1. Now these are the nations that the Lord left to test those in Israel who had not experienced war in Canaan
2. (so that later generations of the children of Israel who did not know war before might know it, to teach them how to fight):
3. the five Philistine lords, all the Canaanites, the Sidonians, and the Hivites living on Mount Lebanon, from Mount Baal Hermon to Lebo Hamath.
4. They were to test Israel, in order to know if they would obey the commandments of the Lord, which He commanded their fathers by the hand of Moses.
5. The children of Israel lived among the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites.
6. They took their daughters for themselves as wives, and gave their own daughters to their sons, and served their gods.
7. The children of Israel did what was evil in the sight of the Lord. They forgot the Lord their God and served the Baals and the Asherahs.
8. The anger of the Lord burned against Israel, and He sold them into the hands of Cushan-Rishathaim, king of Mesopotamia. The children of Israel served Cushan-Rishathaim for eight years.