Joshua:8

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* Now the LORD said to Joshua : "Do not be afraid , nor be dismayed ; take all the people of war with you , and arise , go up to Ai . See , I have given into your hand the king of Ai , his people , his city , and his land . * And you shall do to Ai and its king as you did to Jericho and its king . Only its spoil and its cattle you shall take as booty for yourselves . Lay an ambush for the city behind it ." * So Joshua arose , and all the people of war , to go up against Ai ; and Joshua chose thirty thousand mighty men of valor and sent them away by night . * And he commanded them , saying : "Behold , you shall lie in ambush against the city , behind the city . Do not go very far from the city , but all of you be ready . * Then I and all the people who are with me will approach the city ; and it will come about , when they come out against us as at the first , that we shall flee before them . * For they will come out after us till we have drawn them from the city , for they will say , "They are fleeing before us as at the first .' Therefore we will flee before them . * Then you shall rise from the ambush and seize the city , for the LORD your God will deliver it into your hand . * And it will be , when you have taken the city , that you shall set the city on fire . According to the commandment of the LORD you shall do . See , I have commanded you ." * Joshua therefore sent them out ; and they went to lie in ambush , and stayed between Bethel and Ai , on the west side of Ai ; but Joshua lodged that night among the people . * Then Joshua rose up early in the morning and mustered the people , and went up , he and the elders of Israel , before the people to Ai . * And all the people of war who were with him went up and drew near ; and they came before the city and camped on the north side of Ai . Now a valley lay between them and Ai . * So he took about five thousand men and set them in ambush between Bethel and Ai , on the west side of the city . * And when they had set the people , all the army that was on the north of the city , and its rear guard on the west of the city , Joshua went that night into the midst of the valley . * Now it happened , when the king of Ai saw it , that the men of the city hurried and rose early and went out against Israel to battle , he and all his people , at an appointed place before the plain . But he did not know that there was an ambush against him behind the city . * And Joshua and all Israel made as if they were beaten before them , and fled by the way of the wilderness . * So all the people who were in Ai were called together to pursue them . And they pursued Joshua and were drawn away from the city . * There was not a man left in Ai or Bethel who did not go out after Israel . So they left the city open and pursued Israel . * Then the LORD said to Joshua , "Stretch out the spear that is in your hand toward Ai , for I will give it into your hand ." And Joshua stretched out the spear that was in his hand toward the city . * So those in ambush arose quickly out of their place ; they ran as soon as he had stretched out his hand , and they entered the city and took it , and hurried to set the city on fire . * And when the men of Ai looked behind them , they saw , and behold , the smoke of the city ascended to heaven . So they had no power to flee this way or that way , and the people who had fled to the wilderness turned back on the pursuers . * Now when Joshua and all Israel saw that the ambush had taken the city and that the smoke of the city ascended , they turned back and struck down the men of Ai . * Then the others came out of the city against them ; so they were caught in the midst of Israel , some on this side and some on that side . And they struck them down , so that they let none of them remain or escape . * But the king of Ai they took alive , and brought him to Joshua . * And it came to pass when Israel had made an end of slaying all the inhabitants of Ai in the field , in the wilderness where they pursued them , and when they all had fallen by the edge of the sword until they were consumed , that all the Israelites returned to Ai and struck it with the edge of the sword . * So it was that all who fell that day , both men and women , were twelve thousand--all the people of Ai . * For Joshua did not draw back his hand , with which he stretched out the spear , until he had utterly destroyed all the inhabitants of Ai . * Only the livestock and the spoil of that city Israel took as booty for themselves , according to the word of the LORD which He had commanded Joshua . * So Joshua burned Ai and made it a heap forever , a desolation to this day . * And the king of Ai he hanged on a tree until evening . And as soon as the sun was down , Joshua commanded that they should take his corpse down from the tree , cast it at the entrance of the gate of the city , and raise over it a great heap of stones that remains to this day . * Now Joshua built an altar to the LORD God of Israel in Mount Ebal , * as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded the children of Israel , as it is written in the Book of the Law of Moses : "an altar of whole stones over which no man has wielded an iron tool ." And they offered on it burnt offerings to the LORD , and sacrificed peace offerings . * And there , in the presence of the children of Israel , he wrote on the stones a copy of the law of Moses , which he had written . * Then all Israel , with their elders and officers and judges , stood on either side of the ark before the priests , the Levites , who bore the ark of the covenant of the LORD , the stranger as well as he who was born among them . Half of them were in front of Mount Gerizim and half of them in front of Mount Ebal , as Moses the servant of the LORD had commanded before , that they should bless the people of Israel . * And afterward he read all the words of the law , the blessings and the cursings , according to all that is written in the Book of the Law . * There was not a word of all that Moses had commanded which Joshua did not read before all the assembly of Israel , with the women , the little ones , and the strangers who were living among them .

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