Israel’s Legitimate Claim to the Promised Land

(Refuting Atheists who claim Israel was violent and had no claim on that land)

Atheists, liberal theologian and Christians struggling with doubt say Israel had no right to fight and push out the Canaanites who lived in what God called “The Promised Land.”  These Bible challengers question the Israelite’s right to displace those 7 nations (Jebusites, Hivites, Girgashites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hittites, and Amorites.) 

Before we debate about the Israelites, let’s look way back, before Abraham. What did God tell the first two people alive (Adam and Eve)?  Gen. 1:28a, “God blessed them and said to them, ‘Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it.’”  But after Adam and Eve sinned, the world became so corrupt, God allowed a flood to wipe out all but eight people.  Again, as God told Adam and Eve, God told Noah and his sons, (Gen.9:1), “Be fruitful and multiply.  Fill all the earth.” 

So far, we are seeing people rebelling against God’s command to multiply and to move away from each other.  Can you guess what the people did instead?  Look at Gen.11:4, “Then they said, ‘Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.’”  What they dreaded is just what God called them to do–scatter. Naturally Gen. 11:8-9 tells God’s reaction: “So the Lord scattered them from there over all the earth, and they stopped building the city.  That is why it was called Babel, because there the Lord confused the language of the whole world.  From there the Lord scattered them over the face of the whole earth.”  Over and over these people groups were opposing God’s plan about where he wanted them to go.  We can see a rebellion against listening to God and against going where he told them to go.

Not everyone rebelled against going.  In Gen.12:1-3 God directed Abraham to leave Ur of the Chaldeans and go to a place God had designated: “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.  And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing.  I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse those who curse you, and in you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”  So Abraham went.  This tells us something about God’s relationship with people. 

God wanted people to go to certain places, but also to NOT go to other places and do certain things. For example, in Gens.24:5b-6, Abraham (via God’s direction) prohibited his servant from taking Isaac back to Ur.  Even in the New Testament, God prohibited Paul from preaching in Asia (Act. 16:6.)  God told some people to go to certain places, but also prohibited them from going to other places.

Furthermore, God told certain people groups (outside of Israel) he would give them land.  In Deut. 2:5b, God said, “I have given Mount Seir to Esau for a possession.”

And in Deut.2:19b, God said, “I will not give you possession of any land belonging to the Ammonites.  I have given it as a possession to the descendants of Lot.”  Finally, in Deut. 2:9b, God said, “Do not harass the Moabites or provoke them to war, for I will not give you any part of their land.  I have given Ar to the descendants of Lot as a possession.”  Even a Midianite received land, because Moses urged his Midianite brother-in-law, Hobab, to join them (in Numbers 9:31-32.)  In verse 32, Moses says, “We’ll share with you all the blessings the Lord gives us.”  God was not stingy with other nations, besides the Israelites.  God always wanted to bless all the nations, but some (such as those 7 squatter nations) were ungodly and thus unfit for God’s blessings.  God did not give this land to those 7 nations. They took it against God’s will.

So were those 7 nations finally fulfilling God’s command to fill the earth and multiply when they moved to what God called Israel’s Promised Land?  Very likely NOT!

For God to toss out those 7 nations implies their rebellion, and I suspect also their location.  God never said he wanted those seven nations there, and God clearly did say he wanted other people groups in certain locations (as we already discussed.) Those 7 nations went where they wanted, but not where God had called them to go.  We can see the contrast.  When a man listens to God, as Abraham did, he goes where God tells him.  Somehow those 7 nations had settled in a place where God never told them to go, just as the people at the Tower of Babel refused to separate across the entire earth. In Deut. 32:8 God clearly confirmed his assignment of the lands to certain nations: “When the Most High assigned lands to the nations, when he divided up the human race, he established the boundaries of the peoples according to the number in his heavenly court.” God says he decided where people should go.

Also note, God did want to bless the nations, as it says in Gen. 12:3b, “in you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”  That includes the 7 nations currently “squatting” in the Promised Land (being there without God’s guidance.)  God did not want to curse those nations, as long as they honored Abraham’s promised seed (children through Isaac, and then Jacob.)  Keep this in mind too, as God wanted to BLESS those 7 nations.

So, just what did God say to Abraham about the land on which those 7 nations lived? Gen.13:15, “All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever.”  God even clarified what land would belong to Abraham’s “promised seed” (via Jacob’s offspring): Gen. 15:18, “to your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates…”

The seven nations living as squatters in that land were so evil, that God said he would have to drive them out.  “It is on account of the wickedness of these nations that the Lord is going to drive them out before you,” (Deut. 9:4.)  Those seven nations were living in Abraham’s land, uninvited.

Now some may say, “Yes, but Jacob and his family fled the famine and lived in Egypt for 400 years, so by then the squatter nations had a right to be there.  But did they?  Let’s look at modern life.  Imagine a couple has to go to another state for a long time. An entire year goes by as the couple cares for a sick parent.  Finally, the couple returns to their home, but alas, squatters have taken it over.  They insist the owners were gone for so long, they have no right to reclaim their home, and they get out guns and fight the couple.  What will the couple do?  They will call the police who at first may ask for proof.  So the couple can show their deed to the house, the tax and utility bills the couple paid while they were absent.  They will show that the house is theirs, even though they were gone for such a long time, and even though squatters lived in that home.  Now, if the squatters still try to fight, the police will fight back until they get the squatters out of the house that is not theirs. 

In Deuteronomy chapter 2, the Israelites asked to pass peacefully through land King Sihon occupied.  Instead King Sihon attacked the Israelites.  Only after this King attacked, did the Israelites fight back.  This also happened with King Og in Deuteronomy chapter 3.  This king also refused peaceful passage for the Israelites, but attacked them, so Israel fought back.  God shows us these early battles, so we can see the violent nature of the 7 squatter nations.  Furthermore, in Numbers 10:9, God said, “When you arrived in YOUR OWN land and go to war against your enemies who attack you, sound the alarm with trumpets.  Then the Lord your God will remember you and rescue you from your enemies.”  God was saying the Israelites owned that land, and it was enemies initiating the attacks, not the Israelites initiating them. Here is yet another verse that confirms this truth. Numbers 33:52, “You must drive out all the people living there. You must destroy all their carved and molten images and demolish all their pagan shrines.” The Canaanites could leave on their own, otherwise they needed to be driven out. If the squatter nations had left peacefully, only their left-behind shrines and idols needed to be destroyed. Finally Num.33:53 says, “Take possession of the land and settle in it, because I have given it to you to occupy.”

God did more of the fighting than the Israelites did.  In Numbers 10:35b, Moses shouts, “Rise up, Lord!  May your enemies be scattered; May your foes flee before you.”  Moses acknowledged that Israel’s enemies (the 7 squatter nations) should scatter before God and surrender the land to the Israelites.  Israel only fought when they had to.

Did you know that the squatter nations also knew God did not give them this land, but he gave it to Israel? Look at Joshua2:9, Rahab told the Israelite spies, “I know the Lord has given you this land,’ she told them. ‘We are afraid of you. Everyone in the land is living in terror.'” She also admitted God was sovereign and had the right to do what he did. In Joshua2:11, she said, “No wonder our hearts have melted in fear! No one has the courage to fight after hearing such things. For the Lord your God is the supreme God of the heavens above and the earth below.” Rahab and all of her extended family lived and joined the Israelites as believers. This was another option for the squatter nations, but she and her people were of the few who chose God over their carnal lives (and death.)

Not only did Rahab know God gave the land to the Israelites, so did the Hivite people of the city of Gibeon. In Joshua 9:24a they told Joshua, “We–your servants–were clearly told that the Lord your God commanded his servant Moses to give you this entire land.”

Again, dealing with God’s generosity to non-Israelites, look at Caleb. His heart was fully dedicated to the Lord. But Caleb was not a descendant of Jacob (see Joshua 14:6.) He was a non-Israelite whose family had moved to Egypt, lived near the Israelites there, and then converted to the Jewish faith. Caleb was a Kenite, and from one of the squatter nations God would drive out. But because Caleb embraced God’s faith, the Jewish faith, Caleb was included in the covenant of the Promised Land. This also shows that those of the squatter nations, like Rahab and Caleb, had a choice to become believers of the true God and then be allowed to live in the Promised Land. God was very, very generous to anyone who loved him, not just those born into the Hebrew faith.

We must understand that God has sovereignty, and as the owner of the land, he had every right to give it to Abraham, and his grandson’s descendants, through Jacob (Israel.)  Look at Acts 17:26, “From one man, he made all the nations, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and he marked out their appointed times in history and the boundaries of their land.”  This verse means all the nations were set for appointed times to exist, and God gave them their land, according to his will, if they lived where God wanted them to live.  But if people moved to where God did not call them to live, God had to move them.  So what about the fighting?  There was never a need to fight.  The seven squatter nations could have moved out of the Promised Land peacefully.  The Israelites fought, because when they went in to take their land, the squatter nations fought them.  These battles did not have to happen. Those seven squatter nations chose to stay in land that was not theirs and to fight the Israelites. 

People so quickly say God is bloody, and the Israelites are bloody.  But the real blood thirst came from those 7 squatter nations who murdered their own children in pagan rituals.  God gave Israel that land, and Israel had to defend itself against the squatter nations that tried to keep it from Israel, just like the imaginary squatters in this post.  Many years ago, we had this happen across the street from our house.  Squatters took over a house our neighbor put up for lease while she was out of state.  The police and the courts had to get involved, but eventually the squatters were evicted.  Before they were evicted, one of the squatters attacked his girlfriend, out on the sidewalk where my very young daughter saw everything.  Those squatters were not just thieves, but also violent.  As such, we know squatters can say and do bad things.

In fact, those squatter nations turned on the Gibeonites when they made a peace treaty with Israel. Look at Josh.10:5, “So these five Amorite kings combined their armies for a united attack. They moved all their troops into place and attacked Gibeon.” These squatters were so mean they even attacked their own tribes.

We can share these truths with the doubters who struggle to reconcile the love of God with a God who seems to “murder” seven nations in Canaan. We can help the doubters see that the squatters were the violent ones, and the Israelites had every right to be there.  If our friends and acquaintances do not agree, even after we share these truths with them, we can still pray for our friends to see the truth of God’s light via our loving lives.  But now you have some extra answers when someone asks you this hard question about why the Israelites were justified in “taking over the Promised Land.”  Doubters (and atheists) like to pull one Bible verse out of context. But we can read our entire Bible and find all the answers there.  Keep searching the entire Scriptures, so you can answer the “hard questions” your friends and family members ask you.

I pray we have encouraged you and blessed you with this post.  Please feel free to share it with others, and let me know what you think of the post!