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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=1.0; maximum-scale=1.0; user-scalable=0;"/><title>Deuteronomy 20 New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition</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="/bmcc/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/catholic">Bible</a> > <a href="../">NRSVCE</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">New Revised Standard Version Catholic Edition</td><td width="1%" valign="top"></td></tr></table></div><div class="chap"><div class="text-html"> <h3><span id="en" class="text">Rules of Warfare</span></h3><p class="chapter-2"><span class="text"><span class="versenum">1</span>When you go out to war against your enemies, and see horses and chariots, an army larger than your own, you shall not be afraid of them; for the <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> your God is with you, who brought you up from the land of Egypt. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">2</span>Before you engage in battle, the priest shall come forward and speak to the troops, </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">3</span>and shall say to them: “Hear, O Israel! Today you are drawing near to do battle against your enemies. Do not lose heart, or be afraid, or panic, or be in dread of them; </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">4</span>for it is the <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> your God who goes with you, to fight for you against your enemies, to give you victory.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">5</span>Then the officials shall address the troops, saying, “Has anyone built a new house but not dedicated it? He should go back to his house, or he might die in the battle and another dedicate it. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">6</span>Has anyone planted a vineyard but not yet enjoyed its fruit? He should go back to his house, or he might die in the battle and another be first to enjoy its fruit. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">7</span>Has anyone become engaged to a woman but not yet married her? He should go back to his house, or he might die in the battle and another marry her.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">8</span>The officials shall continue to address the troops, saying, “Is anyone afraid or disheartened? He should go back to his house, or he might cause the heart of his comrades to melt like his own.” </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">9</span>When the officials have finished addressing the troops, then the commanders shall take charge of them.</span></p> <p><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">10</span>When you draw near to a town to fight against it, offer it terms of peace. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">11</span>If it accepts your terms of peace and surrenders to you, then all the people in it shall serve you at forced labor. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">12</span>If it does not submit to you peacefully, but makes war against you, then you shall besiege it; </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">13</span>and when the <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> your God gives it into your hand, you shall put all its males to the sword. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">14</span>You may, however, take as your booty the women, the children, livestock, and everything else in the town, all its spoil. You may enjoy the spoil of your enemies, which the <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> your God has given you. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">15</span>Thus you shall treat all the towns that are very far from you, which are not towns of the nations here. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">16</span>But as for the towns of these peoples that the <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> your God is giving you as an inheritance, you must not let anything that breathes remain alive. </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">17</span>You shall annihilate them—the Hittites and the Amorites, the Canaanites and the Perizzites, the Hivites and the Jebusites—just as the <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> your God has commanded, </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">18</span>so that they may not teach you to do all the abhorrent things that they do for their gods, and you thus sin against the <span style="font-variant: small-caps" class="small-caps">Lord</span> your God.</span></p> <p><span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">19</span>If you besiege a town for a long time, making war against it in order to take it, you must not destroy its trees by wielding an ax against them. Although you may take food from them, you must not cut them down. Are trees in the field human beings that they should come under siege from you? </span> <span id="en" class="text"><span class="versenum">20</span>You may destroy only the trees that you know do not produce food; you may cut them down for use in building siegeworks against the town that makes war with you, until it falls.</span></p> </div></div></div></div></div> </div> </div><div id="botbox"><div class="padbot"><div align="center">Scripture quotations are from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Catholic Edition, copyright © 1989, 1993 National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. 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