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him go and return unto his house, lest his brethren’s heart faint as well as his heart.
9
And it shall
be, when the officers have made an end of speaking unto the people, that they shall make captains
of the armies to lead the people.
10
When thou comest nigh unto a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace unto it.
11
And it
shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be,
that
all the people
that is
found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee.
12
And if it will make
no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it:
13
And when the
L
ORD
thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge
of the sword:
14
But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city,
even
all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which
the L
ORD
thy God hath given thee.
15
Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities
which are
very far off
from thee, which
are
not of the cities of these nations.
16
But of the cities of these people, which
the L
ORD
thy God doth give thee
for
an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth:
17
But thou shalt utterly destroy them;
namely,
the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and
the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the L
ORD
thy God hath commanded thee:
18
That
they teach you not to do after all their abominations, which they have done unto their gods; so
should ye sin against the L
ORD
your God.
19
When thou shalt besiege a city a long time, in making war against it to take it, thou shalt not
destroy the trees thereof by forcing an axe against them: for thou mayest eat of them, and thou shalt
not cut them down (for the tree of the field
is
man’s
life
) to employ
them
in the siege:
20
Only the
trees which thou knowest that they
be
not trees for meat, thou shalt destroy and cut them down;
and thou shalt build bulwarks against the city that maketh war with thee, until it be subdued.
CHAPTER 21
If
one
be found slain in the land which the L
ORD
thy God giveth thee to possess it, lying in the field,
and
it be not known who hath slain him:
2
Then thy elders and thy judges shall come forth, and
they shall measure unto the cities which
are
round about him that is slain:
3
And it shall be,
that
the city
which is
next unto the slain man, even the elders of that city shall take an heifer, which
hath not been wrought with,
and
which hath not drawn in the yoke;
4
And the elders of that city
shall bring down the heifer unto a rough valley, which is neither eared nor sown, and shall strike
off the heifer’s neck there in the valley:
5
And the priests the sons of Levi shall come near; for them
the L
ORD
thy God hath chosen to minister unto him, and to bless in the name of the L
ORD
; and by
their word shall every controversy and every stroke be
tried:
6
And all the elders of that city,
that
are
next unto the slain
man,
shall wash their hands over the heifer that is beheaded in the valley:
7
And they shall answer and say, Our hands have not shed this blood, neither have our eyes seen
it.
8
Be merciful, O L
ORD
, unto thy people Israel, whom thou hast redeemed, and lay not innocent blood
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KJV Bible