Numbers 14:1-19

¹Therefore all the company cried, and wept in that night,

²and all the sons of Israel grutched against Moses and Aaron, and said, We would that we had been dead in Egypt, either that we were dead in this wilderness; we would that we perished,

³and that the Lord lead us not into this land, lest we fall by sword, and our wives and our free children be led, or taken, prisoners; whether it is not better to us to turn again into Egypt?

⁴And they said one to another, Ordain we a duke, or a leader, to us, and turn we again into Egypt.

⁵And when this was heard, Moses and Aaron fell down low to the earth, before all the multitude of the sons of Israel.

⁶And soothly Joshua, the son of Nun, and Caleb, the son of Jephunneh, which also compassed the land, rent their clothes,

⁷and they spake thus to all the multitude of the sons of Israel, The land which we compassed is full good;

⁸if the Lord is merciful to us, he shall lead us into it, and he shall give us the land flowing with milk and honey.

⁹Do not ye rebel against the Lord, neither dread ye the people of this land, for we be able to devour them so as bread; all their help hath passed away from them, the Lord is with us, do not ye dread.

¹⁰And when all the multitude cried, and would have oppressed them with stones, the glory of the Lord appeared upon the roof of the bond of peace, while all the sons of Israel saw.

¹¹And the Lord said to Moses, How long shall this people backbite me, or mis-deem me? How long shall they not believe to me, in all the signs which I have done before them?

¹²Therefore I shall smite them with pestilence, and I shall waste them; soothly I shall make thee prince upon a greater folk, and stronger than is this.

¹³And Moses said to the Lord, The Egyptians hear not, from whose middle thou leddest out this people,

¹⁴and the dwellers of this land, which heard that thou, Lord, art in this people, and art seen face to face, and that thy cloud defendeth them, and that thou goest before them in a pillar of cloud by day, and in a pillar of fire by night,

¹⁵that thou hast slain so great a multitude as one man, and say,

¹⁶He might not bring this people into the land for which he swore to give to them, therefore he killed them in wilderness;

¹⁷therefore the strength of the Lord be magnified, or made great, as thou hast sworn,

¹⁸The Lord is patient, and of much mercy, doing away wickedness and trespasses, and leaving no man unguilty, which visitest the sins of fathers into sons into the third and fourth generation,

¹⁹I beseech thee, forgive thou the sin of this thy people, after the greatness of thy mercy, as thou were merciful to them going out of Egypt till to this place.