1. So then, the Lord left some nations in the land to test the Israelites who had not been through the wars in Canaan.
2. He did this only in order to teach each generation of Israelites about war, especially those who had never been in battle before.
3. Those left in the land were the five Philistine cities, all the Canaanites, the Sidonians, and the Hivites who lived in the Lebanon Mountains from Mount Baal Hermon as far as Hamath Pass.
4. They were to be a test for Israel, to find out whether or not the Israelites would obey the commands that the Lord had given their ancestors through Moses.
5. And so the people of Israel settled down among the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Amorites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites.
6. They intermarried with them and worshipped their gods.
7. The people of Israel forgot the Lord their God; they sinned against him and worshipped the idols of Baal and Asherah.