Numbers 14:37

37 that it was evil, were dead, and smitten in the sight of the Lord . (by saying that it was evil, were then struck by the Lord with a pestilence, or a plague, and died.)

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 For as I spake, so I shall do to all this worst multitude, that rose (up) together against me; it shall fail (they shall fail), and shall die in this wilderness.

36 Therefore all the men which Moses had sent to see the land, and which turned again, and made all the multitude to grouch against him, and depraved the land, (And so all the men whom Moses had sent to look over the land, and returned, and then had made all the multitude to grumble against him, and to despise the land,)

37 that it was evil, were dead, and smitten in the sight of the Lord . (by saying that it was evil, were then struck by the Lord with a pestilence, or a plague, and died.)

38 Soothly (only) Joshua, the son of Nun, and Caleb, the son of Jephunneh, lived, of all the men, that went to see the land (who went to see the land).

39 And Moses spake all these words to all the sons of Israel, and the people mourned greatly. (And Moses spoke all these words to all the Israelites, and the people greatly mourned.)