Joshua 8

Then God said to Joshua, “Do not be afraid or discouraged {because of what happened last time you fought against the men of Ai}. Take with you all the soldiers you have and go up to Ai {again}. I will certainly enable you to defeat the king of Ai and his people, and I will give you his city and his land.

Your army must do to the city of Ai and its people and king the same thing that you did to the city of Jericho and its people and king. But {this time} I will allow you to take all their possessions and keep them for yourselves. Tell some of your soldiers to hide behind the city and prepare to attack it suddenly.” \*

So Joshua led all his army toward the city of Ai. He chose 30, 000 of his best soldiers and prepared them to go out during the night.

Joshua said to them, “Listen carefully! Some of you must hide on the other side of Ai. Do not go very far from the city. Each one of you must be ready {to attack it}. \*

I and the soldiers who are with me will march toward the city {in the morning}. Then the soldiers who are in the city will come out to fight us, as they did before. We will turn around and start to run away from them.

Because they will think that we are running away from them as we did before, they will leave the city and chase after us. While we are running away from them,

those of you who are hiding must come out and enter the city and capture it. God, your God, will enable you to conquer the city. \*

After you capture the city, burn it. Do what God has commanded us to do. Those are the orders I am giving to you.”

Then Joshua sent some of the Israelite soldiers to hide and wait at a place between Bethel and Ai. That place was on the west side of Ai. But Joshua slept that night among his other soldiers. \*

Early the next morning, Joshua gathered his soldiers together. Then he and the other Israelite leaders went in front of them to Ai.

They all set up their tents close to Ai, just to the north of the city, where all the people of the city could see them. There was a valley between them and the city of Ai.

Joshua chose about 5, 000 of his soldiers and told them to go and hide just west of Ai, between Ai and Bethel. \*

So that was how Joshua and the elders {prepared for the battle. They} stationed the main group of Israelite soldiers north of Ai and they stationed the other group on the west side of Ai. That night Joshua went down into the valley.

When the king of Ai saw {the Israelite army}, he and all his soldiers got up early {the next morning} and quickly went out of the city to fight them at a place where they had agreed to meet. That place was near the Jordan River valley. But the king of Ai did not know that some of the Israelite soldiers were hiding behind the city, ready to attack it. \*

Joshua and all the Israelite soldiers {who were with him} allowed the army of Ai to push them back. They retreated toward the wilderness.

Then the king of Ai ordered all the men in the city to chase after Joshua and his men. So they left the city and pursued them.

All the men of Ai and also the men from the city of Bethel pursued the Israelite army. They did not leave a guard behind to defend their cities. They even left the city {gates} wide open as they went to pursue the soldiers of Israel. \*

Then God said to Joshua, “Lift up your curved sword and point it toward Ai, because I am going to enable your soldiers to capture it!” So Joshua pointed his curved sword toward Ai.

When the Israelite men who were hiding saw Joshua do that, they rushed out from the places where they were hiding and ran into the city. They captured it and quickly set it on fire. \*

When the men of Ai looked back, they saw smoke rising from their city up to the sky. They could not escape in any direction, because the Israelite soldiers stopped running away towards the wilderness and turned back toward them.

Joshua and all the Israelite soldiers knew that the men who had been hiding had captured the city and were burning it because they saw the smoke rising. So they turned around and began killing the men of Ai. \*

Meanwhile, the soldiers who had captured the city came out and attacked them {from the rear}. So the men of Ai were {caught} in the middle of the two groups of Israelite soldiers. The Israelites fought against the men of Ai until they killed them all. None of the men of Ai escaped.

But the king of Ai was still alive. They captured him and brought him to Joshua. \*

The Israelite soldiers killed all the men of Ai who had come out into the fields that were in the open country to pursue them. When they had killed every one of them, then all the Israelite soldiers went back to Ai and killed everyone who was there.

{The Israelites} killed 12, 000 men and women that day. They killed everyone who lived in Ai.

Joshua continued to point his curved sword toward Ai until the Israelites had killed all the people who lived in Ai. \*

The Israelite soldiers took for themselves the animals and the other things that had belonged to the people of Ai, just as God had told Joshua that they should do.

Joshua and his soldiers burned Ai and caused it to become a pile of ruins that no one ever rebuilt. It is still an abandoned place now. \*

Joshua hanged the king of Ai on a tree. He left his corpse hanging there until evening. At sunset, Joshua told his men to take the king’s body down from the tree and throw it on the ground at the entrance of the city gate. {After they did that,} they piled a great mound of rocks on top of the king’s corpse. That pile of rocks is still there now. \*

Then Joshua {instructed his men to} build on Ebal Mountain an altar for God, the God whom the Israelites worship.

They built it just as Moses, God’s servant, had written previously in the book of instructions that God had given to him. They made the altar from stones that no one had cut. No one had done any work on these stones using iron tools. The Israelites then offered on the altar sacrifices to God that were burned completely, and they also made fellowship sacrifices.

At that place, Joshua wrote on the stones {of the altar} a copy of the instructions that God had previously given to Moses. The Israelites watched Joshua do this. \*

The leaders, officials, and judges of Israel and all the other Israelites were standing on both sides of the sacred chest. They were all standing facing the Levitical priests who carried the sacred chest of God. Both native-born Israelites and foreigners who were living among the Israelites were there. Half of the people stood {on one side of the valley} below Gerizim Mountain, and the other half of the people stood {on the other side of the valley} below Ebal Mountain. The sacred chest was {in the valley} between the two groups. This is what Moses, God’s servant, had previously instructed them to do when he had given instructions for blessing the people of Israel. \*

Then Joshua read {to the people} everything that Moses had written. That included the things God had instructed them to do and not to do. That also included God’s teachings and the ways that he said he would bless them {if they obeyed his commands} or curse them {if they disobeyed his commands}.

Joshua made sure to read every word that Moses had commanded them. He read every word in front of the entire assembly of Israelites. All the women and children were there as well, and also the foreigners who were living among the people of Israel. \*