Randal Rauser

Home of progressively evangelical, generously orthodox, rigorously analytic, revolutionary Christian thinking (that's what I'm aiming for anyway)

Jesus Loves Canaanites

What Happened When Christians Stopped Allegorizing Canaan?

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During the Reformation, Protestants widely rejected the allegorized interpretations of the Canaanite genocide that had become de rigueur since Origen. With that safeguard gone, it was not long before they were appealing to Joshua to justify their own genocides. To illustrate, here is a passage from Philip Jenkins, Laying Down the Sword: And don’t think […]

Why God Did Not Command the Slaughter of the Canaanites, Briefly Explained

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This article provides a brief synopsis of a case explaining why God did not command the slaughter of the Canaanites. It is based on a debate opening statement that I gave last year. And it provides an introduction to some of the arguments I develop at length in Jesus Loves Canaanites. “Slaughter” is defined as the […]

William Lane Craig Says God May Command Us to “Drive Out Canaanites” in Our Day. I Respond.

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Reasonable Faith just posted a short video from William Lane Craig in which the esteemed apologist defends the prospect that God may command Christians today to target people groups in the same way that the ancient Israelites targeted the Canaanites for extermination. In this video, I provide a response. ?

Is Jesus Loves Canaanites Guilty of Motivated Reasoning?

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Over the last several months, I have often encountered the claim that my book Jesus Loves Canaanites is guilty of motivated reasoning. That’s a deeply misguided claim as I will explain in this article. Let’s start with a definition. Motivated reasoning involves the process of seeking arguments or evidence to achieve a desired outcome rather than allowing […]

Rethinking the History of the Canaanite Genocide: What Do You Have To Lose?

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The other day, I received an email from a reader of Jesus Loves Canaanites who stated that while he was sympathetic with the argument of the book, he remained inclined to accept the history of the Joshua narrative (and by implication, the ethics of divinely commanded genocide) because of uncertainty over alternative interpretations of the passages. […]

Paul Copan and Matthew Flannagan Don’t Want to Debate Me. But if They Did, I’d Ask Them This

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Paul Copan and Matthew Flannagan offer extensive critiques of my views in their book Did God Really Command Genocide? In turn, I devoted most of a chapter on what I called “The Just War Interpreters” to an extensive critique of their ‘kinder, gentler’ interpretation of the Canaanite genocide by demonstrating that it collapses into ethnic cleansing […]