When Elohim through Moses
(Deu 7.1-6)
When Elohim through Moses charged
his chosen Volk to cross the river
and take the promised land, he bade
them utterly destroy those peoples
and their sacred sites and objects:
‘Make no agreement; be merciless;
on no account allow your sons
to wed their daughters. For,’ He said,
‘you are a people holy to me’.
Be glad the Israelites could not
maintain the cruelty they were bidden.
Well it was for Canaanite
and Philistine the chosen people
had no stomach to sustain
that ancient ethnic cleansing. Wrathful
waxed their God they disobeyed;
or was He jealous that His people
could outshine their Lord in kindness? —
or simply jealous of those lads
who’d hitch with Canaan’s lovely daughters?