Miriam and Aaron Oppose Moses

12 Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Cushite woman whom he had married, for he had married a Cushite woman. 2 And they said, “Has the Lord indeed spoken only through Moses? oHas he not spoken through us also?” And pthe Lord heard it. 3 Now the man Moses was very meek, more than all people who were on the face of the earth. 4 And suddenly the Lord said to Moses and to Aaron and Miriam, “Come out, you three, to the tent of meeting.” And the three of them came out. 5 And qthe Lord came down in a pillar of cloud and stood at the entrance of the tent and called Aaron and Miriam, and they both came forward. 6 And he said, “Hear my words: If there is a prophet among you, I the Lord make myself known to him rin a vision; I speak with him sin a dream. 7 Not so with tmy servant Moses. uHe is faithful in all my house. 8 With him I speak vmouth to mouth, clearly, and not in wriddles, and he beholds xthe form of the Lord. Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?” 9 And the anger of the Lord was kindled against them, and he departed.

10 When the cloud removed from over the tent, behold, yMiriam was zleprous,1 like snow. And Aaron turned toward Miriam, and behold, she was leprous. 11 And Aaron said to Moses, “Oh, my lord, ado not punish us2 because we have done foolishly and have sinned. 12 Let her not be as one dead, whose flesh is half eaten away when he comes out of his mother’s womb.” 13 And Moses cried to the Lord, “O God, please heal her—please.” 14 But the Lord said to Moses, “If her father had but bspit in her face, should she not be shamed seven days? Let her be cshut outside the camp seven days, and after that she may be brought in again.” 15 So Miriam dwas shut outside the camp seven days, and the people did not set out on the march till Miriam was brought in again. 16 After that the people set out from eHazeroth, and camped in fthe wilderness of Paran.

Spies Sent into Canaan

13 The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, 2 g“Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the people of Israel. From each tribe of their fathers you shall send a man, every one a chief among them.” 3 So Moses sent them from hthe wilderness of Paran, according to the command of the Lord, all of them men who were heads of the people of Israel. 4 And these were their names: From the tribe of Reuben, Shammua the son of Zaccur; 5 from the tribe of Simeon, Shaphat the son of Hori; 6 ifrom the tribe of Judah, jCaleb the son of Jephunneh; 7 from the tribe of Issachar, Igal the son of Joseph; 8 from the tribe of Ephraim, kHoshea the son of Nun; 9 from the tribe of Benjamin, Palti the son of Raphu; 10 from the tribe of Zebulun, Gaddiel the son of Sodi; 11 from the tribe of Joseph (that is, from the tribe of Manasseh), Gaddi the son of Susi; 12 from the tribe of Dan, Ammiel the son of Gemalli; 13 from the tribe of Asher, Sethur the son of Michael; 14 from the tribe of Naphtali, Nahbi the son of Vophsi; 15 from the tribe of Gad, Geuel the son of Machi. 16 These were the names of the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land. And Moses called kHoshea the son of Nun Joshua.

17 Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan and said to them, “Go up into lthe Negeb and go up into mthe hill country, 18 and see what the land is, and whether the people who dwell in it are strong or weak, whether they are few or many, 19 and whether the land that they dwell in is good or bad, and whether the cities that they dwell in are camps or strongholds, 20 and whether the land is nrich or poor, and whether there are trees in it or not. oBe of good courage and bring some of the fruit of the land.” Now the time was the season of the first ripe grapes.

21 So they went up and spied out the land pfrom the wilderness of Zin to Rehob, qnear Lebo-hamath. 22 They went up into mthe Negeb and came to rHebron. sAhiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the tdescendants of Anak, were there. (uHebron was built seven years before uZoan in Egypt.) 23 And vthey came to the Valley of Eshcol and cut down from there a branch with a single cluster of grapes, and they carried it on a pole between two of them; they also brought some pomegranates and figs. 24 That place was called the Valley of Eshcol,1 because of the cluster that the people of Israel cut down from there.

Report of the Spies

25 At the end of forty days they returned from spying out the land. 26 And they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the people of Israel in the wilderness of Paran, at wKadesh. They brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. 27 And they told him, “We came to the land to which you sent us. It xflows with milk and honey, yand this is its fruit. 28 zHowever, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. And besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. 29 aThe Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country. bAnd the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan.”

30 But cCaleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.” 31 dThen the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” 32 So ethey brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and fall the people that we saw in it are of great height. 33 And there we saw the gNephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the gNephilim), and we seemed to ourselves hlike grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”