3. "Ataroth, Dibon, Jazer, Nimrah, Heshbon, Elealeh, Sebam, Nebo, and Beon is
4. the land that the Lord struck down before the Israelite community. It is a land for livestock, and your servants have livestock."
5. They said, "If you approve our request, give this land to your servants as property. Don’t make us cross the Jordan."
6. Moses said to the Gadites and the Reubenites, "Should your brothers go to war, while you stay here?
7. Why would you destroy the Israelites’ resolve to cross into the land that the Lord gave them?
8. Your ancestors did this, when I sent them from Kadesh-barnea to inspect the land.
9. They went up to the Cluster ravine, saw the land, and destroyed the Israelites’ resolve to enter the land that the Lord had given them.
10. The Lord became angry on that day and promised,
11. ‘None of the persons that went up from Egypt, those 20 years old and above, will see the fertile ground that I promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, because they didn’t remain true to me,
12. except Caleb, Jephunneh the Kenizzite’s son, and Joshua, Nun’s son, because they remained true to the Lord.’
13. The Lord became angry with the Israelites and made them wander in the desert for forty years until the entire generation had died, which had done evil in the Lord’s eyes.
14. Now you’ve taken the place of your ancestors, a group of sinful men, to intensify the Lord’s anger against Israel.
15. If you turn away from him, he will turn away again to abandon Israel in the desert. Then you will destroy this entire people."
16. So they approached him and said, "We will build walled enclosures here for our livestock and towns for our children.
17. Then we will eagerly fight in front of the Israelites until we have brought them into their place. Our children will live in the fortified cities because of the land’s inhabitants.
18. And we won’t return to our homes until each one of the Israelites takes possession of his property.
19. We won’t inherit land with them there across the Jordan, because we’ve received our property on the east side of the Jordan."
20. Moses said to them, "Do this and fight before the Lord in war.