“When you go out to battle against your enemies and see ^ahorses, chariots, and people more numerous than you, ^bdo not be afraid of them; for the LORD your God, who brought you up from the land of Egypt, is with you. 2 When you are approaching the battle, the priest shall come forward and speak to the people. 3 He shall say to them, ‘Hear, Israel, you are approaching the battle against your enemies today. Do not be fainthearted. ^aDo not be afraid, or panic, or be terrified by them, 4 for the LORD your God ^ais the One who is going with you, to fight for you against your enemies, to save you.’ 5 The officers also shall speak to the people, saying, ‘Who is the man that has built a new house but has not ^adedicated it? Let him go and return to his house, otherwise he might die in the battle and another man would dedicate it. 6 And who is the man that has planted a vineyard but has not ¹put it to use? Let him go and return to his house, otherwise he might die in the battle and another man ²would put it to use. 7 ^aAnd who is the man that is ¹betrothed to a woman and has not ²married her? Let him go and return to his house, otherwise he might die in the battle and another man would ³marry her.’ 8 Then the officers shall speak further to the people and say, ‘^aWho is the man that is afraid and fainthearted? Let him go and return to his house, so that ¹he does not make his brothers’ hearts melt like his heart!’ 9 And when the officers have finished speaking to the people, they shall appoint commanders of armies at the head of the people.

10 “When you approach a city to fight against it, you shall ¹offer it terms of peace. 11 And if it ¹agrees to make peace with you and opens to you, then all the people who are found in it shall become your ^aforced labor and serve you. 12 However, if it does not make peace with you, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it. 13 When the LORD your God gives it into your hand, ^ayou shall strike all the ¹men in it with the edge of the sword. 14 However, the women, the children, ^athe animals, and everything that is in the city, all of its spoils, you shall take as plunder for yourself; and you shall ¹use the spoils of your enemies which the LORD your God has given you. 15 This is what you shall do to all the cities that are very far from you, which are not of the cities of these nations ¹nearby. 16 ^aOnly in the cities of these peoples that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, you shall not leave anything that breathes alive. 17 Instead, you shall ¹utterly destroy them, the Hittite and the Amorite, the Canaanite and the Perizzite, the Hivite and the Jebusite, just as the LORD your God has commanded you, 18 so that they will not teach you to do ^1aall the same detestable practices of theirs which they have done for their gods, ²by which you would ^bsin against the LORD your God.

19 “When you besiege a city for a long time, to make war against it in order to capture it, you shall not destroy its trees by swinging an axe against them; for you may eat from them, so you shall not cut them down. For ¹is the tree of the field a human, that it should ²be besieged by you? 20 Only the trees that you know ¹are not fruit trees you shall destroy and cut down, so that you may construct siegeworks against the city that is making war against you until it falls.