Beginning

9 Now when the kings of the land who were beyond the Jordan in the highlands and along the coast of the Mediterranean—the Hittites, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites—heard what had happened, ² they unified to oppose Joshua and Israel.

³ But the people of Gibeon, who were Hivites, had a different idea when they heard what Joshua had done to Jericho and to Ai. ⁴ Knowing that Joshua might turn his attention to them next, they decided to use their wits, not their military might. They formed a delegation to serve as envoys and gathered the most worn-out sacks for their donkeys and worn-out, patched-up wineskins they could find. ⁵ They took some ragged sandals and patched them. They dressed in threadbare clothes—all so it would look as though they had come from far away. Even the food they carried was dry and moldy, as though it had been carried a long distance.

⁶ These envoys went to Gilgal to meet with Joshua and the men of Israel.

¹⁴ The leaders did not consult the Eternal. They broke bread with the messengers, ¹⁵ and Joshua offered them a treaty of peace, with the leaders of Israel swearing an oath to bind it.

¹⁶ Three days after they had sworn peace with these deceptive messengers, they discovered the visitors were Gibeonites from the land of Canaan, their neighbors, who, in fact, were living in part of the land God had promised the Israelites. ¹⁷ So the Israelites went to their cities: Gibeon, Chephirah, Beeroth, and Kiriath-jearim on the third day, ¹⁸ but they did not attack them. Even though they had been tricked into making a treaty, an oath made in the name of the Eternal was sacred. The people of Israel grumbled and complained against their leaders, ¹⁹ but they replied to the entire congregation.

²¹ So the leaders kept their promise to the Gibeonites who became servants of the entire congregation, cutting their wood and drawing their water.

²² Joshua summoned the Gibeonite leaders.

²⁶ So Joshua spared the Gibeonites from the people of Israel and certain death ²⁷ but made them servants of the people of Israel, chopping their wood and carrying their water, serving the Eternal’s sanctuary from that time on, in whatever place he chose as he directed them.

10 When Adoni-zedek, the king of Jerusalem, heard that Joshua had totally destroyed the kings and cities of Jericho and Ai, and when he discovered that the Israelites had made a treaty with the people of Gibeon and were living alongside Israel, ² he was greatly alarmed. The city of Gibeon was large, almost like a royal city, much larger than Ai and with many trained warriors. ^3-5 So Adoni-zedek, king of Jerusalem, dispatched messages to King Hoham of Hebron, to King Piram of Jarmuth, to King Japhia of Lachish, and to King Debir of Eglon.

So these five kings of the Amorites gathered their forces and came down upon the city of Gibeon like a mighty wave. ⁶ The Gibeonites, seeing the camps of these five armies, sent a message to Joshua in the Israelite camp at Gilgal.

⁷ So Joshua honored the oath they had sworn, and he gathered up all of his fighting forces, all the mighty warriors, and went up from Gilgal toward Gibeon.

⁹ Joshua surprised them, having marched his men all night from Gilgal, ¹⁰ and the Eternal caused fear and confusion among the Amorite armies at the sudden sight of Israel among them. He slaughtered the Amorites at Gibeon like cattle, chasing and killing them all the way up Beth-horon, and striking them down as far away as Azekah and Makkedah. ¹¹ As they fled for their lives down the far slope of Beth-horon, He hurled huge and deadly hailstones upon them from heaven, as far as Azekah. More Amorites were killed by God’s hailstones than by the people of Israel on that day.

¹² On the day of the Eternal’s great slaughter, Joshua consulted with the Eternal One; and then, in front of all the people of Israel, he commanded the sun and the moon.

¹³ The sun stood still in the heavens; and the moon did likewise, so that the battle could continue until the Israelites had destroyed their enemies, just as it was written in the scroll of Jashar. The sun stalled in the sky for almost an entire day before it set. ¹⁴ There has never been another day like this before or since, when the Eternal so answered a person’s prayer, for the Eternal fought for the people of Israel.

¹⁵ Joshua and the Israelites later returned to the camp at Gilgal, ¹⁶ but the kings slipped away at the height of the battle and hid in a cave at Makkedah. ¹⁷ Someone told Joshua they had been found hiding there.

²⁰ When Joshua and the Israelites had killed all those who did not escape back into the fortified cities, ²¹ they all returned safely to camp with Joshua at Makkedah, and no one dared to speak a negative word about the Israelites.

²³ They brought forth the kings of Jerusalem, Hebron, Jarmuth, Lachish, and Eglon ²⁴ and led them in front of Joshua and the Israelites.

So the leaders did.

²⁶ Joshua had the kings executed and hung on five trees; and they hung until sunset ²⁷ when Joshua commanded they be taken down, as God’s law requires. Their bodies were thrown into the cave where they had hidden, and the cave was sealed as a tomb by piling stones across the mouth. Their remains lie there to this very day.

²⁸ Also on that day Joshua defeated Makkedah and its king, destroying it completely, killing everyone in it and the king, as he had done in Jericho.

²⁹ Next Joshua led his forces from Makkedah against Libnah, ³⁰ and the Eternal gave the town and its king into their hands. They took no prisoners. They killed everyone in the town and destroyed it and the king, as they did to the king of Jericho.

³¹ From there Joshua and the Israelites passed on to Lachish and besieged it, ³² and on the second day the Eternal gave Lachish to them. They destroyed it and killed everyone in it, as they had just done to Libnah. ³³ When King Horam of Gezer came up to help Lachish, Joshua turned the army against him and his people and destroyed them, leaving no survivors.

³⁴ Passing from Lachish, Joshua and the people attacked Eglon, ³⁵ and it fell to them on the first day. They killed everyone with the sword and destroyed it completely, as they had Lachish.

³⁶ Then Joshua went up with all the forces of Israel from Eglon against Hebron, ³⁷ and it fell to them—its king, all of its villages, and all of its people. Joshua killed everyone with the sword and destroyed it as he had destroyed Eglon. ³⁸ Lastly Joshua, with all of Israel, attacked Debir ³⁹ and took its king, its villages, and all of its people. The Israelites killed them with the sword and destroyed them all. Joshua left no one alive. He did to Debir and its king just as he had done to Hebron and to Libnah and its king.

⁴⁰ So this is how Joshua and the Israelites defeated every area they had encountered: the hill country, the wilderness of the Negev, the coastlands, and the foothills with all the people and all their kings, leaving no one alive, as the Eternal God of Israel had commanded. ⁴¹ Joshua won victories from Kadesh-barnea to Gaza and through all the country of Goshen as far as Gibeon. ⁴² Joshua was able to capture and defeat all these people and all their kings for one simple reason: the Eternal God of Israel fought for Israel.

⁴³ Then Joshua returned to Gilgal to camp with all the Israelites.

11 When King Jabin of Hazor heard what Israel had done to the central and southern cities of Canaan, he sent messengers to King Jobab of Madon, the king of Shimron, the king of Achshaph, ² and the kings who were in the northern hill country, in the Arabah south of Chinneroth, in the lowland, and in the heights of Dor on the west; ³ to the Canaanites in the east and the west; the Amorites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, and the Jebusites in the hill country; the Hivites in the foothills of Mount Hermon in the land of Mizpeh, and to all those who could still fight the invaders. ⁴ They banded together and came out to fight—so many warriors that you could no more count them than you could count the grains of sand on a beach—and leading them was a vast number of horses and chariots. ⁵ All of these kings pooled their forces, and they camped together by the waters of Merom, ready to make war on Israel.

⁷ So Joshua’s army came upon them suddenly where they camped beside the waters of Merom and attacked them, ⁸ and the Eternal delivered this vast army to Israel. They pursued the retreating soldiers as far as Great Sidon and Misrephoth-maim, and to the east as far as the valley of Mizpeh until no one was left to fight. ⁹ And Joshua cut the hamstrings of all their horses and burned all the chariots, as the Eternal had commanded.

¹⁰ Then Joshua turned against Hazor, which had been the leader of all these armies, and destroyed their king ¹¹ and every living, moving, breathing creature within, and burned the city. ¹² Joshua moved through each of these cities destroying their armies and putting them all to the sword, including their king, and utterly destroying them as Moses, the servant of the Eternal, had commanded. ¹³ But Hazor was the only city Joshua burned to the ground of the cities built up on hills. ¹⁴ The Israelites looted all of these towns, taking the goods and the livestock as their own but killing all of the inhabitants with the sword, leaving none alive. ¹⁵ The Eternal had commanded His servant, Moses, and Moses had commanded Joshua; so Joshua did everything he had been told until nothing the Eternal had commanded Moses was left undone.

¹⁶ So Joshua took all of that land: the hill country, the Negev, and the land of Goshen. He conquered the lowland regions, the Arabah, and central hill country with its foothills, ^17-18 from Mount Halak, near Seir, to Baal-gad in the valley of Lebanon below Mount Hermon. Wherever he went in that land—and it was a long war—he captured their kings and defeated them and executed them. ¹⁹ The only people who were not destroyed in battle were the Gibeonites (Hivites) who had made peace with the Israelites. ²⁰ The Eternal boosted the courage of Israel’s enemies so they would come out and oppose Israel as nations receiving no favor but only to be utterly destroyed, just as the Eternal had commanded Moses.

²¹ Finally Joshua went to war with the Anakim and wiped them from the hill country, from Hebron, from Debir, from Anab, and from all the hills of Judah in the south, and from the hills of Israel further north. Joshua’s army utterly destroyed them, their kings, their armies, and their cities, ²² until not one of the Anakim was left alive in the land of the Israelites. Only a few remained in the Philistine coastal cities of Gaza, Gath, and Ashdod.

²³ So this is how Joshua took the whole land, just as the Eternal had commanded Moses in the land beyond the Jordan; Joshua allotted it as an inheritance to the tribes of Israel, and at last the land was quiet from wars.