Page 43 - Advanced Biblical Backgrounds Student Textbook

conquer the land assigned to these tribes. In fact,
they did not get control of it all until the reign of
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David.”

The conquest itself is describe in three campaigns:
the thrust into central Canaan (Joshua 6:1 – 8:35),
the southern campaign (9:1 – 10:43), and the
northern campaign (11:1-15). The reader of these
passages could easily assume that the whole
operation to conquer the land too only a short
time, whereas the process lasted several years.
And when the conquests were “completed” there
still was left to each tribe land and group of people
yet to conquer.

If you take time to read the book of Joshua, you will
find that there are areas that are not conquered
and manage to avoid it for an extended period
after the initial division of the land. Two major
areas that are not conquered, and are a threat to
Israel, include Philistia and Phoenicia. As you read
the book of Joshua and Judges the Philistines are a
source of turmoil to the Israelites. Saul and David
had to fight them. Samson also had to fight them.
God used Samson to demolish one of their temples killing many inside it.

Some of the Israelites conquests appear to have been by peaceful assimilation of the native peoples into
the Israelites’ own group, such as happened with the Gibeonites (Joshua 9).

The danger of such assimilation is that the Israelites’ faith would be mixed with the religious beliefs and
practices of Canaan. The Canaanites recognized many deities, two of the more prominent ones being El,
the great god of the sky and prominent of the gods, and his female consort, Asherah. By the time of the
conquest, the worship of El had been overshadowed by worship of a warrior storm god, Baal, of which
we will see will place a large part in Israel’s future fall from the Lord.

Canaanite worship practices included child sacrifice and fertility rites, often involving relationships with
cult prostitutes. Images of the gods were common in worship, as were the wooden poles or objects
called “Asherim” after the goddess Asherah. Much of Israel’s religious history dealt with the conflict
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between worshipers of the one God of the Exodus and worshipers of these Canaanite deities.

Government structure in Canaanite and Jewish culture at the time.

It is helpful to remember that there are multiple types of government at work during the conquest and
settling of Canaan. Canaan for instance was a group of city kingdoms ruled by councils and later kings.

79 Ibid.
80 So That’s Why Bible, Thomas Nelson Publisher, 1997, p.266.

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