Deuteronomy 7:1-6

Driving Out the Nations

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.
3 Do not intermarry with them. Do not give your daughters to their sons or take their daughters for your sons,
4 for they will turn your children away from following me to serve other gods, and the LORD’s anger will burn against you and will quickly destroy you.
5 This is what you are to do to them: Break down their altars, smash their sacred stones, cut down their Asherah poles[b] and burn their idols in the fire.
6 For you are a people holy to the LORD your God. The LORD your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the face of the earth to be his people, his treasured possession.

Deuteronomy 7:1-6 Meaning and Commentary

INTRODUCTION TO DEUTERONOMY 7

In this chapter the Israelites are exhorted to destroy the seven nations of the land of Canaan, when they entered into it, and to make no alliances with them of any kind, nor suffer any remains of idolatry to continue, De 7:1-5 to observe which, and other commands of God, they are urged from the consideration of their being freely chosen of God above all other people, and of their being redeemed out of the house of bondage, and of the Lord's being a covenant keeping God to them, De 7:6-11 and it is promised them, for their further encouragement to keep the commands of God, that they should have an increase of all temporal good things, and no evils and calamities should come upon them, De 6:12-16, and, lest they should be disheartened at the numbers and might of their enemies, they are put in mind of what God had done for them in Egypt, and of what he had promised to do for them now, De 7:17-20 and they are assured that the nations should be cast out before them by little and little, until they were utterly destroyed, De 7:21-24 and the chapter is concluded with an exhortation to destroy their images, and not admit anything of that sort to be brought into their houses, De 7:25,26.

Cross References 22

  • 1. S Leviticus 14:34; S Deuteronomy 4:38
  • 2. Deuteronomy 20:16-18; Deuteronomy 31:3; Acts 13:19
  • 3. Genesis 15:20
  • 4. S Genesis 10:16
  • 5. S Deuteronomy 1:7
  • 6. Genesis 13:7
  • 7. S Genesis 10:17
  • 8. Joshua 3:10
  • 9. S Deuteronomy 2:33
  • 10. S Deuteronomy 2:34
  • 11. Numbers 31:17; Deuteronomy 33:27; Joshua 11:11
  • 12. S Exodus 23:32
  • 13. ver 16; Deuteronomy 13:8; Deuteronomy 19:13; Deuteronomy 25:12
  • 14. Exodus 34:15-16; Joshua 22:16; Daniel 9:7; Ezra 9:2
  • 15. Judges 3:6
  • 16. S Deuteronomy 4:26; Deuteronomy 6:15
  • 17. S Exodus 34:13; Deuteronomy 16:21
  • 18. S Exodus 23:24; Deuteronomy 12:2-3
  • 19. Exodus 19:6; S Leviticus 27:30; Exodus 19:5-6; 1 Peter 2:9
  • 20. Deuteronomy 26:19; Psalms 30:4; Psalms 37:28; Psalms 50:5; Psalms 52:9; Jeremiah 2:3
  • 21. Deuteronomy 14:2; 1 Kings 3:8; Isaiah 41:9; Ezekiel 20:5
  • 22. S Genesis 17:7; S Exodus 8:22; S Exodus 34:9; Isaiah 43:1; Romans 9:4; Titus 2:14

Footnotes 2

  • [a]. The Hebrew term refers to the irrevocable giving over of things or persons to the Lord, often by totally destroying them; also in verse 26.
  • [b]. That is, wooden symbols of the goddess Asherah; here and elsewhere in Deuteronomy
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