¹ tn Heb “Moses sent to spy out.”

¹ sn You are spies. Joseph wanted to see how his brothers would react if they were accused of spying.

¹ tn The word means “search,” but can be used for a wide range of matters, including spying.

¹ tn Heb “Joshua, son of Nun, sent from Shittim two men, spies, secretly, saying.”

² tn Heb “that you are not spies, that you are honest men.”

² tn Or “searched out.” The Hebrew word is used to describe the activity of the spies in “spying out” the land of Canaan (Num 13-14); cf. KJV “I had espied for them.”

¹ tn Here καί (kai) has been translated as “thus” to indicate the implied result of the plans by the spies.

² tn Heb “Is it not to explore the city and to spy on it and to overthrow it [that] David has sent his servants to you?”

¹ tn Heb “Surely the Lord has given into our hand all the land.” The report by the spies uses the Hebrew perfect, suggesting certitude.

¹ sn The Nephilim are the legendary giants of antiquity. They are first discussed in Gen 6:4. This forms part of the pessimism of the spies’ report.

¹ sn Zin is on the southern edge of the land, but Rehob is far north, near Mount Hermon. The spies covered all the land.

² tc Heb “Is it not to explore and to overturn and to spy out the land (that) his servants have come to you?” The Hebrew term לַהֲפֹךְ (lahafokh, “to overturn”) seems misplaced in the sequence. Some emend the form to לַחְפֹּר (lakhpor, “to spy out”). The sequence of three infinitives may be a conflation of alternative readings.

¹ sn Chapter 13 provides the names of the spies sent into the land (vv. 1-16), their instructions (vv. 17-20), their activities (vv. 21-25), and their reports (vv. 26-33). It is a chapter that serves as a good lesson on faith, for some of the spies walked by faith, and some by sight.

³ tn The verb translated here as “spy on” (κατασκοπέω, kataskopeō) can have a neutral nuance, but here the connotation is certainly negative (so F. F. Bruce, Galatians [NIGTC], 112-13, and E. Burton, Galatians [ICC], 83).

³ sn The term translated watched…closely is emotive, since it carries negative connotations. It means they were watching him out of the corner of their eye or spying on him.

¹ sn The term translated watched…closely is emotive, since it carries negative connotations. It means they were watching him out of the corner of their eye or spying on him.

² tn Heb “Our lives in return for you to die.” If the lives of Rahab’s family are not spared, then the spies will pay for the broken vow with their own lives.

² sn It is worth mentioning in passing that this is one of the Rabbinic proof texts for having at least ten men to form a congregation and have prayer. If God called ten men (the bad spies) a “congregation,” then a congregation must have ten men. But here the word “community/congregation” refers in this context to the people of Israel as a whole, not just to the ten spies.

¹ tn The meaning of the Greek word used here is uncertain. It may mean “spy, informer,” “revolutionary,” or “defrauder, embezzler.” But the most likely meaning is “busybody, one who meddles in the affairs of others, troublesome meddler.” The translation given in the text is intended to suggest this general idea.

¹ tn Heb “I have assigned for you that the years of their iniquity be the number of days.” Num 14:33-34 is an example of the reverse, where the days were converted into years, the number of days spying out the land becoming the number of years of the wilderness wanderings.