Hebrews 3:16

τίνες γὰρ ἀκούσαντες παρεπίκραναν : “For who were they who after hearing provoked?” He proceeds further to enforce his warning that confidence begun is not enough, by showing that they who provoked God and fell in the wilderness had begun a life of faith and begun it well. For the answer to his question is “Nay did not all who came out of Egypt with Moses?” They were not exceptional sinners who fell away, but all who came out of Egypt, the whole mass of the gloriously rescued people whose faith had carried them through between the threatening walls of water and over whom Miriam sang her triumphal ode. ἀλλά adds force to the answer, as if it were said, It is asked who provoked, as though it were some only, but was it not all? πάντες, for it is needless excepting Joshua and Caleb.