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iii. Israel’s Rebellion (14:1-45)
1. Joshua and Caleb Intercede (14:1-12)
1 Then the whole community lifted up their voice and cried out, and that night the people wept. 2 All the people of Isra'el grumbled against Moshe and Aharon, and the whole community said to them, “We wish that we had died in the land of Egypt, or that we had died in this wilderness! 3 Why is ADONAI bringing us to this land just to fall by the sword? Our wives and our little ones will be captured or killed! Wouldn’t it be better for us to go back to Egypt?” 4 So they said to each other, “Let’s choose a leader and go back to Egypt.”
5 Then Moshe and Aharon fell on their faces before all the entire assembled community of the people of Isra'el.
6 Y’hoshua ben Nun and Kalev ben Y’funeh, who were among those who had spied out the land, tore their clothes.[GN] 7 They said to the whole community of the people of Isra'el, “The land that we passed through to spy out is an exceedingly good land. (iii) 8 If ADONAI delights in us, then He will bring us into this land, and give it to us: a land which flows with milk and honey. 9 Only don’t rebel against ADONAI and don’ fear the people of the land; for they are bread for us. Their defense is removed from over them, and ADONAI is with us. Don’t fear them.”
10 But all the community threatened to stone them with stones.
ADONAI’s glory appeared in the Tent of Meeting to all the people of Isra'el. 11 ADONAI said to Moshe, “How long will this people despise Me? How long will they refuse to believe Me, in spite of all the signs I have worked among them? 12 I will strike them with pestilence, disinherit them, will make of you a nation greater and mightier than they are.”
2. Moses Intercedes (14:13-19)
13 Moshe said to ADONAI, “Then the Egyptians will hear of it, because in Your might You brought this people up from among them. 14 They will tell it to the inhabitants of this land. They have heard that You, ADONAI, are among this people; for You, ADONAI, are seen face to face, and Your cloud stands over them, and You go before them, in a pillar of cloud by day, and in a pillar of fire by night. 15 Now if You kill off this people with a single stroke, then the nations which have heard Your fame will say, 16 ‘Because ADONAI was not able to bring this people into the land which He swore to them, He has slain them in the desert.’ 17 Now please let ADONAI’s power be great, just as you have said, 18 ‘ADONAI is slow to anger, and abundant in loving kindness, forgiving iniquity and disobedience; and He will by no means clear the guilty, visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the descendants, on the third and on the fourth generation.’ 19 Please pardon the iniquity of this people according to the greatness of Your loving kindness, and just as You have forgiven this people from Egypt even until now.”
3. God’s Forgiveness and Judgement (14:20-39)
20 Then ADONAI said, “I have pardoned, as you have asked. 21 But as sure as I live, and that the whole earth is filled with ADONAI’s glory, 22 none of those people who have seen My glory and the signs which I did in Egypt and in the desert, yet tested Me these ten times and have not listened to My voice, 23 will see the land I swore to their ancestors! None of those who treated Me with contempt will see it! 24 But my servant Kalev, because he had a different spirit with him and has followed Me completely, I will bring him into the land into which he went. His descendants shall possess it. 25 Since the ‘Amalekim and the Kena‘ani dwell in the valley, tomorrow turn and go into the desert by the way to the Sea of Suf.”
(iv) 26 Again ADONAI said to Moshe and to Aharon, 27 “How long shall I bear with this evil community that complain against me? I have heard the complaints of the people of Isra'el that they complain against Me. 28 Tell them, ‘As I live, says ADONAI, I will do to you just as you have spoken in My hearing. 29 Your dead bodies shall fall in this desert, and all who were counted of you, according to your whole number, from twenty years old and upward, who have complained against Me, 30 you absolutely shall not come into the land concerning which I swore that I would make you dwell therein, except Kalev ben Y’funeh, and Y’hoshua ben Nun. 31 But I will bring in your little ones that you said should be captured or killed, and they shall know the land which you have rejected. 32 But as for you, your dead bodies shall litter this desert. 33 Your descendants shall be wanderers in the desert for forty years, and shall bear your prostitution, until your dead bodies are consumed in the desert. 34 After the number of the days in which you spied out the land, even forty days, for every day a year, you will bear your iniquities, even forty years, and you will know My alienation.’ 35 I, ADONAI, have spoken. I will surely do this to all this evil community who are gathered together against Me. In this wilderness they shall be consumed, and there they shall die.”
36 The men whom Moshe sent to spy out the land, who returned and made all the community to grumble against him by bringing up an evil report against the land, 37 even those men who brought up an evil report of the land, died by the plague in the presence of ADONAI. 38 But Y’hoshua ben Nun and Kalev ben Y’funeh remained alive our out of the men who went to spy out the land.
39 When Moshe told these things to all the people of Isra'el, and the people felt great remorse.
4. The Defeat at Hormah (14:40-45)
40 They arose early the next morning, went up to the top of the mountain, and said, “Hinneh, we are here, and we did have sin, but now we will go up to the place that ADONAI has promised.”
41 Moshe said, “Why are you opposing what ADONAI has said? You won’t succeed! 42 Don’t go up there, because ADONAI isn’t with you. If you do, your enemies will defeat you. 43 The ‘Amalekim and the Kena‘anim are there ahead of you, and you will be struck down by the sword because you have turned away from following ADONAI, so ADONAI will not be with you.”
44 But they were presumtuous and went up to the top of the mountain. But the ark of ADONAI’s Covenant and Moshe didn’t leave the camp. 45 So the ‘Amalekim and the Kena‘anis who lived in the hill country came down, struck them down, and beat them back all the way to Hormah. [MAP]
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ANXIOUSLY WATCHING FOR MASHIACH’S RETURN,
SPEEDILY AND IN OUR DAY. MARANA, TA!
