Numbers 13, Numbers 14:1-38 — Legacy Standard Bible

The Spies Sent into Canaan

13Then ^aYahweh spoke to Moses saying, ²“^aSend out for yourself men so that they may spy out the land of Canaan, which I am going to give to the sons of Israel; you shall send a man from each of their fathers’ tribes, every one a leader among them.” ³So Moses sent them from the wilderness of Paran at the ¹command of Yahweh, all of them men who were heads of the sons of Israel. ⁴These then were their names: from the tribe of Reuben, Shammua the son of Zaccur;

⁵from the tribe of Simeon, Shaphat the son of Hori; ⁶from the tribe of Judah, ^aCaleb the son of Jephunneh; ⁷from the tribe of Issachar, Igal the son of Joseph; ⁸from the tribe of Ephraim, ^aHoshea the son of Nun; ⁹from the tribe of Benjamin, Palti the son of Raphu; ¹⁰from the tribe of Zebulun, Gaddiel the son of Sodi; ¹¹from the tribe of Joseph, from the tribe of Manasseh, Gaddi the son of Susi; ¹²from the tribe of Dan, Ammiel the son of Gemalli; ¹³from the tribe of Asher, Sethur the son of Michael; ¹⁴from the tribe of Naphtali, Nahbi the son of Vophsi; ¹⁵from the tribe of Gad, Geuel the son of Machi.

¹⁶These are the names of the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land; but Moses called ^aHoshea the son of Nun, Joshua.

¹⁷So Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan and said to them, “Go up ¹there into ^athe ²Negev; then go up into the hill country. ¹⁸“And see what the land is like, and whether the people who live in it are strong or weak, whether they are few or many. ¹⁹“And how is the land in which they live, is it good or bad? And how are the cities in which they live, are they ¹like open camps or with fortifications? ²⁰“^aAnd how is the land, is it fat or lean? Are there trees in it or not? ¹Make an ^beffort then to get some of the fruit of the land.” Now the time was the time of the first ripe grapes.

²¹So they went up and spied out the land from ^athe wilderness of Zin as far as Rehob, ¹^,^bat Lebo-hamath. ²²And they had gone up into ^athe Negev and ¹came to Hebron where ^bAhiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the ²descendants of ^cAnak were. (Now Hebron was built seven years before ^dZoan in Egypt.)

²³Then they came to the ¹valley of ²^,^aEshcol and from there cut down a branch with a single cluster of grapes; and they carried it on a pole between two men with some of the pomegranates and the figs. ²⁴That place was called the valley of ¹Eshcol, because of the cluster which the sons of Israel cut down from there.

The Spies Recount What They Saw

²⁵Then they returned from spying out the land, at the end of forty days, ²⁶and went and came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the sons of Israel ¹in the wilderness of Paran, at ^aKadesh; and they brought back word to them and to all the congregation and showed them the fruit of the land. ²⁷Thus they recounted to him and said, “We went in to the land where you sent us; and ^ait certainly does flow with milk and honey, and ^bthis is its fruit. ²⁸“Nevertheless, ^athe people who live in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large; and moreover, we saw ^bthe ¹descendants of Anak there. ²⁹“Amalek is living in the land of ^athe Negev and the Hittites and the Jebusites and ^bthe Amorites are living in the hill country, and ^cthe Canaanites are living by the sea and by the side of the Jordan.”

³⁰Then Caleb quieted the people ¹before Moses and said, “We should by all means go up and take possession of it, for we are surely able to overcome it.” ³¹But the men who had gone up with him said, “^aWe are not able to go up against the people, for they are too strong for us.” ³²So they gave out to the sons of Israel ^aa bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land, which we have passed through to spy out on, is ^ba land that devours its ¹inhabitants; and ^call the people whom we saw in it are men of great size. ³³“There also we saw the ^aNephilim (the sons of Anak are part of the Nephilim); and ^bwe became like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their sight.”

The People Rebel

14Then all the congregation ¹lifted up their voices and cried, and the people wept ²that night. ²And all the sons of Israel ^agrumbled against Moses and Aaron; and the whole congregation said to them, “^bWould that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would that we had died in this wilderness! ³“And why is Yahweh bringing us into this land, ^ato fall by the sword? ^bOur wives and our little ones will become plunder; would it not be better for us to return to Egypt?” ⁴So they said to one another, “^aLet us appoint a leader and return to Egypt.”

⁵^aThen Moses and Aaron fell on their faces in the presence of all the assembly of the congregation of the sons of Israel. ⁶And Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, of those who had spied out the land, tore their clothes; ⁷and they spoke to all the congregation of the sons of Israel, saying, “^aThe land which we passed through to spy out is an exceedingly good land. ⁸“^aIf Yahweh is pleased with us, then He will bring us into this land and give it to us—^ba land which flows with milk and honey. ⁹“But as for you, only ^ado not rebel against Yahweh; and do not ^bfear the people of the land, for they are our ¹bread. Their ²protection has been removed from them, and Yahweh is with us; do not fear them.” ¹⁰^aBut all the congregation said to stone them with stones. Then ^bthe glory of Yahweh appeared in the tent of meeting to all the sons of Israel.

Moses Prays for the People

¹¹^aYahweh said to Moses, “How long will this people spurn Me? And how long will ^bthey not believe in Me, despite all the signs which I have done in their midst? ¹²“I will strike them with ¹^,^apestilence and dispossess them, and I ^bwill make you into a nation greater and mightier than they.”

¹³^aBut Moses said to Yahweh, “Then the Egyptians will hear of it, for by Your power You brought up this people from their midst, ¹⁴and they will tell it to the inhabitants of this land. They have heard that You, O Yahweh, are in the midst of this people, for ^aYou, O Yahweh, are seen eye to eye, while Your cloud stands over them; and You go before them in a pillar of cloud by day and in a pillar of fire by night. ¹⁵“Now if You put this people to death as one man, ^athen the nations who have heard of Your fame will ¹say, ¹⁶‘Because Yahweh ^awas not able to bring this people into the land which He swore to them, therefore He slaughtered them in the wilderness.’ ¹⁷“So now, I pray, let the power of the Lord be great, just as You have ¹declared, ¹⁸‘^aYahweh is slow to anger and abundant in lovingkindness, forgiving iniquity and transgression; but ^bHe will by no means clear the guilty, ^cvisiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children ¹to the third and the fourth generations.’ ¹⁹“^aPardon, I pray, the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of Your lovingkindness, just as You also have forgiven this people, from Egypt even until now.”

Evil Complainers

²⁰So Yahweh said, “^aI have pardoned them according to your word; ²¹but indeed, ^aas I live, ¹^,^ball the earth will be filled with the glory of Yahweh. ²²“Surely ^aall the men who have seen My glory and My signs which I have done in Egypt and in the wilderness, yet ^bhave put Me to the test these ten times and have not listened to My voice, ²³^ashall by no means see the land which I swore to their fathers, nor shall any of those who spurned Me see it. ²⁴“But My servant Caleb, ^abecause he has had a different spirit and has followed Me fully, ¹^,^bI will bring into the land ²which he entered, and his seed shall take possession of it. ²⁵“^aNow the Amalekites and the Canaanites live in the valleys; turn tomorrow and set out to the wilderness by the way of the ¹Red Sea.”

²⁶Yahweh spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying, ²⁷“How long shall I bear with this evil congregation who are ^agrumbling against Me? I have heard the complaints of the sons of Israel, which they are ¹making against Me. ²⁸“Say to them, ‘^aAs I live,’ declares Yahweh, ‘just as ^byou have spoken in My hearing, so I will surely do to you; ²⁹^ayour corpses will fall in this wilderness, even all ^byour ¹numbered men, according to your complete number from twenty years old and upward, who have grumbled against Me. ³⁰‘Surely you shall not come into the land in which I ¹swore to make you dwell, ^aexcept Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun. ³¹‘^aYour little ones, however, who you said would become plunder—I will bring them in, so that they will know the land which you have rejected. ³²‘^aBut as for you, your corpses will fall in this wilderness. ³³‘And your sons shall be shepherds for ^aforty years in the wilderness, and they will ¹suffer for your ²unfaithfulness, until your corpses come to an end in the wilderness. ³⁴‘According to the ^anumber of days which you spied out the land, forty days, for every day you shall bear your ¹guilt a year, even forty years, and you will know My opposition. ³⁵‘^aI, Yahweh, have spoken, surely this I will do to all this evil congregation who are gathered together against Me. In this wilderness they shall come to an end, and there they will die.’”

³⁶^aAs for the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land and who returned and made all the congregation grumble against him by bringing out a bad report concerning the land, ³⁷even ^athose men who brought out the very bad report of the land died by a ^bplague before Yahweh. ³⁸But Joshua the son of Nun and Caleb the son of Jephunneh remained alive out of those men who went to spy out the land.