Deuteronomy 20:17
15 This is how you are to treat all the cities that are far away from you and do not belong to the nations nearby.
16 However, in the cities of the nations that the LORD your God is giving you as an inheritance, you must not leave alive anything that breathes.
For you must devote them to complete destruction —the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites—as the LORD your God has commanded you,
18 so that they cannot teach you to do all the detestable things they do for their gods, and so cause you to sin against the LORD your God.
19 When you lay siege to a city for an extended time while fighting against it to capture it, you must not destroy its trees by putting an axe to them, because you can eat their fruit. You must not cut them down. Are the trees of the field human, that you should besiege them?
This was said to Israel at a particular time, so it is wise to read it together with the surrounding text. Do read the surrounding verses too, because the context often says more than a single verse.
Compare
- BSB
- For you must devote them to complete destruction —the Hittites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites—as the LORD your God has commanded you,
- KJV
- But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee:
- WEB
- but you shall utterly destroy them: the Hittite, the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite, as the LORD your God has commanded you;
- ASV
- but thou shalt utterly destroy them: the Hittite, and the Amorite, the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite; as Jehovah thy God hath commanded thee;
- DARBY
- but shalt utterly devote them to destruction, the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, as Jehovah thy God hath commanded thee;
- BLB
- But you must devote them to complete destruction—the Hittite, and the Amorite, and the Canaanite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite—as YHWH your God has commanded you,
- ÅB
- men du skal slå dem med bann, både hetittene og amorittene og kana'anittene og ferisittene, hevittene og jebusittene, slik som Herren din Gud har befalt deg,
- OTB
- Du skal fullstendig ødelegge dem—hetittene, amorittene, kanaaneerne, perisittene, hevittene og jebusittene—slik Herren din Gud har befalt deg.
- B1930
- men du skal slå dem med bann, både hetittene og amorittene og kana'anittene og ferisittene, hevittene og jebusittene, således som Herren din Gud har befalt dig,
Study notes (Tyndale)
Original text and word study
Cross references
Isaiah 34:5–6
When My sword has drunk its fill in the heavens, then it will come down upon Edom, upon the people I have devoted to destruction.
Read in contextJeremiah 50:35–40
A sword is against the Chaldeans, declares the LORD, against those who live in Babylon, and against her officials and wise men.
Read in contextDeuteronomy 7:1–2
When the LORD your God brings you into the land that you are entering to possess, and He drives out before you many nations—the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites, seven nations larger and stronger than you—
Read in contextEzekiel 38:21–23
And I will summon a sword against Gog on all My mountains, declares the Lord GOD, and every man’s sword will be against his brother.
Read in contextJeremiah 48:10
Cursed is the one who is remiss in doing the work of the LORD, and cursed is he who withholds his sword from bloodshed.
Read in contextRevelation 19:18
so that you may eat the flesh of kings and commanders and mighty men, of horses and riders, of everyone slave and free, small and great.”
Read in context