Numbers 14:11

THE EXCISION OF ISRAEL THREATENED AND AVERTED, Numbers 14:11-25.

11. Provoke me Vulgate, detrahet, slander; R.V., “despise.” The same Hebrew verb is in 2 Samuel 12:14, and Psalms 74:10, translated blaspheme, but the most common rendering is despise. Jehovah is jealous of his good name among men. The cowardice, distrust, and disobedience of Israel were a reflection upon his glory in the eyes of the Gentiles. He had set his name in Israel, and called him his “firstborn son,” (Exodus 4:22,) and thus identified his own reputation with that of this favoured nation.

Believe me Unbelief is the germ of all other sins. Hence its culpability. Mark 16:16; John 3:18; John 16:9, notes. To discredit God’s word is to detract from his reputation.

For all the signs God never requires faith without sufficient grounds. These were the supernatural plagues sent upon the Egyptians, the miraculous deliverance of Israel through the Red Sea, the manifestations of divine power and goodness in the manna, the smitten rock, the pillar of fire, and the grouping of all the sublimities of the physical world about the summit of Sinai at the giving of the law. The firmer the basis for faith the more culpable is unbelief.