The Wilderness Years

and ADONAI sent out a wind which brought quails from across the sea and let them fall near the camp, about a day's trip away on each side of the camp and all around it, covering the ground to a depth of three feet.

The people stayed up all that day, all night and all the next day gathering the quails - the person gathering the least collected ten heaps; then they spread them out for themselves all around the camp.

But while the meat was still in their mouth, before they had chewed it up, the anger of ADONAI flared up against the people, and ADONAI struck the people with a terrible plague.

Therefore that place was named Kivrot-HaTa'avah [graves of greed], because there they buried the people who were so greedy.

From Kivrot-HaTa'avah the people traveled to Hatzerot, and they stayed at Hatzerot.

Miryam and Aharon began criticizing Moshe on account of the Ethiopian woman he had married, for he had in fact married an Ethiopian woman.

They said, "Is it true that ADONAI has spoken only with Moshe? Hasn't he spoken with us too?"ADONAI heard them.

Now this man Moshe was very humble, more so than anyone on earth.

Suddenly ADONAI told Moshe, Aharon and Miryam, "Come out, you three, to the tent of meeting."The three of them went out.

ADONAI came down in a column of cloud and stood at the entrance to the tent. He summoned Aharon and Miryam, and they both went forward.

He said, "Listen to what I say: when there is a prophet among you, I, ADONAI, make myself known to him in a vision, I speak with him in a dream.

But it isn't that way with my servant Moshe. He is the only one who is faithful in my entire household.

With him I speak face to face and clearly, not in riddles; he sees the image of ADONAI. So why weren't you afraid to criticize my servant Moshe?"

The anger of ADONAI flared up against them, and he left.

But when the cloud was removed from above the tent, Miryam had tzara'at, as white as snow. Aharon looked at Miryam, and she was as white as snow.

Aharon said to Moshe, "Oh, my lord, please don't punish us for this sin we committed so foolishly.

Please don't let her be like a stillborn baby, with its body half eaten away when it comes out of its mother's womb!"

Moshe cried to ADONAI, "Oh God, I beg you, please, heal her!"

ADONAI answered Moshe, "If her father had merely spit in her face, wouldn't she hide herself in shame for seven days? So let her be shut out of the camp for seven days; after that, she can be brought back in."

Miryam was shut out of the camp seven days, and the people did not travel until she was brought back in.

Afterwards, the people went on from Hatzerot and camped in the Pa'ran Desert.

ADONAI said to Moshe,

"Send men on your behalf to reconnoiter the land of Kena'an, which I am giving to the people of Isra'el. From each ancestral tribe send someone who is a leader in his tribe."

Moshe dispatched them from the Pa'ran Desert as ADONAI had ordered; all of them were leading men among the people of Isra'el.

Here are their names: from the tribe of Re'uven, Shamua the son of Zakur;