Judges 1

¹ After the death of Joshua the Israelites consulted Yahweh, ‘Which of us shall march up first against the Canaanites to attack them?’

² And Yahweh answered, ‘Judah is to attack first; I am delivering the country straight into his hands’.

³ Then Judah said to Simeon his brother,[*b] ‘March with me into the territory allotted to me; we will attack the Canaanite, and then I in my turn will march with you into your allotted territory’. And Simeon marched with him.

⁴ So Judah marched up, and Yahweh delivered the Canaanites and Perizzites into their hands, and they routed ten thousand men at Bezek.

⁵ They came on Adoni-zedek at Bezek, joined battle with him and routed the Canaanites and Perizzites.

⁶ Adoni-zedek took to flight, but they followed and captured him and cut off his thumbs and big toes.

⁷ Then Adoni-zedek said, ‘Seventy kings with their thumbs and big toes cut off used to pick up the crumbs under my table. As I did to others, so God does to me.’ He was taken to Jerusalem[*c], and there he died.

⁸ (The sons of Judah attacked Jerusalem and took it: they put its people to the sword and set fire to the city.)[*d]

⁹ After this the sons of Judah went down to attack those Canaanites living in the highlands and in the Negeb and the lowlands.

¹⁰ Then Judah marched against the Canaanites in Hebron – in earlier times the name of Hebron was Kiriath-arba – and they overcame Sheshai and Ahiman and Talmai.

¹¹ From there they marched against the inhabitants of Debir – in earlier times the name of Debir was Kiriath-sepher.

¹² Caleb said, ‘To the man who conquers and captures Kiriath-sepher, I will give my daughter Achsah to wife’.

¹³ The man who captured it was Othniel son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother; Caleb gave him his daughter of Achsah to wife.

¹⁴ When she came to her husband, he urged her to ask her father for a field. Then she jumped down from her donkey, and Caleb asked her, ‘What do you want?’

¹⁵ She answered, ‘Grant me a favour; since you have banished me to the wilderness of Negeb, at least grant me some springs of water’. So Caleb gave her the upper springs and the lower springs.

¹⁶ The sons of Hobab the Kenite, father-in-law of Moses, went up with the sons of Judah from the city of palms into the wilderness in the Negeb of Judah at the Ascent of Arad; they went and lived with the Amalekites.

¹⁷ Then Judah set out with his brother Simeon. They overcame the Canaanites who lived in Zephath and delivered it over to the ban; hence the town was given the name of Hormah.

¹⁸ But Judah did not take Gaza with its territory or Ashkelon with its territory or Ekron with its territory;

²⁰ As Moses had directed, Hebron was given to Caleb, and he drove the three sons of Anak out of it.

²¹ As regards the Jebusites living in Jerusalem, the sons of Benjamin did not drive them out, and even now the Jebusites are still living in Jerusalem with the sons of Benjamin.

²² In the same way, the house of Joseph went up against Bethel, and Yahweh was with them.

²³ The house of Joseph made a reconnaissance of Bethel. The name of the city used to be Luz.

²⁴ The scouts saw a man coming out of the city, and said to him, ‘if you show us how to enter the city, we will spare you’.

²⁵ He showed them a way into the city. They put the inhabitants to the sword but let the man go, and all his clan with him.

²⁶ The man went off to the country of the Hittites and built a town which he called Luz; that is its name even yet.

²⁷ Manasseh did not subdue Beth-shean and its outlying villages, or Taanach and its villages. He did not drive out the inhabitants of Dor and its outlying villages, or of Ibleam and its villages, or of Megiddo and its villages; in those parts the Canaanites held their ground.

²⁸ But when the Israelites became stronger, they subjected the Canaanites to forced labour, though they did not drive them out.

²⁹ Nor did Ephraim drive out the Canaanites in Gezer;[*e] thus the Canaanites went on living there among them.

³⁰ Zebulun did not drive out the inhabitants of Kitron or of Nahalol. The Canaanites remained among Zebulun, but were subjected to forced labour.

³¹ Asher did not drive out the inhabitants of Acco or of Sidon or Ahlab, or Achzib . . . or Aphik or Rehob.

³² So the Asherites lived among the Canaanite inhabitants of the country, for they did not drive them out.

³³ Naphtali did not drive out the inhabitants of Beth-shemesh or of Beth-anath; they settled among the Canaanite inhabitants of the country; but the inhabitants of Beth-shemesh and of Beth-anath were compelled to do forced labour for them.

³⁴ The Amorites drove back the Danites into the highlands and would not allow them to enter the plain below.

³⁵ The Amorites held their ground at Har-heres and Shaalbim, but when the hand of the House of Jacob grew heavier, they were subjected to forced labour.

³⁶ The territory of the Edomites begins at the Ascent of Akrabbim, runs to the Rock and continues on upwards.