As Aaron spoke ¹  to the whole community of the Israelites and they looked toward the desert, there the glory of the Lord ²  appeared ³  in the cloud,

¹ The whole community ²  of the Israelites traveled on their journey ³  from the Desert of Sin according to the Lord’s instruction, and they pitched camp in Rephidim. ⁴  Now ⁵  there was no water for the people to drink. ⁶ 

all the rest of the bull ¹  – he must bring outside the camp ²  to a ceremonially clean place, ³  to the fatty ash pile, ⁴  and he must burn ⁵  it on a wood fire; it must be burned on the fatty ash pile.

which the Lord commanded Moses on Mount Sinai on the day he commanded the Israelites to present their offerings to the Lord in the wilderness of Sinai.

Later Moses sought diligently for the sin offering male goat, ¹  but it had actually been burnt. ²  So he became angry at Eleazar and Ithamar, Aaron’s remaining sons, saying,

but the goat which has been designated by lot for Azazel is to be stood alive ¹  before the Lord to make atonement on it by sending it away to Azazel into the wilderness. ² 

I will send the wild animals ¹  against you and they will bereave you of your children, ²  annihilate your cattle, and diminish your population ³  so that your roads will become deserted.

“‘Then the land will make up for ¹  its Sabbaths all the days it lies desolate while you are in the land of your enemies; then the land will rest and make up its Sabbaths.

¹ Now the Lord ²  spoke ³  to Moses in the tent of meeting ⁴  in the wilderness ⁵  of Sinai ⁶  on the first day of the second month of the second year after ⁷  the Israelites ⁸  departed from the land of Egypt. ⁹  He said:

and this water that causes the curse will go ¹  into your stomach, and make your abdomen swell and your thigh rot.” ²  Then the woman must say, “Amen, amen.” ³ 

¹ The Lord spoke to Moses in the wilderness of Sinai, in the first month of the second year after they had come out ²  of the land of Egypt:

And they observed the Passover ¹  on the fourteenth day of the first month at twilight in the wilderness of Sinai; in accordance with all that the Lord had commanded Moses, so the Israelites did.

They came back ¹  to Moses and Aaron and to the whole community of the Israelites in the wilderness of Paran at Kadesh. ²  They reported ³  to the whole community and showed the fruit of the land.

And all the Israelites murmured ¹  against Moses and Aaron, and the whole congregation said to them, “If only we had died ²  in the land of Egypt, or if only we had perished ³  in this wilderness!

For all the people have seen my glory and my signs that I did in Egypt and in the wilderness, and yet have tempted ¹  me now these ten times, ²  and have not obeyed me, ³ 

Your dead bodies ¹  will fall in this wilderness – all those of you who were numbered, according to your full number, from twenty years old and upward, who have murmured against me.

I, the Lord, have said, “I will surely do so to all this evil congregation that has gathered together against me. In this wilderness they will be finished, and there they will die!”’”

Is it a small thing ¹  that you have brought us up out of the land that flows with milk and honey, ²  to kill us in the wilderness? Now do you want to make yourself a prince ³  over us?

¹ Then the entire community of Israel ²  entered the wilderness of Zin in the first month, ³  and the people stayed in Kadesh. ⁴  Miriam died and was buried there. ⁵ 

And the people spoke against God and against Moses, “Why have you brought us up out of Egypt to die in the wilderness, for there is no bread or water, and we ¹  detest this worthless ²  food.”