From the mouths of both Moses and other prophets there came more than once words about Yahweh, who Himself fights for His people in the wars the people have to wage. So what then: does God love war? And does that mean holy war is truly God's work?..
From the mouths of both Moses and other prophets there came more than once words about Yahweh, who Himself fights for His people in the wars the people have to wage. So what then: does God love war? And does that mean holy war is truly God's work?
There were times in Yahwist history when the matter was viewed exactly this way. In the age of Joshua and the Judges, the leaders of the prophetic movement had no doubt that holy war not only had a right to exist, but was directly pleasing to God, who blesses those who go to destroy the enemies of the true faith, and not only blesses them, but Himself marches at the head of His army. The idea of holy war is close to many people at the beginning of the spiritual path; neophytes are often quite militant and intolerant, but in the normal case this passes in the process of spiritual maturation.
And yet: can the words of Moses and the other prophets contain only a human view limited by historical circumstances? That is not characteristic of the Bible. What, then, is the matter here?
War is a consequence of human sinfulness and one of the forms in which it is manifested; hardly anyone who has read the Bible attentively will argue with that. It would be better if there were no wars in the world at all. But in the fallen world things cannot be that way: for them to be that way, the world would have to be created anew, while God wants to save the one that exists.
And it would have been better for the people of God if they had been able to take part in no wars at all: after all, even a fully just war is still a serious spiritual trial and always acts destructively on the soul. That is why the Torah allows a person "weak of heart" to refuse to take part in war: a person's soul is more important than his military exploits. The issue, of course, is not the physical heart.
But God wanted to bring His people to the land He had appointed for them; He wanted to give it to them. Without war it was impossible either to receive that land or to hold it. It would have been possible to do without war only if God had decided to settle His people somewhere beyond the Arctic Circle or even on the Moon, but that was not part of His plans.
Therefore the people of God would inevitably have to fight, even though war is not God's choice. He would have preferred to do entirely without war, but since that course of events was impossible, all that remained for Him was to support His people in the wars in which this people would have to take part. Not only for the people's sake, but also for the sake of the plan in which they had to play a unique role, one that could be entrusted to no other people.
3 The conquest of Og and his country, Deuteronomio 3:1-11.
The distribution of it to the two tribes and an half, Deuteronomio 3:12-17.
On condition of assisting their brethren, Deuteronomio 3:18-20.
Joshua encouraged, Deuteronomio 3:21-22.
Moses prays that he may go into Canaan, Deuteronomio 3:23-25.
But is refused, yet permitted to see it, Deuteronomio 3:26-29.
3:8 On this side Jordan - So it was when Moses wrote this book; but afterward when Israel passed over Jordan it was called the land beyond Jordan.
3:9 Sirion - Elsewhere called Mount Gilead, and Lebanon, and here Shenir, and Sirion, which several names are given to this one mountain partly by several people, and partly in regard of several tops and parts of it.
3:10 All Gilead - Gilead is sometimes taken for all the Israelites possessions beyond Jordan, and so it comprehends Bashan; but here for that part of it which lies in and near mount Gilead, and so it is distinguished from Bashan and Argob.
3:11 In Rabbath - Where it might now be, either because the Ammonites in some former battle with Og, had taken it as a spoil: or because after Og's death, the Ammonites desired to have this monument of his greatness, and the Israelites permitted them to carry it away to their chief city. Nine cubits - So his bed was four yards and an half long, and two yards broad.
3:14 Unto this day - This must be put among those passages which were not written by Moses, but added by those holy men, who digested the books of Moses into this order, and inserted some few passages to accommodate things to their own time and people.
3:15 Gilead - That is, the half part of Gilead. To Machir - That is, unto the children of Machir, son of Manasseh, for Machir was now dead.
3:16 Half the valley - Or rather to the middle of the river: for the word rendered half signifies commonly middle, and the same Hebrew word means both a valley and a brook or river. And this sense is agreeable to the truth, that their land extended from Gilead unto Arnon, and, to speak exactly, to the middle of that river; for as that river was the border between them and others, so one half of it belonged to them, as the other half did to others, Giosuè 12:2. The same thing is expressed in the same words in the Hebrew which are here, though our translators render the self - same words there, from the middle of the river, which here they render, half of the valley. There the bounds of Sihon's kingdom, which was the same portion here mentioned as given to Reuben and Gad, are thus described, from Aroer, which is upon the bank of the river of Arnon, and from the middle of the river, and from half Gilead, even unto the river Jabbok, which is the border of the children of Ammon.
3:17 The plain - The low country towards Jordan. The sea of the plain - That is, that salt sea, which before that dreadful conflagration was a goodly plain.
3:18 You - Namely, the Reubenites and Gadites. All that are meet - In such number as your our brethren shall judge necessary.They were in all above an hundred thousand. Forty thousand of them went over Jordan before their brethren.
3:23 I besought the Lord - We should allow no desire in our hearts, which we cannot in faith offer unto God by prayer.
3:24 Thou hast begun to shew thy servant thy greatness - Lord, perfect what thou hast begun. The more we see of God's glory in his works, the more we desire to see. And the more we are affected with what we have seen of God, the better we are prepared for farther discoveries.
3:25 Let me go over - For he supposed God's threatening might be conditional and reversible, as many others were. That goodly mountain - Which the Jews not improbably understood of that mountain on which thetemple was to be built. This he seems to call that mountain, emphatically and eminently, that which was much in Moses's thoughts, though not in his eye.
3:28 He shall go over - It was not Moses, but Joshua or Jesus that was to give the people rest, Ebrei 4:8. 'Tis a comfort to those who love mankind, when they are dying and going off, to see God's work likely to be carried on by other hands, when they are silent in the dust.