Origins of the Just War : Military Ethics and Culture in the Ancient Near East

A groundbreaking history of the ethics of war in the ancient Near East Origins of the Just War reveals the incredible richness and complexity of ethical thought about war in the three millennia preceding the Greco-Roman period, establishing the extent to which ancient just war thought prefigured much of what we now consider to be the building blocks of the Western just war tradition. In this incisive and elegantly written book, Rory Cox traces the earliest ideas concerning the complex relationship between war, ethics and justice. Excavating the ethical thought of three ancient Near Eastern cultures―Egyptian, Hittite and Israelite―he demonstrates that the history of the just war is considerably more ancient and geographically diffuse than previously assumed. Cox shows how the emergence of just war thought was grounded in a desire to rationalise, sacralise and ultimately to legitimise the violence of war. Rather than restraining or condemning warfare, the earliest ethical thought about war reflected an urge to justify state violence. Cox terms this presumption in favour of war ius pro bello ―the “right for war”―characterizing it as a meeting point of both abstract and pragmatic concerns. Drawing on a diverse range of ancient sources, Origins of the Just War argues that the same imperative still underlies many of the assumptions of contemporary just war thought and highlights the risks of applying moral absolutism to the fraught ethical arena of war. Cover 1 Contents 8 List of Illustrations 10 Acknowledgements 14 List of Abbreviations 18 A Note on Names and Places 20 Maps 22 Introduction 28 Chapter 1. The Art of War in the Ancient Near East 59 Part I. Egypt, C. 3150–C. 1069 BCE 84 Chapter 2. Egypt: Historical Introduction 86 Chapter 3. Egypt: Ius ad bellum; Conceptualising Justice and War 112 Chapter 4. Egypt: Ius in bello; Concepts and Practices 145 Part II. Hatti, C. 1650–C. 1200 BCE 190 Chapter 5. The Hittites: Historical Introduction 192 Chapter 6. Hatti: Ius ad bellum; Conceptualising Justice and War 212 Chapter 7. Hatti: Ius in bello; Concepts and Practices 261 Part III. The Israelites, C. 1000–C. 450 BCE 294 Chapter 8. The Israelites: Historical Introduction 296 Chapter 9. The Israelites: Ius ad bellum; Conceptualising Justice and War 322 Chapter 10. The Israelites: Ius in bello; Concepts and Practices 370 Conclusion: The Characteristics of Ancient Just War Thought 440 Appendix 1: Periodic Chronology of Ancient Egypt with Primary Centres of Power 484 Appendix 2: Internal Narrative Chronology of the Tanakh 486 Reference Bibliography 488 Index 520