וַתִּקְרְב֣וּן אֵלַי֮ כֻּלְּכֶם֒ וַתֹּאמְר֗וּ נִשְׁלְחָ֤ה אֲנָשִׁים֙ לְפָנֵ֔ינוּ וְיַחְפְּרוּ־לָ֖נוּ אֶת־הָאָ֑רֶץ וְיָשִׁ֤בוּ אֹתָ֙נוּ֙ דָּבָ֔ר אֶת־הַדֶּ֙רֶךְ֙ אֲשֶׁ֣ר נַעֲלֶה־בָּ֔הּ וְאֵת֙ הֶֽעָרִ֔ים אֲשֶׁ֥ר נָבֹ֖א אֲלֵיהֶֽן׃
Then all of you came to me and said, “Let us send agents ahead to reconnoiter the land for us and bring back word on the route we shall follow and the cities we shall come to.”
(The above rendering comes from the RJPS translation, an adaptation of the NJPS translation. Before accounting for this rendering, I will analyze the plain sense of the Hebrew term containing אִישׁ—in this case its plural form אֲנָשִׁים—by employing a situation-oriented construal as outlined in this introduction, pp. 11–16.)
When making a proposal, as here, a speaker typically provides a schematic sketch of the situation that the speaker hopes to achieve. Often that situation is defined by its essential participants, who are efficiently labeled as such via a situating noun. Hence this instance is a prototypical usage of אֲנָשִׁים as a situating noun.
The reference here is to a type, rather than to specific individuals. Hence the gender of the persons in view is not specified by the grammar (other than their being not solely womanly). That is, women are not excluded by the grammar. (It is purely for the sake of syntactic gender concord that the subsequent co-referential verbs have masculine inflections.)
Gender is not at issue. Rather, the focus is on the proposed task or function. The purpose clauses that follow the main clause clarify that the participants are to function as the people’s agents.
See further my comment at Num 13:2.
As for the translation, the NJPS “men” nowadays overemphasizes masculine gender. Because there is no warrant for rendering in gendered terms, the revised rendering is gender neutral. On the choice of term, see my comment at Num 13:2.