Joshua 8:3-22

³So Joshua rose up with all the people of war to go up to Ai; and Joshua chose thirty thousand men, valiant warriors, and sent them out at night. ⁴He commanded them, saying, “See, you are going to ambush the city from behind it. Do not go very far from the city, but all of you be ready. ⁵Then I and all the people who are with me will approach the city. And when they come out to meet us as they did the first time, we will flee before them. ⁶They will come out after us until we have lured them away from the city, for they will say, ‘They are fleeing before us just as they did the first time.’ So we will flee before them. ⁷Then you shall rise from your ambush and take possession of the city, for the Lord your God will hand it over to you. ⁸Then it will be when you have seized the city, that you shall set the city on fire. You shall do it in accordance with the word of the Lord. See, I have commanded you.” ⁹So Joshua sent them away, and they went to the place of ambush and remained between Bethel and Ai, on the west side of Ai; but Joshua spent that night among the people.

¹⁰Now Joshua got up early in the morning and mustered the people, and he went up with the elders of Israel before the people to Ai. ¹¹Then all the people of war who were with him went up and approached, and arrived in front of the city; and they camped on the north side of Ai. And there was a valley between him and Ai. ¹²Then he took about five thousand men and set them in ambush between Bethel and Ai, on the west side of the city. ¹³So they stationed the people, all the army that was on the north side of the city, and its rear guard on the west side of the city, and Joshua spent that night in the midst of the valley. ¹⁴And it came about, when the king of Ai saw them, that the men of the city hurried and got up early, and went out to meet Israel in battle, he and all his people at the appointed place before the desert plain. But he did not know that there was an ambush against him behind the city. ¹⁵Then Joshua and all Israel pretended to be defeated before them, and fled by the way of the wilderness. ¹⁶And all the people who were in the city were called together to pursue them, and they pursued Joshua and were lured away from the city. ¹⁷So not a man was left in Ai or Bethel, but they had all gone out after Israel, and they left the city unguarded and pursued Israel.

¹⁸Then the Lord said to Joshua, “Reach out with the sword that is in your hand toward Ai, for I will hand it over to you.” So Joshua reached out with the sword that was in his hand toward the city. ¹⁹Then the men in ambush rose quickly from their place, and when he had reached out with his hand, they ran and entered the city and captured it, and they quickly set the city on fire. ²⁰When the men of Ai turned back and looked, behold, the smoke of the city ascended to the sky, and they had no place to flee this way or that, for the people who had been fleeing to the wilderness turned against the pursuers. ²¹When Joshua and all Israel saw that the men in ambush had captured the city and that the smoke of the city ascended, they turned back and killed the men of Ai. ²²The others came out from the city to confront them, so that they were trapped in the midst of Israel, some on this side and some on that side; and they killed them until there was not one left who escaped or survived.