| IS A WAR EVER HOLY? |
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| among existing Canaanite cities. From the time when the tribes had made a golden calf while Moses was receiving the Ten Commandments (Exodus 32), Israelites had shown a fatal weakness to infection from outside. They seemed particularly susceptible to sins of sex and idolatry, Canaan's national specialties. Israel's later history offers a negative proof of why God commanded utter destruction of Canaanites. The damning phrase in Joshua, "they did not drive them out," hints at trouble to come, and the very next book, Judges, tells of the devastating results. The Israelites slid to one of their lowest levels because they had not fulfilled the original mission of cleansing the land of impure elements. A Struggle Beyond Nations Looking back at this period of time, we tend to see the battles of Joshua as national or racial sturggles: the Israelites versus the people of Canaan. But the Bible presents the warfare as a wider struggle: one between those who followed God and those who opposed him. When God judged groups, as he judged the world in Noah's day or as he judged Sodom and Gomorrah, those few who remained faithful to him found a way to escape. And in Joshua one bright story shines out: the story of Rahab, a non-Jew. A typical Canaanite who worked as a professional prostitute, she nevetheless learned to fear and then trust the God of Israel. She escaped the fall of Jericho. Furthermore, she went on to marry a leading Israelite and became one of the ancestors of the Messiah himself, Jesus. Rahab claimed that others in her city of Jericho had quaked in fear for 40 years, waiting for the judgment of the God of Israel (2:9-11). Yet only she took the further step of seeking help. If others in Canaan had repented and turned to God, they might well have escaped punishment, as Rahab did. |
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