Numbers 32:1-42
32 And the sons of Reuben and the sons of Gad had a great deal of stock, very numerous; and they saw the Jaʽzer country and the Gilead country, and found the place was a place for stock.
2 And the sons of Gad and the sons of Reuben came and said to Moses and Priest Eleazar and the princes of the congregation
3 * “ʽAtaroth and Dibon and Jaʽzer and Nimrah and Heshbon and Elealeh and Sebam and Nebo and Beʽon,
4 the country Jehovah has defeated before the congregation of Israel, is a stock country; and your servants have stock.”
5 And they said “Please let this country be given to your servants as a property; do not take us over the Jordan.”
6 And Moses said to the sons of Gad and the sons of Reuben “Are your brothers to go into battle and you to sit here?
7 And why are you setting the hearts of the sons of Israel against going over to the country Jehovah has given them?
8 that was the way your fathers did when I sent them from Kadesh-Barneaʽ to see the country,
9 and they went up to Cluster Arroyo and saw the country, and set the hearts of the sons of Israel against the idea of going into the country Jehovah had given them;
10 and Jehovah was angry that day and swore
11 ‘The men that came up out of Egypt, from twenty years old up, shall not see the soil I swore to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, because they have not altogether followed me;
12 except Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenazite and Joshuaʽ the son of Nun, because they did altogether follow me.’
13 And Jehovah was angry with Israel and set them roving back and forth in the wilderness forty years, till all the generation that had done what displeased Jehovah were gone.
14 And here you are standing up as your fathers’ successors, a whole brood of sinful men, to add more to Jehovah’s anger against Israel,
15 because you turn back from following him and he will once again leave them in the wilderness, and you will ruin all this people.”
16 And they approached him and said “We will build sheepfolds here for our stock, and cities for our children;
17 * and we ourselves will arm and go under arms before the sons of Israel till we have brought them to their place, while our children stay in the fortified cities for fear of the natives;
18 we will not come home till the sons of Israel have each received his estate;
19 because we will not take estate with them on the further side of the Jordan, because our estate has come to us on the east side of the Jordan.”
20 And Moses said to them “If you do this thing, if you go armed before Jehovah to the war,
21 and every man of yours that bears arms crosses the Jordan before Jehovah till he dispossesses his enemies before him
22 and the country is subjugated to Jehovah, and afterward you go back, you shall be innocent as regards Jehovah and as regards Israel, and shall have this country for your property before Jehovah,
23 * but if you do not do so you will have sinned against Jehovah, and be sure your sin will find you out.
24 Build yourselves cities for your children and folds for your sheep and goats: you are to do what came out of your mouths.”
25 And the sons of Gad and the sons Reuben said to Moses “Your servants will do as my lord is ordering:
26 our children, our women, our stock, and all our beasts shall be there in the cities of Gilead,
27 and your servants, everyone that bears arms for service, will go over before Jehovah to the war as my lord states.”
28 And Moses gave Priest Eleazar and Joshuaʽ the son of Nun and the tribal heads of families of the sons of Israel orders for their case;
29 and Moses said to them “If the sons of Gad and the sons of Reuben go over the Jordan with you, everyone that bears arms, before Jehovah to the war, and the country is subjected to you, give them the country of Gilead for their property;
30 but if they do not go over armed with you, let them come in for property among you in Canaan.”
31 And the sons of Gad and the sons of Reuben answered “What Jehovah has stated to your servants, that same we will do:
32 * we ourselves will go over armed before Jehovah to Canaan, with the property of our estate on the other side of the Jordan vesting in us.”
33 And Moses gave them, the sons of Gad and the sons of Reuben and half the tribe of Manasseh the son of Joseph, the kingdom of King Sihon of the Amorites and the kingdom of King ʽOg of the Bashan, the country city by city, by the boundaries of the cities of the country all round.
34 And the sons of Gad built Dibon and ʽAtaroth and ʽAroʽer
35 and ʽAtaroth-Shophan and Jaʽzer and Jogbehah
36 and Beth-Nimrah and Beth-haran, fortified cities and folds for flocks.
37 And the sons of Reuben built Heshbon and Elealeh and Kirjathaim
38 ** and Nebo and Baal-Meʽon (names to be changed) and Sibmah, and named the cities they built.
39 And the sons of Makir the son of Manasseh went to Gilead and took it and dispossessed the Amorites in it.
40 And Moses gave Gilead to Makir the son of Manasseh and they lived in it.
41 And Jair the son of Manasseh went and took their havvoth [tent-villages] and called them the Havvoth of Jair.
42 And Nobah went and took Kenath and its dependencies and named it Nobah after himself.
Footnotes
^ 32:3 (Beʽon) Susp.
^ 32:17 Var. will go armed in haste before
^ 32:23 Lit. and know your sin that it will find you. Build
^ 32:32 Var. Canaan; and give us the property of our estate on the other side of the Jordan.” (without vesting in us) Conj. will do: we on our part will go over armed before Jehovah to Canaan, and do you on your part give us the property of
^ 32:38 Or (with their names changed)
^ 32:38 Var. built after themselves
