The Genealogical Rachab Was Not A Canaanitess



 

 

Taken from: http://www.israelofgod.org/rahab.htm

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Editor’s note: It is assumed and suggested that the reader have previously read: “The Story of Ruth the Israelite!?” (see: www.israelofgod.org) before reading this article, as the foundation of biblical evidence will already be built from which this article continues and in part, is based. However, the basic premise and resulting conclusion is sustained from within the confines of this article and as a result this article may be read first. IoG Minor grammatical editing done by IoG.

Is there a Canaanite in the ancestry of David and Jesus (Yeshua)? Did Rahab, the harlot of Jericho, marry Salmon and become the mother of Boaz? Could the theologians and scholars be wrong? Did they miss something? What?

 
THE TRUTH ABOUT RAHAB

by R.K. Phillips

Deuteronomy, the Book of God's Royal Law, Chapter 7, makes it very plain that when the Israelites cross the Jordan into Canaan:

a. they were to destroy the entire population of those lands and everything that lived, including the cattle, sheep and asses;

b. they were NOT to make marriages with any of those peoples themselves, nor allow their sons and daughters to marry any of the descendants of those peoples.

It is quite evident that the Israelites of that generation which finally crossed the Jordan did observe these commandments. After the initial set-back at Ai was sorted out, their unbroken success in conquering the land for the next 30 years was proof positive that not one man dared to disobey even the least of those commandments — for they suffered swift and fatal consequences every time they stepped out of line.

The Israelites had received the Law at Sinai and had said they would keep it — Exodus 24:3. Then they broke the Law by setting up a golden calf to worship, and for this rebellious act, some 3,000 men were summarily slain — Exodus 32:27-28.

This lesson lasted for 35 years or so until they came out of the Wilderness and camped in that part of the land of Moab which the Amorites had taken from the Moabites and which the Israelites had, in their turn, taken from the Amorites — "The Plains of Moab".

Here, on the advice of Balaam, the Moabites and Midianites sent the most beautiful of their young women to entice the Israelite men to commit idolatry and fornication with them. And for that flagrant breach of His Law, God ordered 1000 of the backsliding Israelites to be slain and their bodies shamefully hung (impaled or crucified) on stakes, and He caused a further 23,000 Israelites to die of plague. God then ordered the surviving Israelites to send out 12,000 armed men to slaughter all the men, women and male children of the Midianites. Numbers 31:1-20. (Note: the 24,000 of Israel — Numbers 25:9 — who are stated to have `died in the plague', included the 1000 who were hanged, but those who were hanged were not included in the 23,000 mentioned by Paul in 1 Corinthians 10:8 who `fell' in one day. The number 23,000 is 10 times 2300 which is the Biblical number for `cleansing the sanctuary' — of Israel — and 10 is the number of completion of an action before the commencement of a new order or cycle. The execution of this large number of the Israel people not only `cleansed' the nation of all idolatrous practices, but also provided a salutary example of what would happen if they failed to keep God's Laws and commandments in future.

Immediately after the capture of Jericho, God again inflicted sudden death on the Israelites when one soldier (Achan) disobeyed the instruction not to take anything for themselves from that city, for all the gold and silver found in Jericho was to go into the Lord's treasury. But Achan took some of the gold and silver that he found and hid it in his tent. Therefore God caused 36 of the Israel forces to be slain by the men of Ai in the next battle. When Joshua learned the reason for those deaths, he located the guilty soldier and, after his summary court-martial in front of all the people, the stolen goods were brought out and placed on the ground. Then, his whole family was assembled and the people stoned the man and his sons and daughters to death, slaughtered all his cattle, burnt his tent and all that he and his family had possessed, and covered the remains and the stolen goods with a mound of stones.

Threatened with swift and draconian punishment on this scale if even one of His people disobeyed the least of God's commands, it is unlikely that any male member of the Israel Forces would have dared to be so foolish as to marry an idolatrous Canaanite woman in open defiance of the Law of Deuteronomy 7:3-4, which expressly forbade such marriages. The fact that the Israelite armies suffered no more setbacks for the next 25 to 30 years is sufficient evidence in itself that no further transgressions of God's Law occurred during that period.

Who, then, was this female ancestor of our Lord — Rachab — who is stated, in Matthew 1:5, to have married Salmon the son of Naashon, a prince of the Royal line of Judah, some time either before or after the Israelites occupied the Promised Land?

Every Bible translator and commentator, without exception, associates her with, or directly identifies her as `Rahab the harlot' who was saved alive from the massacre of Jericho. But the foregoing evidence shows that after the debacle at the first battle for Ai, no Israelite had dared to disobey God by marrying a Canaanite or any other foreign woman for at least 30 years after crossing the Jordan. Furthermore, Leviticus 21:7,14, state that no priest of God's Tabernacle was to take a harlot for his wife, and verse 9 states that if even the daughter of a priest played the harlot, she was to be killed and burnt in the fire.

Therefore, in view of these severe strictures, it is beyond the bounds of possibility for Jesus, who was (ed. is) a Priest after the Order of Melchisedek, to be the descendant of that `Rahab' who was saved out of Jericho unless it could be proved that she was neither a harlot nor a Canaanitess by race. It has already been proved, by the evidence of Scripture itself, that Ruth — who is similarly claimed by all the churches and commentators to be a heathen Moabitess — was neither a heathen foreigner nor was she a Moabitess by race, but a true daughter of Israel who lived in that land of Moab which the Israelites had taken from the Amorites. That land was still called Moab even though it was occupied by the tribe of Reuben until they were taken into captivity several hundred years later — 1 Chronicles 5:8,16,18-26. What, then, has Scripture to say concerning Rahab of Jericho? Was she neither a harlot nor a Canaanitess as stated in Scripture?

Several attempts have been made:

a. to identify Rahab as an Israelite descendant of Sherah, the daughter of Ephraim, who went to Canaan about two centuries or so before the Exodus — 1 Chronicles 7:24 — and built the strongholds of Beth-horon and Uzzen-sherah some 25 miles west of Jericho

b. to clear her name of the term "harlot" by describing her as a `widow' or an `innkeeper' or as a `trader in flax'.

But the term `harlot' is not only used by Joshua in the Old Testament; it is used again both by Paul and James in the New Testament 1500 years later. Thus there had been ample opportunity since Joshua's day to clear her name from that obnoxious designation if there had been no justification for it. Paul in particular, as a learned disciple of Gamaliel, would most certainly have taken swift action to correct any mistaken slight on the ancestry of Israel kings. Moreover Joshua, himself, was a ninth generation descendant of Ephraim (1 Chronicles 7:24-27) and would have been related to Rahab if she was, in truth, a descendant of Ephraim's daughter Sherah.

Therefore not only would Joshua have given his two spies careful instructions for rescuing Rahab on the grounds of consanguinity but he would also have cleared her name of any undeserved accusations of being a harlot had they not been true. Neither would he have left her fate to a chance encounter with his two spies; nor have left it to her to extract a promise of safekeeping from them. She herself would have sent a direct appeal to her kinsman for safekeeping as well as bringing the fact of her own racial origin to the attention of the two spies.

On the contrary, she had no hesitation — Joshua 2:11 — in identifying herself as a Canaanite, and at the same time inadvertently fulfilling a prophecy made 40 years earlier — Exodus 15:16, where it is stated that "fear and dread" would fall upon the Canaanites and that "all the inhabitants of Canaan shall melt away". In Joshua 2:10, she states that we (the people of Canaan) heard how Jehovah dried up the waters of the Red Sea before you (the Israelites); and in verse 11 she says that when we heard these things "our hearts did melt…".

If Rahab and her family had been Israelites, she would never have included herself among those who heard and whose hearts had melted. She would have said that when they (the Canaanites) heard these things their hearts had melted. Furthermore, it should be noted that when she and her family were finally rescued from Jericho — as stated in Joshua 6:23 — they were "left outside the camp of Israel". This statement once again emphasizes the fact that they were members of a foreign race whose presence within the camp of Israel would have polluted it in God's sight and brought God's swift punishment upon the Israel forces — Deuteronomy 23:14 — quite apart from the risk of sudden death to themselves or to any unauthorised persons who unwittingly ventured close to the Tabernacle (Numbers 1:51).

It is therefore established beyond question, by the record of Scripture itself, that Rahab was a Canaanite by race. Hence it must also be accepted, on the same authority, that she was indeed a harlot. In fact it was because of the dissolute and diseased condition of both the people of Canaan and their animals, that God ordered the Israel armies to slaughter every living thing in the cities they captures (Joshua 6:21) men, women, children and animals, and then burn their cities to the ground in order to cleanse the area by fire.

This fact alone — quite apart from the Laws forbidding marriage with members of other races — makes it unthinkable that either Salmon, a prince of the Royal line of Judah, would even have considered a marriage with such a woman, or that his comrades in arms would have allowed him to do so when they themselves would, most likely, be the very ones to suffer sudden destruction by God for condoning such a deliberate transgression of God's commands.

Joshua 6:25 states that Rahab was given land in the midst of Israel in return for risking her own life by hiding the two spies that were sent to Jericho. Josephus in his "Antiquities of the Jews", Book 5 chapter 1, sections 2 and 7, records the same story but neither he nor Joshua make any reference to a marriage taking place between Rahab and Salmon. That deafening silence is itself the strongest proof that no such marriage did take place. Nor did it take place in fact, because — as the Scripture record shows — the Israelite armies suffered no further setbacks through breaking God's Laws for at least 30 years.

However, let us assume for a moment that Salmon did marry Rahab the harlot within a year or so of the fall of Jericho, and that Boaz was born a year or so after that. If such were the case, then Boaz would have been about 115 years old when he married Ruth! On the other hand, if we assume that Rahab was about 30 years of age when Jericho fell, and that Salmon did not marry her till 30 years or more later, then not only would Rahab have been at least 60 years of age and no longer able to bear children, but Boaz, even if born 30 years after the fall of Jericho, would still have been 85 years of age when he married Ruth.

Furthermore, it is impossible to believe that Naomi would have urged Ruth, her attractive young daughter-in-law, to seek marriage with a kinsman so aged that he would be incapable of begetting children. Thus all the evidence confirms the fact that Salmon did not marry Rahab the Canaanite harlot. In fact, the Bible states, in plain writing, that Salmon married a different woman altogether. A woman with a different name, and without any distinguishing appellation, obnoxious or otherwise, attached to her name. It is the religious translators and commentators who have made the mistake in translation and identified Salmon's wife as the harlot of Jericho.

But the most surprising fact is that the harlot's name is NOT Rahab after all, for there is NO woman with the name of Rahab in the whole of the Bible! In the Hebrew text of the Old Testament, Rahab is a poetic or metaphorical name applied on three occasions to the land of Egypt, with the meaning of being `haughty' or `proud', (see Psalms 87:4, 89:10 and Isaiah 51:9). But these three passages have nothing to do with Joshua, Jericho, or the harlot who lived there. The same Hebrew word `rahab' is, in fact, quite correctly translated in the Authorized version as `proud' in Job 9:13 and 26:12, but in Isaiah 30:7 it is incorrectly translated as `strength'. This verse reads — in the Hebrew text — "Egypt's help is vain and worthless therefore I have called her Rahab sitting still" — (or `Egypt the motionless').

The harlot's name is `Rakhab' (English pronunciation: `Raackharb') A different Hebrew word to `Rahab', with a totally different meaning of "to widen" or "to make broad". It is not spelt with the Hebrew letter `He' as in Rahab, but with the letter `khet' (which has a hard gutteral aspirated sound like the `ch' in `loch' or in the German `macht'.

The Greek alphabet, however, has no equivalent letters corresponding to either `he' or `khet'. Hence, in the Septuagint version of the Book of Joshua, the harlot's name is spelt `Ra'ab' in all passages where it occurs. And exactly the same spelling is used in the New Testament in the Greek text of Hebrews 11:31 and of James 2:25 — but NOT in Matthew 1:5. Furthermore, her name is always coupled with the designation `harlot' either directly or by association with this designation in the same context in which her name appears.

If Salmon's wife was indeed `Rakhab' the harlot, why is it then that, in the Greek text of Matthew 1:5, it is spelt `Raxab' and not Ra'ab as it is in Hebrews 11:31 and James 2:25 and in every passage of the Greek text of the Septuagint where the harlot's name appears? And why is it that Raxab's name in Matthew 1:5 is not coupled with the term `harlot'? This is the first and only occurrence of this name in the New Testament.

Therefore IF Raxab was in actual fact the harlot of Jericho, then it is even more necessary to identify her here as the harlot than it is in Hebrews 11:31 and James 2:25. It should be noted that the letter `x' in Raxab's name is the Greek letter `chi' which has the hard `ch' sound as in the English `chord' or `Christ'. Therefore the English pronunciation of the Greek name `Raxab' in Matthew 1:5 should be `Rachab' — with a short second `a' as in cab — NOT `Rahab' and NOT `Raackharb'.

This is not just another way of spelling or of pronouncing `Rahab' or `Rakhab' either in Greek or in Hebrew. `Rachab' is a different name altogether in the `original' Greek. Therefore it cannot refer to Ra'ab the harlot, it can only refer to a different woman. Now it has been shown time and time again that God never uses two different words, or two different names in the same verse or context to refer to the same thing or person. The different words or names are always put there to draw our attention to the fact that He is referring to different things or persons. [Not sure if this last statement is sustainable — IoG]

But Matthew 1:5, Hebrews 11:31 and James 2:25 cannot be classified as being `in the same context'. Therefore more positive methods have been used in these passages to identify the person concerned precisely and exactly, and to distinguish between one person and another. Thus in Hebrews 11:31 and James 2:25, the reader is told explicitly that these passages refer to Ra'ab the harlot of Jericho:

a. by stating her name,

b. by repeating her designation of a harlot,

c. by mentioning the action which she took to help the two spies. These are all positive marks of identification.

On the other hand in Matthew 1:5 Rachab the wife of Salmon is clearly distinguished from ANY identification or association in any way with the harlot of Jericho:

1. by the different spelling of her name in the `original' Greek,

2. by the different pronunciation of her name,

3. by the absence of any offensive designation attached to her name,

4. by the absence of any reference to Jericho or any activity that took place there.

Nor is the absence of any such additional information about Rachab designed to `cover up' possible unfavourable personal references to individual members of Israel's Royal Line and of the human ancestors of Jesus in this genealogy. The Bible does not shrink from stating unsavoury `incidents' in the lives of any of Israel's famous people. This is demonstrated in the very next verse (Matthew 1:6) by the cutting reference to Bathsheba — not by recording her name, but by bringing her name to mind only through her degrading act of adultery with King David. Again, there is the story of Judah's seduction by Tamar as told in Genesis 38:11-30.

Thus the whole evidence of Scripture is that Salmon's wife was NOT the harlot of Jericho, and in the absence of any other conflicting information concerning her, then the conclusion must be that her ancestry was as impeccable as that of her husband.

ADDENDUM ON RAHAB

There still remains the question about the age of Boaz, at the time he married Ruth. If we assume that Salmon married Rachab either before, or soon after, the fall of Jericho, then Boaz would have been about 115 years old at the time of his marriage. For (it appears) the genealogies of Matthew 1, Luke 3 and Ruth 4, list only four generations covering the 460 years from the fall of Jericho to the birth of David.

It is apparent therefore that, in a Royal dynasty of the one tribe (Judah), it is not necessary to list every link in the chain in order to establish or confirm the legal succession to the throne. For example, Ruth 4:17 states that Obed was called the `son' of Naomi who was actually his grandmother. Hence there must also be similar unlisted generations between Salmon, Boaz, Obed, and Jesse, who was the father of David, in order to fill out the whole period of some 460 years. In fact, it would seem that the only reason why Salmon, Boaz, Obed and Jesse are listed in the genealogies is because they lived at points of marked change in the transition from tribal to national status on the one hand, or from administrative development through elders, military leaders, and judges to a monarchy on the other; or simply because, in this transitional period, these men had each married a woman from one of the other tribes of Israel.

It would appear from the book of Ruth that Ruth was of the tribe of Reuben, and if the wives of those other three men were also from different tribes, then this inclusion of women from different tribes into the Royal line would have done much to assist in the final federation of the Nations of Israel under one king.

The reference to Rakhab's `faith' in Hebrews 11:31 and James 2:25 does not refer to any `religious conversion' on her part, for, as a Canaanite, she would not even have been allowed into the Assembly or Congregation of Israel, let alone to partake of the holy things. Both Paul and James were simply contrasting her faith, and the action she took as a result of it, with that of the Israelites of her day and also of Paul's day.

After only hearing about the miracles which the God of Israel had wrought for Israel at the Red Sea, and in destroying the Amorites, Rakhab not only believed that God was God over Heaven as well as the Earth and would do as He had promised, but she had such great faith in His ability to do those things, that she was willing to risk her own life to protect the two spies in return for their promise to save her and her family when Israel took the city.

In striking contrast to the strength of her faith and positive reaction, many of those Israelites — who had actually witnessed with their own eyes the miracles which Rakhab had only heard about — not only failed to believe in God's power and promises to help them, but were too fearful for their own safety to even risk crossing the Jordan. For that reason God sent them back to wander about in the wilderness for the next 40 years. And so that whole generation perished there for their lack of belief and faith in God's word and also for their lack of faith in His mighty acts of deliverance from their enemies which they had not only witnessed, but in which they themselves had been involved.

Note, the Hebrew grammars contradict each other as to the pronunciation of the Hebrew vowels in the harlot's name. One giving `a' as in lark, another (with the same `pointing') as `a' in mat, and another as `a' in awe.

Now it may be noticed that Rachel's name in the Old Testament is spelt with the same letter `khet' as for Rakhab the harlot. And in Matthew 2:18 the Greek version of Rachel's name is spelt with the same Greek letter `chi' as is used for Rachab in Matthew 1:5. Therefore it could be argued from this that the woman of Matthew 1:5 and the harlot of Jericho must be one and the same person.

This is a reasonable assumption but it is not acceptable because there is no mention in Matthew 1 of Rachab being a harlot, or as being a Canaanite, or as having any part in the fall of Jericho. Moreover if Rachab was the Greek equivalent to the harlot's name in Hebrew then we would expect to find it used again in Hebrews 11:31 and James 2:25. But, as stated previously, in these passages the harlot's name is written as Ra'ab, just as it is in the Greek text of Joshua in the Septuagint. This sharp distinction between the spellings together with context details rejects the assumption that the names refer to the same woman.

In the Hebrew text, the vowel pointing for Rachel differs from that for the harlot and this fact may be the reason why the Greek letter `chi' could be used for the translation of Rachel's name but not for that of Rakhab.

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