Numbers 14:34

34 For forty years you will suffer for your sins -- a year for each of the forty days you explored the land. You will know me as your enemy.'

Numbers 14:34 Meaning and Commentary

Numbers 14:34

After the number of days in which ye searched the land,
[even] forty days
For so long they were searching it, ( Numbers 13:25 ) ; each day for a year;
reckoning each day for a year, forty days for forty years, as in ( Ezekiel 4:6 ) ; shall ye bear your iniquities, [even] forty years:
which number is given, being a round one, otherwise it was but thirty eight years and a half ere they were all cut off, and their children entered the land: and ye shall know my breach of promise;
God never makes any breach of promise; his covenant he will not break, nor alter what is gone out of his lips; men break their promises, and transgress the covenant they have made with him, but he never breaks his, ( Psalms 89:34 ) ; this should rather be rendered only, "ye shall know my breach"; experience a breach made upon them by him, upon their persons and families by consuming them in the wilderness: the Targum of Jonathan is,

``and ye shall know what ye have murmured against me;''

this same word is used in the plural in ( Job 33:10 ) , and is by the Targum rendered "murmurings" or "complaints"; and so the sense is, ye shall know by sad experience the evil of complaining and murmuring against me. The Vulgate Latin version is,

``ye shall know my vengeance;''

and so the Septuagint,

``ye shall know the fury of my anger''

which give the sense, though not a literal version of the words.

Numbers 14:34 In-Context

32 As for you, you will die in this desert.

33 Your children will be shepherds here for forty years. Because you were not loyal, they will suffer until you lie dead in the desert.

34 For forty years you will suffer for your sins -- a year for each of the forty days you explored the land. You will know me as your enemy.'

35 I, the Lord, have spoken, and I will certainly do these things to all these evil people who have come together against me. So they will all die here in this desert."

36 The men Moses had sent to explore the land had returned and spread complaints among all the people. They had given a bad report about the land.