Commentaria in Numeros
Chapter 11
The Hebrews murmur, and ask for flesh and the onions of Egypt: hence, verse 10, Moses is troubled and complains to God; and God, verse 25, divides his burden among seventy elders, who all prophesy. Finally, verse 31, God sends the people quails, but for their murmuring inflicts a plague on them; whence the place was called the Graves of Lust.
1. In the mean time there arose a murmuring of the people against the Lord, as if they were weary of their labour. And when the Lord heard it, he was angry. And the fire of the Lord being kindled against them, devoured them that were at the uttermost part of the camp. 2. And when the people cried to Moses, Moses prayed to the Lord, and the fire was swallowed up. 3. And he called the name of that place, The burning: for that the fire of the Lord had been kindled against them. 4. For the mixed multitude of people that came up with them burned with desire, sitting and weeping, the children of Israel also joining with them, and said: Who shall give us flesh to eat? 5. We remember the fish that we ate in Egypt free cost: the cucumbers come into our mind, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic. 6. Our soul is dry, our eyes behold nothing else but manna. 7. Now the manna was like coriander seed, of the colour of bdellium. 8. And the people went about and gathered it, and ground it in a mill, or beat it in a mortar, and boiled it in a pot, and made cakes thereof of the taste of bread tempered with oil.
9. And when the dew fell in the night upon the camp, the manna also fell with it. 10. Now Moses heard the people weeping by their families, every one at the door of his tent. And the wrath of the Lord was exceedingly enkindled; to Moses also the thing seemed insupportable, 11. and he said to the Lord: Why hast thou afflicted thy servant? Why do I not find favour before thee? And why hast thou laid the weight of all this people upon me? 12. Have I conceived all this multitude, or begotten them, that thou shouldst say to me: Carry them in thy bosom as the nurse is wont to carry the little infant, and bear them into the land for which thou hast sworn to their fathers? 13. Whence should I have flesh to give to so great a multitude? They weep against me, saying: Give us flesh that we may eat. 14. I am not able alone to bear all this people, because it is too heavy for me. 15. But if it seem otherwise to thee, I beseech thee to kill me, and let me find favour in thy eyes, that I be not afflicted with so great evils.
16. And the Lord said to Moses: Gather unto me seventy men of the ancients of Israel, whom thou knowest to be ancients and masters of the people; and thou shalt bring them to the door of the tabernacle of the covenant, and shalt make them stand there with thee, 17. that I may come down and speak with thee: and I will take of thy spirit, and will give to them, that they may bear with thee the burden of the people, and thou mayest not be burdened alone. 18. And thou shalt say to the people: Be ye sanctified; to-morrow you shall eat flesh, for I have heard you say: Who shall give us flesh to eat? It was well with us in Egypt. That the Lord may give you flesh, and you may eat, 19. not for one day, nor for two, nor for five, nor for ten, nor even for twenty, 20. but even for a month of days, till it come out of your nostrils, and become loathsome to you, because you have cast off the Lord, who is in the midst of you, and have wept before him, saying: Why did we come out of Egypt? 21. And Moses said: There are six hundred thousand footmen of this people, and thou sayest: I will give them flesh to eat a whole month: 22. shall then a multitude of sheep and oxen be killed, that it may suffice for their food? or shall all the fishes of the sea be gathered together to fill them?
23. And the Lord answered him: Is the hand of the Lord unable? Thou shalt presently see whether my word shall come to pass or not. 24. Moses therefore came and told the people the words of the Lord, gathering together seventy men of the ancients of Israel, whom he made to stand about the tabernacle. 25. And the Lord came down in a cloud, and spoke to him, taking of the spirit that was in Moses, and giving to the seventy men. And when the spirit had rested in them, they prophesied, nor did they cease afterwards. 26. Now there remained in the camp two of the men, of whom one was called Eldad, and the other Medad, upon whom the spirit rested; for they also had been enrolled, and were not gone forth to the tabernacle. 27. And when they prophesied in the camp, there ran a boy and told Moses, saying: Eldad and Medad prophesy in the camp. 28. Forthwith Josue the son of Nun, the minister of Moses, and chosen out of many, said: My lord Moses, forbid them. 29. But he said: Why hast thou emulation for me? Oh that all the people might prophesy, and that the Lord would give them his spirit!
30. And Moses returned, and the ancients of Israel, into the camp. 31. And a wind going out from the Lord, taking quails up beyond the sea, brought them and let them fall in the camp, for the space of a day’s journey, on every side of the camp round about, and they flew in the air two cubits high above the ground. 32. The people therefore rising up all that day and night, and the next day, gathered together of quails, he that did least, ten cores: and they dried them round about the camp. 33. As yet the flesh was between their teeth, neither had that kind of meat failed, when behold the wrath of the Lord being provoked against the people, struck them with an exceeding great plague. 34. And that place was called, The graves of lust: for there they buried the people that had lusted. And departing from the graves of lust they came to Haseroth, and abode there.
Verse 1. IN THE MEAN TIME THERE AROSE A MURMURING OF THE PEOPLE (the Hebrew is, and the people were murmuring evil; so also the Septuagint and Chaldee), AS IF THEY WERE WEARY OF THEIR LABOUR—from the fatigue of the journey, namely because they had marched three days continuously with little ones, beasts of burden and baggage. For “as if weary” the Hebrew is kemithonenim, that is, as if complaining of labour and pain. Hence it is plain that they did not so much murmur from real fatigue (for they walked slowly, and God strengthened them) as pretend it for their gluttony, and the pots of Egypt, as is plain from verse 5. Wherefore Vatablus renders: It came to pass, when the people complained of some trouble and pain, that the matter displeased in the ears of the Lord. For mithonenim, since it is Hithpael, signifies a reflexive action, namely of those grieving, that is, pleading grief; nay some, as Forster in his Lexicon, render mithonenim “lusting,” namely for flesh and onions, as is plain from verse 5. For the root anah signifies both lust and grief: for the former is the cause of the latter, as guilt is the cause of punishment. Others, as R. David, Pagninus, Mercer, render mithonenim “lying,” namely about fatigue and grief, when in fact they were not so much weary as lusting after the pots of Egypt, after their custom. Marinus renders “acting perversely.” Deuteronomy 8:4 favours this, where it is said: “Thy foot is not worn, behold this is the fortieth year.” Add that when these murmurers express the cause of their murmuring and grief, they do not name fatigue, but the lust for flesh and onions. “Who shall give us,” they say in verse 4, “flesh to eat?” etc. Finally others elsewhere render mithonenim not “grieving,” nor “weary,” but “murmuring,” that is pleading fatigue, when in fact they lusted after flesh. And so the Septuagint and our version render in Lamentations 3:39: “Why hath a living man murmured (Hebrew yithonen), a man for his sins?” as if to say: Why does a man murmur, by pleading and accusing the providence of God, as if it had predestined and decreed his ruin and perdition, when he ought to accuse his own sins, which are the true cause of each one’s perdition? Abulensis thinks that this murmuring happened in the fortieth year after the departure from Egypt: but it is far truer that it happened in the second year from the departure. For it happened soon after the departure from Sinai, at the thirteenth station: but the Hebrews departed from Sinai in the second year, second month.
Again, this murmuring happened on account of the manna; but the manna began to be given in the first year: therefore a little after it, namely in the second year, this murmuring occurred, when from continual eating of it they began to loathe it.