Holy War – Then and Now
Joshua 10-11 - July 20/21, 2002
Intro:
Plans were introduced this past week detailing various proposals for what to do with the site on which the World Trade Center towers stood until last September 11. The clean-up is completed, the search for human remains abandoned. It is time to rebuild.
As much as the physical devastation and loss of innocent life, we have also witnessed a huge social and psychological impact of those events. Here in Canada we haven’t felt them as acutely as our neighbors to the south, but we have certainly also witnessed a change in our culture. We have been horrified, shocked, dumbfounded, angered, confused, anxious, and a host of other feelings associated with the terrorist attacks. It is time for us to rebuild our cultural identity and our place in the world. It is my firm conviction that the best way for us to rebuild is on the love and principles of God expressed in Jesus Christ.
But how do we reconcile that with our study in the book of Joshua? I know you have noticed the violence, the destruction, the annihilation of the enemies of Israel. Perhaps you have been uncomfortable reading the accounts thus far; and even if you haven’t I’d venture a guess that you will be reading chapters 10-11. Maybe you have even felt uncomfortable because the warfare of the Israelites, and their total destruction of all the people in the promised land, reminded you a little of the kind of language you heard on the lips of Osama bin Laden or other radical Muslim terrorists. What do we make of these accounts in the light of our culture and experience today? How do we understand our history, both Biblical and church history, and how we should think and respond to our culture today? Those are really big questions: I hope to get a start at addressing them today.
Joshua 10/11
We’ve been working our way through the book of Joshua, and this week we come to chapters 10 and 11. Up till now, most of the book has been fairly detailed stories recounting events. That changes here, and what we find is a pretty bare-bones description of two military campaigns, one in the south in chapter 10 and one in the north in chapter 11. Because of that, I’m not going to read the entire chapters, but rather just a few portions.
Chapter 10 begins with the Israelites coming to the defense of the Gibeonites, with whom they made a peace treaty in the last chapter. That story ends with this: “9 After an all-night march from Gilgal, Joshua took [the people attacking the Gibeonites] by surprise. 10 The Lord threw them into confusion before Israel, who defeated them in a great victory at Gibeon. Israel pursued them along the road going up to Beth Horon and cut them down all the way to Azekah and Makkedah. 11 As they fled before Israel on the road down from Beth Horon to Azekah, the Lord hurled large hailstones down on them from the sky, and more of them died from the hailstones than were killed by the swords of the Israelites.” The rest of chapter 10 basically says the Israelites went to the next city, the Lord gave it to the Israelites, and they completely destroyed every living thing. The last four verses are the summary: “40 So Joshua subdued the whole region, including the hill country, the Negev, the western foothills and the mountain slopes, together with all their kings. He left no survivors. He totally destroyed all who breathed, just as the Lord , the God of Israel, had commanded. 41 Joshua subdued them from Kadesh Barnea to Gaza and from the whole region of Goshen to Gibeon. 42 All these kings and their lands Joshua conquered in one campaign, because the Lord , the God of Israel, fought for Israel. 43 Then Joshua returned with all Israel to the camp at Gilgal.” That is what we find in chapter 10.
Chapter 11 is much the same, except the campaign goes north instead of south. This second campaign took a long time, and the chapter really briefly summarizes the northern conquest. There is a couple of verses toward the end that we can’t ignore (though they make us uncomfortable): “18 Joshua waged war against all these kings for a long time. 19 Except for the Hivites living in Gibeon, not one city made a treaty of peace with the Israelites, who took them all in battle. 20 For it was the Lord himself who hardened their hearts to wage war against Israel, so that he might destroy them totally, exterminating them without mercy, as the Lord had commanded Moses.”
Let me be really straightforward: those verses make me uncomfortable. I struggle to understand what they say about my Lord, and to understand what they mean in the light of the love of Jesus for our enemies. As we seek to understand what these mean especially in light of our culture, let’s first establish the facts.
Getting the Facts Straight:
A. God’s Command:
We should first go all the way back to Moses (Deuteronomy 20:16-17) where God’s command is clear: However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes. Completely destroy [1] them-the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites-as the Lord your God has commanded you.
Since it is the “completely destroy them” part that is most difficult for us, it helps to understand what God is actually commanding them. There is a technical term here which I want to introduce you to – the Hebrew term “charem.” It is repeated often in Joshua, whenever we talk about the “forbidden things” such as those taken by Achan from Jericho, and whenever it says Joshua “completely destroyed them” it is this term that is being used. Joshua 10/11 use this term 10 times, out of a total of 52 times in the OT. So what does it actually mean? The footnote for Deut. 20:17 in your NIV Bible explains it well: “The Hebrew term refers to the irrevocable giving over of things or persons to the Lord , often by totally destroying them.” The emphasis is on the giving of things completely to the Lord. It was so complete that these things were destroyed, so that they could never be “recycled” or “reclaimed” or in any way taken back. It was final, irrevocable.
So the command of God to “completely destroy” is first of all a command to completely give these to God, to be His exclusively. The means to make them completely God’s was to destroy them. That is fact number one: God commanded the Israelites to give everything to Him by completely destroying it.
B. God’s War:
Remember the really quick story just before the Israelites head up to Jericho? The verses are worth repeating (Josh 5:13-14):
Now when Joshua was near Jericho, he looked up and saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand. Joshua went up to him and asked, "Are you for us or for our enemies?"
"Neither," he replied, "but as commander of the army of the Lord I have now come."
In other words, Joshua could be on God’s side, because it was God’s war. This passage, and numerous other references throughout the battle accounts, demonstrate clearly that the battle for the promised land was the Lord’s battle. This truly was God’s war. When God was with them, as at Jericho, the Israelites were victorious. When God wasn’t, like the first time at Ai, the Israelites were defeated. The choice of words in the book of Joshua goes to great lengths to demonstrate that God was the mighty warrior for His people. So this is fact number 2 – it was God’s war.
C. God did much of the killing Himself:
I’m sure that when the walls of Jericho collapsed, a lot of people lost their lives. That was God’s doing. In chapter 10:11, I read a few moments ago how God killed more with hailstones than the Israelites killed with their swords. God was not looking in from a distance, hands-off, not really involved. Like back in Egypt when the angel of death killed every firstborn. God did it.
Why?
D. God commanded destruction to keep His people holy:
A few moments ago I read God’s command to Moses. The explanation came in the very next verse: “18 Otherwise, they will teach you to follow all the detestable things they do in worshiping their gods, and you will sin against the Lord your God.”
Understanding this fact brings me one significant step closer to comprehending the concept of Holy War and the extent of the destruction. Now we know the reason, and we know the cost. God demands holiness. Since there is sin in our world, the only way to get to a place of holiness is for that sin to be destroyed. Death is part of that – we see that in the New Testament even more clearly than we do in the Old Testament through the death of Jesus – Jesus died so that sin could be destroyed and God could make us holy. It underlines for me how crucial it is for us to live in God’s power for holiness, to not toy with sin thinking it is not really a big deal. It IS a big deal! We must live holy lives by the power of God.
In other words, God’s complete destruction of the residents of Canaan was so that His people, the Israelites, could settle in a pure land and not be tempted to wander off and worship other gods. And we know from the rest of OT history that the Israelites did not completely eradicate the residents of the land (there were still pockets they hadn’t defeated), and did wander off and worship other gods. It reaffirms that our God is the only God and that He demands our exclusive and complete worship.
Applying the Facts:
Knowing these facts – that it was God’s command, God’s war, God did much of the killing, and that He did all of this so that His people might be holy – knowing these facts doesn’t make me any more comfortable with the reality of the death and destruction, but it does reveal a side of God we don’t often talk about – the Holy/Mighty/Jealous side, the side that terrifies us because of the overwhelming gulf between us and Him which can only be breached because Jesus satisfied the demands of this part of God. He is jealous for our exclusive worship, He is the author of life and the one who determines our time of death, He is passionate and mighty and powerful. God isn’t a kindly old grandpa, full of good ideas and helpful suggestions but frail and slow and safe. He is a mighty warrior King, terrifying and powerful.
Yet I also affirm that He is always good, always just, always reaching out to humanity in love (sometimes terrifying love) to bring us back into relationship with Him. This part of God (that we talk about most of the time) underlies even the awesome, terrifying power, and reminds me that God is always right, even when it looks unfair or too violent or too uncomfortable for me. God is still God, and I affirm that He is always good and just.
Each of those facts focus on God’s actions – they are all about God. This is to me perhaps the crucial point in talking about Holy War: Holy War is God’s War, and it is God who fights it. This was God’s way.
It amazed me this week as I researched how almost every army that has marched into battle has done so with the conviction that God is on their side. Leaders constantly invoke the name of God to rally their troops, claiming to be on a mission from God. Adolph Hitler believed he was under the special protection of God, doing God’s work, I read that some of Hitler’s soldiers even had the phrase “God with us” inscribed across their helmet. This is what I believe happens when we decide to do God’s work for Him. When we figure out that God needs a little help, and we take over and say “God, I have a good idea about how we can go about this… let’s do it this way…”. Things get ugly and messy when we do things our way, and they get manipulative and evil and devastating when we claim that our way is God’s way. Because I believe Holy War is God’s war, and it is God who fights it, I just don’t believe any person who claims/preaches that we should go and fight a Holy War, that we should kill in the Name of God. Defending against attack, fighting to protect the weak and innocent, those I can understand as just and could in some situations sanction. But not a person initiating war in the name of God. God initiates war still, but on a spiritual plane and in a spiritual Kingdom, as we will notice in just a moment. Holy war is God’s war, and He will fight it. And if He were to desire for any of us His children to adopt violence as a method, it would have to be as obvious to me that God was fighting the war as it was for the Israelites as the whole nation watched the Jordan part and the walls of Jericho fall and the hailstones kill the enemy.
But first, I confess, as I study this whole part of the book of Joshua and the topic of Holy War, I still come to the conclusion that I don’t understand why God does the things He does. I grab for Isaiah 55:9, where God says, “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts,” and I see that it is ok if I don’t completely understand, because God’s ways are higher. And in faith I affirm God’s ways are better, and they are ultimately good. Even though they make me uncomfortable.
Is anything different today?
Does God still do the same thing today that He did in the book of Joshua – call for the slaughter of groups of people who do not acknowledge Him as the one true God? I believe the answer to that is no. We need to remember that we are studying the OT here in the book of Joshua, and since Jesus came there are some things that are different. The OT is still the Word of God, and authoritative, but we do need to interpret it in light of the NT.
The biggest difference in our present discussion is the nature of the Kingdom of God. In the OT, the Kingdom was a physical kingdom – it was the nation of Israel. Jesus’ inauguration of the Kingdom of God is a very different thing – it is now a spiritual Kingdom. Those are very different. We can, and are correct, in applying the principles of Holy War in the spiritual Kingdom of God, but must recognize the differences – that it is not a battle against other people requiring us to kill and maim. According to the Apostle Paul, “our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.” (Eph. 6:12).
How do we respond to “Holy War” claims in our world?
The issue of Holy War is hard enough for us to understand at any time, but last September 11 makes it even harder. Now we are on the receiving end of the violence perpetrated in the name of Allah by radical Muslim terrorists. What should be our response as Christians?
First and foremost, we need to take Jesus’ words to heart. When asked what was most important, he said first to love God and second to love one another. As Christians, we must respond to everyone in our world with the love of Christ, including Muslims. There is an insert in your bulletin which gives you some details on becoming equipped to do that effectively in our community. What I saw on my TV screen last September was hate in action, and Jesus’ remedy for hate is the same today as when He first said it: “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.”
Secondly, we need to try to understand. We need to first understand that what we hear from bin Laden et al is absolutely NOT representative of the majority of Muslims. Most are people deeply committed to peace. Yes the violent radicals quote the Koran and mis-interpret their Scriptures to defend their ideology, and promise suicide bombers instant access to heaven where they will be welcomed as heroes, but if we apply that to the majority of Muslims we are very wrong. It is very similar to what many have done and continue to do with our Bible. I was shocked and disgusted at some of the things I found this week being said right now by people claiming to be Christians and justifying their hatred by the Bible. I hope we would be as outraged if some of them flew a plane into a Muslim holy place as we were watching the WTC crumble.
Part of understanding is knowing our history. Let me tell you a true story.
The city of Jerusalem has always been a major center for conflict. In 1099, an invading army took the city and massacred the inhabitants. The destruction was so complete that the invaders proudly reported that the narrow streets ran red with blood. 88 years later, an army appeared to retake the city, and after four days of fierce fighting the defenders of the city recognized that they were greatly outmatched and could not win. They sent an emissary to the general and asked for terms of peace. On Oct 2, 1187 this victorious general entered Jerusalem, where he discovered that the holy places of his faith had been desecrated – used as stables for horses, chipped away and sold as souvenir trinkets. His reaction in the face of the previous massacre and this destruction of the holy places? He forbade any further violence, and commanded his army to put away their swords. For those in the city he conquered, he asked for a very small amount of money to be paid as a ransom and then let them go free. This general himself paid the ransom for many of the poorest people who could not pay. He then arranged guards to safely escort the caravans of refugees who wished to return to their native lands.
That is a true story. The first group that took the city in 1099 were the Christians, the crusaders from Europe come to reclaim God’s promised land. They wrote verses like Jer. 48:10 on their shields, “A curse on him who is lax in doing the Lord ’s work! A curse on him who keeps his sword from bloodshed!,” Pope Urban II sent preachers all over Europe to promise instantaneous salvation and a hero’s welcome in heaven for any men who died in this Holy war, and so those Christians proudly killed the Muslim residents of Jerusalem. (Sounds way to much like the edict I read from bin Laden and the other radical Muslims.) The general’s name that re-took the city and was merciful and, dare I say Christlike, was Saladin, the Sultan of Egypt, who was a devout Muslim.
This period of the “Crusades,” as they are called, is not a proud chapter in our history as Christians. I believe September 11 is not a proud chapter in the history of Muslims. I share that story to build understanding, which I hope can be a starting point for us to be able to reach out with the love of Jesus to the Muslim world. We don’t talk about that part of our history often, but my understanding is that many Muslims know the story of Saladin; perhaps it opens a door for conversation.
Third (and finally) we need to make known that our God is one of love and relationship. We need to demonstrate that our faith is built on a personal experience through faith in a personal God who loves us and accepts us as individuals into His family. Our salvation is guaranteed by God through no action of our own, “not by works.” This is a significant, real, and I believe very attractive difference between us as followers of Christ and people of other faiths. The main theme is the love of God for us, which we return in relationship with Him. And the best way to communicate this is by loving others.
Conclusion:
I know this sermon has been a little longer than usual, and a little more aimed at the head than at the heart. And I still feel like we have barely scratched the surface. If you have felt God speaking to you, calling you to action in this area, note the insert in your bulletin and take advantage of that opportunity. That information just arrived this week – a pretty neat working of God’s timing!
Let me sum up what I’ve been trying to say. Reading the Scriptures that describe destruction and loss of human life on a large scale, as we find here in Joshua, makes us uncomfortable. And while I want to look at the hard parts with honesty, not ignoring them or sweeping them under the carpet, I still have to conclude that God’s ways are beyond my comprehension. The picture of God as mighty warrior in battle is part of who God is. At the same time, though, Jesus’ call to love our enemies and His example for us in the face of opposition and persecution is the New Testament way to live. The reality of warfare against sin, and the need for us to completely destroy sin in our lives, has replaced any sense of embodying that warfare in our relationships with others. Our responsibility as Christian citizens in our culture is to love, to understand, and share the news that God is a God of love and of relationship. May God give us the courage to live those things in our world.
