15. So I took the heads of your tribes, wise men, and known, and made them heads over you, captains over thousands, and captains over hundreds, and captains over fifties, and captains over tens, and officers among your tribes.
16. And I charged your judges at that time, saying, Hear the causes between your brethren, and judge righteously between every man and his brother, and the stranger that is with him.
17. You shall not respect persons in judgment; but you shall hear the small as well as the great; you shall not be afraid of the face of man; for the judgment is God's: and the cause that is too hard for you, bring it unto me, and I will hear it.
18. And I commanded you at that time all the things which you should do.
19. And when we departed from Horeb, we went through all that great and terrible wilderness, which you saw by the way of the mountain of the Amorites, as the LORD our God commanded us; and we came to Kadeshbarnea.
20. And I said unto you, you are come unto the mountain of the Amorites, which the LORD our God does give unto us.
21. Behold, the LORD your God has set the land before you: go up and possess it, as the LORD God of your fathers has said unto you; fear not, neither be discouraged.
22. And you came near unto me every one of you, and said, We will send men before us, and they shall search us out the land, and bring us word again by what way we must go up, and into what cities we shall come.
23. And the saying pleased me well: and I took twelve men of you, one of each tribe:
24. And they turned and went up into the mountain, and came unto the valley of Eshcol, and searched it out.
25. And they took of the fruit of the land in their hands, and brought it down unto us, and brought us word again, and said, It is a good land which the LORD our God does give us.
26. Nevertheless you would not go up, but rebelled against the commandment of the LORD your God:
27. And you murmured in your tents, and said, Because the LORD hated us, he has brought us forth out of the land of Egypt, to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites, to destroy us.
28. Where shall we go up? our brethren have discouraged our heart, saying, The people are greater and taller than we; the cities are great and walled up to heaven; and moreover we have seen the sons of the Anakim there.
29. Then I said unto you, Dread not, neither be afraid of them.
30. The LORD your God who goes before you, he shall fight for you, according to all that he did for you in Egypt before your eyes;
31. And in the wilderness, where you have seen how that the LORD your God bore you, as a man does bear his son, in all the way that you went, until you came into this place.
32. Yet in this thing you did not believe the LORD your God,
33. Who went in the way before you, to search you out a place to pitch your tents in, in fire by night, to show you by what way you should go, and in a cloud by day.