So Joshua arose, and all the people of war, to go up to Ai: and Joshua chose out thirty thousand men, the mighty men of valor, and sent them forth by night.
"Joshua lodged that night among the people ..." The critical scholars seize any pretext as an excuse for "emending," changing, the Word of God.  Sizoo thought  Joshua 8:9 contradicts  Joshua 8:13 and proposed "emending the text (adding one letter) to make it harmonize with  Joshua 8:13."[13] Blair stated that, "Such emendations are not necessary, and they serve only to support the contention that here we have TWO parallel accounts of the same incident.[14]  Boling also refused suggestions that the text needs emending, writing: