(יג) כִּֽי־תִשְׁמַ֞ע בְּאַחַ֣ת עָרֶ֗יךָ אֲשֶׁר֩ ה' אֱלֹקֶ֜יךָ נֹתֵ֥ן לְךָ֛ לָשֶׁ֥בֶת שָׁ֖ם לֵאמֹֽר׃
(13) If you hear the following in one of your cities that Hashem your God gives you to live:
"דרוש וקבל שכר"
"To expound and gain reward"
"דרוש וקבל שכר"
"To expound and gain reward"
What lesson can we learn from an Ir Hanidachas? Here we have a
A) city in Israel (Sanhedrin 16b),
B) that worships idols and
C) we are commanded to smite the city with the sword and make all it's possessions cheirem; anything alive is killed by the sword and the rest is burned.
D) Afterwards it remains a permanent ruin never to be rebuilt
This is strikingly reminiscent of the command to smite the idolatrous Canaanite cities in Israel and in some cases (Joshuah 6:17,24,26 Numbers 21:3) condemn them to cheirem, never to be rebuilt.
The lesson is, if you ever dare succumb to idolatry, be prepared to receive the punishment you are about to afflict on the Canaanite for the exact same sin.
This Mitzvah is a concretization of the value expressed in Deuteronomy 9:4-5
(ד) אַל־תֹּאמַ֣ר בִּלְבָבְךָ֗ בַּהֲדֹ֣ף ה' אֱלֹקֶ֨יךָ אֹתָ֥ם ׀ מִלְּפָנֶיךָ֮ לֵאמֹר֒ בְּצִדְקָתִי֙ הֱבִיאַ֣נִי ה' לָרֶ֖שֶׁת אֶת־הָאָ֣רֶץ הַזֹּ֑את וּבְרִשְׁעַת֙ הַגּוֹיִ֣ם הָאֵ֔לֶּה ה' מוֹרִישָׁ֥ם מִפָּנֶֽיךָ׃ (ה) לֹ֣א בְצִדְקָתְךָ֗ וּבְיֹ֙שֶׁר֙ לְבָ֣בְךָ֔ אַתָּ֥ה בָ֖א לָרֶ֣שֶׁת אֶת־אַרְצָ֑ם כִּ֞י בְּרִשְׁעַ֣ת ׀ הַגּוֹיִ֣ם הָאֵ֗לֶּה ה' אֱלֹקֶ֙יךָ֙ מוֹרִישָׁ֣ם מִפָּנֶ֔יךָ וּלְמַ֜עַן הָקִ֣ים אֶת־הַדָּבָ֗ר אֲשֶׁ֨ר נִשְׁבַּ֤ע ה' לַאֲבֹתֶ֔יךָ לְאַבְרָהָ֥ם לְיִצְחָ֖ק וּֽלְיַעֲקֹֽב׃
(4) When Hashem your God kicks them out of your way, don't say to yourself "Hashem brought me here to take over this land (because of a combination of factors,) because I'm a Tzaddik and because the Goyim are evil, that's why Hashem is kicking them out of the way."
(5) Wrong. You're not getting their land because of your rightousness or because your heart is just. Rather, Hashem your God is driving away these Goyim only because of their wickedness and because He wants to fulfill the oath that he made to your fathers, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
However, is an Ir Hanidachas actually reminiscent of the conquest of Canaan? If you witnessed the conquest of Jericho and then witnessed the procedure of an Ir Haniachas would it occur to you that there was a parallel between the two procedures? Absolutely not. The conquest of Cannan involved bloody battles while the procedure of an Ir Hanidachas involved court cases. Very, very long and repetitive court cases with tedious cross examinations (13:15). These were followed by a retrial before the Supreme Court (Mishneh Torah, Idolatry 4:6) to ensure a plethora of technical criteria were met.
How do we account for the fact that even though an Ir Hanidachas is so different from an attack on a Canaanite city in practice, yet the Torah's description of them is so similar?
Perhaps, despite the fact that it's technically inaccurate, we are still supposed to draw the lesson from the parallel between the conquest of Canaan and an Ir Hanidachas; that if you ever dare succumb to idolatry, be prepared to receive the punishment you are about to afflict on the Canaanite for the exact same sin. Put in different terms, perhaps we are supposed to draw the literary parallel (or the Halachik parallel) between the two ideas even though in actual practice they are dissimilar.
This insight, that the Torah wants us to derive lessons from parallel descriptions even if the similarity is technically incorrect, may be a principle or a tool that we can apply to the rest of Torah. This may be an additional lesson that Ir Hanidachas was designed to teach us.