Numbers 13:32

13:32 Then they presented the Israelites with a discouraging ¹  report of the land they had investigated, saying, “The land that we passed through ²  to investigate is a land that devours ³  its inhabitants. ⁴  All the people we saw there ⁵  are of great stature.

Numbers 14:14

14:14 then they will tell it to the inhabitants ⁶  of this land. They have heard that you, Lord, are among this people, that you, Lord, are seen face to face, ⁷  that your cloud stands over them, and that you go before them by day in a pillar of cloud and in a pillar of fire by night.

Numbers 21:34

21:34 And the Lord said to Moses, “Do not fear him, for I have delivered him and all his people and his land into your hand. You will do to him what you did to King Sihon of the Amorites, who lived in Heshbon.

Numbers 22:5

22:5 And he sent messengers to Balaam ⁸  son of Beor at Pethor, which is by the Euphrates River ⁹  in the land of Amaw, ¹⁰  to summon him, saying, “Look, a nation has come out of Egypt. They cover the face ¹¹  of the earth, and they are settling next to me.

Numbers 33:52

33:52 you must drive out all the inhabitants of the land before you. Destroy all their carved images, all their molten images, ¹²  and demolish their high places.

Numbers 35:25

35:25 The community must deliver the slayer out of the hand of the avenger of blood, and the community must restore him to the town of refuge to which he fled, and he must live there ¹³  until the death of the high priest, who was anointed with the consecrated oil.

Numbers 35:34

35:34 Therefore do not defile the land that you will inhabit, in which I live, for I the Lord live among the Israelites.”

¹ tn Or “an evil report,” i.e., one that was a defamation of the grace of God.

² tn Heb “which we passed over in it”; the pronoun on the preposition serves as a resumptive pronoun for the relative, and need not be translated literally.

³ tn The verb is the feminine singular participle from אָכַל (’akhal); it modifies the land as a “devouring land,” a bold figure for the difficulty of living in the place.

⁴ sn The expression has been interpreted in a number of ways by commentators, such as that the land was infertile, that the Canaanites were cannibals, that it was a land filled with warlike dissensions, or that it denotes a land geared for battle. It may be that they intended the land to seem infertile and insecure.

⁵ tn Heb “in its midst.”

⁶ tn The singular participle is to be taken here as a collective, representing all the inhabitants of the land.

⁷ tn “Face to face” is literally “eye to eye.” It only occurs elsewhere in Isa 52:8. This expresses the closest communication possible.

¹¹ sn There is much literature on pagan diviners and especially prophecy in places in the east like Mari (see, for example, H. B. Huffmon, “Prophecy in the Mari Letters,” BA 31 [1968]: 101-24). Balaam appears to be a pagan diviner who was of some reputation; he was called to curse the Israelites, but God intervened and gave him blessings only. The passage forms a nice complement to texts that deal with blessings and curses. It shows that no one can curse someone whom God has blessed.

¹² tn Heb “by the river”; in most contexts this expression refers to the Euphrates River (cf. NAB, NCV, NRSV, TEV, CEV, NLT).

¹³ tn Heb “in the land of Amaw” (cf. NAB, NRSV, TEV); traditionally “in the land of the sons of his people.” The LXX has “by the river of the land.”

¹⁴ tn Heb “eye.” So also in v. 11.

¹⁶ tn The Hebrew text repeats the verb “you will destroy.”

²¹ tn Heb “in it.”