And over him they put a great mass of stones, which is there to this day; then the heat of the Lord's wrath was turned away. So that place was named, The Valley of Achor, to this day.

And I and all the people with me will come near the town, and when they come out against us as they did before, we will go in flight from them;

And they will come out after us, till we have got them away from the town; for they will say, They have gone in flight from us as before; so we will go in flight before them;

So Joshua sent them out: and they took up a secret position between Beth-el and Ai, on the west side of Ai: but Joshua kept with the people that night.

Then Joshua and all Israel, acting as if they were overcome before them, went in flight by way of the waste land.

And all the people in Ai came together to go after them; and they went after Joshua, moving away from the town.

There was not a man in Ai and Beth-el who did not go out after Israel; and the town was open and unwatched while they went after Israel.

Then the secret force came quickly from their place, and running forward when they saw his hand stretched out, went into the town and took it, and put fire to it straight away.

And when Joshua and all Israel saw that the town had been taken by the surprise attack, and that the smoke of the town had gone up, turning round they overcame the men of Ai.

Then the other force came out of the town against them, so that they were being attacked on this side and on that: and Israel overcame them and let not one of them get away with his life.

But the king of Ai they made prisoner, and took him to Joshua.

Then, after the destruction of all the people of Ai in the field and in the waste land where they went after them, and when all the people had been put to death without mercy, all Israel went back to Ai, and put to death all who were in it without mercy.

In the way ordered by Moses, the servant of the Lord, as it is recorded in the book of the law of Moses, an altar of uncut stones, untouched by any iron instrument: and on it they made burned offerings and peace-offerings to the Lord.

And put old stitched-up shoes on their feet, and old clothing on their backs; and all the food they had with them was dry and broken up.

And they came to Joshua to the tent-circle at Gilgal, and said to him and to the men of Israel, We have come from a far country: so now make an agreement with us.

And they said to Joshua, We are your servants. Then Joshua said to them, Who are you and where do you come from?

And they said to him, Your servants have come from a very far country, because of the name of the Lord your God: for the story of his great name, and of all he did in Egypt has come to our ears,

And these wine-skins were new when we put the wine in them, and now they are cracked as you see; and our clothing and our shoes have become old because of our very long journey here.

So Joshua made peace with them, and made an agreement with them that they were not to be put to death: and the chiefs of the people took an oath to them.

Now three days after, when they had made this agreement with them, they had word that these men were their neighbours, living near them.

And, answering Joshua, they said, Because it came to the ears of your servants that the Lord your God had given orders to his servant Moses to give you all this land, and to send destruction on all the people living in it, because of you; so, fearing greatly for our lives because of you, we have done this.

Come up to me and give me help, and let us make an attack on Gibeon: for they have made peace with Joshua and the children of Israel.

And the Lord said to Joshua, Have no fear of them, for I have given them into your hands; they will all give way before you.

And the Lord made them full of fear before Israel, and they put great numbers of them to death at Gibeon, and went after them by the way going up to Beth-horon, driving them back to Azekah and Makkedah

And they did so, and made those five kings come out of the hole to him, the king of Jerusalem, the king of Hebron, the king of Jarmuth, the king of Lachish, and the king of Eglon.

And when they had made those kings come out to Joshua, Joshua sent for all the men of Israel, and said to the chiefs of the men of war who had gone with him, Come near and put your feet on the necks of these kings. So they came near and put their feet on their necks.

Then Joshua had them put to death, hanging them on five trees, where they were till evening.

And when the sun went down, they were taken down from the trees, by Joshua's orders, and put into the hole where they had gone to be safe; and great stones were placed at the mouth of the hole, where they are to this day.

And Joshua and all Israel with him went on from Lachish to Eglon: and they took up their position against it and made an attack on it;

And that day they took it, putting it and every person in it to the sword, as he had done to Lachish.

And they went out, they and all their armies with them, a great people, in number like the sand on the seaside, with horses and war-carriages in great number.

And the Lord gave them up into the hands of Israel, and they overcame them driving them back to great Zidon and to Misrephoth-maim and into the valley of Mizpeh to the east; and they put them all to death, no man got away safely.

And they put every person in it to death without mercy, giving every living thing up to the curse, and burning Hazor.

And all the goods taken from these towns, and their cattle, the children of Israel kept for themselves; but every man they put to death without mercy, till their destruction was complete, and there was no one living.

Not one town made peace with the children of Israel, but only the Hivites of Gibeon: they took them all in war.

Because the children of Joseph were two tribes, Manasseh and Ephraim; and they gave the Levites no part in the land, only towns for their living-places, with the grass-lands for their cattle and for their property.

As the Lord had given orders to Moses, so the people of Israel did, and they made division of the land.

And they came before Eleazar the priest, and Joshua, the son of Nun, and before the chiefs, saying, The Lord gave orders to Moses to give us a heritage among our brothers: so in agreement with the orders of the Lord he gave them a heritage among their father's brothers.

To the south it is Ephraim's, and to the north it is Manasseh's, and the sea is his limit; and they are touching Asher on the north, and Issachar on the east.

And when the children of Israel had become strong, they put the Canaanites to forced work, in place of driving them out.

For the hill-country of Gilead will be yours ... the woodland and cut down ... its outskirts will be yours ... get the Canaanites out, for they have iron war-carriages ... strong.

And they had for their heritage Beer-sheba and Shema and Moladah

The heritage of Simeon was taken out of Judah's stretch of land, for Judah's part was more than they had need of, so the heritage of the children of Simeon was inside their heritage.

(But the limit of the children of Dan was not wide enough for them; so the children of Dan went up and made war on Leshem and took it, putting it to the sword without mercy, and they took it for their heritage and made a place for themselves there, giving it the name of Leshem-dan, after the name of their father, Dan.)

By the orders of the Lord they gave him the town for which he made request, Timnath-serah in the hill-country of Ephraim: there, after building the town, he made his living-place.

So that any man who in error and without design has taken the life of another, may go in flight to them: and they will be safe places for you from him who has the right of punishment for blood.

And if anyone goes in flight to one of those towns, and comes into the public place of the town, and puts his cause before the responsible men of the town, they will take him into the town and give him a place among them where he may be safe.

And if the one who has the right of punishment comes after him, they are not to give the taker of life up to him; because he was the cause of his neighbour's death without designing it and not in hate.

So they made selection of Kedesh in Galilee in the hill-country of Naphtali, and Shechem in the hill-country of Ephraim, and Kiriath-arba (which is Hebron) in the hill-country of Judah.

And on the east side of Jordan at Jericho, they made selection of Bezer in the waste land, in the table-land, out of the tribe of Reuben, and Ramoth in Gilead out of the tribe of Gad, and Golan in Bashan out of the tribe of Manasseh.

From the tribes of the children of Judah and the children of Simeon they gave these towns, listed here by name:

These were for the children of Aaron among the families of the Kohathites, of the children of Levi: for they came first in the distribution.

They gave them Kiriath-arba, the town of Arba, the father of Anak, (which is Hebron) in the hill-country of Judah, with its grass-lands.

But the open country round the town, and its unwalled places, they gave to Caleb, the son of Jephunneh, as his property.

And to the children of Aaron the priest they gave Hebron with its grass-lands, the town where the taker of life might be safe, and Libnah with its grass-lands;

And from the tribe of Benjamin they gave Gibeon and Geba with their grass-lands;

And they gave them Shechem with its grass-lands in the hill-country of Ephraim, the town where the taker of life might be safe, and Gezer with its grass-lands;

And to the children of Gershon, of the families of the Levites, they gave from the half-tribe of Manasseh, Golan in Bashan with its grass-lands, the town where the taker of life might be safe, and Ashtaroth with its grass-lands, two towns.

And to the rest of the Levites, that is, the families of the children of Merari, they gave from the tribe of Zebulun, Jokneam and Kartah with their grass-lands;

Then Joshua gave them his blessing and sent them away: and they went back to their tents.

Now when they came to the country by Jordan in the land of Canaan, the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh put up there, by Jordan, a great altar, seen from far.

And with him they sent ten chiefs, one for every tribe of the children of Israel, every one of them the head of his house among the families of Israel.

And they came to the children of Reuben and the children of Gad and the half-tribe of Manasseh, to the land of Gilead, and said to them,

For we said to ourselves, If they say this to us or to future generations, then we will say, See this copy of the Lord's altar which our fathers made, not for burned offerings or offerings of beasts, but for a witness between us and you.

And the children of Israel were pleased about this; and they gave praise to God, and had no more thought of going to war against the children of Reuben and the children of Gad for the destruction of their land.

And the children of Reuben and the children of Gad gave to that altar the name of Ed. For, they said, It is a witness between us that the Lord is God.

For the Lord has sent out from before you nations great and strong: and they have all given way before you till this day.

For if you go back, joining yourselves to the rest of these nations who are still among you, getting married to them and living with them and they with you:

Then you may be certain that the Lord your God will not go on driving these nations out from before you; but they will become a danger and a cause of sin to you, a whip for your sides and thorns in your eyes, till you are cut off from this good land which the Lord your God has given you.

Then Joshua got all the tribes of Israel together at Shechem; and he sent for the responsible men of Israel and their chiefs and their judges and their overseers; and they took their place before God.

And Joshua said to all the people, These are the words of the Lord, the God of Israel: In the past your fathers, Terah, the father of Abraham, and the father of Nahor, were living on the other side of the River: and they were worshipping other gods.

And I took you into the lands of the Amorites on the other side of Jordan; and they made war on you, and I gave them into your hands and you took their land; and I sent destruction on them before you.

And Joshua said to the people, You are witnesses against yourselves that you have made the decision to be the servants of the Lord. And they said, We are witnesses.

And they put his body in the earth in the land of his heritage in Timnath-serah, in the hill-country of Ephraim, to the north of Mount Gaash.

And the bones of Joseph, which the children of Israel had taken up from Egypt, they put in the earth in Shechem, in the property which Jacob had got from the sons of Hamor, the father of Shechem, for a hundred shekels: and they became the heritage of the children of Joseph.

And Judah went up; and the Lord gave the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hands; and they overcame ten thousand of them in Bezek.

And they came across Adoni-zedek, and made war on him; and they overcame the Canaanites and the Perizzites.

But Adoni-zedek went in flight; and they went after him and overtook him, and had his thumbs and his great toes cut off.

And Adoni-zedek said, Seventy kings, whose thumbs and great toes had been cut off, got broken meat under my table: as I have done, so has God done to me in full. And they took him to Jerusalem, and he came to his end there.

Then the children of Judah made an attack on Jerusalem, and took it, burning down the town after they had put its people to the sword without mercy.

And the Lord was with Judah; and he took the hill-country for his heritage; but he was unable to make the people of the valley go out, for they had war-carriages of iron.

And they gave Hebron to Caleb, as Moses had said; and he took the land of the three sons of Anak, driving them out from there.

So they sent men to make a search round Beth-el. (Now the name of the town in earlier times was Luz.)

So he made clear to them the way into the town, and they put it to the sword; but they let the man and all his family get away safe.

And whenever Israel became strong, they put the Canaanites to forced work, without driving them out completely.

For the Amorites would go on living in Mount Heres, in Aijalon, and in Shaalbim; but the children of Joseph became stronger than they, and put them to forced work.

And so I have said, I will not send them out from before you; but they will be a danger to you, and their gods will be a cause of falling to you.

And they gave that place the name of Bochim, and made offerings there to the Lord.

And they put his body in the earth in the land of his heritage in Timnath-heres, in the hill-country of Ephraim to the north of Mount Gaash.

And they gave up the Lord, the God of their fathers, who had taken them out of the land of Egypt, and went after other gods, the gods of the peoples round about them, worshipping them and moving the Lord to wrath.

And they gave up the Lord, and became the servants of Baal and the Astartes.

And the wrath of the Lord was burning against Israel, and he gave them up into the hands of those who violently took their property, and into the hands of their haters all round them, so that they were forced to give way before them.

Wherever they went out, the hand of the Lord was against them for evil, as the Lord had taken his oath it would be; and things became very hard for them.

But still they would not give ear to their judges, but went after other gods and gave them worship; quickly turning from the way in which their fathers had gone, keeping the orders of the Lord; but they did not do so.

But whenever the judge was dead, they went back and did more evil than their fathers, going after other gods, to be their servants and their worshippers; giving up nothing of their sins and their hard-hearted ways.

In order to put Israel to the test, and see if they will keep the way of the Lord, walking in it as their fathers did, or not.

For the purpose of testing Israel by them, to see if they would give ear to the orders of the Lord, which he had given to their fathers by the hand of Moses.

And they took as wives the daughters of these nations and gave their daughters to their sons, and became servants to their gods.

Then the children of Israel again did evil in the eyes of the Lord; and the Lord made Eglon, king of Moab, strong against Israel, because they had done evil in the Lord's eyes.

And Eglon got together the people of Ammon and Amalek, and they went and overcame Israel and took the town of palm-trees.