Numbers 32:8

8 This is what your fathers did when I sent them from Kadesh-barnea to inspect the land.

Numbers 32:8 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 32:8

Thus did your fathers
Meaning not particularly and only the fathers of these two tribes he was speaking to, but of them and the other tribes also, who acted much such a part; did not choose to go into the good land to possess it, when they were bid to do it, but were for sending spies first, which brought an ill report of it, and discouraged the people from going into it; the history of which Moses here gives:

when I sent them from Kadeshbarnea to see the land;
called only Kadesh, ( Numbers 13:26 ) the reason of the name (See Gill on Numbers 32:13).

Numbers 32:8 In-Context

6 But Moses asked the Gadites and Reubenites, “Shall your brothers go to war while you sit here?

7 Why are you discouraging the Israelites from crossing into the land that the LORD has given them?

8 This is what your fathers did when I sent them from Kadesh-barnea to inspect the land.

9 For when your fathers went up to the Valley of Eshcol and saw the land, they discouraged the Israelites from entering the land that the LORD had given them.

10 So the anger of the LORD was kindled that day, and He swore an oath, saying,