Commentaria in Numeros
9. MOSES THEREFORE TOOK THE ROD, WHICH WAS BEFORE THE LORD—which had been laid up in the tabernacle. This rod was that of Moses, the worker of so many wonders, not that of Aaron which had blossomed: for that was only a sign of the priesthood assigned to Aaron, and was laid up near the ark of the covenant for the testimony of that matter: so some. But since it is certain that the rod of Aaron was laid up in the tabernacle, while it is not known what became of the rod of Moses, we shall here more surely understand the rod of Aaron, not of Moses.
11. AND WHEN MOSES HAD LIFTED UP HIS HAND AND STRUCK THE ROCK TWICE WITH THE ROD, THERE CAME FORTH WATER IN GREAT ABUNDANCE.—This rock and this striking are different from that of Exodus 17:6. For that was at Raphidim, near Sinai, in the second year; this at Cades in the fortieth year. Again, God here by Himself supernaturally brought forth waters from the rock, by changing the neighbouring air into water; but at Raphidim He drew out a subterranean vein of water into the stone struck by Moses, which, cleaving the stone, leapt forth from it, and that continually and without ceasing. For the cosmographers relate that at Raphidim this fountain of the rock struck by Moses endures, and the waters flow forth continually, says Abulensis. So Abbot Theodosius, having first made prayer, striking a rock with his staff, drew from it a fountain of perennial water, which by aqueducts watered a neighbouring monastery built by him in a dry place. This fountain afterward dried up when a bath had been built in the monastery; but when this was destroyed, it began to flow again. For as God does not fail His servants in necessities, so He does not overflow in superfluities; Theodoret is witness in the Philotheus, chapter 10.
Allegorically, the rock is Christ, 1 Corinthians 10:4; the water is spiritual grace flowing from Christ; the rod is the cross of Christ; it is struck twice, because the cross is two pieces of wood set across. Moses bears the type of the Jews: as therefore Moses, striking the rock with the rod, doubted the power of God, so that people, which was held under the law given through Moses, fixing Christ to the wood of the cross, did not believe Him to be the power of God: but as, the rock being struck, water flowed for the thirsty, and God was sanctified by it, so the Lord’s wound of the passion became life to believers; the cross
Verse 8.
Verse 9.
therefore draws forth water, a cause of contradiction to the unbelieving, of sanctification to believers, says St. Augustine here, Question 35, and book XVI against Faustus, chapter 15, and Rupert.
12. BECAUSE YOU HAVE NOT BELIEVED ME, TO SANCTIFY ME BEFORE THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL, YOU SHALL NOT BRING THESE PEOPLE INTO THE LAND WHICH I WILL GIVE THEM.
You will ask: what was this unbelief, or sin of Moses? Some answer first, that it was that he struck the rock twice, when he ought to have struck it once only.
Others, secondly, that, at the people’s request, he struck another rock than that which the Lord had designated; and that this is what Moses says: “Can we bring you forth water out of this rock?” (namely which you, O Hebrews, designate, not the Lord).
Others, thirdly, that he spoke, not to the rock, as the Lord had commanded, but to the people, rebuking and provoking them, calling them incredulous and rebellious: whence the people, being irritated, though they saw the miracle of the waters, did not sanctify the Lord by praising Him and giving Him thanks. So Abulensis, Theodoret, Oleaster, Lyranus; and this opinion is sufficiently probable. For it is hard and difficult to believe that Moses doubted the power of God, when he had so often experienced it in so many wonders.
Others, fourthly, that, being more excited and indignant at the murmuring people, he uttered ambiguously by way of question: “Can we,” etc., what he ought to have uttered absolutely and affirmatively, saying: “Rock, give waters”; and this is what is said of Moses in Psalm 105:33: “He distinguished with his lips,” that is, he uttered the words of God otherwise than they ought to have been uttered.
Fifthly, and this is the true view: the sin of Moses was that he, being now plainly growing old (for old men are easily stirred to bile, impatience, distrust and faint-heartedness), irritated and cast down by the new and unwonted murmuring of the people (for hitherto, from the second year to the fortieth, in which these things were done, we read of no murmuring of the people), struck the rock doubtfully: not that he doubted of God’s power, or His fidelity toward himself: for he himself, from zeal of faith, here charges the people with incredulity, and in much greater wonders wrought by him, and even in a similar striking of the rock at Raphidim, Exodus 17:6, he had believed God; but that he judged so rebellious a people, and one so provoking God, unworthy of this miracle, and therefore doubted whether God would do it, and whether He had truly promised it, or only by irony and sarcasm, or conditionally, namely if the Hebrews should cease to murmur and believe that God would give waters from the rock. Now, seeing them incredulous, he strikes the rock doubtfully, as though it were impossible or improbable that water should come out of the rock for so incredulous a people. For this doubt the words of Moses plainly signify: “Hear, ye rebellious and incredulous: Can we bring you forth water out of this rock?” What is clearer? But God had promised, not ironically nor conditionally, but truly and absolutely, that He would bring forth water from the rock, to quench the thirst both of the Hebrews and of their cattle. Again, the words of God to Moses and Aaron, verses 12 and 24, signify the same plainly: “Because you have not believed me.” They sinned, therefore, by some incredulity, doubt and distrust concerning the water promised by God. So St. Augustine, Question 19, Rabanus, Rupert, Cajetan and others. God permitted this fall of Moses, that, in so great a height of honour and virtues, he might remember that he was a man, that is, frail and weak, not an angel, not God. For “to have the memory of all things, and to err in nothing at all, belongs rather to divinity than to mortality,” says the Emperor Justinian. And that by his example the Saints, who have served God most diligently, especially prelates, may humble themselves, fearing, and saying to themselves: “He that thinks himself to stand, let him take heed lest he fall”; that they may go on working out their salvation with fear and trembling, as men uncertain of perseverance, even to the very last day of their life. In old age fell Solomon, wisest of mortals, Origen, Tertullian, Lucifer of Cagliari; what men and of what sort! Let us therefore pray without ceasing: “Now when I am old and grey-headed, O God, forsake me not.” This lamentable fall of Moses at the end of life teaches us this; which, though it was not a mortal fault, yet shut him out from the holy land so much desired. For death was imposed on him not so much by the sentence of God as by the necessity of nature failing and growing faint: for he was now in the hundred and twentieth year of his age. The same I say of Aaron his brother: for he was three years older than Moses. Both therefore ought soon to die; but God caused both to die before entrance into the holy land, now close at hand, because He had excluded both by sentence.
Secondly, God permitted this fall of Moses for an allegorical cause and signification, which was that God had in mind to appoint Josue successor of Moses, so that he, as a type of Jesus Christ, should lead the people into the promised land.
Allegorically, therefore, Moses bears the figure of the law, Josue of Christ; and so as Moses led the people out of Egypt, but Josue brought them into Chanaan, so the law frees believers from impiety, but Evangelical grace brings them into the kingdom of heaven. So Theodoret, Question 42 on Deuteronomy, and St. Augustine here, Question 53, who says: “When it is said of both brothers, Moses and Aaron, that they are to be added to their people, it is plain that they are not in the wrath of God, which separates from the peace of eternal fellowship. Whence it is made manifest that not only their offices but also their deaths were signs of things to come, not punishments of God’s indignation.” Where St. Augustine plainly signifies that this sin of Moses was light and venial, and therefore that death was to him not so much a punishment as a chastisement, which was rather a sign and signification of the future thing already mentioned: and this is altogether most probable.