4. About three thousand of the people made the attack, but they fled before the army at Ai,
5. who killed some thirty-six of them. They pursued them from the city gate to the Shebarim, and defeated them on the descent, so that the confidence of the people melted away like water.
6. Joshua, together with the elders of Israel, tore their garments and fell face down before the ark of the Lord until evening; and they threw dust on their heads.
7. “Alas, Lord God,” Joshua prayed, “why did you ever allow this people to cross over the Jordan, delivering us into the power of the Amorites, that they might destroy us? Would that we had been content to dwell on the other side of the Jordan.
8. Please, Lord, what can I say, now that Israel has turned its back to its enemies?
9. When the Canaanites and the other inhabitants of the land hear of it, they will close in around us and efface our name from the earth. What will you do for your great name?”
10. The Lord replied to Joshua: Stand up. Why are you lying there?
11. Israel has sinned: they have transgressed the covenant which I enjoined on them. They have taken goods subject to the ban. They have stolen and lied, placing the goods in their baggage.
12. If the Israelites cannot stand up to their enemies, but must turn their back to them, it is because they are under the ban. I will not continue to be with you unless you remove that which is banned from among you.
13. Get up, sanctify the people. Tell them, “Sanctify yourselves before tomorrow, for thus says the Lord, the God of Israel: That which is banned is in your midst, Israel. You cannot stand up to your enemies until you remove it from among you.
14. In the morning you must come forward by tribes. The tribe which the Lord designates shall come forward by clans; the clan which the Lord designates shall come forward by families; the family which the Lord designates shall come forward one by one.
15. Whoever is designated as having incurred the ban shall be destroyed by fire, with all that is his, because he has trangressed the covenant of the Lord and has committed a shameful crime in Israel.”