26 “Then from the Kedemot wilderness, I sent messengers to King Sihon at Heshbon with an offer of peace, 27 ‘Please let us travel through your country. We’ll stay on the road 28 if you’d be able to just sell us some food and water, then we could just walk right through 29 until we cross the Yarden river into the land that our god Yahweh is giving us. Easu’s descendants at Seir allowed us through, as did the Moabites at Ar.’

30 “However, Heshbon’s King Sihon wouldn’t let us go through his country because your god Yahweh had hardened his spirit and made him stubborn so that you could take his land, which we still have to this day.

31 “Yahweh told me, ‘Listen, I’ve begun to give Sihon and his land to you, so enter it and take it. 32 Then King Sihon and all his warriors came out against us at Yahats, 33 but our god Yahweh helped us to defeat him, and we killed Sihon and his son, and all his people. 34 We captured all his cities at that time, and completely destroyed men, women and children in every city, leaving no survivors. 35 Only the cattle were taken as plunder for ourselves, along with the goods in the cities we captured. 36 Our god Yahweh helped us to capture all their towns from Aroer in the south at the edge of the Arnon River valley, to the Gilead region in the north—none of their city walls were too high for us. 37 However, you didn’t go near the Ammonite region, the Yabok river area, the hill country towns, or any other place where our god Yahweh told us not to go.

21 Then Yisrael sent messengers to the Amorite King Sihon, 22 “Let us pass through your country. We won’t turn off into any field or vineyard. We won’t take water from any well. We’ll stay on the king’s highway until we’ve exited at your northern border.” 23 However King Sihon refused them permission, then he took his whole army into the wilderness to meet Yisrael, and they attacked them at Yahats village. 24 Nevertheless, Yisrael defeated them in battle and took possession of his land from the Arnon river up as far as Yabok where the Ammonites’ border was well fortified. 25 So Yisrael took those Amorite cities including Hesbon and the surrounding villages, and started living in them. 26 (Heshbon was where the Amorite King Sihon lived, as he’d previously fought against the former king of Moav and captured all his land down as far as the Arnon river. 27 That was why the poets say,

“Come to Heshbon—let it be rebuilt.

≈ Let King Sihon’s city be established

28 because fire went out from Hesbon,

≈ flame from Sihon’s city.

It consumed Ar in Moav,

and the citizens on Arnon’s hilltops.[ref]

29 Moav, you won’t end well.

≈ Kemosh’s people have perished.

He’s made his sons into fugitives,

≈ and given his daughters over to captivity

by the Amorite King Sihon.

30 We’ve overpowered them.

Hesbon has perished as far as Divon

≈ and shattered Nofah as far as Medeva.)