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<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"><html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /><meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1" /><title>Deuteronomy 20 ESV</title><link rel="stylesheet" href="/chapnew2.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="../spec.css" type="text/css" media="Screen" /><link rel="stylesheet" href="/print.css" type="text/css" media="Print" /></head><body><div id="fx"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" id="fx2"><tr><td><iframe width="100%" height="30" scrolling="no" src="../cmenus/deuteronomy/20.htm" align="left" frameborder="0"></iframe></td></tr></table></div><div id="blnk"></div><div align="center"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" class="maintable"><tr><td><div id="fx5"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" id="fx6"><tr><td><iframe width="100%" height="245" scrolling="no" src="../topmenuchap/deuteronomy/20-1.htm" frameborder="0"></iframe></td></tr></table></div></td></tr></table></div><div align="center"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" class="maintable3"><tr><td><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center" id="announce"><tr><td><div id="l1"><div id="breadcrumbs"><a href="http://biblehub.com">Bible</a> > <a href="../">ESV</a> > Deuteronomy 20</div><div id="anc"><iframe src="/anc.htm" width="100%" height="27" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></iframe></div><div id="anc2"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center"><tr><td><iframe src="/anc2.htm" width="100%" height="27" scrolling="no" frameborder="0"></iframe></td></tr></table></div></div></td></tr></table><div id="movebox2"><table border="0" align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"><tr><td><div id="topheading"><a href="../deuteronomy/19.htm" title="Deuteronomy 19">◄</a> Deuteronomy 20 <a href="../deuteronomy/21.htm" title="Deuteronomy 21">►</a></div></td></tr></table></div><div align="center" class="maintable2"><table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="center"><tr><td><div id="leftbox"><div class="padleft"><div class="vheading"><table width="100%"><tr><td width="99%" valign="top">English Standard Version</td><td width="1%" valign="top"><a href="/p/esv/nas/deuteronomy/20.shtml" style="color:#001320" title="Parallel Chapters"> Par ▾ </a></tr></table></div></a><div class="chap"><p class="heading">Laws Concerning Warfare</p><p class="regular"><span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-1.htm"><b>1</b></a></span>“When you go out to war against your enemies, and see horses and chariots and an army larger than your own, you shall not be afraid of them, for the <span class="divine-name">Lord</span> your God is with you, who brought you up out of the land of Egypt. <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-2.htm"><b>2</b></a></span>And when you draw near to the battle, the priest shall come forward and speak to the people <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-3.htm"><b>3</b></a></span>and shall say to them, ‘Hear, O Israel, today you are drawing near for battle against your enemies: let not your heart faint. Do not fear or panic or be in dread of them, <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-4.htm"><b>4</b></a></span>for the <span class="divine-name">Lord</span> your God is he who goes with you to fight for you against your enemies, to give you the victory.’ <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-5.htm"><b>5</b></a></span>Then the officers shall speak to the people, saying, ‘Is there any man who has built a new house and has not dedicated it? Let him go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another man dedicate it. <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-6.htm"><b>6</b></a></span>And is there any man who has planted a vineyard and has not enjoyed its fruit? Let him go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another man enjoy its fruit. <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-7.htm"><b>7</b></a></span>And is there any man who has betrothed a wife and has not taken her? Let him go back to his house, lest he die in the battle and another man take her.’ <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-8.htm"><b>8</b></a></span>And the officers shall speak further to the people, and say, ‘Is there any man who is fearful and fainthearted? Let him go back to his house, lest he make the heart of his fellows melt like his own.’ <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-9.htm"><b>9</b></a></span>And when the officers have finished speaking to the people, then commanders shall be appointed at the head of the people.</p> <p class="regular"><span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-10.htm"><b>10</b></a></span>“When you draw near to a city to fight against it, offer terms of peace to it. <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-11.htm"><b>11</b></a></span>And if it responds to you peaceably and it opens to you, then all the people who are found in it shall do forced labor for you and shall serve you. <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-12.htm"><b>12</b></a></span>But if it makes no peace with you, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it. <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-13.htm"><b>13</b></a></span>And when the <span class="divine-name">Lord</span> your God gives it into your hand, you shall put all its males to the sword, <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-14.htm"><b>14</b></a></span>but the women and the little ones, the livestock, and everything else in the city, all its spoil, you shall take as plunder for yourselves. And you shall enjoy the spoil of your enemies, which the <span class="divine-name">Lord</span> your God has given you. <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-15.htm"><b>15</b></a></span>Thus you shall do to all the cities that are very far from you, which are not cities of the nations here. <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-16.htm"><b>16</b></a></span>But in the cities of these peoples that the <span class="divine-name">Lord</span> your God is giving you for an inheritance, you shall save alive nothing that breathes, <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-17.htm"><b>17</b></a></span>but you shall devote them to complete destruction,<span class="footnote"><sup><a href="#footnotes" title="That is, set apart (devote) as an offering to the Lord (for destruction)">a</a></sup></span> the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites, as the <span class="divine-name">Lord</span> your God has commanded, <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-18.htm"><b>18</b></a></span>that they may not teach you to do according to all their abominable practices that they have done for their gods, and so you sin against the <span class="divine-name">Lord</span> your God.</p> <p class="regular"><span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-19.htm"><b>19</b></a></span>“When you besiege a city for a long time, making war against it in order to take it, you shall not destroy its trees by wielding an axe against them. You may eat from them, but you shall not cut them down. Are the trees in the field human, that they should be besieged by you? <span class="reftext"><a href="http://biblehub.com/deuteronomy/20-20.htm"><b>20</b></a></span>Only the trees that you know are not trees for food you may destroy and cut down, that you may build siegeworks against the city that makes war with you, until it falls.</p><A name="footnotes"></a><hr size="1" color="DDEEFF"><span class="mainfootnotes"><span class="mainfootnoteshdg">Footnotes:</span><br><span class="footnotesbot">a</span> <span class="fnverse">17</span> That is, set apart (<span class="catch-word">devote</span>) as an offering to the Lord (for destruction)<br /></span></div></div><div id="botbox"><div class="padbot"><div align="center">ESV Text Edition® (2016).<br /><br />The ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®) copyright © 2001 by <a href="http://www.crossway.org/home/esv/">Crossway Bibles</a>, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. 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