1 ¶ And the entire congregation lifted up their voice, and cried; and the people wept that night.

2 And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron: and the whole congregation said to them, Would to God that we had died in the land of Egypt! or would to God we had died in this wilderness!

3 Why has the LORD brought us to this land, to fall by the sword, that our wives and our children should be a prey? would it not better for us to return into Egypt?

4 And they said one to another, Let us choose a leader, and let us return to Egypt.

5 ¶ Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before the whole assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel.

6 And Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, who were of those who scouted out the land, tore their clothes:

7 And they spoke to the entire company of the children of Israel, saying, The land, which we passed through to scout out, is an exceedingly good land.

8 If the LORD delights in us, then he will bring us into that land, and give it to us; a land that flows with milk and honey.

9 Only do not rebel against the LORD, and do not be afraid of the people of the land; for they are bread for us: their protection is as a vanishing shadow, and the LORD is with us: do not fear them.

10 But the entire congregation yelled to stone them with stones. Then the glory of the LORD appeared in the tabernacle of the congregation before all the children of Israel.

11 ¶ And the LORD said to Moses, How long will these people despise me? and how long will it be before they believe in me, for all the signs that I have shown them?

12 I will strike them with the pestilence, and disinherit them, and will make of you a nation greater and mightier than they.

13 But Moses said to the LORD, Then the Egyptians will hear of it, (for you brought up this people in your might up from among them;)

14 And they will tell it to the inhabitants of this land: for they have heard that you LORD are among this people, that you LORD are seen face to face, and that your cloud stands over them, and that you go before them, in a pillar of cloud by day, and in a pillar of fire by night.

15 Now if you kill all of these people as one man, then the nations that have heard of your fame will speak, saying,

16 Because the LORD was not able to bring this people into the land which he swore to give to them, he has slain them in the wilderness.

17 And now, I pray you, let the power of my Lord be great, as you have promised, saying,

18 The LORD is longsuffering, and of great mercy, forgiving iniquity and transgression, but he will by no means overlook sin, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation.

19 Pardon, I beseech you, the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of your mercy, as you have forgiven this people, from Egypt even until now.

20 ¶ And the LORD said, I have pardoned according to your word:

21 But as truly as I live, the entire earth shall be filled with the glory of the LORD.

22 Because all those men who have seen my glory, and my miracles, that I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and have tempted me now these ten times, and have not listened to my voice;

23 Surely they shall not see the land which I swore to their fathers, nor shall any of those who provoked me see it:

24 But my servant Caleb, because he has a different spirit, and has followed me fully, him will I bring into the land to which he went; and his seed shall possess it.

25 (Now the Amalekites and the Canaanites lived in the valley.) Tomorrow turn, and go into the wilderness by the way of the Red sea.

26 And the LORD spoke to Moses and to Aaron, saying,

27 How long shall I put up with this evil congregation, that murmurs against me? I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel, that they murmur against me.

28 Say to them, As truly as I live, says the LORD, what you have said in my hearing, so will I do to you:

29 Your dead bodies will fall in this wilderness; and all of you who were numbered, according to your entire number, from twenty years old and upward, who have murmured against me,

30 I swear that none of you shall enter the land, that I promised to settle you in, save Caleb the son of Jephunneh, and Joshua the son of Nun.

31 But your little ones, which you said should be a prey, those will I bring in, and they shall know the land which you have despised.

32 But as for you, your dead bodies shall fall in this wilderness.

33 And your children shall wander in the wilderness for forty years, and suffer for your unfaithfulness, until your carcasses are consumed in the desert.

34 After the number of the days in which you spied out the land, even forty days, each day for a year, you shall bear your iniquities, even forty years, and you shall know what it means to spurn my promise.

35 I the LORD have said, I will surely do it to all this evil congregation, that are gathered together against me: they shall be consumed in this wilderness, and there they shall die.

36 ¶ And the men, whom Moses sent to scout out the land, who returned, and made the entire congregation to murmur against him, by bringing back a slanderous report of the land,

37 Even those men who brought the evil report of the land, died by the plague before the LORD.

38 But Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, who were of the men who went to search out the land, remained alive.

39 And Moses told these words to all the children of Israel: and the people mourned greatly.

40 And they rose up early in the morning, and went up to the top of the mountain, saying, See, we are here, and will go up to the place which the LORD has promised: for we have sinned.

41 And Moses said, Why do you now transgress the commandment of the LORD? since it will not succeed.

42 Do not go up, for the LORD is not among you; so that you are not struck down before your enemies.

43 For the Amalekites and the Canaanites were there before you, and you shall fall by the sword: because you have turned away from the LORD, the LORD will not be with you.

44 But they presumed to go up to the hill country: nevertheless the ark of the covenant of the LORD, and Moses, remained in the camp.

45 Then the Amalekites came down, and the Canaanites who lived in that hill country, and defeated them, and pursued them, as far as Hormah.