Listen, Israel: Today you are about to cross the Jordan so you can dispossess the nations there, people greater and stronger than you who live in large cities with extremely high fortifications. ¹ 

For you are about to cross the Jordan to possess the land the Lord your God is giving you, and you will possess and inhabit it.

If you besiege a city for a long time while attempting to capture it, ¹  you must not chop down its trees, ²  for you may eat fruit ³  from them and should not cut them down. A tree in the field is not human that you should besiege it! ⁴ 

I declare to you this very day that you will certainly ¹  perish! You will not extend your time in the land you are crossing the Jordan to possess. ²