23. And when Yahweh sent you out from Kadesh Barnea, saying, ‘Go up and take possession of the land that I have given you,’ you rebelled against the command of Yahweh your God, and you did not believe him, and you did not listen to his voice.
24. You have been rebellious toward Yahweh from the day I have known you.
25. “And I lay prostrate before Yahweh through forty days, and through forty nights I prostrated myself, because Yahweh intended to kill you.
26. And I prayed to Yahweh, and I said, ‘Lord Yahweh, you must not destroy your people and your inheritance whom you redeemed in your greatness, whom you brought out from Egypt with a strong hand.
27. Remember your servants, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; you must not pay attention to the stubbornness of this people, to their wickedness and to their sin,
28. lest the people of the land from which you brought us out from there say, “Because Yahweh was not able to bring them to the land that he promised to them and because of his hatred toward them, he has brought them out to kill them in the desert.”
29. For they are your people and your inheritance whom you brought with your great power and with your outstretched arm.’