Deuteronomy 2:34

And we look all his cities E, Numbers 21:24 a, possessed his land from Arnon unto Jabboḳ; J, id.25: Israel took all these cities and dwelt in all the cities of the Amorites, Ḥeshbon and her towns. Anciently this part of the Plateau was thickly populated. From almost every elevation several groups of ruins are visible, mostly Byzantine, but how much older each site may be cannot yet be said. The land is very good for corn.

utterly destroyed every inhabited city, with the women and the little ones Devoted put to the ḥerem or ban every city-full of males, with, etc. The first mention in Deut. of a custom practised also by other Semites. Mesha (Moabite Stone, 14 17) records that having taken Nebo from Israel he slew the whole population for he -had devoted itto Ashtar-Chemosh"; the same verb as in Heb. To Israel as to other peoples a war was from first to last a religious process (see on Deuteronomy 20:1 ff.) and the ḥeremwas the climax of a series of solemn rites. It consisted of the devotion to the deity, by destruction, of the captives and spoil. The name is from the root ḥrm, -to set apart" or -shut off" (cp. Ar. ḥaram-sacred precincts" and ḥarîm) and was not confined to war. By the earliest code every idolatrous Israelite was put to the ḥerem, E, Exodus 22:20 [19]; cp. Deuteronomy 13:6-11 of idolaters, and Deuteronomy 13:12-18 [13 19] of an idolatrous city; P, Leviticus 27:28 f. In war the full process was the slaughter of the conquered population and their cattle, the burning of combustible spoil, and the oblation of the rest to the sanctuary. So in the story of the fall of Jericho and Achan's trespass, Joshua 6 f. (especially Deuteronomy 6:17-19; Deuteronomy 6:21; Deuteronomy 6:24; Deuteronomy 7:1; Deuteronomy 7:11 ff.), which however contains many editorial additions. But as we see from several narratives and laws, the actual practice varied from time to time under the competing influences of religious feeling, material considerations and humane impulses. The most illustrative passage is 1 Samuel 15. Samuel charges Saul to devoteall -Amaleḳ and their cattle; Saul spares the king and the best of the cattle. Either his excuse, that he reserved them for sacrifice, is an afterthought; or from the first he had been unwilling that the best cattle should be rendered by the ḥeremunusable by the people in sacrificial feasts. Was the king moved by feelings of humanity? Samuel condemns his action as disobedience against Jehovah; so absolutely at that time was the ḥeremconceived by the religious leaders. The deuteronomic directions, all in the Sg. address, distinguish between Israel's treatment of the seven Canaanite nations and of Israelite idolaters on the one side, and their treatment of other nations at a distance: (a) Deuteronomy 7:2: the seven nations are to be put to the ḥerembecause of their idolatry and no league with them is allowed; Deuteronomy 2:25 f. their idols are to be burned with the silver and gold on them, for they are ḥeremand if used by Israel would make the people ḥeremor devoted to destruction. Similarly in Deuteronomy 13:15 f. every Israelite community falling to idolatry shall be devoted, and their city, cattle, and spoil burned to Jehovah thy God. But (b) Deuteronomy 20:10 ff directs that distant enemies if they submit shall be spared, though they must become tributary; while if they resist only the males shall be slain, the women, children, cattle and spoil being treated as booty. And in Deuteronomy 20:16-17 it is repeated that the nations of Palestine shall be devoted. Religious feeling, the desire that Israel shall not be infected by the idolatry from which they ran most risk of infection, is obviously the paramount motive of these laws. But it is remarkable that the only instances of the ḥeremrecorded in Deut., those against Sîḥôn and -Ôg, fully agree neither with the treatment enjoined by the deuteronomic laws against the seven nations, nor with that enjoined against distant enemies, but combine features of both. The captive men, women, and children were slain, but the cattle and spoil reserved for booty, Deuteronomy 2:34 f., Deuteronomy 3:6 f. So too in Jos. (outside the story of Achan): Joshua 8:2; Joshua 8:27 spoil and cattle reserved, Joshua 10:28 ff., only the people devoted; Joshua 11:9 horses houghed, chariots burned; Joshua 11:11-15, people devoted, cattle and spoil reserved. Except Joshua 11:9 these passages appear to be editorial. In connection with this subject note that Amos (Amos 1:6; Amos 1:9) condemns as inhuman the selling into captivity of a whole population, just as to-day it is contrary to the Arab conscience to extinguish a ḳabîla or tribe in war (Doughty, Ar. Des.i. 335). Yet, just as by Samuel in the case of Saul, and in Deut., this natural conscience has often been overborne by the rigorous religious demands of Islam. The parallel is instructive; cp. Deuteronomy 20:10-18. See on the use of the term in a criminal case, Exodus 22:20, with Driver's note.