Judges 1:1-18

New Revised Standard Version Updated Edition

Israel’s Failure to Complete the Conquest of Canaan

1 After the death of Joshua, the Israelites inquired of the Lord, “Who shall go up first for us against the Canaanites, to fight against them?”^{(A) 2} The Lord said, “Judah shall go up. I hereby give the land into his hand.” ³ Judah said to his brother Simeon, “Come up with me into the territory allotted to me, that we may fight against the Canaanites; then I, too, will go with you into the territory allotted to you.” So Simeon went with him.^{(B) 4} Then Judah went up, and the Lord gave the Canaanites and the Perizzites into their hand, and they defeated ten thousand of them at Bezek.^{(C) 5} They came upon Adoni-bezek at Bezek and fought against him and defeated the Canaanites and the Perizzites. ⁶ Adoni-bezek fled, but they pursued him and caught him and cut off his thumbs and big toes. ⁷ Adoni-bezek said, “Seventy kings with their thumbs and big toes cut off used to pick up scraps under my table; as I have done, so God has paid me back.” They brought him to Jerusalem, and he died there.

⁸ Then the people of Judah fought against Jerusalem and took it. They put it to the sword and set the city on fire.^{(D) 9} Afterward the people of Judah went down to fight against the Canaanites who lived in the hill country, in the Negeb, and in the lowland. ¹⁰ Judah went against the Canaanites who lived in Hebron (the name of Hebron was formerly Kiriath-arba), and they defeated Sheshai and Ahiman and Talmai.^(E)

¹¹ From there they went against the inhabitants of Debir (the name of Debir was formerly Kiriath-sepher). ¹² Then Caleb said, “Whoever attacks Kiriath-sepher and takes it, I will give him my daughter Achsah as wife.” ¹³ And Othniel son of Kenaz, Caleb’s younger brother, took it, and he gave him his daughter Achsah as wife.^{(F) 14} When she came to him, she urged him to ask her father for a field. As she dismounted from her donkey, Caleb said to her, “What do you wish?”^{(G) 15} She said to him, “Give me a blessing; since you have set me in the land of the Negeb, give me also Gulloth-mayim.”^[a] So Caleb gave her Upper Gulloth and Lower Gulloth.

¹⁶ The descendants of Hobab^[b] the Kenite, Moses’s father-in-law, went up with the people of Judah from the city of palms into the wilderness of Judah, which lies in the Negeb near Arad. Then they went and settled with the Amalekites.^{[c](H) 17} Judah went with his brother Simeon, and they defeated the Canaanites who inhabited Zephath and devoted it to destruction. So the city was called Hormah.^{(I) 18} Judah took Gaza with its territory, Ashkelon with its territory, and Ekron with its territory.