Numbers 14:37

37 these men who were responsible for spreading the bad report about the land were struck down and died of a plague before the LORD.

Numbers 14:37 in Other Translations

37 Even those men that did bring up the evil report upon the land, died by the plague before the LORD.

37 the men who brought up a bad report of the land--died by plague before the LORD.

37 were struck dead with a plague before the LORD .

37 all these men died. Having spread false rumors of the land, they died in a plague, confronted by God.

37 those men who spread the report about the land were struck down by the Lord.

Numbers 14:37 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 14:37

Even those men that did bring up the evil report upon the
land
They, and they only at this time: died by the plague before the Lord;
either by the pestilence immediately sent upon them by the Lord, or by a flash of lightning from him, or in some other way; however, by the immediate hand of God, and in his presence, being in the tabernacle of the congregation, ( Numbers 14:10 ) ; though the Jews differently relate the manner of their death; some say worms came out of their navels, and up to their jaws, and ate them and their tongues; and others that they came out of their tongues, and entered their navels, which they take to be a just retaliation for sinning with their tongues: and the time of their death they differ about; some say, as the Targum of Jonathan, that it was upon the seventh, and others that it was on the seventeenth of Elul or August they died ^F4.

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FOOTNOTES:

F4 Schulchan Aruch, par. 1. c. 580. sect. 2. Shalshalet Hakabala, fol. 7. 2.

Numbers 14:37 In-Context

35 I, the LORD, have spoken, and I will surely do these things to this whole wicked community, which has banded together against me. They will meet their end in this wilderness; here they will die.”

36 So the men Moses had sent to explore the land, who returned and made the whole community grumble against him by spreading a bad report about it—

37 these men who were responsible for spreading the bad report about the land were struck down and died of a plague before the LORD.

38 Of the men who went to explore the land, only Joshua son of Nun and Caleb son of Jephunneh survived.

39 When Moses reported this to all the Israelites, they mourned bitterly.

Cross References

• 1. S Numbers 13:32; 1 Corinthians 10:10; Hebrews 3:17
• 2. Numbers 16:49; Numbers 5:9; Numbers 26:1; Numbers 31:16; Deuteronomy 4:3