22“Please allow us to travel through your country. We won't cross any of your fields or vineyards, or drink water from any of your wells. We will stay on the King's Highway until we have passed through your country.”
23But Sihon refused to allow the Israelites to travel through his territory. Instead, he called out his whole army and went out to meet the Israelites head-on in the desert. When he arrived at Jahaz, he attacked the Israelites.
24The Israelites defeated them, killing them with their swords. They took over his land from the Arnon River to the Jabbok River —but only as far as the border of the Ammonites, because it was well defended.
25The Israelites conquered all the Amorite towns and took them over, including Heshbon and its surrounding villages.
26Heshbon was the capital of Sihon, king of the Amorites, who had fought against the previous king of Moab and had taken from him all his land as far as the Arnon River.
27That's why the old songwriters wrote: “Come to Heshbon and have it be rebuilt; restore the town of Sihon!
28For a fire blazed out from Heshbon, a flame from the town of Sihon. It burned up Ar in Moab where the rulers live on the high places of Arnon.
29What a disaster you face, Moab! You are all going to die, people of Chemosh! You handed over your sons as exiles and your daughters as prisoners to Sihon, king of the Amorites.
30But now we have defeated the Amorites! Heshbon's rule has been destroyed all the way to Dibon. We wiped them out all the way to Nophah and on to Medeba.”