Numbers 14

1 And the whole gathering lifted up their voice and cried out, and the people wept all that night. 2 And all the children of Israel grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and the whole gathering said to them, 2 “If only we had died in the land of Egypt! Or in this wilderness — if only we had died! 3 And why is the Lord bringing us into this land to fall in war? Our wives and our children will be taken as plunder. It would be better for us to go back to Egypt.” 4 And they said to one another, 4 “Let us appoint a leader and go back to Egypt.” 5 And Moses and Aaron fell on their faces in front of the whole gathering of the children of Israel.

6 But Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh, who were among those who had spied out the land, tore their clothes 7 and spoke to the whole gathering of the children of Israel. They said, 7 “The land we went through and looked over is extremely good. 8 If the Lord is pleased with us, he will bring us into this land and give it to us — a land flowing with milk and honey. 9 Only do not turn away from the Lord, and do not be afraid of the people of the land, because they are food for us. Their time has left them, and the Lord is among us. Do not be afraid of them.” [a] 10 And the whole gathering called for them to be stoned with stones. And the glory of the Lord appeared in the cloud on the tent of witness, to all the children of Israel.

11 And the Lord said to Moses, 11 “How long will this people provoke me? And how long will they refuse to trust me, after all the signs I have done among them? 12 I will strike them with death and destroy them, and I will make you and your father's house into a nation greater and stronger than this one.” 13 And Moses said to the Lord, 13 “Then Egypt will hear of it — for you brought this people up out of them by your strength — 14 and so will everyone living in this land. They have heard that you, Lord, are among this people, that you, Lord, are seen by them face to face, that your cloud rests over them, and that you go ahead of them by day in a pillar of cloud and by night in a pillar of fire. 15 And if you destroy this nation as though it were one man, then all the nations that have heard your name will say, 16 ‘Because the Lord could not bring this people into the land he swore to give them, he cut them down in the wilderness.’ 17 And now, Lord, let your strength be lifted high, as you yourself said when you said: 18 The Lord is slow to anger and full of mercy and true, taking away lawless deeds and wrongs and sins; and he will not hold the guilty clean, paying back the sins of fathers onto children, to the third and fourth generation. [b] 19 Forgive this people their sin, according to your great mercy, as you have been merciful to them from Egypt until now.”

20 And the Lord said to Moses, 20 “I am merciful to them, as you have asked. [c] 21 But as I live, and as my name lives, the glory of the Lord will fill the whole earth — 22 and not one of the men who have seen my glory and the signs I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and who have tested me now these ten times and have not listened to my voice, 23 not one of them will see the land I swore to their fathers. But their children, who are here with me, all who do not yet know good from evil, every young one who has seen nothing — to them I will give the land; but none who have provoked me will see it. 24 But as for my servant Caleb, because there was a different spirit in him and he followed after me, I will bring him into the land he went into, and his descendants will have it for their own. 25 But Amalek and the Canaanite live in the valley. Tomorrow turn around and set out for the wilderness, by the road to the Red Sea.”

26 And the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron. He said, 27 “How long am I to put up with this wicked gathering? I have heard their grumbling against me — the grumbling of the children of Israel, which they have grumbled about you. 28 Say to them: As I live, says the Lord, I will do to you exactly what you spoke into my ears. 29 Your bodies will fall in this wilderness — all of you who were counted, all of you who were numbered from twenty years old and up, all who grumbled against me. 30 You will not go into the land I stretched out my hand to settle you in — none except Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun. 31 And your little ones, the ones you said would be taken as plunder — them I will bring into the land, and they will have for their own the land you turned down. 32 And your own bodies will fall in this wilderness. 33 And your sons will be shepherded in the wilderness forty years, and they will carry your whoring, until the last of your bodies is finished in the wilderness. 34 By the number of the days you spied out the land — forty days, a year for each day — you will carry your sins forty years, and you will know what my anger is. 35 I the Lord have spoken. I will surely do this to this whole evil gathering that has banded together against me: in this wilderness they will be used up, and there they will die.”

36 And the men Moses had sent to spy out the land, who came back and set the gathering grumbling against it by bringing out evil words about the land — 37 the men who spread the evil report about the land — died of the plague before the Lord. 38 And of those men who went to spy out the land, Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh were still alive.

39 And Moses spoke these words to all the children of Israel, and the people mourned bitterly. 40 And they got up early in the morning and went up to the top of the mountain, saying, 40 “Here we are. We will go up to the place the Lord spoke of, because we have sinned.” 41 And Moses said, 41 “Why are you going against the word of the Lord? It will not go well for you. 42 Do not go up, because the Lord is not among you; you will fall in front of your enemies. 43 For Amalek and the Canaanite are there ahead of you, and you will fall by the sword — because you have disobeyed the Lord and turned away, and the Lord will not be among you.” 44 But they forced their way up to the top of the mountain; and the ark of the covenant of the Lord, and Moses, did not stir out of the camp. 45 And Amalek and the Canaanite who lived in that hill country came down and beat them and cut them to pieces as far as Hormah; and they came back to the camp. [d]