Passage

Deuteronomy 7.2

Book: Deuteronomy · ASV

Immediate context (±2 verses)

ASV (ASV)

"1. When Jehovah thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and shall cast out many nations before thee, the Hittite, and the Girgashite, and the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, seven nations greater and mightier than thou;"

"2. and when Jehovah thy God shall deliver them up before thee, and thou shalt smite them; then thou shalt utterly destroy them: thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor show mercy unto them;"

"3. neither shalt thou make marriages with them; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son. 4. For he will turn away thy son from following me, that they may serve other gods: so will the anger of Jehovah be kindled against you, and he will destroy thee quickly." (Deuteronomy 7:1-4, ASV)

WEB (WEB)

"1. When Yahweh your God brings you into the land where you go to possess it, and casts out many nations before you, the Hittite, the Girgashite, the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite, seven nations greater and mightier than you;"

"2. and when Yahweh your God delivers them up before you, and you strike them; then you shall utterly destroy them. You shall make no covenant with them, nor show mercy to them;"

"3. neither shall you make marriages with them. You shall not give your daughter to his son, nor shall you take his daughter for your son. 4. For he will turn away your son from following me, that they may serve other gods. So Yahweh’s anger would be kindled against you, and he would destroy you quickly." (Deuteronomy 7:1-4, WEB)

KJV (KJV)

"1. When the LORD thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and hath cast out many nations before thee, the Hittites, and the Girgashites, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than thou;"

"2. And when the LORD thy God shall deliver them before thee; thou shalt smite them, and utterly destroy them; thou shalt make no covenant with them, nor shew mercy unto them:"

"3. Neither shalt thou make marriages with them; thy daughter thou shalt not give unto his son, nor his daughter shalt thou take unto thy son. 4. For they will turn away thy son from following me, that they may serve other gods: so will the anger of the LORD be kindled against you, and destroy thee suddenly." (Deuteronomy 7:1-4, KJV)

YLT (YLT)

"1. 'When Jehovah thy God doth bring thee in unto the land whither thou art going in to possess it, and He hath cast out many nations from thy presence, the Hittite, and the Girgashite, and the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, seven nations more numerous and mighty than thou,"

"2. and Jehovah thy God hath given them before thee, and thou hast smitten them, thou dost utterly devote them, thou dost not make with them a covenant, nor dost thou favour them."

"3. 'And thou dost not join in marriage with them; thy daughter thou dost not give to his son, and his daughter thou dost not take to thy son, 4. for he doth turn aside thy son from after Me, and they have served other gods, and the anger of Jehovah hath burned against you, and hath destroyed thee hastily." (Deuteronomy 7:1-4, YLT)

Setting

Speaker: Moses, in his final addresses to Israel
Audience: the second-generation Israelites at the brink of entering the Promised Land
Location: the plains of Moab, east of the Jordan
Time period: end of the 40-year wilderness wandering, c. 1406 BC (early-date) or 1230s BC (late-date)

Theological reading

The verse is the standing conquest-charam commission against the seven named Canaanite peoples of Deut 7:1. The Hebrew construction haḥarem taḥarim otam (infinitive-absolute + Hiphil imperfect) intensifies the verb: thou shalt utterly devote-to-destruction them. The verse is one of the most-deployed in the atheist Canaanite-conquest objection (Dawkins, Hitchens, Harris); the full defeater treatment lives at Canaanite Conquest Objection Defeater. The Christian-evangelical-academic response engages on five threads: (1) the [[H2763 - charam|charam]] verb's range is irrevocable-religious-devotion, not ethnic-extermination simpliciter; (2) the rationale is religious-judicial-judgment on terminal-corruption (Deut 9:4-5 + Lev 18:24-28, institutional child-sacrifice, ritual incest, bestiality, cultic prostitution, necromancy); (3) the conquest texts use formulaic-hyperbolic ANE-warfare rhetoric, with the same Josh 11 chapter saying "none left breathing" and Judges showing Canaanites everywhere; (4) the conquest-charam admits personal-pivot escape, Rahab (Josh 2 + 6), the Gibeonites (Josh 9), Kenizzite incorporation (Josh 14); (5) the framework is non-portable, Augustine and Aquinas classically articulate the sui generis exception that does not generalize beyond the named seven peoples in the Land at the conquest moment. The rationale given at v. 4 ("he will turn away thy son from following me, that they may serve other gods") is religious-formation-of-Israel, not ethnic-cleansing. See Canaanite Conquest and Herem for the doctrinal landscape.

Key words

H2763 - charam, haḥarem taḥarim, the load-bearing charam construction at the verse's center; the verb in infinitive-absolute + Hiphil imperfect for emphasis.

Quoted in

Why these four translations

ris3n chose ASV, WEB, KJV, and YLT for two reasons together. They are the most literal English translations available (formal-equivalence: word-for-word renderings that preserve the Hebrew and Greek grammar rather than smoothing it into modern dynamic-equivalence idiom). And they are in the public domain in the United States, which means fair-use quotation at any length requires no publisher license. Modern licensed translations (NASB95, ESV, NIV) restrict volume of quotation under their copyright terms, so they are not used at stub-level coverage here. NASB95 appears only on hand-curated rich passage hubs under Lockman Foundation's fair-use allowance.

The four:

ASV (American Standard Version, 1901). The basis of the modern critical-text English tradition.
WEB (World English Bible, contemporary). Public-domain revision in the ASV line, in current English.
KJV (King James Version, 1611). Reformation-era, Textus Receptus base.
YLT (Young's Literal Translation, Robert Young, 1862). Hyper-literal preservation of Hebrew and Greek grammar; useful for word-study work even where English reads stiff.

See Bibles for the full per-translation history, translators, textual basis, strengths, and weaknesses.