Purim 5779 - Haman's Ancient Motive

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Artwork: Vizkopa Confessor - by Ryan Pancoast

Purim 5779 - Haman's Ancient Motive

The Question

Mordechai's refusal to bow down to Haman is one of the pivotal events of Megilas Esther. Were it not for Mordechai's decision and Haman's reaction, the fate of the Jews would have played out quite differently. Let's review the incident in the pesukim at the beginning of Chapter 3:

(1) After these things King Achashveirosh promoted Haman son of Hamedasa the Agagite and elevated him; he set his seat above all the officers who were with him. (2) All the king's servants at the king's gate would bow down and prostrate themselves before Haman, for so had the king commanded concerning him. But Mordechai would not bow and would not prostrate himself. (3) So the king's servants who were at the king's gate said to Mordechai, "Why do you disobey the king's command?" (4) Now it happened when they said this to him day after day and he did not heed them, they told Haman, to see whether Mordechai's words would prevail, for he had told them that he was a Jew. (5) When Haman, himself, saw that Mordechai did not bow down and prostrate himself before him, Haman was filled with wrath. (6) [However,] it was despicable in his eyes to send [his] hand against Mordechai alone, for they had told him the people of Mordechai. So Haman sought to destroy all the Jews, who were throughout the entire kingdom of Achashveirosh - the people of Mordechai.

I've always considered Haman's reaction to be rather extreme. Yes, Haman was egotistical, and Mordechai's flagrant disrespect would have undoubtedly dealt a blow to his ego, but was he really motivated to wipe out ALL Jews simply because this one Jew refused to bow down? This stretches credulity and makes Haman seem more like a Disney villain than an actual human being with real human motives.

That's the question I'd like to take up in this blog post: What was it about Mordechai's refusal to bow that motivated Haman to annihilate all Jews?

The answer begins way earlier than we might think ...

The Targum's Answer

Those who know me are aware that I tend to prioritize pshat over drash. It is for this reason that I love Targum Onkelos, the authoritative Aramaic translation of the Chumash, whom I consider to be the most "minimalistic" commentary. Unfortunately, there is no Targum Onkelos on Megilas Esther. Instead, we have a different Targum - one that freely weaves drash into the pshat. The authenticity of this Targum and its incorporated midrashim is vouched for by none other than Rav Hai Gaon, who wrote: "Here in Bavel there are several Targums of Esther which differ from one another. One has many additions and midrashim, and the other has none" (L. Ginzberg (ed.), Ginzei Schechter 86). All citations of the Targum in this blog post refer to the former. My love of Targum in general is what led me to explore this midrashic Targum, despite the differences from my usual preferred commentaries, and that exploration led me to a new answer to our question.

Before we take a look at the Targum's "translation" (quotation marks are necessary because his midrashic embellishment makes it more of a commentary than an actual translation), let's review the original pasuk which talks about Haman's reaction:

[However,] it was despicable in his eyes to send [his] hand against Mordechai alone, for they had told him the people of Mordechai. So Haman sought to destroy all the Jews, who were throughout the entire kingdom of Achashveirosh - the people of Mordechai.

Compare that to the Targum:

[However,] it was despicable before him to send his hand to kill Mordechai alone, because they informed him that Mordechai descended from Yaakov, who took the birthright and the blessing from Eisav - the ancestor (lit. "grandfather") of Haman -  and the Jews are the people of Mordechai, and Haman sought to destroy all of the Jews who were throughout the entire kingdom of Achashveirosh - the people of Mordechai. 

According to the Targum, Haman sought to avenge Eisav, his ancestor, by annihilating the descendants of Yaakov, who "stole" Eisav's birthright and blessing. That is why Haman wasn't content with sending forth his hand against Mordechai alone. To him, this wasn't about Mordechai. It was about all the descendants of Yaakov.

The Targum follows this theory consistently throughout his "translation" of the Megilah. For example, Chapter 4 recounts the dialogue between Mordechai and Esther, via Hasach (a.k.a. Daniel, according to the midrash, as accepted by the Targum). The pasuk reads:

(9) Hasach came and told Esther the words of Mordechai. (10) Then Esther told Hasach, and ordered him [to return] to Mordechai, [saying]: (11) "All the king's servants and the people of the king's provinces know that any man or woman who approaches the king in the inner court etc.

Check out how the Targum "translates" the seemingly content-free Esther 4:10:

(10) Esther told Hasach to go and speak to Mordechai, and commanded him regarding the matter of Mordechai [saying] that he should not incite the conflict with Haman regarding the grudge [Haman] held between Yaakov and Eisav.

Esther 5:1 tells of Esther's appearance before the king. The Targum inserts a lengthy prayer that Esther recited before she made her entrance. Her prayer concludes with the following request:

Have mercy on Your people, and do not give over the descendants of Yaakov into the hands of Haman son of Hamdasa son of Ada son of Biznai son of Aflitus son of Dyosos son of Peros son of Chamdan son of Talyon son of Asnisomus son of Charum son of Charsum son of Shegar son of Genar son of Parmashta son of Vayzasa son of Agag son of Sumkar son of Amalek son of Eliphaz son of the wicked Eisav.

According to the Targum, Esther viewed the entire conflict between Mordechai and Haman as a conflict between the descendants of Yaakov and the descendants of Eisav. The Targum even goes so far as to trace Haman's genealogy past Agag, where the megilah itself stops, all the way back to Eisav. (Parenthetically, this genealogy appears to be literal from Haman to Agag, but not from Agag to Amalek, since the latter two were separated by over 500 years.)

That, so far as I can tell, is all the material that the Targum gave us to work with. However, if we take the Targum's lead, I believe we can expand upon his theory, and in doing so, attain a deeper understanding of Haman's motives.

Support for the Targum's Claim

According to the Targum, Haman was enraged by the fact that Yaakov took the birthright and the blessing from his ancestor, Eisav. On the surface, this might sound like an outrageously unrealistic (and stereotypically midrashic) claim - but if we think about it, it's not as far-fetched as it initially appears. 

Haman was the descendant of Agag. Though some take this non-literally, it would appear from the detailed genealogy cited above that the Targum took it at face value. He maintained that Agag, the king of Amalek, was the great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great-great grandfather of Haman. We know what happened with Agag. Over 500 years prior to the events of Purim, Shaul the Benjaminite waged war with Agag the Amalekite, and even though Shaul erred by having pity on Agag himself, he did kill all of Agag's people (i.e. his extended tribal family). This episode most certainly bequeathed to Agag's descendants a legacy of anti-Jewish hatred - particularly, against the offspring of Binyamin.

And Agag, himself, was the bearer of a legacy of anti-Jewish animosity on account of the war between Bnei Yisrael and Amalek that occurred shortly after Yetzias Mitzrayim (the Exodus from Egypt), which took place several hundred years before the battle between Shaul and Agag. Bnei Yisrael were on their way to receive the Torah at Sinai when they were ambushed from behind by the nation of Amalek, who, undeterred by the display of Divine might in Egypt, nevertheless set its heart on the total annihilation of Israel. There, too, Amalek was decimated to the brink of extinction, and driven back into the hills from whence they came. 

And what motivated the nation of Amalek to attack Bnei Yisrael so soon after Yetzias Mitzrayim? According to a midrash in Yalkut Shimoni (Parashas Chukas), it was none other than the desire to avenge Eisav, their ancestor - the same yearning for vengeance that the Targum ascribes to Haman. The midrash expresses this in the form of a dialogue between Eisav and the nation of Amalek:

Eisav said to Amalek: "O how much I have toiled to kill Yaakov, and he has not been given over into my hands! Apply yourself to take revenge on my behalf!" Amalek said to Eisav: "How will I be able to vanquish him?" He replied: "Let this mesorah (oral tradition) be in your hand: when you see [Yaakov's descendants] stumble [in sin,] pounce upon them!"

The midrash then goes on to enumerate several instances in which Amalek utilized this strategy. But we see from here that there was a living mesorah, passed down from Eisav to Amalek, charging the latter with the mission of taking revenge for the "theft" of the birthright and the blessing. Indeed, the Ralbag (end of Beshalach) explains that this is the reason why Amalek chose to strike Bnei Yisrael at this point in time:

The Amalekites were the descendants of Eisav, and knew about the matter of the blessings - that Yitzchak blessed Yaakov, thereby making the descendants of Eisav servants to the descendants of Yaakov. 

It was also known [to Amalek] what Yitzchak said to Eisav in his blessing to him, that "[he] will live by [his] sword," and that when the circumstances were such that [Eisav] had the upper hand, it would be possible for him to cast off the yoke of the descendants of Yaakov from upon his neck. 

Thus, Amalek strategically went to war with Israel at a time when they were naturally poised to defeat Israel, for the descendants of Eisav were successful in matters of the sword and warfare, as Yitzchak blessed them, and Bnei Yisrael had a lowly psychological disposition at that time, and were not trained in warfare, and - based on [Amalek's] knowledge - they were in the wilderness without bread and food, and were tired and weary. For this reason, [Amalek] hastened to do this to them (i.e. to ambush them) before Israel reached its success, which would result in the descendants of Eisav becoming servants to them.

According to the Ralbag - who, generally speaking, tries to avoid midrashim and sticks to the pshat - the mesorah of Yitzchak's blessings to Yaakov and Eisv was alive and well in the nation of Amalek. They may not have been God-fearing, but they certainly believed in God, and in the reality of the blessings. It is for this reason that they sought to take advantage of this rare moment when they had the upper hand against the descendants of Yaakov. If they could manage to wipe out Bnei Yisrael now, before they got the Torah and established themselves as a sovereign nation in Israel, then they would be able to permanently free themselves from the yoke of servitude to the Bnei Yaakov. Thus, in a sense, they would have restored the blessing and the birthright to Eisav, their ancestor and (in their eyes) the rightful heir.

It is reasonable to assume that this mesorah of vengeance was passed from Eisav to Amalek, from Amalek to Agag, and from Agag to Haman. I was delighted to find this theory corroborated in the 19th century Megilas Esther commentary of Rav Y.S. Reggio, who explains how the history of Amalek's conflicts with Bnei Yisrael fueled Haman's hatred of Mordechai and his people: 

First you need to know and understand that the cause of Haman's hatred against the Jews was not only on account of Mordechai's refusal to bow before him, but aside from this, and even before this, great enmity had taken root in [Haman's] heart, which he inherited from his ancestors, the Agagites, who were offspring of Amalek. 

It was known how Amalek tormented the nation that left Egypt and struck the weaklings from behind. The pasuk testifies about the wickedness of Amalek, saying: "[Amalek] did not fear God" (Devarim 25:18). It is also possible that word had reached [Haman's] ears of God's statement: "a war of Hashem against Amalek from generation to generation" (Shemos 17:16), and Israel's commandment to "wipe out the memory of Amalek" (Devarim 25:19), just as [Haman] remembered without a doubt the harsh war between Shaul and [Haman's] ancestors, and the execution of Agag at the hands of Shmuel. All of this strengthened Haman's hatred and [the hatred of] the members of his household against the Jews.  

And now the author of the megilah explains this to us in the statement: "[However,] it was despicable in his eyes to send [his] hand against Mordechai alone, for they had told him the people of Mordechai etc." Behold - if Mordechai were from another nation, it would have been enough [for Haman] to take revenge against that man alone, but once he heard that this was a Jew, this preexisting hatred against the entire people was awakened, and he thought that it would be beneath his dignity to send forth his hand against that lone member of this abominable offspring. Therefore, he sought to annihilate them all.

Some might wonder why Haman didn't take action against the Jews at an earlier point in time. Why did Mordechai's refusal to bow set into motion the revenge-plot against the Bnei Yaakov?

I have a theory based on the content of blessings. Let's look at the wording of the blessing that Yaakov was given by Yitzchak, which he "stole" from Eisav (Bereishis 27:28-29):

May God give you of the dew of the heavens and of the fatness of the earth, and abundant grain and wine. Peoples will serve you, and regimes will prostrate themselves to you; be a lord to your brethren, and your mother's sons will prostrate themselves to you; cursed be those who curse you, and blessed be those who bless you.

The berachah, which was passed down in Amalek's mesorah, specifically mentions bowing! According to the berachah, the indicator of who is ascendant - Yaakov or Eisav - is who bows to whom. With that in mind, let us attempt to paint a new picture of what Haman saw when he encountered Mordechai, which I will indent for dramatic effect:

As far as Haman is concerned, the blessing to Eisav has reached its fulfillment in him. Bnei Yisrael are defeated and exiled from their homeland and from their destroyed Temple, subjugated to a foreign king, with no hope of ever returning. He is the de facto ruler. Haman is second in command to the king of the largest empire the world has seen. The king has given Haman so much power that he is literally able to make his own laws, as he sees fit. Moreover, the king has commanded everyone to bow down to Haman in a demonstration of absolute subservience. What's more, if he plays his cards right, then he might actually succeed in maneuvering his way into the kingship itself.

Then Haman sees Mordechai - the Jew, the Benjaminite, the descendant of Yaakov - refusing to bow.

To Haman, this is not merely a personal affront. It is a beckoning call from his ancestors, charging him with the mission they could not complete: revenge. Agag faced the Benjaminite descendant of Yaakov, and was vanquished. Amalek faced the nation of Bnei Yisrael, and was vanquished. Eisav faced Yaakov himself, and was vanquished.

And here stands Haman, at the end of his bloodline, in a position of power unparalleled by any of his forebears, with only one person standing in his way: Mordechai, the Benjaminite descendant of Yaakov. Haman has the ability to succeed where his ancestors failed. He has the opportunity to reclaim for his grandfather Eisav the blessing and the birthright which are rightfully his. And there is only one way to do it: kill all of the Bnei Yaakov, just as Amalek attempted to do prior to Bnei Yisrael receiving the Torah.

"... and Haman sought to destroy all of the Jews who were throughout the entire kingdom of Achashveirosh - the people of Mordechai."

Icing on the Cake

I hope that I have made a convincing case for the Targum's explanation of Haman's motive. Having said all of that, there is one more point I would like to mention. I do not want to call it "evidence" because I do not believe it to be on par with the evidence I have just presented. Instead, consider it to be "icing on the cake." And if you find this icing to be too cloying, just scrape it off and focus on the cake.

It has become fashionable in certain Jewish academic circles to seek out literary allusions in the text of Tanach. Although I am sometimes skeptical of making too much out of such findings, there are some that just seem too spot-on to be coincidental. Let's take another look at how the Megilah describes Haman's reaction upon considering Mordechai's actions:

[However,] it was despicable in his eyes (va'yeebez b'einav) to send [his] hand against Mordechai alone etc.

Curiously enough, this form of the word "despised" (va'yeebez) occurs in exactly one other place in all of Tanach: Eisav's reaction upon considering the birthright that he sold to Yaakov (Bereishis 25:34):

Yaakov gave Eisav bread and lentil stew, and he ate and drank, got up and left, and Eisav despised (va'yeebez) the birthright.

Upon noticing this linguistic parallel, I wondered: Is this a sign that the Targum's theory is correct, or am I reading too much into the pesukim? I then consulted the midrashim on this pasuk in Esther Rabbah. Lo and behold, Chazal make the same observation in Esther Rabbah 7:10:

"and it was despicable in his eyes to send [his] hand against Mordechai alone" - [Haman] was a despicable person who was a descendant of a despicable person (bazui ben bazui). Elsewhere it is written: "and Eisav despised (va'yeebez) the birthright," and here it is written: "and it was despicable (va'yeebez) in his eyes ... and Haman sought to destroy all of the Jews."

There you have it: Chazal explicitly link Haman's genocidal decree with Eisav's feelings about selling his birthright - just as the Targum explained. It would appear that this literary allusion was, indeed, intentional.

Concluding Thoughts

What is the take-away from all of this? The Targum's explanation certainly changes our reading of the Megilah, but what of it?

I believe the answer lies in understanding what Amalek and Haman were attempting to do. According to the Targum - and Ralbag and Rav Reggio - Amalek wasn't an antisemite in the way that many people think of antisemites today. Amalek didn't simply hate the Jews, nor did Amalek deny that the Jews are "the chosen people." To the contrary - Amalek acknowledged our "chosenness," as determined by Yitzchak's bestowal of the superior blessing on Yaakov instead of Eisav.

What was Amalek's evil? Amalek's evil consisted in the fact that they acknowledged the reality of hashgachas Hashem (Divine providence), and nevertheless sought to undermine it for the sake of dominance and power. When Amalek attacked Bnei Yisrael on their way out of Egypt, they knew that Hashem had redeemed them "with a strong hand and an outstretched arm" and they knew He was leading them through the Wilderness en route to claim their inheritance in the Land of Israel, as He promised to the Avos (forefathers) on numerous occasions. And yet, Amalek saw that it had the upper hand, and sought to annihilate Bnei Yisrael in order to reclaim and establish their dominion, contrary to God's plan.

I do not mean to downplay the evil of the Nazis, the white supremacists, certain factions of Americans and Europeans, and many other antisemitic groups. The evil and antisemitism of these wicked people and groups is very real and very dangerous. However, it is of a fundamentally different nature than that of Amalek. The antisemitism of these groups stems from bigotry, nationalism, xenophobia, and a host of other psychological causes. In contrast, the antisemitism of Amalek stems from a genuine recognition of the truth and reality of Hashem and His plan, and a conscious effort to overturn it to satisfy their own lust for greatness.

That, I believe, is what makes Amalek so dangerous. A fool who is blinded to reality by his own emotions still has hope: if you can enable him to see reality, there's a chance that he might change his mind. But a rasha (evil person) who recognizes reality and nevertheless chooses to go against it? There is no hope for such a rasha, nor is there a limit to what that rasha will do in his efforts to achieve his megalomaniacal vision.

This is the difference between Haman and Mordechai. Haman recognized the truth and reality of Hashem and His plan for the Jews and humanity, but nevertheless sought to thwart His will in a misguided effort to achieve god-like supremacy. In contrast, Mordechai maintained his allegiance to the truth and reality of Hashem and His will, even when this meant putting himself and his people at the risk of retaliation by the enemies of Israel. The story of the megilah is the story of which approach is destined to fail, and which will succeed.

Yitzchak's blessing to Yaakov ends with the words: "cursed be those who curse you, and blessed be those who bless you." Today, on Purim, we emphasize the theme: "Accursed is Haman!" "Blessed is Mordechai!"

May we all merit to know the difference between the blessedness of Mordechai, and the accursedness of Haman, and thereby merit the ultimate redemption. 

Parashas Shoftim: The Eleven Nations of America and the Seven Nations of Canaan

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Woodard's map of the 11 Nations of America

Parashas Shoftim: The Eleven Nations of America and the Seven Nations of Canaan

Woodard's Theory of Eleven American Nations

I've been hooked on a book called American Nations: A History of the Eleven Rival Regional Cultures of North America (2011), by Colin Woodard. The author states his thesis in his introduction:

America's most essential and abiding divisions are not between red states and blue states, conservatives and liberals, capital and labor, blacks and whites, the faithful and the secular. Rather, our divisions stem from this fact: the United States is a federation comprised of the whole or part of eleven regional nations, some of which truly do not see eye to eye with one another. These nations respect neither state nor international boundaries, bleeding over the U.S. frontiers with Canada and Mexico as readily as they divide California, Texas, Illinois, or Pennsylvania. Six joined together to liberate themselves from British rule. Four were conquered but not vanquished by English-speaking rivals. Two more were founded in the West by a mix of American frontiersmen in the second half of the nineteenth century. Some are defined by cultural pluralism, others by their French, Spanish, or "Anglo-Saxon" heritage. Few have shown any indication that they are melting into some sort of unified American culture. On the contrary, since 1960 the fault lines between these nations have been growing wider, fueling culture wars, constitutional struggles, and ever more frequent pleas for unity.

Woodard then clarifies what he means by "nation":

I have very consciously used the term nations to describe these regional cultures, for by the time they agreed to share a federated state, each had long exhibited the characteristics of nationhood. Americans - because of this particular historical circumstance - often confuse the terms state and nation, and are the only people in the world who use statehood and nationhood interchangeably. A state is a sovereign political entity like the United Kingdom, Kenya, Panama, or New Zealand, eligible for membership in the United Nations and inclusion on the maps produced by Rand McNally or the National Geographic Society. A nation is a group of people who share - or believe they share - a common culture, ethnic origin, language, historical experience, artifacts, and symbols. Some nations are presently stateless - the Kurdish, Palestinian, or Quebecois nations, for instance. Some control and dominate their own nation-state, which they typically name for themselves, as in France, Germany, Japan, or Turkey. Conversely, there are plenty of states - some of them federated - that aren't dominated by a single nation, like Belgium, Switzerland, Malaysia, Canada and, indeed, the United States. North America's eleven nations are all stateless, though at least two currently aspire to change that, and most of the others have tried to at one time or another.

In order to appreciate the author's thesis on even a basic level (which, I should mention, is essential for understanding this blog post) read or skim this article, which the author recommends as an overview of his theory. At the very least, scroll down through the descriptions of the eleven nations provided there to get a sense of what he means by "nation" and how these nations continue to persist and shape the cultural and political landscape of our country today.

The quality and quantity of evidence the author provides in his book is staggering. I will never view American history or American politics the same way again. Although the particular claims he makes are subject to disagreement, Woodard's paradigm is compelling to the point where I wonder how people can think otherwise.

I'm not even finished with the book yet and it's already having far-reaching implications for my Torah learning. I'd like to share one example from this week's parashah. 

Annihilating the Seven Nations of Canaan

One of the most controversial mitzvos is the commandment to annihilate the seven nations indigenous to the Land of Canaan. This is actually a pair of mitzvos: the mitzvas aseh (positive mitzvah) to exterminate the seven nations is from Vaeschanan, and the mitzvas lo taaseh (negative mitzvah) to not allow them to live is from Shoftim. Here is the Sefer ha'Chinuch's summary of the mitzvas aseh:

Vaeschanan: Mitzvah #425 - the Mitzvah of Annihilating the Seven Nations 

[We are commanded] to put to death the seven nations that held our land before we captured it from them - these being the Canaanite, Amorite, Hittite, Hivite, Perizzite, and Jebusite [and the Girgashite] - and to eliminate them from wherever we may find them, for it is stated about them: "you shall utterly destroy them" (Devarim 7:2); and the mitzvah was reiterated in Sidrah Shoftim, as it is stated there: "for you shall utterly destroy them - the Hittite and the Amorite, etc." (ibid. 20:17). 

At the root of this mitzvah lies the reason that these seven nations are the ones that started to perform all kinds of avodah zarah (idolatry), and every abomination of Hashem, which He detests. Therefore, since they were a principal root of avodah zarah and its first foundation, we were commanded about them to extirpate and eliminate them from under the heavens, that they may not be remembered or recalled in the land of the living. And in this mitzvah of ours about them, to destroy them, a benefit will result for us: we will eliminate their remembrance from the world, and [thus] we will not learn from their actions. It is, moreover, for us to learn a moral lesson from this - that we should not turn towards avodah zarah, for when we pursue every man in this evil family [of nations] to kill him, because they occupied themselves with idolatry, the thought will not arise in the heart of any man to do acts like theirs under any circumstances. [1]

Before we move on, let me be clear about the scope of this post. Our aim here is not to analyze how it is morally justifiable to eradicate another nation. That is a far more difficult question, which requires its own analysis. Likewise, we will not address the question of the status of these nations in the present day, nor the question of whether we would or wouldn't implement this mitzvah in the present time.

Having said that, working on the premise that the extermination of the seven nations is morally justifiable, my question is: Why was it necessary to eradicate every member of the Seven Nations? In other milchamos (wars), whether a milchemes mitzvah (obligatory war) or a milchemes ha'reshus (optional war), if the opposing nation refuses to make peace with us, we only kill the adult males, but we spare the women and children. Only in the cases of the Seven Nations and Amalek do we kill every individual - that is, in the event that these nations don't accept our overtures to peace [2] - as it says in Shoftim: "do not allow any soul to live" (Devarim 20:16). Why can't we allow women and children of the Seven Nations to live, as we do with other enemy nations?

The Sefer ha'Chinuch cited above addressed this question, saying: "a benefit will result for us: we will eliminate their remembrance from the world, and [thus] we will not learn from their actions." This answer wasn't innovated by him, but is openly stated in the pesukim:

But from the cities of these peoples that Hashem, your God, gives you as an inheritance, you shall not allow any soul to live. Rather you shall utterly destroy them - the Hittite, the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Perizzite, the Hivvite, and the Jebusite - as Hashem, your God, has commanded you, so that they will not teach you to act according to all their abominations that they performed for their gods, so that you will sin to Hashem, your God. (ibid. 20:16-18)

I've known that this is the Torah's reasoning for quite a while, but it hasn't sat well with me. Is it really necessary to exterminate every person in order to achieve this goal? Even the women and children?

Woodard's Answer

It wasn't until I read Woodard's American Nations that I found the answer stated in the pesukim to be satisfying. Woodard raises an objection to his own theory, and his answer to that objection also answers our question:

Any argument that claims to identify a series of discrete nations on the North American continent must address the obvious objection: can nations founded centuries ago really have maintained their distinct identities to the present day? We’re a continent of immigrants and internal migrants, after all, and those tens of millions of newcomers representing every possible culture, race, and creed surely must have diluted and dissipated those old cultures. Is it not the height of fancy to suggest New York City’s distinctive culture is a heritage of having been founded by the Dutch, given that people of Dutch ancestry now account for just 0.2 percent of its population? In Massachusetts and Connecticut – those most Yankee of states – the largest ethnic groups are the Irish and Italians respectively. One might naturally assume that the continent’s nations must have long since melted into one another, creating a rich, pluralistic stew. But, as we shall see, the expected course of events isn’t what actually happened. North American life has been immeasurably enriched by the myriad cultures and peoples who settled there. I personally celebrate our continent’s diversity, but I also know that my great-great grandfather’s people in western Iowa – Lutheran farmers from the island of Funen in Denmark – assimilated into the dominant culture of the Midland Midwest, even as they contributed to its evolution. My Irish Catholic great-grandparents worked the iron and copper mines of the interior West, but their children grew up to be Far Westerners. My great-great-great-grandmother's family fled from the same part of Ireland as their future cousins-in-law, but the mines they found work in happened to be in Quebec, so their descendants grew up speaking French and traveling on aboriginal snowshoes. All of them undoubtedly altered the places to which they emigrated - for the better, I hope - but over the generations they assimilated into the culture around them, not the other way around. They may have embraced or rejected the dominant culture, but they didn't replace it. And it wasn't an "American" or "Canadian" culture they confronted and negotiated with or against; it was one of the respective "national" cultures identified earlier.

Cultural geographers came to similar conclusions decades ago. Wilbur Zelinsky of Pennsylvania State University formulated the key theory in 1973, which he called the Doctrine of First Effective Settlement. “Whenever an empty territory undergoes settlement, or an earlier population is dislodged by invaders, the specific characteristics of the first group able to effect a viable, self-perpetuating society are of crucial significance for the later social and cultural geography of the area, no matter how tiny the initial band of settlers may have been," Zelinsky wrote. "Thus, in terms of lasting impact, the activities of a few hundred, or even a few score, initial colonizers can mean much more for the cultural geography of a place than the contributions of tens of thousands of new immigrants a few generations later." The colonial Atlantic seaboard, he noted, was a prime example. The Dutch may be all but extinct in the lower Hudson Valley - and landed aristocracy may have lost control of the Chesapeake country - but their influence carries on all the same.

The Seven Nations had inhabited the Land of Canaan for hundreds of years prior to the conquest of the land by Israel. The Torah repeatedly emphasizes the depraved culture of Canaan: "do not act in accordance with the actions of the Land of Canaan to which I bring you, and do not follow their practices" (Vayikra 18:3). This corrupt culture started long ago, with the progenitor of Canaan:

Noach, the man of the earth, debased himself and planted a vineyard. He drank of the wine and became drunk, and he uncovered himself within his tent. Cham, the father of Canaan, saw his father's nakedness [which, according to Midrash Tanchuma, is a euphemistic way of saying that he either sodomized his father or castrated him] ... Noach awoke from his wine and realized what his small son had done to him. And he said: "Cursed is Canaan; a slave of slaves he shall be to his brothers. (Bereishis 7:20-25)

By the time the Avos arrived on the scene, Canaan had already become a nation with a reputation of degeneracy. Avraham made Eliezer swear "that you not take a wife for my son from the daughters of the Canaanites, among whom I dwell" (ibid. 24:3). Before Yitzchak bid Yaakov farewell, he warned him: "Do not take a wife from the Canaanite women" (ibid. 28:1). Even the wicked Eisav recognized how his father regarded the culture of Canaan, as the Torah states: "then Eisav perceived that the daughters of Canaan were evil in the eyes of Yitzchak, his father" (ibid. 28:8) - though that didn't stop him from marrying Canaanite women, as the Torah later recounts (ibid. 36:2)

According to Zelinksy's "Doctrine of First Effective Settlement," it was necessary to annihilate every member of the Seven Nations in order to ensure the complete eradication of of their culture from the Land of Israel, in order to be able to establish a new "First Effective Settlement" on Torah ideas and values. Anything short of complete eradication would have left open the possibility that the Canaanite culture and its abominations would persist, and infect the new Jewish society.

Of course, this doesn't mean we regard every single Canaanite as a cultural cancer cell, which would grow out of control if left unchecked. Rather, the halacha must be formulated categorically, and in the laws of waging war, there are only two options: either the women and children civilian population is spared, or it is annihilated. It would be ineffective and impossible to independently assess each and every Canaanite to determine who poses a threat to the new nation. 

Woodard's numerous examples of this dynamic are what sold me on this answer, especially his example about the Dutch settlers of New Amsterdam, and the present-day culture of New York City. As Woodard observed, "people of Dutch ancestry now account for just 0.2 percent of its population" - and yet, the Dutch values of diversity, tolerance, and mercantile ambition continue to set New York City apart from much of the rest of the state. But seriously - read the book and you'll find hundreds of examples.

This is yet another example of how the Divine perspective has a much longer-term range than the limited perspective of man.

[1] I'm going to quote the rest of the Sefer ha'Chinuch's explanation down here in a footnote because it's not really relevant to the question at hand, but is still important enough to cite:

Now, it should not be asked at all: Why were these evil nations created, since ultimately they were to be completely removed from the world? For we have previously known [learned] that free choice is given to man to be good or evil, and Hashem will not impel a man toward either one of them. And since it is so, we have to say that these seven peoples corrupted their ways of action and turned wicked, until they all incurred the fate of elimination and death, although at the beginning of Creation they were fit also for goodness. Now, to this reason we would [also] ascribe the mitzvah of extirpating Amalek in Sidrah Ki Teitzei, the last of the mitzvos aseh in the sidrah (#604).  

If we like, we could further say that perhaps they had at some certain time a brief period of worthiness, and because of that brief period they merited to be created. Or perhaps we could say that from among them all, one worthy person emerged; and for his sake they all merited to be created - in keeping with what we find that the Sages of blessed memory said, that there was one man among the descendants of Amalek, namely Antoninus. It is not out of the question for the Creator to produce any number of persons for the sake of one: for He (blessed is He) experiences no wearisome effort in whatever He desires to do. As His desire is established, whatever He wishes is done; and He (blessed is He), Who comprehends all our actions, knows what need there is for others because of the one particular person, so that all should be created for his sake.

[2] Whenever I teach these topics in school, I make sure to emphasize this point: we always offer peace to every nation - even to the Seven Nations and Amalek - and if they accept peace under the halachically specified conditions, then we do not annihilate them. See Rabbeinu Moshe ben Maimon (Rambam / Maimonides), Mishneh Torah: Sefer Shoftim, Hilchos Melachim u'Milchamos Chapter 6 for details. Likewise, I emphasize that we accept converts even from the Seven Nations and Amalek. See Rabbeinu Shlomo ben Yitzchak (Rashi) on Devarim 20:18, and Rambam, Mishneh Torah: Sefer Kedushah, Hilchos Issurei Biah Chapter 12.