A series of propositions attempting to contextualize the narratives of the Israelite conquest of Canaan in its ancient Near Eastern world.

The work has much to commend it: it is important to understand what is going on in terms of the ancient Near Eastern world, and not our own. The authors do well at setting that groundwork, and suggesting how maintaining order is one of the primary concerns for life at the time.

The authors are most convincing in their more thorough treatment of the Hebrew word herem as not necessarily meaning "devote to destruction" as much as to "put under a ban," to have something's identity changed to be made more useful for the divinity. Sometimes things were destroyed when put under the ban, but it was not necessary to do so. The authors' application to the Christian being made devoted to God and have their identity changed is a good parallel.

The authors' arguments about the sinfulness of the Canaanites having nothing to do with their elimination from the land is a bit more of a stretch. They spend much time discussing it, attempting to reframe the language of certain verses about it, but one has to wonder why so much effort has to go into this particular idea. They at least demonstrate that the sinfulness of the Canaanites is by no means the driver of the conquest. But they go a bit too far in presuming that it had nothing to do with it.

For all of their profession of trying to understand the Conquest in terms of the ancient Near Eastern world, the authors' Protestant biases are on full display regarding works, morality, and the law. The idea that the Law, featuring situational laws, was not intended to be literally obeyed is absolutely not at all anything which makes sense according to the history of interpretation. At many points the Protestant confession of works having nothing to do with salvation is set forth, even though one would never get such an impression from the Old Testament at all, and one has to completely misread Paul to see it in the New Testament.

There's a lot of good and deep contextual forms of assistance in here, looking at how things are marked off as holy to a god in the ancient Near Eastern world, and illuminating the nature of warfare and the aspects of existence of other groups. It is disappointing that it gets muddled with much more modern ideologies and designs.

While John Walton's other Lost World books are not only spectacular (Genesis, Adam and Eve, and Scripture), they've made me think in new ways about the biblical text than I've never thought previously. However, this book did not seem to add any new information to the debate, or resolve differences in ways that have not been previously given. It seems that this book was written mostly by his son, because it doesn't seem congruous in the writing style and careful logic of Walton's other works. While Walton (s) does make some good points, i do not think this book will emerge as the go to for understanding the Israelite conquest narratives. With that being said, if your diving in to a deeper study of this topic I would still pick up this book!

The Lost World of the Israelite Conquest

Covenant, Retribution, and the Fate of the Canaanites
by John H. Walton, J. Harvey Walton

InterVarsity Press

IVP Academic
Christian , History

Pub Date 07 Aug 2017

I am reviewing a copy of The Lost World of the Israelite Conquest through Intervarsity Press and Netgalley:

This book brings up the controversial topic of Spiritual Warfare, along with the ethical discussions it brings up. The author goes on to point out that in order to better understand we need to adjust our expectations of what the Bible is.

The author goes on to point out that the Bible teaches clearly and consistently that affliction by God cannot Automatically be attributed to wrongdoing on the part of the victim.

The author points out that the ancient laws and codes such as Leviticus 18-20 are not a list of rules to be obeyed, and we are reminded too that Holiness is a status granted by God, not one earned through good works.

I give The Lost World of the Israelites Conquest five out of five stars.

Happy Reading

I was not a fan of this book. I felt that it portrayed the Israelite Conquest through the lense of Christianity which really couldn't be further from the history of the Conquest. Christians should not look to find meaning in the Conquest nor try to rationalize a genocide. It should be examined at face value and not put a Christian angle to a pre-Christian Conquest