Bible Time

¹THEN all the congregation was in commotion, and lifted up their voices and cried; and the people wept that night. ²And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron; and the whole congregation said to them, Would God we had died in the land of Egypt. Or would God that we had died in this wilderness. ³Why has Yahvah brought us into this land, to fall by the sword, that our wives and children should be a prey? We were better off when we lived in Egypt. ⁴And they said to one another, Let us appoint a leader, and let us return to Egypt.

⁵Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel. ⁶And Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jophaniah, who were from those who had spied out the land, tore their clothes; ⁷And they said to all the congregation of the children of Israel, The land through which we passed to spy it out is an exceedingly good land. ⁸If Yahvah delights in us, he will bring us into this land and give it to us, a land which indeed flows with milk and honey. ⁹Only do not rebel against Yahvah, nor be afraid of the people of the land; for their conquest will be as easy as eating bread; their strength has left them, and Yahvah is with us; fear them not. ¹⁰But the whole congregation said to stone them with stones. And the glory of Yahvah appeared in the cloud in the tabernacle of the congregation before all the children of Israel.

¹¹And Yahvah said to Moses, How long will this people provoke me? And how long will they not believe me, for all the signs which I have done among them? ¹²I will strike them with pestilence, and destroy them, and I will make of you a nation which is greater and mightier than they. ¹³And Moses said to Yahvah, Then the Egyptians will hear it, for you brought up this people in your might from among them, ¹⁴And they will tell it to the inhabitants of this land; for they have heard that you Yahvah are in the middle of this people, that you Yahvah are seen face to face, and that your cloud stands over them, and that you go before them in a pillar of cloud by day and in a pillar of fire by night. ¹⁵And if you will kill all this people as one man, then the nations who have heard the fame of you will say, ¹⁶Because Yahvah was not able to bring this people into the land which he swore to them, therefore he has slain them in the wilderness. ¹⁷And now, let your power, oh Yahvah, be great according as you have spoken, saying, ¹⁸Yahvah is long-suffering and of great mercy, and you forgive iniquity and transgression, by no means clearing the guilty, but visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and on their children's children to the 3rd and 4th generation. ¹⁹Pardon the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of your mercy, and as you have forgiven them from Egypt even until now.

²⁰And Yahvah said to Moses, I have forgiven them according to your word; ²¹But as truly as I live, the whole earth will be filled with the glory of Yahvah. ²²Yet all the men who have seen my glory and the signs which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness have tempted me, look now, these 10 times, and have not listened to my voice; ²³Surely they will not see the land which I swore to their fathers, neither will any of those who provoked me see it; ²⁴But my servant Caleb, because he has my spirit with him and has followed me fully, I will bring into the land into which he went; and his descendants will possess it. ²⁵Now the Amalekites and the Canaanites lived in the mountains. Tomorrow turn and set out for the wilderness by the way of the Red Sea. ²⁶And Yahvah spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying, ²⁷How long will this wicked congregation murmur in my presence? I have heard the complaints of the children of Israel which they murmur in my presence. ²⁸Say to them, As I live, says Yahvah, as you have spoken in my presence, so I will do to you; ²⁹Your corpses will fall in this wilderness; and all that were numbered of you, according to your whole number, from 20 years old and upward, because you have murmured against me. ³⁰You will not come into the land concerning which I swore to make you live, except Caleb the son of Jophaniah, and Joshua the son of Nun. ³¹But your little ones, who you said would become the prey, and your sons who today do not know good and evil, they will enter into the land, and I will bring them there, and they will know the land which you have despised. ³²But as for you, your corpses will fall in this wilderness. ³³And your sons will be shepherds 40 years in this wilderness, and will suffer for your prostitution until your corpses are consumed in this wilderness. ³⁴According to the number of the days in which you spied out the land, even 40 days, a year for each day, you will suffer for your iniquities, 40 years; then you will know that it is because you have murmured before me. ³⁵I, Yahvah, have said, I will surely do it to all this evil congregation that are gathered together before me; in this wilderness they will be consumed, and there they will die.

³⁶And the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land, who returned and made all the congregation murmur against him by publishing an evil report concerning the land, ³⁷These men who published an evil report of the land died by a sudden plague before Yahvah. ³⁸But Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jophaniah, who were of the men who went to spy out the land, still lived. ³⁹And Moses told these sayings to all the children of Israel; and the people mourned greatly. ⁴⁰And they rose up early in the morning and went up to the top of the mountain, saying, Look, we will go up to the place which Yahvah has promised us; for we have sinned. ⁴¹And Moses said to them, Why now do you transgress the commandment of Yahvah? Therefore, you will not succeed. ⁴²Do not go up, for Yahvah is not with you; lest you be defeated before your enemies. ⁴³For the Canaanites and the Amalekites are there before you, and you will fall by the sword; because you are turned away from following Yahvah, therefore Yahvah will not be with you. ⁴⁴Yet they started to go up to the top of the mountain; but neither the ark of the contract of Yahvah nor Moses departed out of the camp. ⁴⁵Then the Amalekites and the Canaanites who lived in that mountain came down and struck them and pursued them as far as Hirmah.