"fore liest thou thus upon thy face? Is"rael hath sinned, and hath transgressed

my covenant which I commanded them; 'they have even taken of the accursed "thing, and have also stolen and have put "it amongst their own stuff; therefore the "Children of Israel could not stand before "their enemies, because they were accurs"ed. Neither will I be with you any more, except ye destroy the accursed thing from among you. Up, sanctify the people, and "on the morrow the Lord will by lot, take first the tribe, next the family, and lastly, "the man, who hath taken the accursed

thing: and he shall be burnt with fire, and "all that he hath, because he hath taken "the accursed thing." The solemn inquisition is made; the lot is cast; the criminal is found; he confesses that he had taken part of the spoil of Jericho, even gold and silver and raiment, and that they were hid in his tent: they are found; the congregation stone the criminal, and burn him with fire. Now the Lord is reconciled; victory again crowns the host of Jehovah, the elements of heaven war for Israel; and in a great battle, more of their opponents

fall

fall by hailstones of supernatural magnitude than by the sword.

After all these proofs of a divine interference, could the Jews avoid being fully convinced, that their God, the omnipresent and all-powerful Lord of heaven and earth, had commanded the extermination of the Canaanites; or could they venture to dispute the command? Let us then reflect on the feelings which must have influenced them while acting under this command, the natural effects it may have produced on their moral character and conduct, and the probable reasons, why such a mode of executing the divine judgments formed a part of the Jewish dispensation.

In the first place, is it not evident that the Jews, considering themselves as nothing more than instruments in the hands of Jehovah, to execute his sentence on the condemned nations of Canaan, were not actuated by any of those depraved motives, which almost universally attend the prosecution of war? The whole series of events which occurred, while they were thus obeying the plain mandate, or rather yielding to the resistless

resistless impulse of Omnipotence, was a continued trial of their humble reliance on the divine protection, their confidence in the divine promises, and their submission to the divine will; to which they were to sacrifice every personal indulgence, and subjugate every passion of their soul. The thirst of plunder, and the indulgence of licentious desires, are too frequently the most powerful stimulus to war and conquest, with the bulk of every soldiery: but with the Jews, these motives were on this occasion wholly set aside. The entire spoil however rich, the captives however numerous or desirable, were wholly devoted to the Lord, condemned to destruction, with the city or people to whom they belonged. Avarice and licentiousness therefore, were checked not cherished by this system in the Jewish people: they acted not from their own choice, they indulged not their own desires, they merely obeyed the immediate direction of Almighty Power, not daring either to destroy or to shew mercy, to consume or to spare, any thing animate

or

or inanimate, but according to the strict letter of the divine instructions.

Further, as all avaricious and licentious propensities were upon this occasion checked and disappointed; so it is scarcely to be conceived that, circumstanced as the Jews were, sanguinary passions could find access to their minds, or be cherished and encouraged, from the part they were compelled to act. The greatest care was taken to mark out the crime of idolatry in general, not the peculiar individuals with whom they were then at war, as the object of abhorrence. Every thing connected with such false worship, animate and inanimate, was stigmatized as an abomination to the Lord: the image, the altar, the grove around it, the silver, the gold, the houses which were the property of idolaters, as well as the idolaters themselves, were to be utterly destroyed. And in order that the feelings of detestation and abhorrence might be inseparably associated with the crime of idolatry, not with the persons of the Canaanites; in order to prove to the Jews that they were commanded to exterminate the seven nations,

not

not from any principle of personal resentment or national hostility, but merely as criminals condemned by God; they were solemnly bound, to exercise exactly the same

*

severity towards any of their own nation, who should apostatize to idolatry.

The

IDOLATROUS HEBREW CITY or HEBREW

TRIBE WAS TO BE TOTALTY EXTERMINATED, AS WELL AS THE NATIONS OF CANAAN.

If

the most beloved brother, or the chosen friend of the Jew, the wife of his bosom, or the child of his hopes, should worship false gods, it was commanded that he should pursue this dearest object of his affection even unto death: "His eye was not to spare, nei"ther was he to shew pity unto him."

Acting under such a system, it seems probable that ferocious passion, personal resentment, and even national hostility, could not prevail in the Jewish host, with the same force as in any other conquering army; and if there is in human nature any tendency to pity the sufferings of criminals, where the crime hurts not ourselves, it was probably felt on this occasion by the Jews. Indeed

* Vide Deut. xii. and supra, Vol. I.

p. 330.