Spies Sent into Canaan^(A)

13 And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ^2 (B)“Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the children of Israel; from each tribe of their fathers you shall send a man, every one a leader among them.”

³ So Moses sent them ^(C)from the Wilderness of Paran according to the command of the Lord, all of them men who were heads of the children of Israel. ⁴ Now 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 (D)from the tribe of Judah, ^(E)Caleb the son of Jephunneh; ⁷ from the tribe of Issachar, Igal the son of Joseph; ⁸ from the tribe of Ephraim, ^[a]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 are the names of the men whom Moses sent to ^[b]spy out the land. And Moses called ^(F)Hoshea^[c] the son of Nun, Joshua.

¹⁷ Then Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan, and said to them, “Go up this way into the South, and go up to ^(G)the mountains, ¹⁸ and see what the land is like: whether the people who dwell in it are strong or weak, few or many; ¹⁹ whether the land they dwell in is good or bad; whether the cities they inhabit are like camps or strongholds; ²⁰ whether the land is ^[d]rich or poor; and whether there are forests there or not. ^(H)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 ^(I)from the Wilderness of Zin as far as ^(J)Rehob, near the entrance of ^(K)Hamath. ²² And they went up through the South and came to ^(L)Hebron; Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the descendants of ^(M)Anak, were there. (Now Hebron was built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.) ^23 (N)Then they came to the ^[e]Valley of Eshcol, and there cut down a branch with one cluster of grapes; they carried it between two of them on a pole. They also brought some of the pomegranates and figs. ²⁴ The place was called the Valley of ^[f]Eshcol, because of the cluster which the men of Israel cut down there. ²⁵ And they returned from spying out the land after forty days.

²⁶ Now they departed and came back to Moses and Aaron and all the congregation of the children of Israel in the Wilderness of Paran, at ^(O)Kadesh; they brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. ²⁷ Then they told him, and said: “We went to the land where you sent us. It truly ^[g]flows with ^(P)milk and honey, ^(Q)and this is its fruit. ²⁸ Nevertheless the ^(R)people who dwell in the land are strong; the cities are fortified and very large; moreover we saw the descendants of ^(S)Anak there. ^29 (T)The Amalekites dwell in the land of the South; the Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the mountains; and the Canaanites dwell by the sea and along the banks of the Jordan.”

³⁰ Then ^(U)Caleb quieted the people before Moses, and said, “Let us go up at once and take possession, for we are well able to overcome it.”

^31 (V)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 And they ^(W)gave the children of Israel a bad report of the land which they had spied out, saying, “The land through which we have gone as spies is a land that devours its inhabitants, and ^(X)all the people whom we saw in it are men of great stature. ³³ There we saw the ^[h]giants (^(Y)the descendants of Anak came from the giants); and we were ^(Z)like^[i] grasshoppers in our own sight, and so we were ^(AA)in their sight.”