Friends & Foes:
Enemies Within Israel
Lv 26:32
I will bring the land into desolation; and your enemies that dwell therein
will be astonished at it.
Dt 20:16-18
16 But of the cities of these peoples, that Yahweh your God gives you for an
inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes;
17 but you shall utterly destroy them: the Hittite, and the Amorite, the
Canaanite, and the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite; as Yahweh your God
has commanded you;
18 that they not teach you to do after all their abominations, which they
have done to their gods; so would you sin against Yahweh your God.
Jsh 9:3-27
3 But when the inhabitants of Gibeon heard what Joshua had done to
Jericho and to Ai,
4 they also resorted to a ruse, and went and made as if they had been
ambassadors, and took old sacks on their donkeys, and wineskins, old and torn
and bound up,
5 and old and patched shoes on their feet, and wore old garments. All the bread
of their provision was dry and moldy.
6 They went to Joshua to the camp at Gilgal, and said to him, and to the men of
Israel, “We have come from a far country. Now therefore make a covenant with
us.”
7 The men of Israel said to the Hivites, “What if you live among us. How
could we make a covenant with you?”
8 They said to Joshua, “We are your servants.” Joshua said to them, “Who
are you? Where do you come from?”
9 They said to him, “Your servants have come from a very far country
because of the name of Yahweh your God; for we have heard of his fame, all that
he did in Egypt,
10 and all that he did to the two kings of the Amorites who were beyond the
Jordan, to Sihon king of Heshbon and to Og king of Bashan, who was at Ashtaroth.
11 Our elders and all the inhabitants of our country spoke to us, saying,
‘Take provision in your hand for the journey, and go to meet them, and tell
them, “We are your servants. Now make a covenant with us.”’
12 This our bread we took hot for our provision out of our houses on the day we
went out to go to you; but now, behold, it is dry, and has become moldy.
13 These wineskins, which we filled, were new; and behold, they are torn. These
our garments and our shoes have become old because of the very long journey.”
14 The men sampled their provisions, and didn’t ask counsel from the mouth of
Yahweh.
15 Joshua made peace with them, and made a covenant with them, to let them live.
The princes of the congregation swore to them.
16 It happened at the end of three days after they had made a covenant with
them, that they heard that they were their neighbors, and that they lived among
them.
17 The children of Israel traveled and came to their cities on the third day.
Now their cities were Gibeon, Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kiriath Jearim.
18 The children of Israel didn’t strike them, because the princes of the
congregation had sworn to them by Yahweh, the God of Israel. All the
congregation murmured against the princes.
19 But all the princes said to all the congregation, “We have sworn to them by
Yahweh, the God of Israel: now therefore we may not touch them.
20 This we will do to them, and let them live; lest wrath be on us, because of
the oath which we swore to them.”
21 The princes said to them, “Let them live, so they became wood cutters and
drawers of water for all the congregation, as the princes had spoken to them.”
22 Joshua called for them, and he spoke to them, saying, “Why have you
deceived us, saying, ‘We are very far from you,’ when you live among us?
23 Now therefore you are cursed, and some of you will never fail to be
bondservants, both wood cutters and drawers of water for the house of my God.”
24 They answered Joshua, and said, “Because your servants were certainly told
how Yahweh your God commanded his servant Moses to give you all the land, and to
destroy all the inhabitants of the land from before you. Therefore we were
very afraid for our lives because of you, and have done this thing.
25 Now, behold, we are in your hand. Do to us as it seems good and right to you
to do.”
26 He did so to them, and delivered them out of the hand of the children of
Israel, so that they didn’t kill them.
27 That day Joshua made them wood cutters and drawers of water for the
congregation and for the altar of Yahweh, to this day, in the place which he
should choose.
Jsh 23:4,7,12,13
4 Behold, I have allotted to you these nations that remain, to be an
inheritance for your tribes, from the Jordan, with all the nations that I have
cut off, even to the great sea toward the going down of the sun.
7 that you not come among these nations, these that remain among you;
neither make mention of the name of their gods, nor cause to swear by them,
neither serve them, nor bow down yourselves to them;
12 “But if you do at all go back, and hold fast to the remnant of these
nations, even these who remain among you, and make marriages with them, and
go in to them, and they to you;
13 know for a certainty that Yahweh your God will no longer drive these
nations from out of your sight; but they shall be a snare and a trap to you,
a scourge in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until you perish from off this
good land which Yahweh your God has given you.
2Kg 17:24-41
24 The king of Assyria brought men from Babylon, and from Cuthah, and from
Avva, and from Hamath and Sepharvaim, and placed them in the cities of Samaria
instead of the children of Israel; and they possessed Samaria, and lived in the
cities of it.
25 So it was, at the beginning of their dwelling there, that they
didn’t fear Yahweh: therefore Yahweh sent lions among them, which killed some
of them.
26 Therefore they spoke to the king of Assyria, saying, “The nations which
you have carried away, and placed in the cities of Samaria, don’t know the
law of the god of the land. Therefore he has sent lions among them, and behold,
they kill them, because they don’t know the law of the god of the land.”
27 Then the king of Assyria commanded, saying, “Carry there one of the priests
whom you brought from there; and let them go and dwell there, and let him teach
them the law of the god of the land.”
28 So one of the priests whom they had carried away from Samaria came and lived
in Bethel, and taught them how they should fear Yahweh.
29 However every nation made gods of their own, and put them in the houses of
the high places which the Samaritans had made, every nation in their cities in
which they lived.
30 The men of Babylon made Succoth Benoth, and the men of Cuth
made Nergal, and the men of Hamath made Ashima,
31 and the Avvites made Nibhaz and Tartak; and the Sepharvites
burnt their children in the fire to Adrammelech and Anammelech, the gods of
Sepharvaim.
32 So they feared Yahweh, and made to them from among themselves priests of the
high places, who sacrificed for them in the houses of the high places.
33 They feared Yahweh, and served their own gods, after the manner of the
nations from among whom they had been carried away.
34 To this day they do what they did before: they don’t fear Yahweh, neither
do they follow their statutes, or their ordinances, or the law or the
commandment which Yahweh commanded the children of Jacob, whom he named Israel;
35 with whom Yahweh had made a covenant, and commanded them, saying, “You
shall not fear other gods, nor bow yourselves to them, nor serve them, nor
sacrifice to them;
36 but you shall fear Yahweh, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt with
great power and with an outstretched arm, and you shall bow yourselves to him,
and you shall sacrifice to him.
37 The statutes and the ordinances, and the law and the commandment, which he
wrote for you, you shall observe to do forevermore. You shall not fear other
gods.
38 You shall not forget the covenant that I have made with you; neither shall
you fear other gods.
39 But you shall fear Yahweh your God; and he will deliver you out of the hand
of all your enemies.”
40 However they did not listen, but they did what they did before.
41 So these nations feared Yahweh, and served their engraved images. Their
children likewise, and their children’s children, as their fathers did, so
they do to this day.
Ps 106:34-38
34 They didn’t destroy the peoples,
as Yahweh commanded them,
35 but mixed themselves with the nations,
and learned their works.
36 They served their idols,
which became a snare to them.
37 Yes, they sacrificed their sons and their daughters to demons.
38 They shed innocent blood,
even the blood of their sons and of their daughters,
whom they sacrificed to the idols of Canaan.
The land was polluted with blood.