Numbers 14:1

The Israelites Respond in Unbelief

14:1 ¹ Then all the community raised a loud cry, ²  and the people wept ³  that night.

Numbers 14:39

14:39 When Moses told ⁴  these things to all the Israelites, the people mourned ⁵  greatly.

Hosea 7:14

7:14 They do not pray to me, ⁶ 

but howl in distress on their beds;

They slash themselves ⁷  for grain and new wine,

but turn away from me.

Zechariah 7:3

7:3 by asking both the priests of the temple ⁸  of the Lord who rules over all and the prophets, “Should we weep in the fifth month, ⁹  fasting as we have done over the years?”

Zechariah 7:5

7:5 “Speak to all the people and priests of the land as follows: ‘When you fasted and lamented in the fifth and seventh ¹⁰  months through all these seventy years, did you truly fast for me – for me, indeed?

¹ sn This chapter forms part of the story already begun. There are three major sections here: dissatisfaction with the reports (vv. 1-10), the threat of divine punishment (vv. 11-38), and the defeat of the Israelites (vv. 39-45). See K. D. Sakenfeld, “The Problem of Divine Forgiveness in Num 14,” CBQ 37 (1975): 317-30; also J. R. Bartlett, “The Use of the Word רֹאשׁ as a Title in the Old Testament,” VT 19 (1969): 1-10.

² tn The two verbs “lifted up their voice and cried” form a hendiadys; the idiom of raising the voice means that they cried aloud.

³ tn There are a number of things that the verb “to weep” or “wail” can connote. It could reflect joy, grief, lamentation, or repentance, but here it reflects fear, hopelessness, or vexation at the thought of coming all this way and being defeated by the Canaanite armies. See Judg 20:23, 26.

⁴ tn The preterite here is subordinated to the next preterite to form a temporal clause.

⁵ tn The word אָבַל (’aval) is rare, used mostly for mourning over deaths, but it is used here of mourning over bad news (see also Exod 33:4; 1 Sam 15:35; 16:1; etc.).

⁶ tn Heb “they do not cry out to me in their heart”; NLT “with sincere hearts.”

⁷ tc The MT reads יִתְגּוֹרָרוּ (yitgoraru) which is either (1) Hitpolel imperfect 3rd person masculine plural (“they assemble themselves”; so KJV, NASB) from I גּוּר (gur, “to sojourn”; BDB 157 s.v. I גּוּר) or (2) Hitpolel imperfect 3rd person masculine plural (“they excite themselves”) from II גּוּר (gur, “to stir up”; BDB 158 s.v. II גּוּר). However, the Hebrew lexicographers suggest that both of these options are unlikely. Several other Hebrew mss preserve an alternate textual tradition of יִתְגּוֹדָדוּ (yitgodadu) which is a Hitpolel imperfect 3rd person common plural (“they slash themselves”) from גָּדַד (gadad, “to cut”; BDB 151 s.v. גָּדַד), as also reflected in the LXX (cf. NAB “they lacerated themselves”; NRSV, TEV “gash themselves”; NLT “cut themselves.” This reflects the pagan Canaanite cultic practice of priests cutting themselves and draining their blood on the ground to elicit agricultural fertility by resurrecting the slain fertility god Baal from the underworld (Deut 14:1; 1 Kgs 18:28; Jer 16:6; 41:5; 47:5). Cf. CEV which adds “in the hope that Baal will bless their crops.”

⁸ tn Heb “house” (so NAB, NIV, NRSV).

⁹ sn This lamentation marked the occasion of the destruction of Solomon’s temple on August 14, 586 b.c., almost exactly 70 years earlier (cf. 2 Kgs 25:8).

¹⁰ tn The seventh month apparently refers to the anniversary of the assassination of Gedaliah, governor of Judah (Jer 40:13-14; 41:1), in approximately 581 b.c.