Thread: Destruction of Israel's Enemies?

How do you explain the Destruction of Israel's enemies as commanded by God in some instances if I'm not mistaken to include Men, Women, and Children? How could a loving God be so merciless to those Nations conquered by Israel?

This is an actual question posed to me, what is your response?

Who's standard of love are you using as your benchmark? Did God not place His image upon all men? Did those in question not blaspheme His love beyond all reason and thought?

Let us not confuse God as fitting only in the 'love box'. God is also perfectly just as well- and within perfect love and justice, His actions are altogether righteous.

Theognome

But why does He withold the same punishment from the Israelites when they violate His Law? What does this destruction of other Nations and the mercy He displays toward the Nation of Israel typify if anything? Appreciate the dialogue Bill just drawing out some application here with regard to God's dealing with Israel.

Originally Posted by whitway

But why does He withold the same punishment from the Israelites when they violate His Law? What does this destruction of other Nations and the mercy He displays toward the Nation of Israel typify if anything? Appreciate the dialogue Bill just drawing out some application here with regard to God's dealing with Israel.

Didn't He sometimes do the same to Israel? Open the earth and swallow many, kill a whole family for the father's sin, Sodom probably had kids in it, Noah's flood, etc.

I think He was consistent but particularly:

1. He had a plan to eliminate people from the promised land as a type of mortification of sin, purification, animals as well as people.

2. Type of heaven with no sin.

3. He was just in judging those people temporally as well as eternally.

To put this in context, we're told in Genesis 15 that the inhabitants of Canaan were already wicked and that God was being patient with them in not sending Israel into the land until their "iniquity was full". This was over 400 years before Joshua's invasion.

The Holy War waged by Joshua becomes a type of the evangelisation and judgement of the world in New Covenant times as God's New Covenant people weild the sword of the Spirit, the Word of God, instead of the sword of iron.

The Word of God is superior to the sword of iron because it judges those who reject it, and yet spiritually slays and brings to life again those who receive it by faith (II Cor 2:15-16).

Whatsoever the Lord commands, by mere virtue of His commanding it, is holy, righteous, just, and good.

1. He can serve no other God, for He is God.
2. He cannot worship Himself wrongly, for He is God.
3. He cannot take His name in vain, for He is God.
4. He cannot break the Sabbath. He instituted it, and He is Lord of the Sabbath.
5. He cannot break the 5th Commandment, for Who is His superior?
6. When commands to kill, it is not murder, for all have sinned and deserve His judgment.
7. He cannot commit adultery for He is holy.
8. He cannot steal for everything is His.
9. He cannot lie, for He is truth.
10. He cannot covet, for everything is His.

The sweetest newborn child is a sinner that deserves hell, no one is innocent, that is what total depravity is all about.

God has a plan for his own glory that involves depraved men either being justly punished now, being justly punished later or being saved by grace. This is Gods decretal plan and the time that God allows sinful man to remain in this life is part of this plan for his glory. Jonathan Edwards remarkable "sinners in the hands of an angry God" illustrates this point excellently.

Gods mercy to either national Israel or the Church is undeserved and it is for the purpose of his glory, there is no other explanation either available or needed. As men we find this hard, but it is hard because we are by nature rebellious.

We do need to understand a few things:
1) Destruction was GOD's act, not human actions. The men were occasional instruments, however, God was the one who is represented as acting. I believe it was Rev. Winzer who has helpfully pointed out that the idea of "holy war" is not especially helpful when considering the conquest. This was not so much men engaged in a bloody extermination and ethnic cleansing, as it was God serving notice--and doing much of the fighting--against squatters who had defied his eviction notice.

2) Think of the worst conceivable people--men women and children--you can think of. The most abominable behavior and conduct. THAT is what God drove out of Canaan, or killed with the sword. Let's not have any namby-pamby gloss on the Canaanites. God says they were unspeakably defiled. That's a divine verdict, and not subject to a human being's review for "constitutionality".

3) God permitted occasional mercies under limited circumstances during the conquest (I'm thinking specifically of certain women being permitted as captives according to the Law); even the most devastating of the "herem" (as demanded by God) was limited to a handful of battles, Amalek, Jericho, Ai, coming to mind. Israel refused, after Joshua's death, to press forward, and take what was now theirs by letting God drive the heathen out before them with hornets. So, because of lack of faith God said those people would now stay and be thorns in their sides. Who was shown mercy?

4) God's object lessons are not open to repetition. He doesn't need to repeat himself. He speaks once, and that's enough. We need to read the story, and understand the moral lesson.


Finally, Whit, I think your questioner needs to get to grips with the God who doesn't have to give an account for himself. But who must be accepted on the terms he sets. This is the reverse of what the natural man wants to do. He wants God to conform to a man's confused ideas about morality. Instead of acknowledging God as revealed, and then puzzling out his sometimes inscrutable ways.

To which type of person are you speaking? Whomever it is they must ultimately know that all people are born depraved and deserve hell. The path you take to get to this end might be important tho.