Was Canaan located in the kingdom of Israel?

Answer 1

Wayne T. Pitard (The Oxford History of the Biblical World, Before Israel) says that during the second millennium BCE, Canaan was the name often used for Palestine, an area west of the Jordan River, whose northern boundary fluctuated between southern and central Lebanon. Modern scholars generally use the term in referring to a wider region in Syria-Palestine where a substantial cultural continuum defined as Canaanite can be discerned. However, there never was one single nation of Canaan, rather a number of city-states with loose affiliations and shared interests.

The Israelites appeared on the scene shortly before 1200, settling in the mountainous Canaanite hinterland, which had until this time been sparsely populated. Until recently, it was accepted that Israel expanded to take in many of the coastal Canaanite cities during the tenth century BCE. However, recent archaeological research and more accurate carbon-dating now appear to place the expansive period up to one hundred years later, during the reigns of Omri and Ahab, kings of Israel. After a further one hundred years, the northern kingdom of Israel was once again reduced to its former territory away from the coast, then in 722 BCE, Israel was destroyed forever. Meanwhile, the small inland kingdom of Judah continued in the southern hinterland.

On this evidence, Israel occupied the less productive part of Canaan for several centuries, expanding briefly by conquest and then forced back into its core territory. As a whole, the two kingdoms of Israel and Judah never at any time occupied all the land of Canaan, so it would be more accurate to say that Israel was located within the land of Canaan.