6. Moses said to the children of Gad and to the children of Reuben, “Will your brothers go to war, and you will dwell here?
7. And why would you discourage the hearts of the children of Israel from going over into the land which the Lord has given to them?
8. Thus your fathers did, when I sent them from Kadesh Barnea to see the land.
9. When they went up to the Valley of Eshkol and saw the land, they discouraged the hearts of the children of Israel so they would not go into the land which the Lord had given them.
10. And the anger of the Lord was inflamed on that day, and He swore, saying,
11. ‘Surely none of the men who came up out of Egypt, from twenty years old and older, will see the ground which I swore to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, because they did not completely follow Me,
12. except Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenizzite, and Joshua the son of Nun, because they completely followed the Lord.’
13. The anger of the Lord was inflamed against Israel, and He made them wander in the wilderness forty years, until all the generation that did evil in the eyes of the Lord was finished.
14. “Behold, you have risen up in your fathers’ place, an increase of sinful men, to increase more the burning anger of the Lord toward Israel.
15. If you turn away from following Him, He will again abandon them in the wilderness, and you will destroy all this people.”
16. They approached him and said, “We will build sheepfolds here for our livestock and cities for our children.
17. But we ourselves will be armed, ready before the children of Israel, until we have brought them to their place. Our little ones will dwell in the fortified cities because of the inhabitants of the land.
18. We will not return to our houses until all the children of Israel have inherited their inheritance.
19. We will not inherit with them on the other side of the Jordan or beyond, because our inheritance fell to us on this side of the Jordan to the east.”
20. Moses said to them, “If you will do this thing, if you will be armed before the Lord for war,
21. and all of you, each armed, will go over the Jordan before the Lord until He has driven out His enemies from before Him
22. and the land is subdued before the Lord, then after that you will return and be exempt before the Lord and before Israel, and this land will be your possession before the Lord.