Show Them No Mercy: Four Views on God and Canaanite Genocide (Counterpoints)

Publisher Review:

A Counterpoints book that discusses various contemporary views held by evangelicals on God's command to the Israelites to destroy utterly the Canaanites and how each view sees the relationship between this God of the Israelites and the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has commanded us to love our enemies.

Christians are often shocked to read that Yahweh, the God of the Israelites, commanded the total destruction of all men, women, and children of the ethnic group know as the Canaanites. This seems to contradict Jesus' command in the New Testament to love your enemies and do good to all people. How can Yahweh be the same God as the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ? What does genocide in the Bible have to do with the politics of the 21st century?

This book explores, in typical Counterpoints format, the Old Testament command of God to exterminate the Canaanite population and what that implies about continuity between the Old and New Testaments.

The four points of view presented on the continuity of the Testaments are:

• Strong Discontinuity -- C . S. Cowles
  
  
• Moderate Discontinuity -- Eugene H. Merrill
  
  
• Spiritual Continuity -- Tremper Longman III
  
  
• Eschatological Continuity -- Daniel L. Gard