27 And they recount to him, and say, `We came in unto the land whither thou hast sent us, and also it `is' flowing with milk and honey -- and this `is' its fruit;
and I go down to deliver it out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to cause it to go up out of the land, unto a land good and broad, unto a land flowing with milk and honey -- unto the place of the Canaanite, and the Hittite, and the Amorite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite.
for forty years have the sons of Israel gone in the wilderness, till all the nation of the men of war who are coming out of Egypt, who hearkened not to the voice of Jehovah, to whom Jehovah hath sworn not to show them the land which Jehovah sware to their fathers to give to us, a land flowing with milk and honey, are consumed;
and rejoiced in all the good which Jehovah thy God hath given to thee, and to thy house, thou, and the Levite, and the sojourner who `is' in thy midst. `When thou dost complete to tithe all the tithe of thine increase in the third year, the year of the tithe, then thou hast given to the Levite, to the sojourner, to the fatherless, and to the widow, and they have eaten within thy gates, and been satisfied, and thou hast said before Jehovah thy God, I have put away the separated thing out of the house, and also have given it to the Levite, and to the sojourner, and to the orphan, and to the widow, according to all Thy command which Thou hast commanded me; I have not passed over from Thy commands, nor have I forgotten. I have not eaten in mine affliction of it, nor have I put away of it for uncleanness, nor have I given of it for the dead; I have hearkened to the voice of Jehovah my God; I have done according to all that Thou hast commanded me; look from Thy holy habitation, from the heavens, and bless Thy people Israel, and the ground which Thou hast given to us, as Thou hast sworn to our fathers -- a land flowing `with' milk and honey.
`And it hath been, when Jehovah bringeth thee in unto the land of the Canaanite, and of the Hittite, and of the Amorite, and of the Hivite, and of the Jebusite, which He hath sworn to thy fathers to give to thee, a land flowing with milk and honey, that thou hast done this service in this month.
and I say, I bring you up out of the affliction of Egypt, unto the land of the Canaanite, and the Hittite, and the Amorite, and the Perizzite, and the Hivite, and the Jebusite, unto a land flowing `with' milk and honey.
And also, I, I have lifted up My hand to them in the wilderness, Not to bring them in to the land that I had given, Flowing with milk and honey, A beauty it `is' to all the lands,
In that day I did lift up My hand to them, To bring them forth from the land of Egypt, Unto a land that I spied out for them, Flowing with milk and honey, A beauty it `is' to all the lands,
unto a land flowing with milk and honey, for I do not go up in thy midst, for thou `art' a stiff-necked people -- lest I consume thee in the way.'
and I bring them in unto the ground which I have sworn to their fathers -- flowing with milk and honey, and they have eaten, and been satisfied, and been fat, and have turned unto other gods, and they have served them, and despised Me, and broken My covenant.
and he bringeth us in unto this place, and giveth to us this land -- a land flowing with milk and honey.
and so that ye prolong days on the ground which Jehovah hath sworn to your fathers to give to them and to their seed -- a land flowing with milk and honey.
and they take with their hand of the fruit of the land, and bring down unto us, and bring us back word, and say, Good is the land which Jehovah our God is giving to us. `And ye have not been willing to go up, and ye provoke the mouth of Jehovah your God, and murmur in your tents, and say, In Jehovah's hating us He hath brought us out of the land of Egypt, to give us into the hand of the Amorite -- to destroy us; whither are we going up? our brethren have melted our heart, saying, A people greater and taller than we, cities great and fenced to heaven, and also sons of Anakim -- we have seen there. `And I say unto you, Be not terrified, nor be afraid of them; Jehovah your God, who is going before you -- He doth fight for you, according to all that He hath done with you in Egypt before your eyes, and in the wilderness, where thou hast seen that Jehovah thy God hath borne thee as a man beareth his son, in all the way which ye have gone, till your coming in unto this place. `And in this thing ye are not stedfast in Jehovah your God, who is going before you in the way to search out to you a place for your encamping, in fire by night, to shew you in the way in which ye go, and in a cloud by day.
if Jehovah hath delighted in us, then He hath brought us in unto this land, and hath given it to us, a land which is flowing with milk and honey;
Worthy.Bible » Commentaries » Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible » Commentary on Numbers 13
Commentary on Numbers 13 Commentary Critical and Explanatory on the Whole Bible
CHAPTER 13
Nu 13:1-33. The Names of the Men Who Were Sent to Search the Land.
1, 2. The Lord spake unto Moses, Send thou men, that they may search the land, of Canaan—Compare De 1:22, whence it appears, that while the proposal of delegating confidential men from each tribe to explore the land of Canaan emanated from the people who petitioned for it, the measure received the special sanction of God, who granted their request at once as a trial, and a punishment of their distrust.
3. those men were heads of the children of Israel—Not the princes who are named (Nu 10:14-16, 18-20, 22-27), but chiefs, leading men though not of the first rank.
16. Oshea—that is, "a desire of salvation." Jehoshua, by prefixing the name of God, means "divinely appointed," "head of salvation," "Saviour," the same as Jesus [Mt 1:21, Margin].
17. Get you up this way … , and go up into the mountain—Mount Seir (De 1:2), which lay directly from Sinai across the wilderness of Paran, in a northeasterly direction into the southern parts of the promised land.
20. Now the time was the time of the first grapes—This was in August, when the first clusters are gathered. The second are gathered in September, and the third in October. The spies' absence for a period of forty days determines the grapes they brought from Eshcol to have been of the second period.
21-24. So they … searched the land—They advanced from south to north, reconnoitering the whole land.
the wilderness of Zin—a long level plain, or deep valley of sand, the monotony of which is relieved by a few tamarisk and rethem trees. Under the names of El Ghor and El Araba, it forms the continuation of the Jordan valley, extending from the Dead Sea to the Gulf of Akaba.
Rehob—or, Beth-rehob, was a city and district situated, according to some, eastward of Sidon; and, according to others, it is the same as El Hule, an extensive and fertile champaign country, at the foot of Anti-libanus, a few leagues below Paneas.
as men come to Hamath—or, "the entering in of Hamath" (2Ki 14:25), now the valley of Balbeck, a mountain pass or opening in the northern frontier, which formed the extreme limit in that direction of the inheritance of Israel. From the mention of these places, the route of the scouts appears to have been along the course of the Jordan in their advance; and their return was by the western border through the territories of the Sidonians and Philistines.
22. unto Hebron—situated in the heart of the mountains of Judah, in the southern extremity of Palestine. The town or "cities of Hebron," as it is expressed in the Hebrew, consists of a number of sheikdoms distinct from each other, standing at the foot of one of those hills that form a bowl round and enclose it. "The children of Anak" mentioned in this verse seem to have been also chiefs of townships; and this coincidence of polity, existing in ages so distant from each other, is remarkable [Vere Monro]. Hebron (Kirjath Arba, Ge 23:2) was one of the oldest cities in the world.
Zoan—(the Tanis of the Greeks) was situated on one of the eastern branches of the Nile, near the lake Menzala, and was the early royal residence of the Pharaohs. It boasted a higher antiquity than any other city in Egypt. Its name, which signifies flat and level, is descriptive of its situation in the low grounds of the Delta.
23. they came unto the brook of Eshcol—that is, "the torrent of the cluster." Its location was a little to the southwest of Hebron. The valley and its sloping hills are still covered with vineyards, the character of whose fruit corresponds to its ancient celebrity.
and cut down from thence a branch with one cluster of grapes—The grapes reared in this locality are still as magnificent as formerly—they are said by one to be equal in size to prunes, and compared by another to a man's thumb. One cluster sometimes weighs ten or twelve pounds. The mode of carrying the cluster cut down by the spies, though not necessary from its weight, was evidently adopted to preserve it entire as a specimen of the productions of the promised land; and the impression made by the sight of it would be all the greater because the Israelites were familiar only with the scanty vines and small grapes of Egypt.
26. they came … to Kadesh—an important encampment of the Israelites. But its exact situation is not definitely known, nor is it determined whether it is the same or a different place from Kadesh-barnea. It is supposed to be identical with Ain-el-Weibeh, a famous spring on the eastern side of the desert [Robinson], or also with Petra [Stanley].
27, 28. they told him, and said, We came unto the land whither thou sentest us, and surely it floweth with milk and honey—The report was given publicly in the audience of the people, and it was artfully arranged to begin their narrative with commendations of the natural fertility of the country in order that their subsequent slanders might the more readily receive credit.
29. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south—Their territory lay between the Dead and the Red Seas, skirting the borders of Canaan.
Hittites … dwell in the mountains—Their settlements were in the southern and mountainous part of Palestine (Ge 23:7).
the Canaanites dwell by the sea—The remnant of the original inhabitants, who had been dispossessed by the Philistines, were divided into two nomadic hordes—one settled eastward near the Jordan; the other westward, by the Mediterranean.
32. a land that eateth up the inhabitants—that is, an unhealthy climate and country. Jewish writers say that in the course of their travels they saw a great many funerals, vast numbers of the Canaanites being cut off at that time, in the providence of God, by a plague or the hornet (Jos 24:12).
men of a great stature—This was evidently a false and exaggerated report, representing, from timidity or malicious artifice, what was true of a few as descriptive of the people generally.
33. there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak—The name is derived from the son of Arba, a great man among the Arabians (Jos 15:14), who probably obtained his appellation from wearing a splendid collar or chain round his neck, as the word imports. The epithet "giant" evidently refers here to stature. (See on Ge 6:4). And it is probable the Anakims were a distinguished family, or perhaps a select body of warriors, chosen for their extraordinary size.
we were in our own sight as grasshoppers—a strong Orientalism, by which the treacherous spies gave an exaggerated report of the physical strength of the people of Canaan.