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Spies Sent into Canaan

¹ The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ^2 (a)"Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the people of Israel. From each tribe of their fathers you shall send a man, every one a chief among them." ³ So Moses sent them from ^(b)the wilderness of Paran, according to the command of the Lord, all of them men who were heads of the people of Israel. ⁴ And these were their names: From the tribe of Reuben, Shammua the son of Zaccur; ⁵ from the tribe of Simeon, Shaphat the son of Hori; ^6 (c)from the tribe of Judah, ^(d)Caleb the son of Jephunneh; ⁷ from the tribe of Issachar, Igal the son of Joseph; ⁸ from the tribe of Ephraim, ^(e)Hoshea the son of Nun; ⁹ from the tribe of Benjamin, Palti the son of Raphu; ¹⁰ from the tribe of Zebulun, Gaddiel the son of Sodi; ¹¹ from the tribe of Joseph (that is, from the tribe of Manasseh), Gaddi the son of Susi; ¹² from the tribe of Dan, Ammiel the son of Gemalli; ¹³ from the tribe of Asher, Sethur the son of Michael; ¹⁴ from the tribe of Naphtali, Nahbi the son of Vophsi; ¹⁵ from the tribe of Gad, Geuel the son of Machi. ¹⁶ These were the names of the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land. And Moses called ^(f)Hoshea the son of Nun Joshua.

¹⁷ Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan and said to them, "Go up into ^(g)the Negeb and go up into ^(h)the hill country, ¹⁸ and see what the land is, and whether the people who dwell in it are strong or weak, whether they are few or many, ¹⁹ and whether the land that they dwell in is good or bad, and whether the cities that they dwell in are camps or strongholds, ²⁰ and whether the land is ⁽ⁱ⁾rich or poor, and whether there are trees in it or not. ^(j)Be of good courage and bring some of the fruit of the land." Now the time was the season of the first ripe grapes.

²¹ So they went up and spied out the land ^(k)from the wilderness of Zin to Rehob, ^(l)near Lebo-hamath. ²² They went up into ^(m)the Negeb and came to ⁽ⁿ⁾Hebron. ^(o)Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the ^(p)descendants of Anak, were there. (^(q)Hebron was built seven years before ^(r)Zoan in Egypt.) ²³ And ^(s)they came to the Valley of Eshcol and cut down from there a branch with a single cluster of grapes, and they carried it on a pole between two of them; they also brought some pomegranates and figs. ²⁴ That place was called the Valley of Eshcol,^[a] because of the cluster that the people of Israel cut down from there.

Report of the Spies

²⁵ At the end of forty days they returned from spying out the land. ²⁶ And they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the people of Israel in the wilderness of Paran, at ^(t)Kadesh. They brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. ²⁷ And they told him, "We came to the land to which you sent us. It ^(u)flows with milk and honey, ^(v)and this is its fruit. ^28 (w)However, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. And besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. ^29 (x)The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country. ^(y)And the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan."

³⁰ But ^(z)Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, "Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it." ^31 (aa)Then 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 are." ³² So ^(ab)they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, "The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and ^(ac)all the people that we saw in it are of great height. ³³ And there we saw the ^(ad)Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the ^(ae)Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves ^(af)like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them."