On the Israelites entering into Canaan they were forbidden to make any league with the people of the land, they were not to show them any mercy, nor to make any marriages with them (Deut. 7:2-3); and later, when Joshua was about to die, he said to them, that with the nations that were still left they were to make no marriages, nor to go in unto them. If they did, God would drive out no more of the nations, and they would be snares and traps unto them, and scourges in their sides and thorns in their eyes (Josh. 23:12-13). Joshua and the princes of Israel were, alas, deceived by the Gibeonites, and without seeking counsel of God they made a covenant with them (Josh. 9:3-21). The failure of the Israelites in this particular (compare Ezra 9; Ezra 10; Neh. 13) is typical of the church making alliances with the world which have so sadly dimmed and destroyed the testimony which should have been borne by a heavenly people.