Today, I am reading and commenting on  Numbers 14-15.

In yesterday’s passage Moses sent twelve men, one from each tribe, to explore the land of Canaan.  Ten of those explorers reported that while the land was indeed rich, the people living there were too powerful for the Israelites.  Caleb and Joshua disagreed.  The people were so frightened by what the other ten explorers reported that they began planning to appoint a leader to take them back to Egypt.  When Joshua and Caleb continued to argue that God could deliver the people of the land into their hands, the people started talking about stoning the two of them.  The people of Israel listened to their experts, to the people who knew the land they were about to enter.  Over 80% of those experts agreed invading the land of Canaan would be a bad idea.  When the remaining experts tried to explain what the other experts were overlooking, the people attempted to silence them for spreading “misinformation”.  The majority of the experts told them they should be afraid, so they were afraid.  They did not listen to the arguments Joshua and Caleb made as to why they should not be afraid and evaluate whether those arguments were valid or not.  Most of the time, the advice given by the majority of those who have studied the situation will be correct, but sometimes, as in this situation, they will be disastrously wrong.  You cannot tell which it is unless you listen to the arguments the dissenters make explaining why they disagree with the majority.

I use the daily Bible reading schedule from “The Bible.net” for my daily Bible reading.