Joshua 8:4-17

⁴He commanded them, “Look, you will lie in ambush against the city, behind it. Do not go very far from the city, but all of you be ready.

⁵I and all the men with me will approach the city, and when they come out to attack us, we will run away from them just as before.

⁶They will come out after us until we have drawn them away from the city. They will say, 'They are running away from us as they did the last time.' So we will run away from them.

⁷Then you come up out of your place of hiding, and you will capture the city. Yahweh your God will give it into your hand.

⁸When you capture the city, you will set it on fire. You will do this when you obey the command given in the word of Yahweh. See, I have commanded you.”

⁹Joshua sent them out, and they went to the place of ambush, and they hid between Bethel and Ai to the west of Ai. But Joshua slept that night among the people.

¹⁰Joshua got up early in the morning and got his soldiers ready, Joshua and the elders of Israel, and they attacked the people of Ai.

¹¹All the fighting men who were with him went up and approached the city. They came near the city and camped on the north side of Ai. Now there was a valley between them and Ai.

¹²He took about five thousand men and set them in ambush on the west side of the city between Bethel and Ai.

¹³They positioned all the soldiers, the main army on the north side of the city, and the rear guard on the west side of the city. Joshua spent that night in the valley.

¹⁴It came about when the king of Ai saw it, he and his army got up early and rushed out to attack Israel at a certain place that was overlooking the Jordan River valley. He did not know that an ambush was waiting to attack from behind the city.

¹⁵Joshua and all Israel let themselves be defeated before them, and they fled toward the wilderness.

¹⁶All the people who were in the city were called together to go after them, and they went after Joshua and they were drawn away from the city.

¹⁷There was not a man left in Ai and Bethel who had not gone out to pursue Israel. They abandoned the city and left it open as they pursued Israel.