6. “Yahweh our God spoke to us at Horeb, saying, ‘You have stayed long enough at this mountain.
7. Turn now and move on, and go into the hill of the Amorites and to all of the neighboring regions in the Jordan Valley in the hill country and in the Negev and in the coastal area along the sea, into the land of the Canaanites and into the Lebanon, as far as the great river Euphrates.
8. Look, I have set the land before you; go and take possession of the land that Yahweh swore to your ancestors, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give it to them and to their offspring after them.’
9. “And I spoke to them at that time, saying, ‘I am not able to bear you alone.
10. Yahweh your God has multiplied you, and look; you are today as the stars of the heaven in number.
11. Yahweh, the God of your ancestors, may he add to you as you are now a thousand times, and may he bless you just as he promised you.
12. How can I bear you by myself, your burden and your load and your strife?
13. Choose for yourselves wise and discerning and knowledgeable men for each of your tribes, and I will appoint them as your leaders.’
14. “And you answered me, and you said, ‘The thing you have said to do is good.’
15. And so I took the leaders of your tribes, wise and knowledgeable men, and then I appointed them as leaders over you as commanders of groups of thousands and commanders of groups of hundreds and commanders of groups of fifties and commanders of groups of tens as officials for your tribes.
16. And at that time I instructed your judges, saying, ‘hear out your fellow men, and then judge fairly between a man and between his brother and between his opponent who is a resident alien.
17. You must not be partial in your judgment; hear out the small person as also the great person; do not be intimidated by any person, because the judgment is God’s; and the case that is too difficult for you, bring it to me, and I will hear it out.’
18. And so I instructed you at that time concerning all of the things that you should do.
19. “Then we set out from Horeb, and we went through the whole of that great and terrible desert that you saw on the way to the hill country of the Amorites as Yahweh our God had commanded us, and so we came up to Kadesh Barnea.
20. I said to you, ‘You have reached the hill country of the Amorites that Yahweh our God is giving to us.
21. See, Yahweh your God has set before you the land; go up and possess it as Yahweh the God of your ancestors said to you; do not fear and do not be dismayed.’
22. “Then all of you approached me, and you said, ‘Let us send men before us, and let them explore the land for us, and let them bring back a report to us concerning the way that we should take and concerning the cities that we shall come to.’
23. The plan was good in my opinion, and so I took from among you twelve men, one from each tribe.
24. And they set out and went up into the hill country, and they went up to the wadi of Eschol, and they spied out the land.
25. They took in their hands some of the fruit of the land, and they brought it down to us, and they brought to us back a report, and they said, ‘The land that Yahweh our God is giving to us is good.’
26. But you were not willing to go up, and you rebelled against the command of Yahweh your God.