Commentary - Deuteronomy 20:10-18

Bird's-eye view

In this portion of Deuteronomy, Moses is laying out the rules of engagement for Israel's army. This is not some ancient free-for-all, but rather a divinely structured approach to warfare. God is a God of order, and that order extends even to the battlefield. We see two distinct protocols established here. The first deals with cities that are "very far from you," which is to say, cities outside the boundaries of the Promised Land. The second deals with the cities inside Canaan, the inheritance God is giving to Israel. The difference between these two sets of instructions is stark, and the reasons for that difference are profoundly theological. This is not about ethnicity, but about idolatry. It is not about racial purity, but about covenantal purity. God is making a sharp distinction between ordinary warfare and a unique, one-time act of divine judgment against the cancerous cultures of the Canaanites.

The overarching principle is God's holiness and His demand for holiness from His people. The offer of peace to distant cities shows that God's default position is not destruction for its own sake. But the command to utterly destroy the inhabitants of the land demonstrates the mortal danger that their particular brand of wickedness posed to Israel and, by extension, to God's entire redemptive plan. This was a surgical excision of a profoundly corrupting influence, commanded by the great Physician Himself. To misunderstand this is to misunderstand the gravity of sin and the holiness of God.

Outline

Clause-by-Clause Commentary

v. 10 “If you come near a city to fight against it, you shall call for terms of peace.

Right out of the gate, the first step in siege warfare is not to attack, but to parley. This is for cities outside the Promised Land, mind you, but it establishes a crucial principle. God is not bloodthirsty. Israel was not to be a marauding horde, but a disciplined army operating under divine law. The offer of peace must come first. This is a reflection of the gospel itself. God does not desire the death of the wicked. He offers terms of peace to a rebellious world before judgment falls. This protocol forces Israel to act with a measure of justice and restraint that was utterly foreign to the pagan armies of the ancient world. It places the onus for the subsequent bloodshed squarely on the shoulders of those who reject the offer.

v. 11 Now it will be that if it agrees to make peace with you and opens to you, then all the people who are found in it shall become your forced labor and shall serve you.

If the city accepts the terms, they are not annihilated. They are subjugated. They become vassals to Israel, paying tribute through forced labor. Now, our modern democratic sensibilities may recoil at this, but we must read it in its historical context. This was a far more merciful outcome than the typical ancient Near Eastern practice, which was often wholesale slaughter and enslavement regardless. The people are spared, the city is not destroyed, and they are incorporated into the larger sphere of Israel's influence. This subjugation was a political and economic reality, a consequence of their surrender. They chose this path over annihilation, which was their only other option if they insisted on fighting.

v. 12 However, if it does not make peace with you, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it.

Peace was offered, and peace was refused. The city has now declared its intentions. They have chosen war. The consequences that follow are a direct result of their own defiant choice. Israel is now authorized by God to prosecute the war fully. The offer of mercy has been rejected, and the time for judgment has come. This is a pattern we see throughout Scripture. God extends His grace, but when it is finally and definitively rejected, judgment is the necessary response of a just and holy God.

v. 13 And Yahweh your God shall give it into your hand, and you shall strike all the males in it with the edge of the sword.

Notice the language. "Yahweh your God shall give it into your hand." Israel's victory is not a result of their military might alone, but a gift from God. He is the one who delivers their enemies to them. And the consequence for the city that chose war is severe. All the adult males, the soldiers and fighting men who stood to resist, are to be executed. This was the lex talionis, the law of retaliation, on a corporate scale. They chose the sword, and so they will perish by the sword. This is a targeted judgment against the ones who actively prosecuted the war after refusing a peaceful alternative.

v. 14 Only the women and the little ones and the animals and all that is in the city, all its spoil, you shall plunder for yourself; and you shall consume the spoil of your enemies which Yahweh your God has given you.

Here again, we see a form of mercy, even in judgment. The non-combatants, the women and children, are spared. This is a stark contrast to the command regarding the Canaanite cities that is coming. The wealth of the city, its spoil, is given to Israel as plunder. This too is a gift from God. The phrase "which Yahweh your God has given you" bookends this whole process. The victory, the judgment, and the subsequent provision are all from His hand. Israel is acting as His instrument, and He provides for them through their obedience.

v. 15 Thus you shall do to all the cities that are very far from you, which are not of the cities of these nations nearby.

Moses makes the distinction crystal clear. This entire protocol, from the offer of peace to the sparing of non-combatants, applies only to cities outside the land of Canaan. This is the standard operating procedure for foreign wars. This is not a universal ethic for all warfare for all time, but it is the specific law given to Israel for this particular period of its history. The distinction is crucial because the mission inside Canaan is entirely different.

v. 16 Only in the cities of these peoples that Yahweh your God is giving you as an inheritance, you shall not leave alive anything that breathes.

And here is the pivot. The rules change dramatically when Israel engages with the inhabitants of the Promised Land. The command is herem, or devotion to utter destruction. Nothing that breathes is to be spared. This is shocking to our ears, and it is meant to be. This is not ordinary warfare. This is the execution of a divine sentence. God had given the inhabitants of Canaan four hundred years to repent, from the time of Abraham (Gen. 15:16), but their iniquity was now "full." They had reached the point of no return. God, who is the author of life, has the absolute right to take it. Here, He is commanding His people to be the instruments of that judgment.

v. 17 But you shall devote them to destruction, the Hittite and the Amorite, the Canaanite and the Perizzite, the Hivite and the Jebusite, as Yahweh your God has commanded you,

The targets are named specifically. This is not a racial command; it is a judicial one against specific cultures steeped in irredeemable wickedness. These were nations whose very cultural and religious fabric was woven with the most heinous sins, including child sacrifice. Think of it this way: if a surgeon must remove a cancerous tumor to save a patient's life, he cuts out every last cell. He does not leave a little bit behind out of a misplaced sense of compassion for the tumor. To do so would be to kill the patient. These Canaanite cultures were a spiritual cancer of the most virulent kind.

v. 18 so that they may not teach you to do according to all their abominations which they have done for their gods, so that you would sin against Yahweh your God.

Here is the reason. God is not arbitrary. The rationale is explicitly protective and preventative. The utter destruction of the Canaanites was necessary to protect Israel from spiritual contamination. The Lord knew that if any of these people remained, their idolatrous practices, their "abominations," would be a snare to Israel. And the subsequent history of Israel, as recorded in Judges and Kings, proves God's point with tragic clarity. Every time Israel failed to carry out this command, every time they made treaties and intermarried and allowed the Canaanites to remain, it led directly to apostasy, idolatry, and eventually, God's judgment upon Israel itself. This severe command was, in a profound way, a mercy to Israel and to the future generations through whom the Messiah would come.

Application

So what do we do with a text like this? First, we must refuse to be embarrassed by the Word of God. We must affirm that God is just and that all His commands are righteous. This was a unique, unrepeatable moment in redemptive history. This is not a mandate for holy war for the church. The conquest of Canaan was a type, and the antitype is the Great Commission. Our weapons are not carnal, but they are mighty through God to the pulling down of strongholds (2 Cor. 10:4).

The offer of peace to the distant cities is a picture of the gospel's free offer to all. We go to the nations and offer terms of peace with God through faith in Jesus Christ. For those who accept, there is life, though it is a life of service to a new King. For those who refuse, there is a coming judgment that will be far more terrible than the edge of the sword.

The command to utterly destroy the Canaanites teaches us the deadliness of sin and the necessity of radical holiness. We are to put to death the sin that remains in our hearts with the same ruthless finality. We are to make no peace with our idols. We are to tear down the high places in our own lives, lest they corrupt us and teach us to do according to their abominations. The battle has moved from an external, physical one to an internal, spiritual one, but the principle remains. Compromise with wickedness is spiritual suicide.