Judges 3:4-7

4These nations were still there to test the Israelites. The Lord wanted to know if his people would obey his commands. Those were the commands that he had told Moses to give to the ancestors of the Israelites.

5So the Israelites lived among those other nations, the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Hivites and Jebusites.

6Some Israelites married young women from these nations. They also let their daughters marry Canaanite men. As a result, the Israelites started to worship the Canaanite gods.

7The Israelites forgot to serve the Lord their God. They did things that he saw were evil. They worshipped idols of Baal and Asherah.