Numbers 13
1 Yahweh said to Moses/me,
And the Lord spoke unto Moses, saying,
2 “Send some men to Canaan [land] to explore it. That is the land that I will give to you Israelis. Send men who are leaders in their tribes.”
Send thou out some men that they may spy out the land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel: one man each of every tribe of their fathers shall ye send, every one who is a prince among them.
3 So Moses/I did what Yahweh commanded him/me. He/I sent out twelve Israeli men who were all leaders of their tribes. He/I sent them from their/our camp at Paran in the desert.
And Moses sent them out from the wilderness of Paran by the order of the Lord: they all were men, [who] were heads of the children of Israel.
4 These are the names of the men [and the tribes they belonged to: ] Shammua, the son of Zaccur, from the tribe of Reuben;
And these are their names: Of the tribe of Reuben, Shammua the son of Zaccur.
5 Shaphat, the son of Hori, from the tribe of Simeon;
Of the tribe of Simeon, Shaphat the son of Chori.
6 Caleb, the son of Jephunneh, from the tribe of Judah;
Of the tribe of Judah, Caleb the son of Yephunneh.
7 Igal, the son of Joseph, from the tribe of Issachar;
Of the tribe of Issachar, Yigal the son of Joseph.
8 Hoshea, the son of Nun, from the tribe of Ephraim;
Of the tribe of Ephraim, Hoshea, the son of Nun.
9 Palti, the son of Raphu, from the tribe of Benjamin;
Of the tribe of Benjamin, Palti the son of Raphu.
10 Gaddiel, the son of Sodi, from the tribe of Zebulun;
Of the tribe of Zebulun, Gaddiel the son of Sodi.
11 Gaddi, the son of Susi, from the tribe of Manasseh;
Of the tribe of Joseph, of the tribe of Menasseh, Gaddi the son of Sussi.
12 Ammiel, the son of Gemalli, from the tribe of Dan;
Of the tribe of Dan, 'Ammiel the son of Gemalli.
13 Sethur, the son of Michael, from the tribe of Asher;
Of the tribe of Asher, Sethur the son of Michael.
14 Nahbi, the son of Vophsi, from the tribe of Naphtali;
Of the tribe of Naphtali, Nachbi the son of Vophsi.
15 and Geuel, the son of Maki, from the tribe of Gad.
Of the tribe of Gad, Geuel the son of Machi.
16 Those are the names of the men whom Moses/I sent out to explore Canaan. [Before they left], Moses/I gave Hoshea a new name, Joshua, [which means ‘Yahweh is the one who saves].’
These are the names of the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land; and Moses called Hoshea the son of Nun, Joshua [[Yehoshua']].
17 Before Moses/I sent them to explore Canaan, he/I said to them, “Go through the southern part of Canaan, and then go [north] into the hilly area.
And Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan, and he said unto them, Go you up this way at the south side, and go up into the mountain;
18 See what the land is like. See if the people who live there are strong or weak. See if there are many people or only a few people.
And see the land, what it is; and the people that dwell therein, whether they be strong or weak, whether they be few or many;
19 Find out what kind of land they live in [RHQ]. Is it good or bad? Find out about the towns in which they live [RHQ]. Do they have walls around them or not?
And what the land is on which they dwell, whether it be good or bad; and what the cities are in which they dwell, whether in open places, or in strongholds;
20 Find out about the soil [RHQ]. Is it (fertile/good for growing crops) or not? Find out if there are trees there [RHQ]. Try to bring back some of the fruit that grows in that land.” [He/I said that because] it was the beginning of the time to harvest grapes.
And what the land is, whether it be fat or lean, whether there be trees therein, or not; and take ye courage, and take away some of the fruit of the land. Now the time was the season of the first ripening of grapes.
21 So those men went to Canaan. They went [through the entire land], from the Zin desert [in the south] all the way to Rehob [town] near Lebo-Hamath [in the north].
And they went up, and spied out the land from the wilderness of Zin unto Rechob, on the road to Chamath.
22 In the south, they went to Hebron, where Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, [huge men] descended from Anak, lived. Hebron was a city that was built seven years before Zoan [city] was built in Egypt.
And they ascended on the south side, and came unto Hebron; and there were Achiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the children of 'Anak; [now Hebron had been built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.]
23 In one valley, they cut from a grapevine one cluster of grapes. [Because it was very large, they needed] two men to carry it on a pole. They also picked some pomegranates and some figs [to carry back to their camp].
And they came unto the valley of Eshcol, and they cut down from there a branch with one cluster of grapes, and they bore it upon a barrow between two; and [they took some] of the pomegranates and of the figs.
24 They called that place Eshcol [which means ‘cluster’] because they had cut that [huge] cluster of grapes there.
That place was called the valley of Eshcol, on account of the cluster which the children of Israel cut down from there.
25 After they explored the land for 40 days, they returned to their camp.
And they returned from spying out the land at the end of forty days.
26 They came to Aaron and Moses/me and the rest of the Israeli people in the desert at Paran. They reported to everyone what they had seen. They also showed them the fruit that they had brought back.
And they went and came to Moses, and to Aaron, and to all the congregation of the children of Israel, unto the wilderness of Paran, to Kadesh; and they brought back word unto them, and unto all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land.
27 But this is what they reported to Moses/me: “We arrived in the land that you sent us to explore. It is truly a beautiful land, and it is very fertile [IDM]. Here is some of the fruit.
And they told him, and said, We came unto the land whither thou didst send us, and truly doth it flow with milk and honey; and this is its fruit.
28 But the people who live there are very strong. Their cities are large and are surrounded by walls. We even saw some of the [huge] descendants of Anak there.
Nevertheless the people are strong that dwell in the land, and the cities are very strongly walled, and great; and the children of 'Anak also have we seen there.
29 The descendants of Amalek live in the southern part [of the land], and the descendants of Heth, Jebus, and Amor live in the hilly area [to the north]. The descendants of Canaan live along the coast of the [Mediterranean] sea and along the Jordan [River].”
The Amalekites dwell in the southern country; and the Hittites, and the Jebusites, and the Emorites, dwell in the mountains; and the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and by the margin of the Jordan.
30 [When they said that, the people were afraid and started to cry out very loudly]. But Caleb told the people who were standing near Moses/me to be quiet. Then he said, “We should go there and take the land, because we are certainly able to conquer it!”
And Caleb stilled the people toward Moses, and he said, We can easily go up, and take possession of it; for we are well able to overcome it.
31 But the men who had gone with him said, “No, we cannot attack [and defeat] those people! They are much stronger than we are!”
But 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.
32 So those men gave to the Israeli people a bad report about the land that they had explored. They said, “The land that we explored is very large; we cannot conquer it. And all the people whom we saw are very tall.
And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had spied out unto the children of Israel, saying, The land through which we have passed to spy it out, is a land that consumeth its inhabitants; and all the people that we saw in it are men of a great stature.
33 We even saw the descendants of Nephili there. The descendants of Anak [whom we saw there] are descended from the giant Nephili people. When we saw them, we felt [as small] as grasshoppers [SIM], and they thought that we looked like grasshoppers too!”
And there we saw the giants, the sons of 'Anak, of the giants' [family]: and we were in our own eyes as grasshoppers, and so were we in their eyes.
