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10 When you draw near to a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace to it. 11 It shall be, if it gives you answer of peace and opens to you, then it shall be that all the people who are found therein shall become forced laborers to you, and shall serve you. 12 If it will make no peace with you, but will make war against you, then you shall besiege it. 13 When Yahweh your God delivers it into your hand, you shall strike every male of it with the edge of the sword; 14 but the women, the little ones, the livestock, and all that is in the city, even all its plunder, you shall take for plunder for yourself. You may use the plunder of your enemies, which Yahweh your God has given you. 15 Thus you shall do to all the cities which are very far off from you, which are not of the cities of these nations. 16 But of the cities of these peoples that Yahweh your God gives you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes; 17 but you shall utterly destroy them: the Hittite, the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite, as Yahweh your God has commanded you; 18 that they not teach you to follow all their abominations, which they have done for their gods; so would you sin against Yahweh your God.

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Rules of Peace

10 “When you approach a city to wage war against it, extend terms of peace. 11 If it agrees to peace and welcomes you, then all the people found in it will serve you as forced laborers. 12 But if they refuse to make peace with you and instead choose war, then attack it. 13 The Lord your God will deliver it into your control, and you must execute every male. 14 The women, children, all the livestock in the city, and all of the spoil and plunder will belong to you. Appropriate the spoil of your enemies, which the Lord your God will give you. 15 Do this to all the cities that are distant from you—that is, to those cities that are not in neighboring nations.”

Destruction of the Canaanites

16 “You are not to leave even one person alive in the cities of these nations that the Lord your God is about to give you as an inheritance. 17 You must completely destroy the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites, just as the Lord your God commanded you, 18 so they won’t teach you to do all the detestable things that they do for their gods. If you do what they teach you, you will sin against the Lord your God.”

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