But they presumed to go up to the heights of the hill country: See verse 40. Even though Moses told the Israelites not to invade Canaan, they defiantly did it anyway. The Hebrew verb rendered presumed means “be defiant” or “be presumptuous.”

Although neither the ark of the covenant of the LORD, nor Moses, departed out of the camp: The Covenant Box, Moses, and presumably a number of other obedient people remained in the camp. God did not approve of this military effort, so it was doomed to fail. For the ark of the covenant of the LORD, see the comments on 10.33; for camp see 1.50.

Quoted with permission from de Regt, Lénart J. and Wendland, Ernst R. A Handbook on Numbers. (UBS Helps for Translators). Miami: UBS, 2016. For this and other handbooks for translators see here .