⁷ They fought against Midian, as the Lord commanded Moses,^(A) and killed every man.^{(B) 8} Among their victims were Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur and Reba^(C)—the five kings of Midian.^(D) They also killed Balaam son of Beor^(E) with the sword.^{(F) 9} The Israelites captured the Midianite women^(G) and children and took all the Midianite herds, flocks and goods as plunder.^{(H) 10} They burned^(I) all the towns where the Midianites had settled, as well as all their camps.^{(J) 11} They took all the plunder and spoils, including the people and animals,^{(K) 12} and brought the captives, spoils^(L) and plunder to Moses and Eleazar the priest and the Israelite assembly^(M) at their camp on the plains of Moab, by the Jordan across from Jericho.^(N)

¹³ Moses, Eleazar the priest and all the leaders of the community went to meet them outside the camp. ¹⁴ Moses was angry with the officers of the army^(O)—the commanders of thousands and commanders of hundreds—who returned from the battle.

¹⁵ “Have you allowed all the women to live?” he asked them. ¹⁶ “They were the ones who followed Balaam’s advice^(P) and enticed the Israelites to be unfaithful to the Lord in the Peor incident,^(Q) so that a plague^(R) struck the Lord’s people. ¹⁷ Now kill all the boys. And kill every woman who has slept with a man,^{(S) 18} but save for yourselves every girl who has never slept with a man.