Numbers 14:36-45 comments: the Israelites go out presumptuously against the Amalekites and are defeated

 

Numbers 14:36 ¶  And the men, which Moses sent to search the land, who returned, and made all the congregation to murmur against him, by bringing up a slander upon the land, 37  Even those men that did bring up the evil report upon the land, died by the plague before the LORD. 38  But Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, which were of the men that went to search the land, lived still. 39  And Moses told these sayings unto all the children of Israel: and the people mourned greatly. 40  And they rose up early in the morning, and gat them up into the top of the mountain, saying, Lo, we be here, and will go up unto the place which the LORD hath promised: for we have sinned. 41  And Moses said, Wherefore now do ye transgress the commandment of the LORD? but it shall not prosper. 42  Go not up, for the LORD is not among you; that ye be not smitten before your enemies. 43  For the Amalekites and the Canaanites are there before you, and ye shall fall by the sword: because ye are turned away from the LORD, therefore the LORD will not be with you. 44  But they presumed to go up unto the hill top: nevertheless the ark of the covenant of the LORD, and Moses, departed not out of the camp. 45  Then the Amalekites came down, and the Canaanites which dwelt in that hill, and smote them, and discomfited them, even unto Hormah.

 

Rather than destroy the entire race of people God brought out of Egypt his plague of pestilence as mentioned in verse 12 is more limited in scope and includes all of the scouts who tried to discourage the people. Only Caleb and Joshua lived.  The people mourned and declared that they were ready to do God’s bidding but Moses told them that God would not be with them.

Still the Hebrews tried to go against the Amalekites and the Canaanites but God did not go with them. They got beaten pretty badly and were driven backwards.

Numbers 13:29  The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south: and the Hittites, and the Jebusites, and the Amorites, dwell in the mountains: and the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and by the coast of Jordan.