Miriam and Aaron Oppose Moses

¹Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Cushite woman whom he had married, for he had married a Cushite woman. ²And they said, “Has the Lord indeed spoken only through Moses? Has he not spoken through us also?” And the Lord heard it. ³Now the man Moses was very meek, more than all people who were on the face of the earth. ⁴And suddenly the Lord said to Moses and to Aaron and Miriam, “Come out, you three, to the tent of meeting.” And the three of them came out. ⁵And the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud and stood at the entrance of the tent and called Aaron and Miriam, and they both came forward. ⁶And he said, “Hear my words: If there is a prophet among you, I the Lord make myself known to him in a vision; I speak with him in a dream. ⁷Not so with my servant Moses. He is faithful in all my house. ⁸With him I speak mouth to mouth, clearly, and not in riddles, and he beholds the form of the Lord. Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?” ⁹And the anger of the Lord was kindled against them, and he departed.

¹⁰When the cloud removed from over the tent, behold, Miriam was leprous,1 like snow. And Aaron turned toward Miriam, and behold, she was leprous. ¹¹And Aaron said to Moses, “Oh, my lord, do not punish us2 because we have done foolishly and have sinned. ¹²Let her not be as one dead, whose flesh is half eaten away when he comes out of his mother's womb.” ¹³And Moses cried to the Lord, “O God, please heal her—please.” ¹⁴But the Lord said to Moses, “If her father had but spit in her face, should she not be shamed seven days? Let her be shut outside the camp seven days, and after that she may be brought in again.” ¹⁵So Miriam was shut outside the camp seven days, and the people did not set out on the march till Miriam was brought in again. ¹⁶After that the people set out from Hazeroth, and camped in the wilderness of Paran.

Spies Sent into Canaan

¹The Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ²“Send men to spy out the land of Canaan, which I am giving to the people of Israel. From each tribe of their fathers you shall send a man, every one a chief among them.” ³So Moses sent them from the wilderness of Paran, according to the command of the Lord, all of them men who were heads of the people of Israel. ⁴And these were their names: From the tribe of Reuben, Shammua the son of Zaccur; ⁵from the tribe of Simeon, Shaphat the son of Hori; ⁶from the tribe of Judah, Caleb the son of Jephunneh; ⁷from the tribe of Issachar, Igal the son of Joseph; ⁸from the tribe of Ephraim, Hoshea the son of Nun; ⁹from the tribe of Benjamin, Palti the son of Raphu; ¹⁰from the tribe of Zebulun, Gaddiel the son of Sodi; ¹¹from the tribe of Joseph (that is, from the tribe of Manasseh), Gaddi the son of Susi; ¹²from the tribe of Dan, Ammiel the son of Gemalli; ¹³from the tribe of Asher, Sethur the son of Michael; ¹⁴from the tribe of Naphtali, Nahbi the son of Vophsi; ¹⁵from the tribe of Gad, Geuel the son of Machi. ¹⁶These were the names of the men whom Moses sent to spy out the land. And Moses called Hoshea the son of Nun Joshua.

¹⁷Moses sent them to spy out the land of Canaan and said to them, “Go up into the Negeb and go up into the hill country, ¹⁸and see what the land is, and whether the people who dwell in it are strong or weak, whether they are few or many, ¹⁹and whether the land that they dwell in is good or bad, and whether the cities that they dwell in are camps or strongholds, ²⁰and whether the land is rich or poor, and whether there are trees in it or not. Be of good courage and bring some of the fruit of the land.” Now the time was the season of the first ripe grapes.

²¹So they went up and spied out the land from the wilderness of Zin to Rehob, near Lebo-hamath. ²²They went up into the Negeb and came to Hebron. Ahiman, Sheshai, and Talmai, the descendants of Anak, were there. (Hebron was built seven years before Zoan in Egypt.) ²³And they came to the Valley of Eshcol and cut down from there a branch with a single cluster of grapes, and they carried it on a pole between two of them; they also brought some pomegranates and figs. ²⁴That place was called the Valley of Eshcol,1 because of the cluster that the people of Israel cut down from there.

Report of the Spies

²⁵At the end of forty days they returned from spying out the land. ²⁶And they came to Moses and Aaron and to all the congregation of the people of Israel in the wilderness of Paran, at Kadesh. They brought back word to them and to all the congregation, and showed them the fruit of the land. ²⁷And they told him, “We came to the land to which you sent us. It flows with milk and honey, and this is its fruit. ²⁸However, the people who dwell in the land are strong, and the cities are fortified and very large. And besides, we saw the descendants of Anak there. ²⁹The Amalekites dwell in the land of the Negeb. The Hittites, the Jebusites, and the Amorites dwell in the hill country. And the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and along the Jordan.”

³⁰But Caleb quieted the people before Moses and said, “Let us go up at once and occupy it, for we are well able to overcome it.” ³¹Then the men who had gone up with him said, “We are not able to go up against the people, for they are stronger than we are.” ³²So they brought to the people of Israel a bad report of the land that they had spied out, saying, “The land, through which we have gone to spy it out, is a land that devours its inhabitants, and all the people that we saw in it are of great height. ³³And there we saw the Nephilim (the sons of Anak, who come from the Nephilim), and we seemed to ourselves like grasshoppers, and so we seemed to them.”

Why Should I Fear in Times of Trouble?

To the choirmaster. A Psalm of the Sons of Korah.

¹Hear this, all peoples!

Give ear, all inhabitants of the world,

²both low and high,

rich and poor together!

³My mouth shall speak wisdom;

the meditation of my heart shall be understanding.

⁴I will incline my ear to a proverb;

I will solve my riddle to the music of the lyre.

⁵Why should I fear in times of trouble,

when the iniquity of those who cheat me surrounds me,

⁶those who trust in their wealth

and boast of the abundance of their riches?

⁷Truly no man can ransom another,

or give to God the price of his life,

⁸for the ransom of their life is costly

and can never suffice,

⁹that he should live on forever

and never see the pit.

¹⁰For he sees that even the wise die;

the fool and the stupid alike must perish

and leave their wealth to others.

¹¹Their graves are their homes forever,1

their dwelling places to all generations,

though they called lands by their own names.

¹²Man in his pomp will not remain;

he is like the beasts that perish.

¹³This is the path of those who have foolish confidence;

yet after them people approve of their boasts.2 Selah

¹⁴Like sheep they are appointed for Sheol;

death shall be their shepherd,

and the upright shall rule over them in the morning.

Their form shall be consumed in Sheol, with no place to dwell.

¹⁵But God will ransom my soul from the power of Sheol,

for he will receive me. Selah

¹⁶Be not afraid when a man becomes rich,

when the glory of his house increases.

¹⁷For when he dies he will carry nothing away;

his glory will not go down after him.

¹⁸For though, while he lives, he counts himself blessed

—and though you get praise when you do well for yourself—

¹⁹his soul will go to the generation of his fathers,

who will never again see light.

²⁰Man in his pomp yet without understanding is like the beasts that perish.

The Mountain of the Lord

¹The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.

²It shall come to pass in the latter days

that the mountain of the house of the Lord

shall be established as the highest of the mountains,

and shall be lifted up above the hills;

and all the nations shall flow to it,

³and many peoples shall come, and say:

“Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord,

to the house of the God of Jacob,

that he may teach us his ways

and that we may walk in his paths.”

For out of Zion shall go the law,1

and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

⁴He shall judge between the nations,

and shall decide disputes for many peoples;

and they shall beat their swords into plowshares,

and their spears into pruning hooks;

nation shall not lift up sword against nation,

neither shall they learn war anymore.

⁵O house of Jacob,

come, let us walk

in the light of the Lord.

The Day of the Lord

⁶For you have rejected your people,

the house of Jacob,

because they are full of things from the east

and of fortune-tellers like the Philistines,

and they strike hands with the children of foreigners.

⁷Their land is filled with silver and gold,

and there is no end to their treasures;

their land is filled with horses,

and there is no end to their chariots.

⁸Their land is filled with idols;

they bow down to the work of their hands,

to what their own fingers have made.

⁹So man is humbled,

and each one is brought low—

do not forgive them!

¹⁰Enter into the rock

and hide in the dust

from before the terror of the Lord,

and from the splendor of his majesty.

¹¹The haughty looks of man shall be brought low,

and the lofty pride of men shall be humbled,

and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day.

¹²For the Lord of hosts has a day

against all that is proud and lofty,

against all that is lifted up—and it shall be brought low;

¹³against all the cedars of Lebanon,

lofty and lifted up;

and against all the oaks of Bashan;

¹⁴against all the lofty mountains,

and against all the uplifted hills;

¹⁵against every high tower,

and against every fortified wall;

¹⁶against all the ships of Tarshish,

and against all the beautiful craft.

¹⁷And the haughtiness of man shall be humbled,

and the lofty pride of men shall be brought low,

and the Lord alone will be exalted in that day.

¹⁸And the idols shall utterly pass away.

¹⁹And people shall enter the caves of the rocks

and the holes of the ground,2

from before the terror of the Lord,

and from the splendor of his majesty,

when he rises to terrify the earth.

²⁰In that day mankind will cast away

their idols of silver and their idols of gold,

which they made for themselves to worship,

to the moles and to the bats,

²¹to enter the caverns of the rocks

and the clefts of the cliffs,

from before the terror of the Lord,

and from the splendor of his majesty,

when he rises to terrify the earth.

²²Stop regarding man

in whose nostrils is breath,

for of what account is he?

Christ's Sacrifice Once for All

¹For since the law has but a shadow of the good things to come instead of the true form of these realities, it can never, by the same sacrifices that are continually offered every year, make perfect those who draw near. ²Otherwise, would they not have ceased to be offered, since the worshipers, having once been cleansed, would no longer have any consciousness of sins? ³But in these sacrifices there is a reminder of sins every year. ⁴For it is impossible for the blood of bulls and goats to take away sins.

⁵Consequently, when Christ1 came into the world, he said,

“Sacrifices and offerings you have not desired,

but a body have you prepared for me;

⁶in burnt offerings and sin offerings

you have taken no pleasure.

⁷Then I said, ‘Behold, I have come to do your will, O God,

as it is written of me in the scroll of the book.’”

⁸When he said above, “You have neither desired nor taken pleasure in sacrifices and offerings and burnt offerings and sin offerings” (these are offered according to the law), ⁹then he added, “Behold, I have come to do your will.” He does away with the first in order to establish the second. ¹⁰And by that will we have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all.

¹¹And every priest stands daily at his service, offering repeatedly the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins. ¹²But when Christ2 had offered for all time a single sacrifice for sins, he sat down at the right hand of God, ¹³waiting from that time until his enemies should be made a footstool for his feet. ¹⁴For by a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified.

¹⁵And the Holy Spirit also bears witness to us; for after saying,

¹⁶“This is the covenant that I will make with them

after those days, declares the Lord:

I will put my laws on their hearts,

and write them on their minds,”

¹⁷then he adds,

“I will remember their sins and their lawless deeds no more.”

¹⁸Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any offering for sin.

The Full Assurance of Faith

¹⁹Therefore, brothers,3 since we have confidence to enter the holy places by the blood of Jesus, ²⁰by the new and living way that he opened for us through the curtain, that is, through his flesh, ²¹and since we have a great priest over the house of God, ²²let us draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, with our hearts sprinkled clean from an evil conscience and our bodies washed with pure water. ²³Let us hold fast the confession of our hope without wavering, for he who promised is faithful. ²⁴And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, ²⁵not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.

²⁶For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, ²⁷but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. ²⁸Anyone who has set aside the law of Moses dies without mercy on the evidence of two or three witnesses. ²⁹How much worse punishment, do you think, will be deserved by the one who has trampled underfoot the Son of God, and has profaned the blood of the covenant by which he was sanctified, and has outraged the Spirit of grace? ³⁰For we know him who said, “Vengeance is mine; I will repay.” And again, “The Lord will judge his people.” ³¹It is a fearful thing to fall into the hands of the living God.

³²But recall the former days when, after you were enlightened, you endured a hard struggle with sufferings, ³³sometimes being publicly exposed to reproach and affliction, and sometimes being partners with those so treated. ³⁴For you had compassion on those in prison, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property, since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession and an abiding one. ³⁵Therefore do not throw away your confidence, which has a great reward. ³⁶For you have need of endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. ³⁷For,

“Yet a little while,

and the coming one will come and will not delay;

³⁸but my righteous one shall live by faith,

and if he shrinks back,

my soul has no pleasure in him.”

³⁹But we are not of those who shrink back and are destroyed, but of those who have faith and preserve their souls.