OET-RV NUM Chapter 13

13 Then Yahweh told Mosheh (Moses), 2 “Send some men in to explore Kanaan—the land that I’m giving to the Israelis. Send one man from each ancestral tribe—a leader within that tribe.” 3 Then at Yahweh’s command, Mosheh sent them off from the Paran wilderness. They were all Israeli leaders 4 and their names were:

• Shammua (Zakkur’s son) from Reuven tribe,
• 5 Shafat (Hori’s son) from Shimeon tribe,
• 6 Kalev (Caleb—Yefunneh’s son) from Yehudah (Judah) tribe,
• 7 Yigal (Yosef’s son) from Yissakar tribe,
• 8 Hoshea (Nun’s son) from Efrayim tribe,
• 9 Palti (Rafu’s son) from Binyamin tribe,
• 10 Gaddiyel (Sodi’s son) from Zevulun tribe,
• 11 Gaddi (Susi’s son) from Yosef tribe,
• 12 Ammiyel (Gemalli’s son) from Dan tribe,
• 13 Setur (Mikael’s son) from Asher tribe,
• 14 Nahbi (Vofsi’s son) from Naftali tribe, and
• 15 Geuel (Maki’s son) from Gad tribe.

16 Mosheh called (Nun’s son) Hoshea, ‘Yehoshua’ (Joshua). Those were the names of the men that Mosheh sent out to explore Kanaan.

17 So Mosheh sent them to explore Kanaan, telling them, “Go through the Negev and then up into the hill country. 18 Find out what the land’s like, and whether the people living there are militarily strong or weak, and if they’re many or few. 19 Find out whether the land is good or bad, what cities they live in, and how fortified they are. 20 Find out whether the soil is fertile or not, whether or not there’s trees there. Be courageous and bring back some of the produce from that land.” (He said that because it was the time of the year when grapes were starting to ripen.)

21 So the twelve men went and explored the region from the Tsin wilderness in the south, all the way up to Rehob at Levo-Hamat in the north. 22 They started in the Negev, and went as far as Hevron where some of Anak’s descendents lived: Ahiman, Sheshay, Talmai. Hevron had been built seven years before Tsoan in Egypt (Heb. Mitsrayim). 23 When they got to the Eshkol riverbed, they cut off a branch with a cluster of grapes, and carried it on a pole between two of them, along with some pomegranates and figs. 24 (That place was then called Eshkol, meaning ‘cluster’, because of the cluster of grapes they’d taken from there.)

25 Forty days later, they returned from exploring that land 26 and went to Kadash in the Paran wilderness. There they reported back to Mosheh and Aharon and all the assembled people, and showed them the fruit from the land, 27 and told them, “We went to the land where you sent us, and it is indeed flowing with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. 28 However, the people living in that land are powerful, and the cities are very well fortified. Also, some of the Anak people group live there. 29 The Amalekite people live in the Negev, and the Hittites, Yebusites, and Amorites live in the hill country, and the Kanaanites live along the coast and along the Yordan river.”

30 Then Kalev (Caleb) raised an arm to quieten the people in front of Mosheh and stated, “We’ll certainly go in there and take it over, because we’re capable of going against them.”

31 But the men who’d gone in with him argued, “No,, we’re not able to battle against them because they’re stronger than us.” 32 Then they went on to bring out a bad report to the Israelis about the land that they’d explored, saying, “The land that we passed to explore is a land that devours those who live in it. In addition, all the people we saw in there were tall and powerful, 33 plus we saw the Nefilim (descendants of Anak), and we felt as small as grasshoppers compared to them, and that’s how they saw us as well.”[ref]