The Canaanites

Abstract

The Canaanites become one of the most intriguing examples of the neighboring group as “other” in the Bible, and because the narrator of the book of Genesis repeatedly calls the land Israel’s ancestors occupy “Canaan,” we begin with them. It is not too much of a stretch to say that the Canaanites are Israel’s first neighbor, their most primordial neighbor, setting a pattern of tensions and interaction that prove instructive for thinking about other neighboring groups. The archaeological record of the Canaanites in the period before “Israel” arrives on the scene is difficult on many fronts, and the problem doesn’t end when Israel arrives either, since the Canaanites seem to coexist alongside Israel in an ambiguous manner. The Hebrew Bible considers the Canaanites and groups associated with them—Amorites, Hittites, Jebusites, Hivites, Perizzites, and Girgashites—constituting what tradition calls the “seven nations of Canaan,” as distinct people who are to be variously resisted or destroyed.