The necessities of this life are
frequently summed up under the phrase “bread and water”, to which we must add
“raiment” (I Tim. vi. 8). It will be
found that in the pilgrimage of Israel, type of the earthly walk of all the
Lord’s redeemed people, these three items come before us with some degree of
prominence.
“Water” figures at Marah in Exodus xv.,
and again at Rephidim in chapter
xvii. The question of the provision of
“bread” for the pilgrimage occupies the whole of the intervening chapter xvi. The
murmurers remember the flesh pots of Egypt and that they then did eat “bread to
the full” (xvi. 3), but the bread of Egypt must give place to the “bread of
heaven” for all those who walk the pilgrim’s way. It will be remembered that the hasty
departure of Israel out of Egypt led to the institution of a new kind of
bread:--
“And the people took their dough before it
was leavened” (Exod.xii.34),
and
this apparent accident was overruled to emphasize the lesson that the heavenly
pilgrimage cannot be sustained with the bread of Egypt, and so the new food
provided by God is called “bread from heaven” (Exod. xvi. 4). Psalm.lxxviii.25 calls this bread “angel’s food”. Manna, the name given to this bread from
heaven, first meets us in Exod. xvi.
15:--
“And when the children of Israel first saw
it, they said one to another, ‘It is manna’, for they wist not what it was.”
It is usual to explain the meaning of the
word “manna” by saying that it is the Hebrew word uttered by Israel as a
question, “What is this?”. The Hebrew
reads:--
“When the children of Israel saw it, they
said one to another man-hu for they
did not know mah-hu.”
The A.V. gives an alternative meaning in
the margin, reading:--
“Or what is
this? or it is a portion.”
The Hebrew word man signifies a portion or a gift.
Helen Spurrell’s translation reads, "It is the gift, for they knew
not its name". Aaron Pick in his Bible Students’ Concordance reads MANNA
MON, a gift. The marginal note in
Newberry’s Bible is man-hu, i.e., in Chaldee what is it? In
Hebrew it is an appointed portion.
Parkhurst quotes from Bates in Grit.
Heb. to the effect that:--
"The children of Israel said man-hu this (is) a particular species, a
peculiar thing, for they knew not what it was."
This comes under manah, “to distribute”, and so includes the word “kind” of Gen. i. 11, 12, etc., the idea referred to above of “species” and
also a distributed portion or gift.
Urquhart’s comment is:
"It is the name which has enshrined the
surprise and joy of deliverance from death … when it was picked up and tasted,
the words of Moses flashed upon them and the heart of Israel was swayed as the
heart of one man … ‘It is a gift’. It
was a happy title, and the Scripture thankfully records it."
We believe the meaning of the word manna
in Exodus xvi. is “It is a gift”, but seeing that the
commonly accepted rendering is fairly strongly held, we felt it necessary to
show the authority we have for departing from the traditional meaning. We notice that this bread from heaven was a
special provision for the wilderness:--
“Until they came unto the borders of the
land of Canaan” (Exod. xvi. 35).
“And the manna ceased on the morrow after
they had eaten the old corn of the land; neither had the children of Israel manna any
more” (Josh. v. 12).
During the days of our pilgrimage here the
Lord provides for our spiritual needs to suit the circumstances, but we are
ever to remember that when this life ceases, and we enter into the life to
come, the blessings and mercies of the days of our pilgrimage will appear small
when compared with the exceeding riches of grace and glory that shall then be
enjoyed. There is a sad addition to the
story of Exodus xvi. in
Numb. xi. 6:--
“But now our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all, beside this manna,
before our eyes.”
“This manna!” the gift of God, the bread
from heaven, angel’s food! To complete
the sad evidence against these people we read in Numb. xxi. 5:--
“Our soul loatheth this light bread.”
The word “light” means “exceedingly
light”, and the word “loathe” means “to be weary”, as Rebekah said:--
“I am weary of my life because of the
children of Heth” (Gen.xxvii.46).
It is a sad thing when the heart grows
weary of the Lord’s heavenly provision for His people, yet the same liability
to turn in heart away from Christ to the things that have been left behind is
not the malady merely of a past generation.
It is with us still. The man who
could say he counted all things loss did so because of “the excellency of the
knowledge of Christ”, and he could add:--
“This one thing i do, forgetting those
things which are behind, and reaching forth unto the things which are before, i
press . . . . .” (Phil. iii. 8-14).
Those, on the contrary, who said “there is
nothing at all besides this manna” and who eventually sank so low as to
“loathe” and call “contemptible” the bread from heaven, had prepared the way
for this rebellious spirit by an unholy remembrance. Unlike Paul, who forgot those things that
were behind, these said:--
“We remember the fish . . . . . the
cucumbers, and the melons and the leeks and the onions and the garlick” (Numb.xi.5).
They remembered the savouries, the tasty
morsels, and were not satisfied with the simple fare for the heavenly
pilgrimage: Is there no lesson here for
ourselves? They forgot the bitterness of
hard bondage which had caused the cry to reach heaven (Exod. ii. 23). This people said on another occasion:--
“Let us make a captain, and let us return
into Egypt” (Numb.xiv.4),
but
the inspired comment, given by Nehemiah, is:--
“In their rebellion they appointed them a
captain to return to THEIR BONDAGE” (Neh. ix. 17).
If at any time the old nature seeks to
turn the face of the pilgrim back to the world he has left behind, it will call
to remembrance the pleasures (the leek, the onion, the garlick), but will not
remind of the awful bondage and bitterness.
We are not left to the evident analogy of the type to show that the
manna set forth the Lord Jesus, for with unmistakable directness He Himself has
taught the lesson:--
“Our fathers did eat manna in the desert,
as it is written, He gave them bread from heaven to eat.” “Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness
and are dead. This is the bread which cometh down from
heaven, that a man may eat thereof and not die.” “I am the bread of life.” “This is that bread which came down from
heaven; not as your fathers did eat
manna, and are dead; he that eateth of
this bread shall live for the age” (John vi. 31, 48-50, 58).
Step by step we shall find Israel’s
history unfolding the all-sufficiency of the Son of God for all things. His one sacrifice as the great Passover was
all sufficient for our deliverance.
Identification with Him breaks the threefold dominion of sin, death and
law. His cross makes every Marah sweet,
and He, the great gift of God, supplies all our needs unto the very border of
the promised land. The experiences of
the Exodus are to be repeated in the near future. The sore judgments of the Revelation echo the
plagues of Egypt. In an earlier article
we saw that the crossing of the Red Sea was in its turn a type of the future,
and now we shall find that the miraculous supply of bread from heaven will be
repeated:--
“And to the woman was given two wings of a
great eagle, that she might fly into the wilderness, into her place, where she
is nourished” (Rev. xii. 14).
In our articles on The Sermon on the Mount we drew attention to a clause in the prayer
taught therein, viz., “Give us this day our daily bread”. “Daily” in Greek is epiousios, from epi =
upon, and ousios = coming. The true rendering of the prayer therefore
is, “Give us this day the bread which cometh down upon us”, i.e., the
manna. We read of “the hidden manna” in Rev. ii. 17. Some of
the manna which fell in the wilderness was placed in the ark.
“That they may see the bread wherewith I
have fed you in the wilderness, when I brought you forth from the land of
Egypt” (Exod. xvi. 32).
The overcomer in Pergamos was strengthened
by the fact that the God Who could sustain His children for forty years in the
wilderness could once again give all needed supplies both spiritual and
physical, and even though the edict should go forth that none should be allowed
to buy or sell who had not the mark of the beast, even then the Lord would
provide while witness was necessary.
Stored up in the Ark of the Covenant were
three precious witnesses of the fulness of Christ; (1) the unbroken tables of the law, speaking
of His perfect obedience, (2) the rod that budded, speaking of His undying
priesthood, and (3) the golden pot that had the manna, speaking of His faithful
provision throughout the whole of life’s pilgrimage:--
“Jesus said, ‘I am the bread of life: he that cometh to Me shall never
hunger; and he that believeth on Me shall
never thirst’.”
“Lord, evermore give us this bread” (John
vi. 34, 35).
No comments:
Post a Comment