Twelve Scouts Explore Canaan
13 The Lord now said to Moses, 2 “Send out men to explore the land of Canaan, the land I am giving to the Israelites. Send one leader from each of the twelve ancestral tribes.” 3 So Moses did as the Lord commanded him. He sent out twelve men, all tribal leaders of Israel, from their camp in the wilderness of Paran. 4 These were the tribes and the names of their leaders:
Tribe Leader
Reuben Shammua son of Zaccur
5 Simeon Shaphat son of Hori
6 Judah Caleb son of Jephunneh
7 Issachar Igal son of Joseph
8 Ephraim Hoshea son of Nun
9 Benjamin Palti son of Raphu
10 Zebulun Gaddiel son of Sodi
11 Manasseh son of Joseph Gaddi son of Susi
12 Dan Ammiel son of Gemalli
13 Asher Sethur son of Michael
14 Naphtali Nahbi son of Vophsi
15 Gad Geuel son of Maki
16 These are the names of the men Moses sent out to explore the land. (Moses called Hoshea son of Nun by the name Joshua.)
17 Moses gave the men these instructions as he sent them out to explore the land: “Go north through the Negev into the hill country. 18 See what the land is like, and find out whether the people living there are strong or weak, few or many. 19 See what kind of land they live in. Is it good or bad? Do their towns have walls, or are they unprotected like open camps? 20 Is the soil fertile or poor? Are there many trees? Do your best to bring back samples of the crops you see.” (It happened to be the season for harvesting the first ripe grapes.)
21 So they went up and explored the land from the wilderness of Zin as far as Rehob, near Lebo-hamath. 22 Going north, they passed through the Negev and arrived at Hebron, where Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai—all descendants of Anak—lived. (The ancient town of Hebron was founded seven years before the Egyptian city of Zoan.) 23 When they came to the valley of Eshcol, they cut down a branch with a single cluster of grapes so large that it took two of them to carry it on a pole between them! They also brought back samples of the pomegranates and figs. 24 That place was called the valley of Eshcol (which means “cluster”), because of the cluster of grapes the Israelite men cut there.
The Scouting Report
25 After exploring the land for forty days, the men returned 26 to Moses, Aaron, and the whole community of Israel at Kadesh in the wilderness of Paran. They reported to the whole community what they had seen and showed them the fruit they had taken from the land. 27 This was their report to Moses: “We entered the land you sent us to explore, and it is indeed a bountiful country—a land flowing with milk and honey. Here is the kind of fruit it produces. 28 But the people living there are powerful, and their towns are large and fortified. We even saw giants there, the descendants of Anak! 29 The Amalekites live in the Negev, and the Hittites, Jebusites, and Amorites live in the hill country. The Canaanites live along the coast of the Mediterranean Sea[a] and along the Jordan Valley.”
30 But Caleb tried to quiet the people as they stood before Moses. “Let’s go at once to take the land,” he said. “We can certainly conquer it!”
31 But the other men who had explored the land with him disagreed. “We can’t go up against them! They are stronger than we are!” 32 So they spread this bad report about the land among the Israelites: “The land we traveled through and explored will devour anyone who goes to live there. All the people we saw were huge. 33 We even saw giants[b] there, the descendants of Anak. Next to them we felt like grasshoppers, and that’s what they thought, too!”
The People Rebel
14 Then the whole community began weeping aloud, and they cried all night. 2 Their voices rose in a great chorus of protest against Moses and Aaron. “If only we had died in Egypt, or even here in the wilderness!” they complained. 3 “Why is the Lord taking us to this country only to have us die in battle? Our wives and our little ones will be carried off as plunder! Wouldn’t it be better for us to return to Egypt?” 4 Then they plotted among themselves, “Let’s choose a new leader and go back to Egypt!”
Footnotes:
13:29 Hebrew the sea.
13:33 Hebrew nephilim.
Great idea, to send some scouts ahead. Check out the land, the crops, the soil, see what we're fighting for and what we'll be up against. So the reports come back and as usual, some see the half full cup: flowing with milk and honey, oversized grapes, pomegranates
and figs.
But oh, in every group, there are also the naysayers. They see the air above the milk. They are so fixated on the negative, they look right beyond the positive. Honestly, they never see it at all. So they allow their fears and their imaginations to run away with them. All of a sudden, tall people become giants, and they are more powerful than we, even with the God Almighty on our side. And then there are their fortified cities... oh, don't even get me going on those...
And so they wept. God's people cried through the night because the negative voices won again...
Oh, to give voice to those who can see, and even taste, the milk.
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