1The two angels came to Sodom in the evening while Lot was sitting in the city’s gateway. When Lot saw them, he got up to meet them and bowed down with his face toward the ground.

2He said, “Here, my lords, please turn aside to your servant’s house. Stay the night and wash your feet. Then you can be on your way early in the morning.” “No,” they replied, “we’ll spend the night in the town square.”

3But he urged them persistently, so they turned aside with him and entered his house. He prepared a feast for them, including bread baked without yeast, and they ate.

4Before they could lie down to sleep, all the men – both young and old, from every part of the city of Sodom – surrounded the house.

5They shouted to Lot, “Where are the men who came to you tonight? Bring them out to us so we can have sex with them!”

6Lot went outside to them, shutting the door behind him.

7He said, “No, my brothers! Don’t act so wickedly!

8Look, I have two daughters who have never had sexual relations with a man. Let me bring them out to you, and you can do to them whatever you please. Only don’t do anything to these men, for they have come under the protection of my roof.”

9“Out of our way!” they cried, and “This man came to live here as a foreigner, and now he dares to judge us! We’ll do more harm to you than to them!” They kept pressing in on Lot until they were close enough to break down the door.

10So the men inside reached out and pulled Lot back into the house as they shut the door.

11Then they struck the men who were at the door of the house, from the youngest to the oldest, with blindness. The men outside wore themselves out trying to find the door.

12Then the two visitors said to Lot, “Who else do you have here? Do you have any sons-in-law, sons, daughters, or other relatives in the city? Get them out of this place

13because we are about to destroy it. The outcry against this place is so great before the Lord that he has sent us to destroy it.”

14Then Lot went out and spoke to his sons-in-law who were going to marry his daughters. He said, “Quick, get out of this place because the Lord is about to destroy the city!” But his sons-in-law thought he was ridiculing them.

15At dawn the angels hurried Lot along, saying, “Get going! Take your wife and your two daughters who are here, or else you will be destroyed when the city is judged!”

16When Lot hesitated, the men grabbed his hand and the hands of his wife and two daughters because the Lord had compassion on them. They led them away and placed them outside the city.

17When they had brought them outside, they said, “Run for your lives! Don’t look behind you or stop anywhere in the valley! Escape to the mountains or you will be destroyed!”

18But Lot said to them, “No, please, Lord!

19Your servant has found favor with you, and you have shown me great kindness by sparing my life. But I am not able to escape to the mountains because this disaster will overtake me and I’ll die.

20Look, this town over here is close enough to escape to, and it’s just a little one. Let me go there. It’s just a little place, isn’t it? Then I’ll survive.”

21“Very well,” he replied, “I will grant this request too and will not overthrow the town you mentioned.

22Run there quickly, for I cannot do anything until you arrive there.” (This incident explains why the town was called Zoar.)

23The sun had just risen over the land as Lot reached Zoar.

24Then the Lord rained down sulfur and fire on Sodom and Gomorrah. It was sent down from the sky by the Lord.

25So he overthrew those cities and all that region, including all the inhabitants of the cities and the vegetation that grew from the ground.

26But Lot’s wife looked back longingly and was turned into a pillar of salt.

27Abraham got up early in the morning and went to the place where he had stood before the Lord.

28He looked out toward Sodom and Gomorrah and all the land of that region. As he did so, he saw the smoke rising up from the land like smoke from a furnace.

29So when God destroyed the cities of the region, God honored Abraham’s request. He removed Lot from the midst of the destruction when he destroyed the cities Lot had lived in.

30Lot went up from Zoar with his two daughters and settled in the mountains because he was afraid to live in Zoar. So he lived in a cave with his two daughters.

31Later the older daughter said to the younger, “Our father is old, and there is no man anywhere nearby to have sexual relations with us, according to the way of all the world.

32Come, let’s make our father drunk with wine so we can have sexual relations with him and preserve our family line through our father.”

33So that night they made their father drunk with wine, and the older daughter came and had sexual relations with her father. But he was not aware that she had sexual relations with him and then got up.

34So in the morning the older daughter said to the younger, “Since I had sexual relations with my father last night, let’s make him drunk again tonight. Then you go and have sexual relations with him so we can preserve our family line through our father.”

35So they made their father drunk that night as well, and the younger one came and had sexual relations with him. But he was not aware that she had sexual relations with him and then got up.

36In this way both of Lot’s daughters became pregnant by their father.

37The older daughter gave birth to a son and named him Moab. He is the ancestor of the Moabites of today.

38The younger daughter also gave birth to a son and named him Ben-Ammi. He is the ancestor of the Ammonites of today.