice mentions (21:6, 15, two of the only three uses of this term in Judges). Israel’s leaders now need a way to replenish the tribe of Benjamin, but the six hundred surviving Benjamite men cannot reproduce without women. Israel has slaughtered all the Benjamite women, as well as taken an impulsive oath before God not to let Benjamites intermarry with them (21:1).

Seizing more innocent women

The leaders, however, reach a solution that prevents them from breaking their oaths. Now they will execute herem against another Israelite town, Jabesh Gilead! Judges 21:11 is in fact one of only two uses of the Hebrew verb related to herem in the Book of Judges. (Later Saul, who fails to execute herem against Amalekites in 1 Sam 15:3-23, essentially executes it against God’s priests in 22:19!)

Again Israel keeps their word: they had promised to kill anyone who did not come to help them with the battle (21:5). These oaths were may not have been a good idea; they certainly cannot justify the wholesale action that now follows. The virgin daughters of Jabesh Gilead are now seized, just as the Levite’s concubine was seized. Meanwhile, wives and concubines are slaughtered—just as the Levite’s concubine was killed. (Probably Benjamites later repopulated their maternal ancestor’s town. Later Saul as a Benjamite has natural ties with Jabesh Gilead, evident in 1 Sam 11:5-9 and 31:11-12.)

Thus Israelites again slaughter their own people. The intensity of lethal and sexual violence here readily reminds us of the sorts of atrocities that some Islamic extremists have committed in the Middle East or northern Nigeria, or genocidal actions elsewhere. The spirit of violence in the world is not new, even if modern technologies have provided increasingly efficient means of killing.

The decimation of Jabesh Gilead, however, did not supply enough young women for the Benjamites: just four hundred young wives for six hundred men. (Given the average likely age of marriage, most of these women were probably sixteen or younger—perhaps many in their early teens.) So what did the Israelites do? They went and kidnapped some other Israelite girls. They chose a convenient location that did not require much travel—their host town, Shiloh, just a day’s march from devastated Gibeah (21:12). (They had earlier gathered at another centrally located site, Mizpah, fewer than five miles from Gibeah; Judg 20:1, 3; 21:1, 5, 8.) At some point (perhaps later) Shiloh became the place of the tabernacle (18:31).

So—at a feast for the Lord (Judg 21:19)—the Israelites invited the two hundred Benjamites who were still single to capture two hundred single young women from Shiloh. The Hebrew text of 21:20 suggests that they “ambushed” them, the same terminology used for the recent attack against the Benjamites (20:29, 33, 36-38). (An attentive reader of Judges in Hebrew might recall that, in this book, apart from that recent attack only the wicked “ambush” or “lie in wait”; Judg 9:25, 32, 34, 43; 16:2, 9, 12.)

Although the strategy of ambush made sense against the opposing army, here it is carried out against unarmed, young teenage girls; the law prohibited ambushing or lying in wait (the same Hebrew term) for a neighbor to harm them (Deut 19:11). Each one “catches” a wife for himself (Judg 21:21), a Hebrew term elsewhere applied to violence (Ps 10:9). The other Israelites explain to the girls’ fathers in Shiloh that since they did not give their daughters in marriage to the Benjamites, they have not violated Israel’s oath. How much would this consolation have reduced the horror for the families now rent apart?

The Israelite actions began as a quest for justice, a call for vengeance on behalf of an unnamed women who was mercilessly gang-raped to death. Yet the quest ended up as the slaughter of men, women and boys, along with the seizure of preadolescent girls and unmarried teenage women.

Everyone did what was right in their own eyes

Recounting the acts without inserting moral comment so far, the narrator lets the horror of the story strike with its own graphic force. Only the book’s concluding comment sheds light on its perspective: there was no king in Israel, and everyone did what they personally viewed as right (21:25). This horrible story is a story of moral anarchy, the kind of violent lawlessness we sometimes might associate with the old frontier in the western United States, war-torn Somalia, or other unstable regions. It could well be the story of unbridled human hearts anywhere that lacks means of civil restraint, where the strong are free to prey on those socially or physically weaker than themselves.

Why do the final chapters of Judges begin and end with a refrain about moral anarchy associated with lack of kingship (17:6; 19:1; 21:25)? Although in this book God periodically raises up judges, Israel as a whole has no stable government here, no provision for continuing moral leadership.

As the subsequent story of Israel in Samuel through Kings illustrates, however, a continuing government without obedience to God was ultimately no less liable to fail. The first part of that story elaborates Saul’s failure and David’s success, quickly followed by David’s failure and its consequences for his kingdom. Within a generation, we witness the fraying of the delicate tribal unity often achieved under David and particularly achieved in the early part of Solomon’s reign. When there was a king in Israel who did only what was right in his own eyes (or in the eyes of others not obeying God), the nation was also led astray.

It fell to prophets to repeatedly call God’s people back to his Word. True prophets (as opposed to the corrupted ones) provided a conscience for Israel, some moral leadership. But prophets can influence only those willing to heed them.

Ultimately neither judges nor kings could provide more than stopgap measures (though stopgaps are safer than anarchy). Through the prophets, God ultimate promised Israel a more permanent solution: the coming of his own kingdom, when he would reign through his appointed vizier, the promised descendant of David. Yet what would a kingdom of righteousness mean for a sinful people, the sort of people we encounter in Judges? Fortunately for us, the promised kingdom has already made its first entrance into more gently our world; the king came first not to avenge, but to offer justice and righteousness a different way. Jesus’ way was not to kill sinners but to transform them. As followers of Jesus, we must work for the peace and justice that our king requires, even in this world of incredible tragedy and pain, until he returns to consummate his promise of that new era.

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Slaughtering the Benjamites I: Benjamin’s depravity—Judges 19:1—20:28

If biblical texts about slaughtering the Canaanites rightly make us uncomfortable (see http://www.craigkeener.org/slaughtering-the-canaanites-part-i-limiting-factors/; http://www.craigkeener.org/slaughtering-the-canaanites-part-ii-switching-sides/; http://www.craigkeener.org/slaughtering-the-canaanites-part-iii-gods-ideal/), biblical texts about Israel’s wholesale slaughter of fellow Israelites (Judg 20:48; 21:10-12) may with good reason make us sick.

Judges 19—21 is a tale of horror, and no one should try to understand it otherwise. After narrating the exploits (and failures) of many of Israel’s judges, Judges frames its closing chapters with an ominous refrain: “In those days there was no king in Israel; each person did what was right in their own eyes” (Judg 17:6; 21:25). The accounts between these two bookends illustrate the horror of that moral anarchy even more hideously than most earlier events in the Book of Judges. Half the refrain also appears in Judg 19:1, at the beginning of the book’s closing story, signalling the special unity of the single story in chs. 19—21. It is this story, and especially the climax of its broadest violence, that I survey here.

A fatal gang rape

A Levite seeking to regain his concubine experiences excessive hospitality in Bethlehem (Judg 19:4-9) but the epitome of inhospitality in Gibeah of Benjamin (Judg 19:15, 22). (The one hospitable person there was a sojourner, a fellow Ephraimite, not a local; 19:16.) This story may thus have been of special interest early in David’s reign, since David was from Bethlehem, whereas Saul, his rival predecessor, was from Gibeah!

What highlights all the more starkly the contrast between hospitable Bethlehem and murderous Gibeah is the reason that the travelers chose to rest in Gibeah to begin with, rather than a somewhat nearer town. The Levite chose to trust the hospitality of Gibeah more than that of Jebus—the future Jerusalem—because Gibeah was an Israelite town and Jebus wasn’t (Judg 19:11-12). Yet Gibeah soon acted like a pagan town—like Sodom, in fact. (Israel’s prophets often later compared Israel’s wickedness to Sodom more explicitly—e.g., Isa 3:9; Jer 23:14; Lam 4:6; Ezek 16:46-56.)

Local thugs want to gang-rape the Levite visitor just as Sodom’s thugs wanted to violate the angelic visitors in Genesis 19. Likewise, the Levite’s host in Gibeah offers two women instead of his male guest, just as Lot in Sodom offered his daughters. (Like Lot, the Levite’s host was not from, and had not fully absorbed the attitude toward strangers in, the wicked town. But both Lot and the Levite’s host reflected some of their cultures’ values in other ways.)

Yet here, in contrast to the story of Lot and Sodom in Genesis 19, there is no divine intervention; God seems silent, and events follow their natural course with no deliverance. The Levite saves himself, his servant and his host’s household by forcing his concubine outside to the insistent criminals in the street. But God does not intervene in this tragedy, in contrast to his intervention in Sodom (just as Jephthah’s daughter is not delivered in Judg 11:34-40, in contrast to Abraham’s son in Gen 22:10-14).

Whereas in Genesis the angels “seized” Lot’s family to rescue them (Gen 19:16), here the Levite “seizes” his concubine to substitute her for himself (Judg 19:25, a matter perhaps conveniently omitted in the Levite’s retelling of the events in 20:5). He later seizes her violated body to cut it apart (19:29). (That the term used for “cutting” here often refers to cleaving meat or sacrifices may drive home the horror even more harshly.)

A war to avenge injustice

Many Israelites rightly took rape seriously, especially when someone violated their sister (Gen 34:27; 2 Sam 13:32), though the counterviolence sometimes killed the innocent alongside the guilty (cf. Gen 49:6-7). Gang-raping the concubine to death, however—an atrocity perhaps underlined all the more graphically by her subsequent dismemberment—stunned Israel’s sensitivities even in this anarchic period (Judg 19:30). Thus the rest of the tribes of Israel gather to demand justice, perhaps determined to prevent further atrocities caused by the continued disintegration of public morality.

The Benjamites, however, refuse to hand over the perpetrators (Judg 20:13). Were they simply unable to locate them and unwilling to admit it? The language of Judges probably instead suggests more deliberate refusal. Most likely, ethnic and family ties prove stronger here than ethical ones, as in the case of the Shechemites’ earlier murder of Abimelech’s brothers (9:1-6). Nepotism, racism, nationalism and other self-centered systems of group loyalties can blind us to moral truth. Not only the other men of Gibeah, but the other Benjamites join them, preemptively preparing for Israel’s attack (20:14).

By refusing to punish those responsible, the Benjamites embrace corporate responsibility for the murder (cf. Deut 21:1-9). Israel, which in the Book of Judges was often notably unable to unite against foreign aggressors without a divinely-empowered judge, now unites to battle the Israelite tribe of Benjamin (Judg 20:8-11, a paragraph that begins and concludes by noting Israel’s unity “as one”).

The Israelites heavily outnumbered the Benjamites (20:15-17), though the terrain probably prevented them from deploying their numbers all at once and the Benjamites had the advantage of distance “artillery” (20:16). Like all ancient peoples, Israel consulted its god before battle; yet God allows Israel to suffer heavily in it (20:21). Again the Lord remains largely silent in the background, the first few times apparently speaking only through the casting of lots that decides which tribe will go to battle (Judg 20:18) or whether they should keep engaging the battle (20:23, 28). Only after many losses does God promise victory (20:28), and unlike the stories in Joshua when God was with his people, this victory still comes at a cost of many Israelite warriors’ lives (20:31; cf. Josh 7:5, 11-12).

The suffering of many individuals before a common objective is achieved fits much of our present existence in this world; both in Scripture and today, suffering comes to both the righteous and the unrighteous. Still, there may also be another reason for God’s relative silence in this narrative, a silence that allows even more innocent people to suffer. Benjamin is not the only tribe in Israel that is sinning. God knows the rest of Israel’s moral state, as becomes clear later in the narrative, the part treated in Part II (to keep any one post from running too long), to be posted tomorrow (http://www.craigkeener.org/slaughtering-the-benjamites-ii-merciless-anarchy-judges-2029-2125/).

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No weapon formed against you will prosper—Isaiah 54:17

Scripture contains many promises about protection, including this one. It is appropriate to remember such promises in prayer, looking to God for protection.

Sometimes, however, God’s people suffer. In fact, some texts warn us to expect this (2 Tim 3:12). So while we can trust that not a hair from our head will fall to the ground apart from our Father’s plan for us, this does not mean that we will not face attacks—only that God has everything under control and the final outcome is his.

The context of this passage focuses on God’s people. Israel had sinned, been judged, but now would be restored, and those who had tried to oppose Israel would be crushed. God would fulfill his promises to his people; he judged them when they sinned but now that they had turned back to him, he would restore them, and nothing could stop his plan.

There is a principle here that God vindicates his people; but it is not an ironclad guarantee for every circumstance in the short run for each individual. (For example, though God often does provide protection for Christians, he does not do so all the time; many Christians have died as faithful martyrs.)

It does encourage us, however, that God will ultimately vindicate his servants and his plans for history. So whatever we must face in the short run, in the long run we can be sure of God’s faithfulness and vindication if we remain faithful to him.

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Slaughtering the Canaanites, Part III: not God’s ideal

(Continued from Part II; see also Part I)  Why didn’t more Canaanites join with Israel, as did Rahab and, in a sense, the Gibeonites? Most people understood their gods as ethnic gods, gods of their peoples. Becoming part of another people, especially the enemies of one’s people, was viewed as being a traitor. Although foreigners did find refuge in Israel in various periods (e.g., Ruth 1:16; 1 Sam 26:6; 2 Sam 6:11; 8:18; 12:9-10; 15:18; 18:21; 20:7, 23; 23:39; 24:16, 18; Jer 39:16-18), there were cultural barriers that made full integration difficult (cf. Gen 23:4; Exod 2:22; Ruth 2:10) and, on a corporate level, usually unthinkable. Again, the one example of this, in Gen 34, was aborted by betrayal from the Israelite side. It was not that God did not have a better purpose, but that the world was not ready for it. Crossing those cultural boundaries happened much more often in the later Jewish Diaspora, and particularly (moving past the covenant requirement of physical circumcision) in the Diaspora mission recounted in Acts.

Israel conquered peoples who fought against Israel instead of surrendered. Under the circumstances, this conquest may have been the best available means to procure a land for a nation to flourish as a vehicle for God’s plan in history. But even if it was the best available means, as followers of Jesus we recognize that it was never God’s ideal.

Jesus noted that some statements in the law were divine concessions to human weakness (e.g., Mark 10:5)—God sometimes accommodated people at their level of understanding. That does not mean that God was not active among them, but that he also communicated in ways that were intelligible to them culturally, stretching them toward his ideal without usually stretching them to the breaking point.

Jesus tells us God’s ideal: Love even your enemies (Matt 5:43-44; Luke 6:27, 35). Loving our enemies is not a “technique” that always makes them like us. Sometimes those who love their enemies, or at least choose not to harm them, get killed. That happened to Gandhi. That happened to Martin Luther King, Jr. And most relevantly here (and not irrelevant to models used by Gandhi and King), that happened to our Lord.

Jesus proved this new way of peace by how he loved his enemies—when we were his enemies: “God proves his love for us this way: while we were sinners, Christ died for us. How much more now, having been made right in God’s sight through Jesus’s sacrificial blood, we shall be saved from God’s anger through him. For if, while we were God’s enemies, we were put in right relationship with him through the death of his Son, how much more, having been put in right relationship, shall we be saved through his life” (Rom 5:8-10). Jesus announced a different kind of kingdom established a different way—not only confronting, but loving, our enemies. Like our Lord Jesus, we must trust our heavenly Father, who raises the dead, to bring his own plan to fruition.

(Also of interest: Slaughtering the Benjamites, part 1 and part 2)

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Slaughtering the Canaanites, Part II: Switching sides

(Continued from Part 1)

Reading through Joshua in Hebrew several years ago I had to keep putting it down. As a follower of Jesus, the prince of peace, I could not stomach the slaughter I was again encountering afresh. Revulsion is an appropriate response for those who understand God’s loving heart for people; as God said later, “Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?” (Ezek 18:23, NIV).

But my most recent read through the Hebrew text of Joshua has been different, and also appropriate in another way. Jericho’s walls collapsed, and Israel won battle after battle. Yet other peoples in Canaan continue desperately gathering armies against them. As I kept reading, I found myself repeatedly thinking, “Why are these kings so stupid? Don’t they realize that they cannot war against Israel’s God? Why don’t they switch sides?” (I have to confess, that though I should read from the standpoint of the history of God’s people, I sometimes find myself as a person of non-Israelite descent wishing that more Gentiles in the Old Testament turned to the true God.) These peoples knew the stories about this powerful God fighting for Israel (Josh 2:10-11; 9:24; cf. later 1 Sam 4:7-8; 6:6)!

I found this way of reading Joshua confirmed when I reached Joshua 11:20 (NIV): “For it was the LORD himself who hardened their hearts to wage war against Israel, so that he might destroy them totally …” God hardening hearts is another question that provokes discussion, but note here the point that God was destroying them through Israel because they waged war against Israel. These enemies had an alternative: they could have changed sides and been welcomed.

How do we know that? Because a few people did just that. To survive, the Gibeonites came over to Israel’s side. Nevertheless, they chose to do it deceptively, and thus ended up with a servile status only somewhat better than typical ancient prisoners of war. But Israel defended them as allies against the other peoples (Josh 10:6-8); later, God himself avenged them when an Israelite king broke the treaty with some of them (2 Sam 21:1-6).

Another approach, however, would have been better: had they embraced Israel’s God, they would have been welcomed among God’s people, as the law commanded (Exod 12:48-49; Num 9:14; 15:15-16), and as the Book of Joshua recognized (Josh 20:9). (See discussion of Rahab, below.)

By giving up condemned practices and proclaiming allegiance to the true, powerful God doing miracles for Israel, they could have lived and should have even found welcome. Israel was forbidden to mistreat a foreigner among them (Exod 22:21; 23:9; Lev 19:33; Deut 24:14; 27:19). Because most foreigners were displaced from their homelands in an agrarian society based on land ownership, their condition was vulnerable. Thus God would watch out for them as for others in need (Deut 10:18), and he commanded his people to do the same (Lev 19:10; 23:22; 25:35; Deut 24:19, 21; 26:12-13). Indeed, Israelites were to love a foreigner among them like a fellow Israelite (Lev 19:34)—i.e., as one of the neighbors they should love like themselves (19:18; cf. Luke 10:27-29, 33).

Justice was to be the same for both foreigner and descendant of Israel (Exod 12:49; Num 9:14; 15:16; Deut 1:16); indeed, Israelites themselves had some foreign blood (cf. e.g., Gen 41:50; Exod 2:21-22). Thus, for example, when a son of mixed parentage was to be executed for a crime (Lev 24:10-14), the LORD made explicit that the same punishment was to apply regardless of one’s parentage (Lev 24:15-16).

The chief example of this strategy in Joshua is the action of Rahab. The Israelite Achan betrayed Israel’s God, hid some of Jericho’s loot under his tent, and brought death on himself and his family (Josh 7:1, 21-26). (Because the family would have known that he hid the loot under the tent, their silence showed their complicity and hope to profit.) By contrast, from fear of the LORD (2:9, 12) Rahab betrayed Jericho, hid Israel’s spies on her roof, and brought deliverance for herself and her family (2:4-6; 6:17, 25). Her descendants continued to live safely in Israel after that time (6:25), and Matthew’s Gospel lists her as an ancestor of King David and of the Messiah (Matt 1:5). Like some of their Jewish contemporaries, early Christians cited Rahab as an example of faith (Heb 11:31; James 2:25).(Some betrayed their people to save their own lives but chose to relocate; cf. Judg 1:24-26.) (Some betrayed their people to save their own lives but chose to relocate; cf. Judg 1:24-26.)

Centuries earlier one people had wanted to unite with the Israelites and intermarry with them. Jacob’s sons posed one condition on this people, the people of Shechem: they had to accept circumcision. Painful as this was for adults, this city agreed. Simeon and Levi, however, betrayed their covenant and butchered the city’s men, to avenge the rape of their sister Dinah and to prevent any counterattack (Gen 34). Jacob, meanwhile, was furious with these young men, his rash sons (34:30), and even cursed them for this years later when giving out his blessings (49:5-7). If the Canaanites knew this story, it might deter them from conversion. This time there had been no rape, however, and Israel’s defense of Gibeon should have made clear that they would now stand by their allies.

(Continued in part 3)

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Slaughtering the Canaanites, Part I: Limiting factors

The conquest of Canaan in the Book of Joshua was supposed to be the sequel to the exodus: an oppressed people, now liberated, overcome insurmountable odds to make a home for themselves in a hostile country. Today, however, many criticize the book as a blueprint for genocide. Still more troubling, some people in history have actually taken the book as a model for carrying out holy war. (The slaughter of the Canaanites never set well with most non-Israelites, however; in the first century, some Jewish writers with audiences outside the holy land avoided the topic or transformed its focus.)

How we read and apply the book, then, makes a life-and-death difference. In reading it, however, several factors should be taken into account. The most important factor for Christians I reserve for the end (in part III).

First, Old Testament scholars now emphasize the genre of Joshua’s conquest accounts. Ancient conquest lists functioned as triumph boasts, but they were understood to communicate only part of a story. Thus Egyptian records could say, “We subdued these cities”—and Egypt’s army had to march into those cities the next spring for a new offensive. Sometimes they declared, we “utterly annihilated” peoples, but the peoples continued to exist; the boast simply means they defeated their warriors. Likewise the Israelites sometimes defeated enemies “completely”—and then some of the enemies escaped (Josh 10:20). As in some other ancient conquest lists, Israel reportedly took all the land (10:40; 11:11, 16, 19)—yet much land in fact remained to be taken (13:1-7). Only a minority of cities were actually destroyed (11:13), cities defeated at one point often had to be retaken (cf. 8:17, 22, 24; 12:16; Judg 1:22-25), and Israel settled mostly in the hill country. Both the Book of Judges and archaeological evidence (if we have in view the right period) show us that Joshua’s conquest lists, like others of the era, summarized victories in glowing terms not always intended completely literally.

Second, God did not allow Israel to take the land until “the sin of the Amorites” living there “has … reached its full measure” (Gen 15:16, NIV). That is, God was executing judgment on the Canaanites through the invasion. If God could destroy most of humanity in a flood or could destroy Sodom and Gomorrah through fire, he could also send judgment through other means that he chose, including invasions. For example, God later judged Israel and Judah through Assyria and Babylon, although the agents of his judgment intended the violence only for their own purposes and would in turn be judged for their sin (Isa 10:5-14).

Whether we like it or not, God has the right to judge humanity; whether we like it or not, every one of us will sooner or later face death in one way or another, and must answer to him for our choices. Once Canaan’s sin “reached its full measure,” God had the right to execute capital punishment on the society, and chose to do it through Israel. This is why God’s orders clearly restricted this punishment to the land in question. “Holy war” and devoting things to deities for destruction were concepts understood in cultures surrounding Israel. But Israel could fight such a war only under God’s direct orders (though we also see a “just war” in Gen 14:14-16 to free slaves; cf. 2 Sam 30:7-8, 18-20).

Third, God knew what would happen to Israel if they shared the land with the Canaanites—what did in fact happen later. At this time Israel was virtually alone among surrounding cultures in being monotheistic and aniconic (no deity-images). Israel would be very susceptible to “progressive” outside influences from apparently stronger cultures. Based on thousands of remains of cremated babies at Carthage (a Phoenician settlement elsewhere) and other evidence many scholars speak of Canaan’s special depravity. Many Canaanite towns’ annual revolts against Egypt, once Egyptian armies were no longer in sight, also suggest that nothing less than total war would subdue them firmly.

Fourth, most of the peoples in the land chose to fight Israel, ensuring these peoples’ destruction (Josh 11:20). Pacifism has much to be said for it as an expression of sacrificial Christian devotion, but ancient Israel did not yet have the foundations for such an approach. Had Israel sought to settle in the land without fighting, their enemies would have annihilated them. God does perform miracles, but often through what is already at hand (e.g., Exod 14:21); in this case, God promised Israel victory but also summoned them to do their part and fight for it.

Nevertheless, if there is any continuity at all in the biblical picture of God, the slaughter of the Canaanites cannot ever have been God’s ideal. (This discussion is continued in Part II and Part III. One may also consult works such as a recent book by Paul Copan: http://www.amazon.com/Is-God-Moral-Monster-Testament/dp/0801072751)

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David’s judgment—2 Samuel 12:11

David’s sin regarding Bathsheba and Uriah undermined the testimony of David’s past devotion to God. He had dishonored God’s name, and now God, who had graciously blessed him beyond measure, publicly shamed David. Because David was a leader in God’s household, his behavior affected many others and required strict judgment (12:14); God takes sin very seriously, especially when it leads others to misunderstand his holiness.

David would experience God’s mercy, but not before he had experienced great anguish. Sometimes we think that David’s punishment ended with his unnamed son’s death (12:18). But David would lose two or three more sons afterward, many of his followers would die, and one of his daughters would be terribly abused. He had set the example by sexually exploiting one subject and killing another. Sexual exploitation and murder were soon to devastate his own household.

In 12:11, Nathan prophesies against David judgment from within his household, including the rape of some his wives (as he committed immorality with another man’s wife) by a friend of his, in public. This prophecy provides almost an outline for the rest of 2 Samuel.

The Bible is clear that suffering is not always judgment; sometimes even when it is judgment, it is judgment on a group, not on the specific person who suffers. In chapter 13, David’s son Amnon rapes his half-sister Tamar. It is important to remember that Tamar is innocent in this narrative. Yet, although David was angry (13:21), he apparently does not even punish Amnon! Whether that is because he recognizes that Amnon has simply carried his own example of sexual exploitation further, or because he was reluctant to discipline (as later with Absalom), he leaves a matter of justice unsettled.

Before the end of chapter 13, Tamar’s full brother Absalom avenges his sister’s honor by killing Amnon. Perhaps more than coincidentally, Amnon also happens to be the brother immediately Absalom’s elder, meaning that—if Chileab is uninvolved in politics (he is nowhere mentioned)—Absalom is also next in line for the throne by birthright (2 Sam 3:2-3).

Eventually Absalom returns from exile through the help of Joab, who knows that the king longs for Absalom’s return anyway (ch. 14). (Absalom later burns Joab’s field to get his attention, in 14:31. It works, but we are not too surprised when Joab later is unfriendly toward the spoiled prince, ensuring that he is quite dead in 18:14.) Absalom eventually leads a revolt that nearly destroyed David and his allies (chs. 15—18)—and broke his father’s heart. Absalom slept with his father’s concubines in the sight of Israel (16:21), despite the fact that this was against the law (Lev 20:11).

Once this revolt was quelled and David returned to Jerusalem in peace (ch. 19), he had to deal with another revolt in the wake of the previous one, by a Benjamite usurper (ch. 20). By the opening of 1 Kings, the son immediately younger than Absalom is plotting to seize the throne (1 Kgs 1). Though forgiven by God and restored to his throne, David suffered the consequences of his pattern of sin for the rest of his life.

This story provides a harsh warning for spiritual leaders today who forget their responsibility to live holy lives. It is true that we all have areas of weakness and failure and we cannot afford to throw stones at those who fall. Any of us can live holy lives only by God’s grace, who takes us through the dark times and teaches us deeper dependence on him. May we learn to draw close to him, and encourage one another in doing so. Not only for our own sake, but also for that of others, and for the Lord’s honor.

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“As he thinketh in his heart, so is he”—Proverbs 23:7

People sometimes quote Prov 23:7 to say that the real person is the person inside, the way a person thinks. This is a real principle—Jesus said that by their fruits you will know them (Matt 7:16-20) and that a person’s behavior issues from the heart (Matt 15:17-20). Getting it from this verse in Proverbs is more problematic.

The first issue is how to translate this line. The NASB quotes the line similarly to the KJV here: “as he thinks within himself, so he is.” The NIV, however, renders it: “for he is the kind of person who is always thinking about the cost” (which fits the context); the NRSV even translates it, “for like hair in the throat, so are they.” If I were following the Greek translation, I would agree with the NRSV here, but the traditional Hebrew text seems more easily translated like we have it in the NASB or the KJV.

The second issue is the point in the context. The context is a selfish man urging you to eat the food he sets before you, but his heart is not really with you. If you eat too much of the food he shares, you will be sorry, because he really does not want to share much with you. His real attitude is what’s in his heart.

In the ancient world, sharing food obligated people to loyalty to one another. But Proverbs warns that you cannot trust your host if he is selfish; he may encourage you to eat as much as you like, but you will be sorry if you trust him. What matters is not what he says to you, but what he really thinks in his heart (23:6-8). In the same way, when you dine before a ruler and are tempted to eat the lavish meal prepared before you, put a knife to your throat (figuratively speaking) to keep yourself from eating too much (23:2).

You have to know the character of your host. When my wife cooks something, she really wants to share it as much as possible. I try to use resources more sparingly, to spread them around, so I eat and share food more sparingly. But when you don’t know someone well enough to trust their intentions, it may be wise to see how generous they really wish to be before imposing on them.

The point is not a general illustration about thinking in the heart (although it might illustrate that) but about keeping yourself and your appetite under control when your host may be more concerned about the cost of the food than about entertaining you. My Western culture has less sense of obligation to invite people for meals, but we still need to be sensitive to whether someone really wants to help us in given ways or we will be seen as a drain on their time and resources. In other words, choose your friends and allies wisely, and do not let your hair down (for those who still have hair!) in front of just anyone. Not everyone has the same intention.

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The Lord’s Army in Joel 2

The Bible often speaks of spiritual warfare, for example in Ephesians 6:10-20, where the armor includes righteousness, faith, and truth. In Revelation 12:11, believers “triumph over” their accuser by the blood of the lamb and the message to which they bear witness.

Not all the biblical passages that some interpreters apply to spiritual warfare really mean that, however. It took me a long time to figure out that when most people were singing, “They rush on the city, they run on the wall,” they did not realize that they were singing about judgment. They were thinking of Joel 2:9 out of context. The passage is not referring to a spiritual battle, but a physical one. Nor is it referring to believers.

Although the third chapter of Joel seems to describe a future war, chapters one and two depict as an invading army a devastating locust plague (Joel 1:4; 2:25). This text does not depict the church as a spiritual army of evangelists; it depicts locusts as an agricultural judgment against the sins of God’s people. Although Joel uses figurative language, as was common in the prophets, the great army that carries out God’s command (Joel 2:11) is explicitly an “army” of locusts in Joel 2:25 (see also 1:4, 6-7)! If God’s people recognized the judgment and repented, God would turn back the judgment and restore his people (1:13-14; 2:13-32).

This image of a locust plague, however, does blend into greater future judgments; it functions as a foretaste of them. The prophets often grouped events according to the kind of event they were rather than specifying their exact sequence.

The day of the Lord may apply to the day of God’s reckoning through the judgment of the locusts (Joel 1:15, 2:1, 11, 31), but it also foreshadows a greater day of God’s judgment to come (3:14). At that time the nations would gather against God’s people and be defeated (Joel 3:16). The darkness of the locusts obscuring the sky (2:2, 10, 30) foreshadows the judgment of that day (3:15). The restoration after the locusts (2:26-27) resembles the restoration after the attack from the nations (3:18).

Of course, the nations gathered against God’s people in the future judgment of Joel 3 do not represent godly spiritual warriors, either. God’s army in Joel simply cannot be identified with the righteous, if we pay attention to context at all.

The New Testament does not read all these events as chronologically bound together; it applies part of the context to something different than either locusts or war. Jesus’s followers learned that the beginning of the promised outpouring of the Spirit and era of salvation happened not simultaneously with either a locust plague or nations attacking Jerusalem. It was a different kind of foretaste of the future (2:28-32; Acts 2:17-21, 39).

That the passage is sometimes misapplied does not mean that it has nothing to say to us. The passage tells us plainly that God does not look the other way in a world of injustice. Although the promised day of the Lord will set all things right, even judgments in the present age foreshadow that future judgment. Like most passages that address judgment in this world, this one addresses judgments on societies, rather than implying that every individual who suffers has done something wrong. Nevertheless, that sufferings strike even the proud oppressors should remind them that they are ultimately no stronger than those they oppress. Judgments remind us that all of us will one day have to answer for how we have treated others and how we have heeded God’s summons to us. God is not looking the other way. (See also http://www.craigkeener.org/let-the-weak-say-i-am-strong-—-joel-310/.)