Canaanites

The Canaanites were the pre-Israelite inhabitants of the land west of the Jordan, descended in the biblical genealogy from Canaan son of Ham (Gen. 10:15-19). The term functions both narrowly (one of the seven peoples of Canaan: Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites — Deut. 7:1) and broadly (all inhabitants of the land). Their religion centered on Baal the storm god, Asherah the fertility goddess, and Astarte, with worship practices including child sacrifice, sacred prostitution, and divination.

The Mosaic command to utterly destroy the Canaanites (Deut. 7:1-5; 20:16-18) is grounded explicitly in two concerns: the danger of Israelite religious contamination through intermarriage ('they will turn your sons away from following me to serve other gods' — Deut. 7:4) and the execution of divine judgment on a society whose sin had reached full measure after centuries of warning (Gen. 15:16). The command's moral dimensions have generated sustained theological discussion from ancient times. Its practical outworking in Judges 1-2 shows incomplete fulfillment, and the remaining Canaanites became exactly the religious snare the law predicted (Judg. 2:11-13). Rahab and the Gibeonites represent individual Canaanites who sought covenant inclusion and received it.