JOURNEY PAST MOAB

8 “So we bypassed our brothers, the descendants of Esau, who live in Seir. We turned away from the Arabah road and from Elath and Ezion-geber.r We traveled along the road to the Wilderness of Moab. 9 The Lord said to me, ‘Show no hostility toward Moab, and do not provoke them to battle, for I will not give you any of their land as a possession, since I have given Ar as a possession to the descendants of Lot.’ ”s

10 The Emim, a great and numerous people as tall as the Anakim,t had previously lived there. 11 They were also regarded as Rephaim,u like the Anakim, though the Moabites called them Emim.v 12 The Horitesw had previously lived in Seir, but the descendants of Esau drove them out, destroying them completelyE and settling in their place, just as Israel did in the land of its possession the Lord gave them.

13 “The Lord said, ‘Now get up and cross the Zered Valley.’ So we crossed the Zered Valley.x 14 The time we spent traveling from Kadesh-barnea until we crossed the Zered Valley was thirty-eight years until the entire generation of fighting men had perished from the camp, as the Lord had sworn to them. 15 Indeed, the Lord’s hand was against them, to eliminatey them from the camp until they had all perished.z