Editing Religious war (section)

===Judaism===
{{Main|Milkhemet Mitzvah|Herem (war or property)}}
{{Further|Judaism and violence}}
{{See also|Numbers 31#Scholarly discussions}}
[[File:Tissot The Women of Midian Led Captive by the Hebrews.jpg|thumb|Midianite women, children and livestock taken captive by Israelite soldiers after all Midianite men had been killed and their towns burnt. Watercolour by [[James Tissot]] (c. 1900) illustrating the War against the Midianites as narrated in [[Numbers 31]].]]
[[Reuven Firestone]] (2012) stated "that holy war is a common theme in the Hebrew Bible. Divinely legitimized through the authority of biblical scripture and its interpretation, holy war became a historical reality for the Jews of antiquity. Among at least some of the Jewish groups of the late [[Second Temple period]] until the middle of the second century, C.E., holy war was an operative institution. That is, Jews engaged in what is defined here as holy war."{{sfn|Firestone|2012|p=3}} He mentioned the [[Maccabean Revolt]] (167–160 BCE), the [[First Jewish–Roman War]] (66–73 CE) and the [[Bar Kokhba revolt]] (132–136 CE) as three examples of a "holy war" or "Commanded War" ({{Langx|he|מלחמת מצווה}} ''[[Milkhemet Mitzvah]]'') in the eyes of [[Rabbinic Judaism]] at the time.{{sfn|Firestone|2012|p=3}} He asserted that this concept may have re-emerged in modern times within some factions of the [[Zionist movement]], particularly [[Revisionist Zionism]].<ref>Holy War in Judaism: The Fall and Rise of a Controversial Idea</ref>{{page needed|date=March 2022}}

In 2016, however, Firestone made a distinction between what he regarded as the Hebrew Bible's concept and the 'Western' concept of holy war:<ref>{{cite web|last1=Firestone|first1=Reuven|title=Holy War Idea in the Hebrew Bible|url=http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/crcc/private/cmje/issues/more_issues/Holy_War_in_the_Hebrew_Bible.pdf|publisher=USC|access-date=2 June 2016|archive-date=13 October 2016|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161013061244/http://www.usc.edu/schools/college/crcc/private/cmje/issues/more_issues/Holy_War_in_the_Hebrew_Bible.pdf|url-status=dead}}</ref><blockquote>"Holy war" is a Western concept referring to war that is fought for religion, against adherents of other religions, often in order to promote religion through conversion, and with no specific geographic limitation. This concept does not occur in the Hebrew Bible, whose wars are not fought for religion or in order to promote it but, rather, in order to preserve religion and a religiously unique people in relation to a specific and limited geography.</blockquote>Several scholars regard [[The Bible and violence#Warfare from Genesis through Joshua|war narratives in the Hebrew Bible]], such as the [[Numbers 31|war against the Midianites in Numbers 31]], to be a holy war, with Niditch (1995) asserting the presence of a "priestly ideology of war in Numbers 31".<ref name="Niditch">{{Cite journal |last=Niditch |first=Susan |date=1995 |title=War in the Hebrew Bible and Contemporary Parallels |url=http://wordandworld.luthersem.edu/content/pdfs/15-4_Nations/15-4_Niditch.pdf |journal=[[Word & World]] |publisher=[[Luther Seminary]] |volume=15 |issue=4 |pages=406 |access-date=20 March 2021 |archive-date=1 January 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220101190138/http://wordandworld.luthersem.edu/content/pdfs/15-4_Nations/15-4_Niditch.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref> Hamilton (2005) argued that the two major concerns of Number 31 are the idea that war is a defiling activity, but Israelite soldiers need to be ritually pure, so they may only fight wars for a holy cause, and are required to cleanse themselves afterwards to restore their ritual purity.<ref name="Hamilton" /> The Israelite campaign against Midian was blessed by the Israelite god [[Yahweh]], and could therefore be considered a holy war.<ref name="Hamilton">{{Cite book |last=Hamilton |first=Victor P. |date=2005 |title=Handbook on the Pentateuch: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=qVcVWPXuMsAC&pg=PT371 |location=Grand Rapids, Michigan |publisher=Baker Books |page=371 |isbn=9781585583003 |access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref> Olson (2012), who believed the war narrative to be a fictional story with a theological purpose, noted that the Israelite soldiers' actions in Numbers 31 closely followed the holy war regulations set out in Deuteronomy 20:14, although [[Moses]]' commandment to also kill the captive male children and non-virgin women was a marked departure from these regulations.<ref name="Olson">{{Cite book |last=Olson |first=Dennis T. |date=2012 |title=Numbers |chapter=Numbers 31. War against the Midianites: Judgment for Past Sin, Foretaste of a Future Conquest |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=jlFKK7xkxJsC&pg=PA176 |location=Louisville, Kentucky |publisher=Westminster John Knox Press |pages=176–180 |isbn=9780664238827 |access-date=14 March 2021}}</ref> He concluded: "Many aspects of this holy war text may be troublesome to a contemporary reader. But understood within the symbolic world of the ancient writers of Numbers, the story of the war against the Midianites is a kind of dress rehearsal that builds confidence and hope in anticipation of the actual conquest of Canaan that lay ahead."<ref name="Olson" />

Dawn (2016, translating Rad 1958) stated: "From the earliest days of Israel's existence as a people, holy war was a sacred institution, undertaken as a cultic act of a religious community".<ref>{{Cite book|last=Rad|first=Gerhard von|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ezaCr3i3JeIC
| translator= Marva J. Dawn
|title=Holy War in Ancient Israel|date=2016| orig-year= 1958|publisher=Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing|isbn=978-0-8028-0528-7
| place= Grand Rapids 
|language=en}}</ref>

Other wars known to Judaism include a [[mandatory war]] and a [[voluntary war]].