At that time Joshua attacked and eliminated the Anakites from the hill country – from Hebron, Debir, Anab, and all the hill country of Judah and Israel. Joshua annihilated them and their cities.

But be careful when you are setting apart the riches for the Lord. If you take any of it, you will make the Israelite camp subject to annihilation and cause a disaster.

So Joshua instructed the priests, “Come up from the Jordan!”

“Select for yourselves twelve men from the people, one per tribe.

“Instruct the priests carrying the ark of the covenantal laws to come up from the Jordan.”

The people went up from the Jordan on the tenth day of the first month and camped in Gilgal on the eastern border of Jericho.

Now Joshua set up in Gilgal the twelve stones they had taken from the Jordan.

So about three thousand men went up, but they fled from the men of Ai.

So Joshua and his whole army, including the bravest warriors, marched up from Gilgal.

Joshua attacked them by surprise after marching all night from Gilgal.

Their southern border started at the southern tip of the Salt Sea,

When the Canaanites and all who live in the land hear about this, they will turn against us and destroy the very memory of us from the earth. What will you do to protect your great reputation?”

He told them, “Look, set an ambush behind the city. Don’t go very far from the city; all of you be ready!

They will attack us until we have lured them from the city, for they will say, ‘They are retreating from us like before.’ We will retreat from them.

All the reinforcements in Ai were ordered to chase them; they chased Joshua and were lured away from the city.

Joshua summoned the Gibeonites and said to them, “Why did you trick us by saying, ‘We live far away from you,’ when you really live nearby?

Now you are condemned to perpetual servitude as woodcutters and water carriers for the house of my God.”

All Jerusalem was terrified because Gibeon was a large city, like one of the royal cities. It was larger than Ai and all its men were warriors.

Joshua said, “Open the cave’s mouth and bring the five kings out of the cave to me.”

The sin we committed at Peor was bad enough. To this very day we have not purified ourselves; it even brought a plague on the community of the Lord.