7. What man is there who has pledged to be married a wife, and has not taken her? Let him go and return to his house, lest he die in the battle, and another man take her.”
8. The officers shall speak further to the people, and they shall say, “What man is there who is fearful and faint-hearted? Let him go and return to his house, lest his brother’s heart melt as his heart.”
9. It shall be, when the officers have finished speaking to the people, that they shall appoint captains of armies at the head of the people.
10. When you draw near to a city to fight against it, then proclaim peace to it.
11. It shall be, if it makes you answer of peace, and opens to you, then it shall be, that all the people who are found therein shall become forced laborers to you, and shall serve you.
12. If it will make no peace with you, but will make war against you, then you shall besiege it.
13. When Yahweh your God delivers it into your hand, you shall strike every male of it with the edge of the sword;
14. but the women, the little ones, the livestock, and all that is in the city, even all its plunder, you shall take for plunder for yourself. You may use the plunder of your enemies, which Yahweh your God has given you.
15. Thus you shall do to all the cities which are very far off from you, which are not of the cities of these nations.
16. But of the cities of these peoples, that Yahweh your God gives you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes;
17. but you shall utterly destroy them: the Hittite, the Amorite, the Canaanite, the Perizzite, the Hivite, and the Jebusite; as Yahweh your God has commanded you;