Numbers 14:1-12 ▼

1 And all the congregation lifts up, and they give forth their voice, and the people weep during that night;

2 and all the sons of Israel murmur against Moses and against Aaron, and all the congregation says to them, “O that we had died in the land of Egypt, or in this wilderness, O that we had died!

3 And why is YHWH bringing us to this land to fall by the sword, [that] our wives and our infants become a prey? Is it not good for us to return to Egypt?”

4 And they say to one another, “Let us appoint a head and return to Egypt.”

5 And Moses falls—Aaron also—on their faces, before all the assembly of the congregation of the sons of Israel.

6 And Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, of those spying out the land, have torn their garments,

7 and they speak to all the congregation of the sons of Israel, saying, “The land into which we have passed over to spy it out [is] a very, very good land;

8 if YHWH has delighted in us, then He has brought us into this land, and has given it to us, a land which is flowing with milk and honey;

9 only, do not rebel against YHWH: and you, do not fear the people of the land, for they [are] our bread; their defense has turned aside from off them, and YHWH [is] with us; do not fear them.”

10 And all the congregation says to stone them with stones, and the glory of YHWH has appeared in the Tent of Meeting to all the sons of Israel.

11 And YHWH says to Moses, “Until when does this people despise Me? And until when do they not believe in Me, for all the signs which I have done in its midst?

12 I strike it with pestilence, and dispossess it, and make you become a nation greater and mightier than it.”