Deuteronomy 2:24-35

2:24 Get up, make your way across Wadi Arnon. Look! I have already delivered over to you Sihon the Amorite, king of Heshbon, ¹  and his land. Go ahead! Take it! Engage him in war! 2:25 This very day I will begin to fill all the people of the earth ²  with dread and to terrify them when they hear about you. They will shiver and shake in anticipation of your approach.” ³ 

Defeat of Sihon, King of Heshbon

2:26 Then I sent messengers from the Kedemoth ⁴  Desert to King Sihon of Heshbon with an offer of peace: 2:27 “Let me pass through your land; I will keep strictly to the roadway. ⁵  I will not turn aside to the right or the left. 2:28 Sell me food for cash ⁶  so that I can eat and sell me water to drink. ⁷  Just allow me to go through on foot, 2:29 just as the descendants of Esau who live at Seir and the Moabites who live in Ar did for me, until I cross the Jordan to the land the Lord our God is giving us.” 2:30 But King Sihon of Heshbon was unwilling to allow us to pass near him because the Lord our ⁸  God had made him obstinate ⁹  and stubborn ¹⁰  so that he might deliver him over to you ¹¹  this very day. 2:31 The Lord said to me, “Look! I have already begun to give over Sihon and his land to you. Start right now to take his land as your possession.” 2:32 When Sihon and all his troops ¹²  emerged to encounter us in battle at Jahaz, ¹³  2:33 the Lord our God delivered him over to us and we struck him down, along with his sons ¹⁴  and everyone else. ¹⁵  2:34 At that time we seized all his cities and put every one of them ¹⁶  under divine judgment, ¹⁷  including even the women and children; we left no survivors. 2:35 We kept only the livestock and plunder from the cities for ourselves.

[2:24]  ¹ sn Heshbon is the name of a prominent site (now Tell Hesba„n, about 7.5 mi [12 km] south southwest of Amman, Jordan). Sihon made it his capital after having driven Moab from the area and forced them south to the Arnon (Num 21:26-30). Heshbon is also mentioned in Deut 1:4.

[2:25]  ² tn Heb “under heaven” (so NIV, NRSV).

[2:25]  ³ tn Heb “from before you.”

[2:26]  ⁴ sn Kedemoth. This is probably Aleiyan, about 8 mi (13 km) north of the Arnon and between Dibon and Mattanah.

[2:27]  ⁵ tn Heb “in the way in the way” (בַּדֶּרֶךְ בַּדֶּרֶךְ, baderekh baderekh). The repetition lays great stress on the idea of resolute determination to stick to the path. IBHS 116 §7.2.3c.

[2:28]  ⁶ tn Heb “silver.”

[2:28]  ⁷ tn Heb “and water for silver give to me so that I may drink.”

[2:30]  ⁸ tc The translation follows the LXX in reading the first person pronoun. The MT, followed by many English versions, has a second person masculine singular pronoun, “your.”

[2:30]  ⁹ tn Heb “hardened his spirit” (so KJV, NASB, NRSV); NIV “made his spirit stubborn.”

[2:30]  ¹⁰ tn Heb “made his heart obstinate” (so KJV, NASB); NRSV “made his heart defiant.”

[2:30]  ¹¹ tn Heb “into your hand.”

[2:32]  ¹² tn Heb “people.”

[2:32]  ¹³ sn Jahaz. This is probably Khirbet el-Medeiyineh. See J. Dearman, “The Levitical Cities of Reuben and Moabite Toponymy,” BASOR 276 (1984): 55-57.

[2:33]  ¹⁴ tc The translation follows the Qere or marginal reading; the Kethib (consonantal text) has the singular, “his son.”

[2:33]  ¹⁵ tn Heb “all his people.”

[2:34]  ¹⁶ tn Heb “every city of men.” This apparently identifies the cities as inhabited.

[2:34]  ¹⁷ tn Heb “under the ban” (נַחֲרֵם, nakharem). The verb employed is חָרַם (kharam, usually in the Hiphil) and the associated noun is חֵרֶם (kherem). See J. Naudé, NIDOTTE, 2:276-77, and, for a more thorough discussion, Susan Niditch, War in the Hebrew Bible, 28-77.