Bible passages grouped for study and reflection.

₁₀ When you march up to attack a city, make its people an offer of peace. ₁₁ If they accept and open their gates, all the people in it shall be subject to forced labor and shall work for you. ₁₂ If they refuse to make peace and they engage you in battle, lay siege to that city. ₁₃ When the Lord your God delivers it into your hand, put to the sword all the men in it. ₁₄ As for the women, the children, the livestock and everything else in the city, you may take these as plunder for yourselves. And you may use the plunder the Lord your God gives you from your enemies. ₁₅ This is how you are to treat all the cities that are at a distance from you and do not belong to the nations nearby.

₄₄ “ ‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. ₄₅ You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. ₄₆ You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.

₁₀ When you go to war against your enemies and the Lord your God delivers them into your hands and you take captives, ₁₁ if you notice among the captives a beautiful woman and are attracted to her, you may take her as your wife. ₁₂ Bring her into your home and have her shave her head, trim her nails ₁₃ and put aside the clothes she was wearing when captured. After she has lived in your house and mourned her father and mother for a full month, then you may go to her and be her husband and she shall be your wife. ₁₄ If you are not pleased with her, let her go wherever she wishes. You must not sell her or treat her as a slave, since you have dishonored her.