More Things ...18

Holy War

We closed last week with the demise of the giant Og, last of the Rephaim (see Deut. 3: 1-11). Israel’s battles in the Transjordon bring us face-to-face with an issue that has troubled bible students, pastor and scholars for centuries: the practice of extermination in Israel’s war of conquest. Og’s defeat is illustrative: Deut 3:6

Deuteronomy 3:6 ESV

And we devoted them to destruction, as we did to Sihon the king of Heshbon, devoting to destruction every city, men, women, and children.

Og was lord of Bashan, the region that included Mount Hermon. We saw that the verb translated “devote to destruction” shares the same root consonants as Mount Hermon (Kh-r-m). The wars with Sihon and Og foreshadowed the logic of the kherem, the act of devoting something to destruction, a logic that, as we will see in this meeting, has the Nephilim bloodlines as its focus.

Kherem and the Biblical Supernatural Worldview

The idea of kherem is broader than warfare. Fundamental to the concept is a sanctioning of some person or thing because is it forbidden either due to an accused status or due to Yahweh’s exclusive ownership and use. Persons or objects could be consecrated to Yahweh using this verb. Lev 27:28

Leviticus 27:28 ESV

“But no devoted thing that a man devotes to the Lord, of anything that he has, whether man or beast, or of his inherited field, shall be sold or redeemed; every devoted thing is most holy to the Lord.

No other object or person could be substituted for that which was sanctified in this sense. The death sentence for worshipping another god was described with the verb kharam. Exo 22:20

Exodus 22:20 ESV

“Whoever sacrifices to any god, other than the Lord alone, shall be devoted to destruction.

Any person guilty of this crime was accursed. The sentence could not be revoked. Yahweh was the exclusive owner of that life or thing.

Joshua’s kherem must be viewed against the backdrop of Gen 6: 1-4 and the Deut. 32 worldview. Yahweh had disinherited the nations, assigning them to lesser gods. Gen 6: 1-4 is evoked by Israel’s initial contact with the occupants of the land in Numbers, where the giant Anakim are described as descendants of the Nephilim. As we will see in the discussion that follows, this belief is behind the conquest passages that use “devote to destruction” (kherem) to describe Israel’s warfare on certain occasions. Remember the land here was Yahweh’s portion and alloted to God’s people - the lesser watchers, godlings, knew this.

In the view of the biblical writers, Israel is at war with enemies spawned by rival divine beings. The Nephilim bloodlines were not like the peoples of the disinherited nations. Gen 10 makes it clear that the people who were disinherited owed their existence to Yahweh. It clearly casts the human inhabitants of those nations as owing their existence to God - as they descended from Noah’s sons and, therefore, Noah — all the way back to Adam. The Nephilim bloodlines had a different pedigree. They were produced by other divine beings. They did not belong to Yahweh, and he therefore had no interest in claiming them. Coexistence was not possible with the spawn of other gods.

Viewed against this backdrop, Joshua’s Kherem is a holy war begun under Moses in the Transjordon, specifically against the Amorite giant kings Sihon and Og. The lives of Israel’s enemies were to be “devoted to destruction: as an act of sacrifice to Yahweh. But just who was in God’s cross-hairs to this extent?

Numbers 13:32–33 ESV

So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”

This first encounter of Israel with the inhabitants of the land involves the Anakim. The report of the spies contains the sweeping comment that everyone they saw in the land was unusually tall. There are good textual reasons for not taking this assessment as a literally true assessment in terms of its comprehensive nature. We’ve already noted that Biblical writers at times use sweeping generalizations that are not intended to be precise. For instance, Gen 15:16 and Joshua 7:7 referred to the occupants of the land as Amorites when it is abundantly clear that there were other groups in the land. The term “Canaanite” is also used in the same imprecise way.

Consequently, it is much more coherent to read that the spy saw unusually tall people groups everywhere they went in the land. The bible tells us where the spies ventured ventured: the Negeb, the hill country, the seacoast, and along the Jordon. The spies saw Anakim in those locations among Amalakites, Hittites, Jebusites, Amorites and Canaanites.

This point helps explain something that will become apparent as we proceed - the Kherem in the conquest is used only of assaults in cities or locales that overlap with giant clan population centers. There is one exception, a lone indiscriminate use of Kherem

Deuteronomy 7:1–2 ESV

“When the Lord your God brings you into the land that you are entering to take possession of it, and clears away many nations before you, the Hittites, the Girgashites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations more numerous and mightier than you, and when the Lord your God gives them over to you, and you defeat them, then you must devote them to complete destruction. You shall make no covenant with them and show no mercy to them.

This reflects the report Moses had recieved 40 years earlier. Its meaning is not that all inhabitants of the land are put under Kherem because everyone is a giant. Its meaning is that, wherever they are found, the bloodlines of the giant clans - descendents of the Nephilim — are to be eradicated. Once the conquest of Canaan actually begins, that is indeed how the term is used in the reports of Israelite victories. We must allow the more precise passages to inform the generalizations.

The Wars of Joshua

Soon after the victories over Sihon and Og, Moses died without every having stepped into the promised land. The leadership of the nation passed to Joshua, who was directed by God to spy out the land, then cross the Jordon from the site of Shittim, and renew the covenant between God and Israel. The conquest began at Jericho, a central location of the land. A general military campaign would have the immediate effect of separating the cities of the north and south regions. Divide and conquer.

As with Jericho, the city of Ai was “devoted to destruction” after the spiritual failure of Achan Josh 8:26

Joshua 8:26 ESV

But Joshua did not draw back his hand with which he stretched out the javelin until he had devoted all the inhabitants of Ai to destruction.

Joshua then moved south into the hill country, part of the land that the spies of Moses has surveyed where they had seen Anakim. The southern campaign in in Joshua 10: 28-43

Joshua 10:28–43 ESV

As for Makkedah, Joshua captured it on that day and struck it, and its king, with the edge of the sword. He devoted to destruction every person in it; he left none remaining. And he did to the king of Makkedah just as he had done to the king of Jericho. Then Joshua and all Israel with him passed on from Makkedah to Libnah and fought against Libnah. And the Lord gave it also and its king into the hand of Israel. And he struck it with the edge of the sword, and every person in it; he left none remaining in it. And he did to its king as he had done to the king of Jericho. Then Joshua and all Israel with him passed on from Libnah to Lachish and laid siege to it and fought against it. And the Lord gave Lachish into the hand of Israel, and he captured it on the second day and struck it with the edge of the sword, and every person in it, as he had done to Libnah. Then Horam king of Gezer came up to help Lachish. And Joshua struck him and his people, until he left none remaining. Then Joshua and all Israel with him passed on from Lachish to Eglon. And they laid siege to it and fought against it. And they captured it on that day, and struck it with the edge of the sword. And he devoted every person in it to destruction that day, as he had done to Lachish. Then Joshua and all Israel with him went up from Eglon to Hebron. And they fought against it and captured it and struck it with the edge of the sword, and its king and its towns, and every person in it. He left none remaining, as he had done to Eglon, and devoted it to destruction and every person in it. Then Joshua and all Israel with him turned back to Debir and fought against it and he captured it with its king and all its towns. And they struck them with the edge of the sword and devoted to destruction every person in it; he left none remaining. Just as he had done to Hebron and to Libnah and its king, so he did to Debir and to its king. So Joshua struck the whole land, the hill country and the Negeb and the lowland and the slopes, and all their kings. He left none remaining, but devoted to destruction all that breathed, just as the Lord God of Israel commanded. And Joshua struck them from Kadesh-barnea as far as Gaza, and all the country of Goshen, as far as Gibeon. And Joshua captured all these kings and their land at one time, because the Lord God of Israel fought for Israel. Then Joshua returned, and all Israel with him, to the camp at Gilgal.

This passage tells us on five occasions that the inhabitants of these hill country cities were devoted to destruction, along with six comments that Joshua left none remaining. The strategy of the Israelites is apparent at this point. Israel’s Kherem focused on those regions where Anakim were known to live in the land and, therefore, certain cities in those regions. Other people living in those regions and towns were naturally under threat - -they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Joshua and his army didn’t check birth certificates, so to speak, or interview the occupants to weed out non-Anakim. When they arrived at a place under kherem, the intent was to leave no Anakim alive.

After the invasion of the southern hill country, Joshua went north and carried out the same plan. The northern campaign is described there who appear, where it explained that the twelve Israelite spies had seen Anakim (Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites). Interestingly, Joshua ran into warriors from nearly Mount Hermon in the region of Bashan as well. Once again, we are told that Joshua’s armies “left none remaining” and devoted the cities of the region to destruction.

The destruction seems wanton, but it isn’t. The logic for the Kherem emerges here:

Joshua 11:21–23 ESV

And Joshua came at that time and cut off the Anakim from the hill country, from Hebron, from Debir, from Anab, and from all the hill country of Judah, and from all the hill country of Israel. Joshua devoted them to destruction with their cities. There was none of the Anakim left in the land of the people of Israel. Only in Gaza, in Gath, and in Ashdod did some remain. So Joshua took the whole land, according to all that the Lord had spoken to Moses. And Joshua gave it for an inheritance to Israel according to their tribal allotments. And the land had rest from war.

This passage makes it evident that the target of the kherem was the Anakim. Notice that it says the hill country of Judah and the hill country of Israel. That is language that only makes sense after the tribal allotments under Joshua - which had not taken place yet — few books are written during war. In addition, the division of the land under Rehoboam would need to occur and that is far into the future. So we may have had editing to clarify or the text may have been written later …doesn’t matter. Judah was southern campaign, Israel the northern… and in both campaigns the object was the Anakim.

As if this were not enough of an indication to draw the reader’s attention to the Nephilim bloodlines, the writer adds in verse 22 …only in Gaza, in Gath and in Ashdod did some remain. Why add that note? This were Philistine cities. Remember that Goliath of Gath and his brothers were faced by David. The battle continued into his era.

Supernatural, not Bizarre, Orientation

The point of this brief reconstruction is not that the Israelites took only the lives of the remnant of the giant clans. Others were certainly slain. The point is that the rationale for kherem annihilation was the specific elimination of the descendents of the Nephilim. Ridding the land of these bloodlines was the motivation. If we go back to the report of the bad spies we see that the Anakim were scattered throughout the land of Canaan. It is clear that the Anakim were targeted for elimination, not every Canaanite.

In point of fact, the conquest narratives utilize other verbs besides Kherem that are not necessarily words for taking life. Not every engagement was devoted to destruction. The picture that emerges when all are woven together was that when the Israelites encountered a member of the giant clans, or one descended from the giant clans, they were under Kherem. Others might be killed in warfare, but their lives were not required by the supernatural - theological orientation of this conflict.

The unusual size of these people groups was attributed to divine origin, something a belief in the supernatural must allow. It is not, however, an excuse for a reading of the text that is cartoonish or bizarre.

How tall were the Biblical giants?

The only measurement for a giant that exists in the biblical text is that of Goliath. The traditional (Masoretic) Hebrew text has him at “six cubits and a span”, roughly 9 feet, 9 inches. The Dead Sea scroll reading of 1 Sam 17:4

1 Samuel 17:4 (ESV)

And there came out from the camp of the Philistines a champion named Goliath of Gath, whose height was six cubits and a span (4 cubits and a span)

has him at 4 cubits and a span, or 6 foot 6 inches. Virtually all who study this seen the older Dead Sea scroll reading as superior and authentic.

Archaeological work across the Ancient Near East confirms that 6 and one-half feet tall by the standards of the day was a giant. The average height of an ancient Israelite in the patriarchal period was around five feet. The stories then make sense to others when we compare this.

We have found no valid skeletons from this area of unusual size, but that is no surprise. The people of Canaan and Israel of the time did not embalm their dead. Human remains from the period are very rare. Of the millions that lived in this period during the time, a few thousand have been found...

The situation in ancient Egypt is somewhat better due to embalming. Moreover these were the elite class, which meant better diets, which in turn meant better health and optimal growth. Looking at mummies, the average height of Egyptian male as 5 to 5 1/2 feet.

This is not to say that there is no evidence external to the Bible for unusually tall people in Canaan during the biblical period. One Egyptian text from the period of Ramesses II, makes that point and I quote:

“ The narrow valley is dangerous with Bedouin, hidden under the bushes. Some of them are four or five cubits (from) their noses to the heel, and fierce of face. Their hearts are not mild, and they do no listen to wheedling.”

The picture that emerges from the biblical text and archaeology is that vestiges of the Nephilim bloodline were scattered throughout Canaan among a number of other people groups. The aim of the conquest was to drive out all the inhabitants and eliminate these bloodlines in the process. The thinking is foreign to us, but it was a part of the supernatural worldview of the biblical writers.

Isreal failed, of course. It would be centuries before the sort of kingdom envisioned by Moses and Joshua would arise. And that was mostly a mess. We tend to process the Old Testament after Joshua as just a bunch of genealogies and some murder, sex, and scandal thrown in to keep our attention. There is more to it than that — a lot more.