Considering Biblical Genocide
by
Michael R. Walker
The “Holy War” passages in the Bible that describe the Israelite
Conquest of Canaan are surely some of the most disturbing – and
disturbingly misused – passages in all of Scripture.
In Deuteronomy 7:2, for instance, Moses tells the Israelites that when they
enter the Land of Canaan, which God had promised to give them, they will
encounter its current inhabitants whom they “must destroy totally.” And
then in the description of the conquest in Joshua we find these instructions
carried out in a sweeping manner. For instance, in Joshua 6, after God
collapses the walls of Jericho, the Israelites “devoted the city to the
LORD and destroyed with the sword every living thing in it—men and women,
young and old, cattle, sheep and donkeys.” The Hebrew word here translated
“devoted” is herem and it’s a technical term in a variety of such Old
Testament passages describing things (and people) that Israel was supposed
to “devote” to the Lord, often devotion through destruction: “Herem
War.”
Some refer to the Conquest of Canaan as “genocide,” since the term means
the “killing of a people,” which is exactly what’s described in the
Book of Joshua. God’s covenant people were to be holy, and the rationale
of the Conquest seems to have been that the whole Canaanite culture of
worshipping false gods in the Land needed to be eradicated so that Israel
would not be tempted to violate their covenant with God and themselves be
destroyed (Deut. 7:4).
These passages certainly jolt modern readers, and undoubtedly they were
intended to raise the eyebrows of their ancient near eastern readers as
well. I have recently had some conversations about these passages,
considering them in light of the character of God, the teaching of Jesus in
the New Testament, and “holy war” themes in the modern geopolitical
landscape. Of course, these are areas of disagreement among Christians, and
tomes have been written on each of these issues. But here are a few things
that have come up in conversation.
The Broader Drama of Redemption
First things first: it is important to remember that the Conquest of Canaan
is one event in the broader drama of God’s war against sin and evil, and
his mercy toward sinful humanity. Ultimately, ancient Israel, including the
Conquest of Canaan, played an indispensable part in the story we now know
climaxes in Jesus Christ, through whom salvation is brought to all nations
of the earth. Our reading of the Conquest narratives should begin with this
in mind.
In the course of redemptive-history, God’s justice and mercy always go
together. Put bluntly and simply, in the broader biblical narrative, God
both extends grace toward humanity by saving some and judges humanity in
destroying others. The story of the Flood in Genesis is a gruesome example
(Genesis 6-9). While we like to make it a cute story to depict on the wall
of children’s nurseries, the story is about how God destroys just about
every living thing on earth, because it had become so corrupt. The mercy of
God is seen in his provision of salvation for a few through Noah and the
Ark. This story highlights God’s willingness to judge human sin through
destruction and shows God’s mercy by giving humanity a fresh start. This
theme runs throughout Scripture, right up to the Final Judgment when the
Messiah returns. When we take sin as seriously as God does, including our
own, the horror of human destruction doesn’t diminish, but we gain a
perspective unlike the modern presumption of human goodness and belief in a
distant and benign Creator. God is very much involved in history; and God is
both just and merciful in the face of human sin and rebellion.
The uniqueness of the Conquest of Canaan, then, seems not to be that God
would destroy human beings but that (a) he would single out a particular
people group for destruction and (b) he would use one people group as his
instrument to destroy another. Hence, the term “genocide” applied to
this instance.
Looking More Closely at Some Aspects of the Conquest
While I don’t think there is any way to avoid characterizing the biblical
narrative of the Conquest as “genocidal,” there are several other
important things to keep in mind. The biblical narrative of the Conquest
does not simply focus on one ethnic group (Israel) wiping out another ethnic
group (the Canaanites). True to the broader scope of redemption just
mentioned, it really focuses on God (the primary “protagonist”) vs. sin
and idolatry (the primary “antagonist”). We see this in the story in
numerous ways.
The Canaanites are pictured as wicked and idolatrous, toward whom their
Creator, who is owed perfect obedience, exercises forbearance (Gen 15:16).
And when the Canaanites are destroyed, the biblical narratives go to great
lengths to emphasize that God achieves their destruction, not the Israelite
solders: it is God who collapses the walls of Jericho (Joshua 6), and it is
God who “threw down huge hail stones from heaven” on the Amorites, and
“there were more who died because of the hailstones than the Israelites
killed with the sword” (Josh. 10:11).
That the drama is really about God vs. his enemies and not Israel vs. the
Canaanites can also be seen in God’s willingness to punish Israel when
they turn against him: he sends them into Exile (e.g. 2 Kings 17). In the
story of the Conquest, God had chosen them to be his covenant people who
would receive the gift of the Land in which they were to live in holiness.
When they violate their covenant with God, the instrument of destruction
becomes the object of wrath.
We can also see the primacy of the covenantal nature of the relationship and
the less-than-“pure” ethnic identification by the fact that Canaanites
could apparently be spared by repenting and turning to God, such as in the
case of Rahab and her family (Josh. 2). God’s covenant people were not
strictly defined by ethnicity but rather by covenant faithfulness.
Additionally, “the commander of the army of the Lord” who comes to
Joshua in a vision refuses to identify himself with the side of Israel
(Josh. 5:13-15). That would be a misconstrual of the situation. Israel has
been brought onto God’s side and has been given a special role to play in
God’s fight against sin and evil; God has not come to take up arms for
Israel.
Further still, and very importantly, the special role given to Israel in
fighting the Canaanites was in the end not for the sake only of the nation
of Israel but was one part of God’s ultimate plan to use Israel as a
blessing to all nations of the earth (Gen. 12:1-4).
To the above clarification about who is really doing the fighting and why,
we should note that the “special role” that the nation of Israel was
given in carrying out a policy of Herem War was strictly limited to the era
of the Conquest. God gives no extension to the policy beyond that particular
campaign.
The above points at least help us to place the story in the broader plan of
redemption and in the light of God’s justice and mercy. And though those
who are prone to misuse biblical texts are not prone to careful exegesis,
keeping these things in mind should also distance the biblical narrative
from any contemporary programs of nationalistic violence and ethnic
cleansing.
The Warrior God In the New Testament
In the New Testament, the picture of God as a Warrior is by no means left
behind. In many ways God’s judgment on the Canaanites as Israel enters the
Promised Land foreshadows the Final Judgment, where the “King of kings”
comes “to strike down the nations” prior to establishing the New Heaven
and Earth in which the saints will reign with Christ forever (Rev. 19-22).
Indeed, in his first advent, Jesus the King came to earth to battle against
God’s enemies, and the victory of God was achieved through the cross,
which mysteriously defeats the powers of darkness (Col. 2:15), and through
the Resurrection, which triumphs over death and destruction once and for
all.
As God’s New Covenant people await Christ’s return, when that victory
will be fully manifest on earth, we continue the battle through spiritual
warfare as we witness to the reign of Jesus Christ. The Apostle Paul
famously puts it: “For our struggle is not against enemies of blood and
flesh, but against the rulers, against the authorities of this present
darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places”
(Eph. 6:12). If in the “Old Covenant” (Old Testament) God’s covenant
people took up physical arms for physical battles in the cause of God’s
Kingdom, in the “New Covenant” (New Testament) the war enters a new
phase of deep, spiritual intensity. God has fulfilled his promise to
Abraham, that through his descendants all the nations of the earth would be
blessed: God’s people are now not a “nation” but among all nations,
and we conquer not by the sword by the proclamation of the Gospel that Jesus
is already the reigning King who will come again.
This does not, however, mean that in this era, before Christ returns and
takes up the sword himself (Rev. 19:15), that God has not given the power of
the sword to anyone. In Romans 13, we read that God has given the power of
the sword to legitimate “governing authorities” to be “the servant of
God to execute wrath on the wrongdoer.” The “state” is supposed to
reward righteousness and punish evil. In other words, they are to rule with
justice, and they have been given the power of the sword in the service of
justice.
There sill remains the controversial question of whether Christians can then
participate in the state’s God-ordained activity of ruling with justice by
the sword. I’ll have to return to this issue separately in the near future.
(The two most common Christian approaches to answering this question are
those of Christian pacifism, which emphasizes Jesus’ teachings on
nonviolence, and Just War theory, which emphasizes Christian responsibility
to protect the lives of the innocent. While both positions are defensible
(depending on the specifics), Just War theory has broader representation in
the Christian tradition and I think it is able to deal better with the
breadth of biblical teaching on these issues.)
In the meantime, here’s some reading to consider on the Conquest of Canaan
and the politically charged yet biblical theme of God as a Warrior.
Some Suggested Reading on the Conquest of Canaan
The following are only a few suggestions. They are from authors who have
what I would consider to be a “high view” of Scripture – in other
words, they really try to deal with the theology of the Conquest narratives
as they appear in Scripture, rather than setting them aside on the
assumption that they merely represent a primitive religious consciousness in
ancient Israel – though they represent a variety of approaches to the
biblical narratives.
Goldingay, John. Israel’s Gospel. Old Testament Theology, Vol. 1 [1] .
Downer’s Grove: IVP, 2003. See pages 474-505 along with the postscript on
the nature of historical narratives in the Old Testament. I found
Goldingay’s treatment of the Conquest to be provocative, even if not
entirely convincing. He embraces a pretty flexible understanding of the
historicity of Old Testament historical narratives, and in the case of the
Conquest he does a theology of the history of Israel instead of a theology
of the Old Testament narratives. In other words, he makes what he admits is
a “large exception” to his usual methodology, and attempts to go behind
the text to the actual “history” of Israel and do his theology with that
“history behind the text” in mind. Because there are so many different views
on what that actual history is, the net effect of focusing on the
“history” in this case is to make the meaning of the narratives a bit
more ambiguous and less offensive for modern readers. While I find this
tempting, in order to be really convincing I think he needs to make a
stronger case for why we should employ a different methodology in dealing
with the Conquest narratives than with most other “historical
narratives” in the Old Testament.
Gundry, Stanley N., ed. Show Them No Mercy: 4 Views on God and Canaanite
Genocide [2] . Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2003. Here are four different
“conservative” approaches to the Conquest narratives and how they relate
to the teachings of Jesus in the New Testament. The one I agree with the
most is Tremper Longman’s essay, where he argues for the “spiritual
continuity” between the Conquest narrative and life as the New Covenant
people of God.
Longman, Tremper. God is a Warrior [3] . Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1995. A
more extended version of his essay in the above book.
Wright, N.T. Evil and the Justice of God [4] . Downer’s Grove: IVP, 2006.
A very good little book, a biblical theologian’s approach to re-framing a
classic theological and philosophical problem. I hesitate to offer a quote
from the book, because you really need the larger framework within which
he’s working in order to place it, but nevertheless here’s part of what
he says about the Conquest:
“We look back from our historical vantage point – and post-Enlightenment
thought has looked back from its supposed position of moral superiority –
and we shake our heads over the whole sorry business of conquest and
settlement. Ethnic cleansing, we call it; however much the Israelites had
suffered in Egypt, we find it hard to believe that they were justified in
doing what they did to the Canaanites, or that the God who was involved in
this operation was the same God we know in Jesus Christ.
And yet ever since the garden, ever since God’s grief over Noah, ever
since Babel and Abraham, the story has been about the messy way in which God
has had to work to bring the world out of the mess. Somehow, in a way we are
inclined to find offensive, God has to get his boots muddy and, it seems, to
get his hands bloody, to put the world back to rights. If we declare, as
many have done, that we would rather it not so, we face a counter-question:
Which bit of dry, clean ground are we standing on that we should pronounce
on the matter with such certainty? Dietrich Bonhoeffer declared that the
primal sin of humanity consisted in putting the knowledge of good and evil
before the knowledge of God. That is one of the further dark mysteries of
Genesis 3: there must be some substantial continuity between what we mean by
good and evil and what God means; otherwise we are in moral darkness indeed.
But it serves as a warning to us not to pontificate with too much certainty
about what God should and shouldn’t have done” (pp. 58-59).
Reprinted with Permission from www.regulafidei.com
The Rev. Michael R. Walker is a Ph.D candidate at Princeton Seminary, and Theologian in Residence at Highland Park Presbyterian Church, Dallas, TX. He is the former Executive Director of Presbyterian for Renewal.
[1] http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0830825614/105-3574792-6881266?ie=UTF8&tag=reflforrene-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=1789&creativeASIN=0830825614
[2] http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0310245680/105-3574792-6881266?ie=UTF8&tag=reflforrene-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=1789&creativeASIN=0310245680
[3] http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0310494613/105-3574792-6881266?ie=UTF8&tag=reflforrene-20&linkCode=xm2&camp=1789&creativeASIN=0310494613