So Joshua burned the town of Ai, and it became a permanent mound of ruins, desolate to this very day.
Parallel translations
- WEB So Joshua burned Ai, and made it a heap forever, even a desolation, to this day.
- KJV And Joshua burnt Ai, and made it an heap for ever, even a desolation unto this day.
- BSB So Joshua burned Ai and made it a permanent heap of ruins, a desolation to this day.
- NKJV So Joshua burned Ai and made it a heap forever, a desolation to this day.
- NASB So Joshua burned Ai and made it a refuse heap forever, a desolation until this day.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
Scripture quotations taken from the (NASB®) New American Standard Bible®, Copyright © 1960, 1971, 1977, 1995, 2020 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission. All rights reserved. lockman.org
Scripture quotations are taken from the Holy Bible, New Living Translation, copyright © 1996, 2004, 2015 by Tyndale House Foundation. Used by permission of Tyndale House Publishers, Carol Stream, Illinois 60188. All rights reserved.
Quick answer
Joshua burns Ai and leaves it a permanent heap of ruins. The city is reduced to a lasting monument of judgment.
Overview
The total burning of Ai fulfills God's command and leaves a desolation 'to this day' as a witness. Its name, meaning 'ruin' or 'heap,' becomes fittingly literal. The enduring desolation stands as a testimony to the judgment that falls on those who oppose the living God.
Cross-references & the web
Cross-references · 9
- Deut 13:16You shall gather all its plunder into the middle of its street, and shall burn with fire the city, and all every bit of its plunder, to Yahweh your God. It shall be a heap forever. It shall not be built again.
- Jer 49:2Therefore behold, the days come,” says Yahweh, “that I will cause an alarm of war to be heard against Rabbah of the children of Ammon; and it shall become a desolate heap, and her daughters will be burned with fire: then Israel will possess those who possessed him,” says Yahweh.
- Jer 50:26Come against her from the farthest border. Open her storehouses. Cast her up as heaps. Destroy her utterly. Let nothing of her be left.
- Josh 4:9Joshua set up twelve stones in the middle of the Jordan, in the place where the feet of the priests who bore the ark of the covenant stood; and they are there to this day.
- 2 Kgs 19:25Haven’t you heard how I have done it long ago, and formed it of ancient times? Now I have brought it to pass, that it should be yours to lay waste fortified cities into ruinous heaps.
- Isa 17:1The burden of Damascus: “Behold, Damascus is taken away from being a city, and it will be a ruinous heap.
- Isa 25:2For you have made a city into a heap, a fortified city into a ruin, a palace of strangers to be no city. It will never be built.
- Jer 9:11“I will make Jerusalem heaps, a dwelling place of jackals. I will make the cities of Judah a desolation, without inhabitant.”
- Mic 3:12Therefore Zion for your sake will be plowed like a field, and Jerusalem will become heaps of rubble, and the mountain of the temple like the high places of a forest.
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Christ at the center
Joshua — the same name as Jesus, 'the LORD saves' — leads God's people into their inheritance, a shadow of the greater Joshua who brings us into the true rest and the promised land that remains.
How Joshua 8:28 points to him is part of the one story that runs through all Scripture — meet Jesus at the heart of the web, or follow a trail that traces him from Genesis to Revelation.
Original language
Each word below is tagged with its Strong’s number — tap one to see the underlying Hebrew word, its meaning, and every verse that uses it.