The conquest of Hazor
According to the Book of Joshua, Hazor was the site which was occupied by a powerful Canaanite king who assembled a confederation of Canaanite tribes to oppose the Israelites under Joshua following the fall of Jericho. The confederation included chariots of iron according to the biblical story. The army confronted Joshua after the Israelites had captured several cities in the southern regions of Canaan, as described in the first ten chapters of the Book of Joshua. When Joshua turned to the north as directed by God it was to complete the conquest of Canaan and the destruction of its people.
The Israelites defeated the Canaanite confederation in battle, after which the towns of Hazor, Madon, Anab, Debir, Achshaph, and Shimron were razed, their leaders hanged, and their population put to the sword in accordance with herem. Joshua lists the kings of the Canaan tribes which were defeated by the Israelites and describes their fate. There is no timetable for the conquest of Canaan, the only reference which can be made is that by the end of the campaigns Joshua is described as old and weak from the ravages of time, an observation attributed in the book to God himself. Canaan was divided by the conquerors into lands of the twelve tribes of Israel.
Throughout the campaigns described in the Book of Joshua God intervenes by giving Joshua specific instructions regarding the conduct of coming battles, and providing plans for the campaign. God also performs miracles to assist the Israelites in battle by confounding their enemies, including stopping the motion of the sun and the moon across the sky. Bombardment of the enemy with hailstones is another technique of aiding the Israelites. By the end of Joshua’s conquest of the land, only one of the Canaanite tribes agreed to peaceful terms with the Israelites, the Gibeonites. They are enslaved by the Israelites, with God’s permission.
The historicity of the Book of Joshua has been questioned and most scholars consider the battles described therein, as well as the massacres of populations, to be mythical. By the end of the sixteenth century of the Common Era, it was generally regarded to have been written by multiple authors, revised several times, and was a creation of a much later time than the period depicted in the book. Archaeological evidence presents many of the cities described in Joshua as being unoccupied or even non-existent during the period the book covers. By the beginning of the twentieth century, the military campaigns described in Joshua were considered to be false.
The war of the united Israelites against the tribes of Canaan are supported with little historic or archaeological evidence, and the later authorship of Joshua – which bears many similarities to earlier accounts of Moses and later ones of Josiah – makes its accuracy uncertain. There are those who believe that the accounts of the Bible are unchallengeable, and the absence of historical or archaeological evidence is of no consequence. Fact or fiction, the details of the Book of Joshua and its military campaigns reveal a savage war of extermination against the tribes of Canaan.