There are good reasons to believe that God did not order the genocide of the Canaanites.

Just to refresh everyones mind here are the most relevant passages this debate is centered around:"1 When the LORD your God brings you into the land you are entering to possess and drives out before you many nations the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger than you" 2 and when the LORD your God has delivered them over to you and you have defeated them, then you must destroy them totally.[a] Make no treaty with them, and show them no mercy. " [Deut 7:1-2]"16However, in the cities of the nations the Lord your God is giving you as an inheritance, do not leave alive anything that breathes.17Completely destroy[a]them—the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites—as the Lord your God has commanded you." [Deut 20:16-18]To reiterate, I aim to provide good reasons to think that God did not order the genocide of the Canaanites - biblical text notwithstanding. I draw much of my inspiration from Wes Morriston and Randal Rauser. [1][2][3]The Argument(1) God is the most perfect being there could be.(2) Yahweh is God.(3) Yahweh ordered people to commit genocide.(4) Genocide is always a moral atrocity.(5) A perfect being would not order people to commit a moral atrocity.(6) Therefore, a perfect being would not order people to commit genocide (4,5).(7) Therefore, Yahweh did not order people to commit genocide (1,2,6). [4]Obviously, (7) contradicts (3). I will contend that (7) has much better reasons to be accepted than (3), and given the chain of reasoning in (4) - (6), that warrants accepting (7) and rejecting (3), thus fulfilling my burden of proof. A moral atrocity is defined as roughly equivalent to the philosopher Marilyn McCord Adams notion of horrendous evils - that is, "the participation in which (that is, the doing or suffering of which) constitutes prima facie reason to doubt whether the participant’s life could (given their inclusion in it) be a great good to him/her on the whole." [5] I anticipate that (1) and (2) will not be contested by opponent, so I will not waste time and space defending them. Obviously, (3) is in dispute, and Con may wish to challenge (4) and (5) because if he did not (6) and (7) flow logically from the other premises and the conclusion is guaranteed. I will thus focus my attention on defending (4) and (5).Rationalizing GenocideWhy are we taking the testimony of the perpetrators of genocide so literally and at face value? Of course the perpetrators of genocide are going to make it seem as if their enemies are the most evil and malevolent and threatening people possible - it's simply a psychological fact that humans will often demonize each other in order to justify and rationalize committing moral atrocities on each other that they wouldn't do otherwise. Imagine if I read a tract by the Nazi's about the Jews. Of course they are going to make it sound as if Jews are the worst thing to ever grace this planet - that's how you justify treating other people like you did. I'm not going to go read Hutu propaganda to get an accurate depiction of what the Tutsi were like. It is no secret that history is written by the victors. There seem to be elements in common that provide the rationale for genocide: (1.1) Divide: distinguish between an in and out-group while asserting the superiority of the in group and the inferiority of the out group. (2.) Demonize: accuse the out-group of promoting an injustice, inequality, or presenting a threat. (3.1) Destroy: implore the in-group to redress the perceived injustice, with divine/transcendent backing. [6] I think, Israel's reasons (rationalizations) given for the genocide clearly fit this pattern. WRT to (1.1) the Israelites clearly think they are divinely chosen and that God has given them the land that the Canaanites occupy thus giving them superiority (Gen 15:18-21). (2.1) The Canaanites have no right to the land for doing "unclean" things (Lev 18:24-27). (3.1) God gives the Israelites divine license to wipe out the Canaanites (Deut 20:16-18, as quoted above). Why should we accept this account of genocide as any different from an other obviously failed rationales for genocide such as those of the Nazis or Hutus?Child KillersI think this reason right here should be enough to affirm the resolution: even if we suppose that the adult Canaanites were irredeemably evil - and there's not really a reason we should concede that - why in the world should we suppose that the children are irredeemably evil and should be wiped out along with them? Children are the innocent ones, and nearly all recognize that losing children is one of wars greatest tragedies. But, in the Israelites' case, Canaanite children aren't just dying as "collateral damage" - the Israelites are specifically targeting the children as targets for death for the crimes of their elders. As if children could be held morally responsible for the sins of their fathers and mothers. If nothing else is unspeakably evil, that is. If nothing else is a moral atrocity, murdering innocent children surely is.Soul-Destroying EffectsBut setting those above reasons aside there are even more problematic points. Not only is genocide a moral atrocity to the victims, it is also a moral atrocity to the victimizer. We have numerous reports and ample evidence today that show the devastating effects of war on the soldiers who do the killing. It often scars these soldiers for the their entire lives (which gives rise to our concept of PTSD). War does horrible things to people and can turn normal people into ones who will either willingly or unwillingly commit moral atrocities. I would suggest that nothing could be more traumatizing than a solider having to kill children under divine sanction which would be done under more brutal conditions than most modern day analogues. As more than likely they'd be up close killing the children with short range weapons such as swords. Perhaps someone could say "Well, all that is technically true but times were much more brutal back then; killing children wouldn't be so hard on the Israelites because they'd be desensitized to it living in those hard times." That may very well be true, but that only highlights more problems. Don't we lament the fact that a normal person can be turned into someone who actually enjoys or is numb to the brutalizing effects of war (or, more specifically, murdering children)? That is an evil and a tragedy all in and of itself. Present day genocide?Supposing we accept the rationale for the Canaanite genocide, what, exactly, would rule out us using the underlying rationalizations to authorize modern day genocide? It's already been shown time and again that the genocides in the bible have been used to justify religious violence in the past. If one thinks their God had authorized genocide in the past, why not in the present or future? Imagine I said that God told me that killing all Muslims would be an excellent idea (including those "evil" Muslim children that had the misfortune to be born to the wrong family). Why would Christians reject my claim to a divine command? I maintain the reason would be a moral one. Other Christians would rightly recognize that such an evil act is incompatible with the nature of a perfectly good God and take it to mean that I did not receive a true divine command to exterminate all Muslims. Of course, if one does not accept that these genocide texts are being erroneously attributed to God then what reason has another Christian to reject my "divine" command?I think, given all these reasons, that there are good reasons to believe God did NOT order the genocide of the Canaanites.Sources[1] http://www.colorado.edu...[2] http://www.learningace.com...[3] http://randalrauser.com...[4] ibid, p 28 - 29[5] ibid, p 30[6] ibid, p 37