Numbers 13:27–14:4

²⁷And they told him,^o “We came to the land that you sent us, and it is flowing of milk and honey; this is its fruit. ²⁸Yet the people who are inhabiting it are strong and the cities are fortified and very large; moreover, we saw the descendants of the Anakites there. ²⁹The Amalekites are living in the land of the Negev;^p the Hittites, Jebusites, and the Amorites are living in the hill country; and the Canaanites are living at the sea and on the banks of the Jordan.”

³⁰And Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, “Surely, let us go up and let us take possession of it because surely we will be able to prevail over it.” ³¹And the men who went up with him said, “We are not able to go up to the people because they are stronger than us.” ³²And they presented the report of the land that they explored to the Israelites,^q saying, “The land that we went through to explore is a land that eats its inhabitants, and all the people whom we saw in its midst are men of great size.^{r 33}There we saw the Nephilim (the descendants^s of Anak came from the Nephilim), and we were like grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were in their eyes.”

The People Complain

14Then all the community lifted up their voices,^a and the people wept during that night. ²And all the Israelites^b grumbled against Moses and Aaron, and all the community said to them, “If only we had died in the land of Egypt or in this desert! ³Why did Yahweh bring us into this land to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little children will become plunder; would it not be better for us to return to Egypt?” ⁴They said to each other,^c “Let us appoint a leader, and we will return to Egypt.”