Комментарий к Бамидбар 14:8

'אם חפץ בנו ה, if the Lord has taken a liking to us. True, the goodness of the land depends in great measure on G’d taking a liking to us, as we know that this is a land which is constantly under G’d’s supervision so that disobedience to His laws will be promptly punished. All of this had been spelled out in Deuteronomy 11,12-13.

אם חפץ בנו השם, "If G'd delights in us, etc." They were clever to present G'd's attitude to the Israelites as something still doubtful. They did this in order to have a chance to finish what they had to say without hostile interruptions. They succeeded in this and the people waited with their attempt to stone them until after they had completed their speech. This is where we ought to ask why the Israelites did not try and stone them already at the beginning of their words seeing they said nothing different in the course of their speech than what they had said at the beginning. We must therefore assume that the conditional word אם at the beginning of Joshua's words gave the people hope that he too would come up with something negative before concluding what he had to say.

V. 8. אם חפץ וגו׳ und sein Besitz hängt nur davon ab, dass wir des göttlichen Wohlgefallens würdig bleiben. ארץ אשר היא וגו׳ drückt den ganzen Grad aus, in welchem sie über die Verlästerung des Landes empört sind. Sie haben das Land gesehen, es ist in Wahrheit, wie es ihnen immer verheißen worden: זבת חלב ודבש.