Dual Panel1THE LORD said to Joshua, “Do not be afraid or discouraged; take the whole army with you and go and attack Ai. I am delivering the king of Ai into your hands, along with his people, his city, and his territory.
2Deal with Ai and its king as you dealt with Jericho and its king, except that you may keep for yourselves the cattle and any other spoil you take. Set an ambush for the city to the west of it.”
3Joshua and the army prepared for the assault on Ai. He chose thirty thousand warriors and dispatched them by night,
4with these orders: “Lie in ambush to the west of the city, not far distant from it, and hold yourselves in readiness, all of you.
5I myself will advance on the city with the rest of the army, and when the enemy come out to meet us as they did last time, we shall turn and flee before them.
6They will come in pursuit until we have drawn them away from the city, for they will think we are in flight as before. While we are retreating,
7rise from your ambush and occupy the city; the LORD your God will deliver it into your hands.
8When you have taken it, set it on fire. Thus you will do what the LORD commands; these are my orders to you.”
9After Joshua sent them off, they went to the place of ambush and lay in wait between Bethel and Ai to the west of Ai, while Joshua spent the night with the army.
10Early in the morning Joshua mustered the army and, with Joshua himself and the elders of Israel at its head, they marched against Ai.
11All the armed forces with him marched on until they came within sight of the city, where they encamped north of Ai, with the valley between them and the city.
12Joshua took some five thousand men and set them in ambush between Bethel and Ai to the west of the city.
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14When the king of Ai saw them, he and the citizens set off hurriedly and marched out to do battle against Israel, being unaware that an ambush had been prepared for him to the west of the city.
15Joshua and the Israelites made as if they were worsted by them and fled towards the wilderness,
16while all the people of the city were called out in pursuit. In pursuing Joshua they were drawn away from the city,
17until not a man was left in Ai; they had all gone out in pursuit of the Israelites and thus had left the place wide open.
18The LORD then said to Joshua, “Point towards Ai with the dagger you are holding, for I will deliver the city into your hands.” Joshua pointed with his dagger towards Ai
19and, at his signal, the men in ambush rose quickly from their position; dashing into the city, they captured it and at once set it on fire.
20The men of Ai looked back and saw the smoke from the city already going up to the sky; they were powerless to make their escape in any direction. The Israelites who had feigned flight towards the wilderness now turned on their pursuers,
21for when Joshua and all the Israelites with him saw that the men in ambush had seized the city and that smoke from it was already going up, they faced about and attacked the men of Ai.
22Those who had come out to contend with the Israelites were now hemmed in by Israelites on both sides of them, and the Israelites cut them down until there was not a single survivor; no one escaped.
23Only the king of Ai was taken alive and brought to Joshua.
24When the Israelites had slain all the inhabitants of Ai in the open country and the wilderness where they had pursued them, and the massacre was complete, they all went back to Ai and put it to the sword.
25The number who fell that day, men and women, was twelve thousand, the whole population of Ai.
26Joshua held out his dagger and did not draw back his hand until all who lived in Ai had been destroyed;
27but the Israelites kept for themselves the cattle and any other spoil that they took, following the LORD's instructions given to Joshua.
28So Joshua burnt Ai to the ground, and left it the desolate ruined mound it remains to this day.
29He hanged the king of Ai on a gibbet and left him there till evening. At sunset they cut down the body on Joshua's orders and flung it on the ground at the entrance of the city gate. Over it they raised a great cairn of stones, which is there to this day.
30At that time Joshua built an altar to the LORD the God of Israel on Mount Ebal.
31The altar was of blocks of undressed stone on which no iron tool had been used; this followed the commands given to the Israelites by Moses the servant of the LORD, as is described in the book of the law of Moses. On the altar they offered whole-offerings to the LORD, and slaughtered shared-offerings.
32There in the presence of the Israelites Joshua engraved on blocks of stone a copy of the law of Moses.
33All Israel, native-born and resident alien alike, with the elders, officers, and judges, took their stand on either side of the Ark, facing the levitical priests who carried the Ark of the Covenant of the LORD. Half of them stood facing Mount Gerizim and half facing Mount Ebal, to fulfil the command of Moses the servant of the LORD that the blessing should be pronounced first.
34Then Joshua recited the whole of the blessing and the cursing word by word, as they are written in the book of the law;
35there was not a single word of all that Moses had commanded which Joshua did not read aloud in the presence of the whole congregation of Israel, including the women and dependants and the aliens resident among them.