Page 15 - Biblical Backgrounds

In the Old Testament, God commanded the children of Israel to enter the Promised Land and kill all the
inhabitants of the Land, including women, children, and even animals. This does not make sense!
Doesn’t God killing people make Him a murderer?

The sixth of the ten commandments says, “Thou shalt not kill.” (KJV - Exodus 20:2-17 and Deuteronomy
6:6-17). Actually, the King James Bible translation is unfortunate because the Hebrew translation of the
word ratsach means intentional killing without cause. A better rendering of the word is “murder.” Most
modern translations render the word correctly (ESV, NIV, NASV, HCSB, and even paraphrases like the
Living Bible). The best paraphrase of the commandment would be, “Do not put anyone to death
without cause.”

Think about it. God destroyed the world with a flood, killing all inhabitants, including animals that
breathe air, because of the gross wickedness of man’s heart. God had just cause to eliminate all except
righteous Noah and his family (Genesis 7:21-23). Does killing evil mankind make God a murderer?

No, because murder is the “premeditated, unlawful taking of another person’s life.” Killing is the taking
of life for a reason or cause. For example, Exodus 22:2 allows a person to defend himself when
threatened with the force of even killing. Self-defense is a cause.

What about all the “innocent” Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites that God commanded
Joshua to kill? Was that not God murdering without cause? Deuteronomy 9:5 says God drove these
societies out of the Land because of their wickedness. They were utterly defiled. The Canaanites were a
hideously nasty bunch. Their culture was grossly immoral and decadent to its roots. They practiced
divination, witchcraft, female and male temple sex, homosexuality, transvestitism, pederasty (men
sexually abusing boys), sex with beasts, and incest. Sodom was a Canaanite city that God destroyed for
the cause of its wickedness.

One of the gods of the Canaanites was Molech. He was a bull-
headed idol with a human body in whose belly a fire was stoked
and in whose outstretched arms a child was placed that would
burn to death. They not only sacrificed infants, but also children
up to four years old, who were burned alive to their god. As the
flame burned a child, the limbs would shrivel up, and the mouth
would appear to grin as if laughing until it was shrunk enough to
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slip into the cauldron.

The Canaanites have been reveling in these debasements for
centuries as God patiently postponed judgment (Genesis 16:16).
God was willing to spare the evil city of Sodom for a few righteous
people, but none could be found. God is slow to anger and always
fast to forgive. But eventually, God’s justice reaches a point where
blatant defiance and wickedness are not tolerated, and righteous
and deserved judgment is doled out.

25 https://www.str.org/w/the-canaanites-genocide-or-judgment-

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