Deuteronomy 1:26–43

²⁶But you were unwilling to go up; you rebelled against the command of the LORD your God. ²⁷You grumbled in your tents and said, “Because the LORD hates us, He has brought us out of the land of Egypt to deliver us into the hand of the Amorites to be annihilated. ²⁸Where can we go? Our brothers have made our hearts melt, saying: ‘The people are larger and taller than we are; the cities are large, with walls up to the heavens. We even saw the descendants of the Anakim there.’”

²⁹So I said to you: “Do not be terrified or afraid of them! ³⁰The LORD your God, who goes before you, will fight for you, just as you saw Him do for you in Egypt ³¹and in the wilderness, where the LORD your God carried you, as a man carries his son, all the way by which you traveled until you reached this place.”

³²But in spite of all this, you did not trust the LORD your God, ³³who went before you on the journey, in the fire by night and in the cloud by day, to seek out a place for you to camp and to show you the road to travel.

³⁴When the LORD heard your words, He grew angry and swore an oath, saying, ³⁵“Not one of the men of this evil generation shall see the good land I swore to give your fathers, ³⁶except Caleb son of Jephunneh. He will see it, and I will give him and his descendants the land on which he has set foot, because he followed the LORD wholeheartedly.”

³⁷The LORD was also angry with me on your account, and He said, “Not even you shall enter the land. ³⁸Joshua son of Nun, who stands before you, will enter it. Encourage him, for he will enable Israel to inherit the land. ³⁹And the little ones you said would become captives — your children who on that day did not know good from evil — will enter the land that I will give them, and they will possess it. ⁴⁰But you are to turn back and head for the wilderness along the route to the Red Sea.^d”

⁴¹“We have sinned against the LORD,” you replied. “We will go up and fight, as the LORD our God has commanded us.” Then each of you put on his weapons of war, thinking it easy to go up into the hill country.

⁴²But the LORD said to me, “Tell them not to go up and fight, for I am not with you to keep you from defeat by your enemies.”

⁴³So I spoke to you, but you would not listen. You rebelled against the command of the LORD and presumptuously went up into the hill country.