Numbers 11
1 The people complained, and it was evil in the LORD’s ears. The LORD heard, and his anger flared up; the LORD’s fire blazed among them and consumed the edge of the camp.
2 The people cried out to Moses. Moses prayed to the LORD, and the fire died down.
3 That place was named Taberah, because the LORD’s fire had burned among them.
4 The mixed crowd among them was seized with craving, and the Israelites also began to weep again and said, “Who will give us meat to eat?
5 We remember the fish we ate for free in Egypt, the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic.
6 But now our appetite is dried up; there is nothing at all, except this manna before our eyes.”
7 The manna was like coriander seed, and its appearance was like bdellium.
8 The people went about gathering it; they ground it in hand mills or crushed it in a mortar, cooked it in a pot, and made cakes from it. Its taste was like the taste of a cake made with oil.
9 When the dew fell on the camp at night, the manna fell on it.
10 Moses heard the people weeping, each clan at the entrance of its tent. The LORD’s anger blazed fiercely, and it seemed evil to Moses.
11 Moses said to the LORD, “Why have you treated your servant so badly? Why have I not found favor in your eyes, that you have laid the burden of all these people on me?
12 Was I the one who conceived all these people? Was I the one who gave birth to them, that you should say to me, ‘Carry them in your arms, as a nurse carries a nursing child,’ to the land you swore to their fathers?”
13 “Where am I to get meat to give all these people? They keep weeping before me, saying, ‘Give us meat to eat.’
14 I cannot carry all these people by myself; the burden is too heavy for me.
15 If this is how you are going to treat me, please kill me now, if I have found favor in your eyes, so I will not have to see my misery.”
16 The LORD said to Moses, “Gather for me seventy men from among Israel’s elders, whom you know to be elders of the people and their officials. Bring them to the tent of meeting, and have them stand there with you.
17 I will come down and speak with you there. I will take some of the Spirit that is on you and put it on them. They will share the burden of the people with you, so you will not carry it alone.
18 And say to the people, ‘Consecrate yourselves for tomorrow, and you will eat meat, because you wept in the LORD’s hearing, saying, «Who will give us meat to eat? How well off we were in Egypt!» The LORD will give you meat, and you will eat.
19 You will eat, not for just one day, or two days, or five days, or ten days, or twenty days,
20 but for a whole month, until it comes out of your nostrils and becomes repulsive to you, because you rejected the LORD, who is among you, and wept before him, saying, «Why did we ever leave Egypt?»’”
21 Moses said, “The people among whom I live number six hundred thousand men on foot, and yet you say, ‘I will give them meat, and they will eat for a whole month.’
22 Can flocks and herds be slaughtered for them and be enough? Or can all the fish in the sea be gathered for them and be enough?”
23 The LORD said to Moses, “Is the LORD’s hand too short? Now you will see whether what I say will happen to you or not.”
24 Moses went out and told the people the words of the LORD. He gathered seventy men from among the people’s elders and had them stand around the tent.
25 The LORD came down in the cloud and spoke with him. He took some of the Spirit that was on him and put it on the seventy elders. When the Spirit rested on them, they prophesied, but did not do so again.
26 Two men had remained in the camp; one was named Eldad and the other Medad. The Spirit rested on them—they were among those registered, but had not gone out to the tent—and they prophesied in the camp.
27 A young man ran and reported to Moses, “Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp.”
28 Joshua son of Nun, Moses’ assistant from his youth, answered, “My lord Moses, stop them!”
29 Moses answered, “Are you jealous for my sake? I wish all the LORD’s people were prophets, and that the LORD would put his Spirit on them!”
30 Moses returned to the camp, he and the elders of Israel.
31 Then a wind went out from the LORD and brought quail from the sea, scattering them over the camp. They covered an area a day’s journey on one side and a day’s journey on the other, all around the camp, and were about two cubits deep above the ground.
32 The people got up and gathered quail all that day, all night, and all the next day. The one who gathered the least collected ten homers, and they spread them out around the camp.
33 The meat was still between their teeth, before they had chewed it, when the LORD’s anger blazed against the people, and the LORD struck them with a very great plague.
34 That place was named Kibroth-hattaavah, because there they buried the people who had been seized with craving.
35 From Kibroth-hattaavah the people set out for Hazeroth, and they stayed at Hazeroth.
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