The LORD asked Moses to send men to explore the land:
’Send thou men, that they may spy out the land of Canaan, which I give unto the children of Israel; of every tribe of their fathers shall ye send a man, every one a prince among them.’ And Moses sent them from the wilderness of Paran according to the commandment of the LORD; all of them men who were heads of the children of Israel. (Numbers 13:2–3)
שְׁלַח לְךָ אֲנָשִׁים וְיָתֻרוּ אֶת אֶרֶץ כְּנַעַן, אֲשֶׁר אֲנִי נֹתֵן לִבְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל, אִישׁ אֶחָד אִישׁ אֶחָד לְמַטֵּה אֲבֹתָיו תִּשְׁלָחוּ – כֹּל נָשִׂיא בָהֶם. וַיִּשְׁלַח אֹתָם מֹשֶׁה מִמִּדְבַּר פָּארָן, עַל פִּי ה' – כֻּלָּם אֲנָשִׁים, רָאשֵׁי בְנֵי יִשְׂרָאֵל הֵמָּה. (במדבר י"ג, ב-ג)
This description might fit the twelve tribal princes. Yet the military census at the beginning of Numbers, led by the tribal princes early in the second year after the exodus (1:1), lists entirely different names. Shortly after that census, on the twentieth of the second month of that year, Israel left Sinai (10:11), then reached the wilderness of Paran, from which the spies were sent (13:3). It is hard to suppose that all the princes were replaced in so short a time without the Torah mentioning it explicitly. “Every one a prince among them” therefore more likely refers to an eminent person of senior standing within the tribe, not necessarily its principal leader.
Abraham, for example, is called “thou art a mighty prince among us” (Genesis 23:6), and Zimri son of Salu, killed by Phinehas following the sexual misconduct with Midianite women, is described as “a prince of a fathers’ house among the Simeonites” (Numbers 25:14). The head of an ancestral house, the leadership level beneath tribal heads (see Numbers 36:1), can thus also be called a prince. The spies may therefore have been leading representatives of each tribe without being the tribal princes themselves.
Who were these men?
Apart from Caleb son of Jephunneh and Joshua son of Nun, who survived the plague (Numbers 14:37), we know nothing about them. Neither the spies nor their sons or fathers are mentioned again in the Bible. We cannot connect them with any known lineage or other event. This raises the question: why list their names?
Moreover, many names carry symbolic meanings strikingly suited to their mission and its consequences, suggesting deliberate literary choice. “Sodi,” “Sethur,” and “Nahbi,” for example, suggest secrecy, concealment, and hiding; “Shammua son of Zaccur” recalls the injunction to hear and remember; “Palti son of Raphu” evokes healing and escape; and “Vophsi” recalls the word marking the turn in the spies’ speech: “Howbeit [efes] the people that dwell in the land are fierce” (Numbers 13:28). Aggadic midrash indeed interprets their names in its own way, but in this case the plain meaning itself may invite us to read them as literary hints at the mission’s character and failure.
According to I Chronicles 7:26–27, Joshua son of Nun, sent for Ephraim, was the grandson of Elishama son of Ammihud, the tribal prince (Numbers 1:10). We also know that although Moses was the principal leader, Joshua rather than Moses actually commanded the force fighting Amalek (Exodus 17:9). Perhaps the tribal princes listed at the beginning of Numbers were the tribes’ older leaders, while the men chosen to explore the land were younger leaders who actually commanded each tribe’s military force, just as Joshua operated alongside Moses.
