Numbers 21:5

_AND THE PEOPLE SPAKE AGAINST GOD, AND AGAINST MOSES, WHEREFORE HAVE YE BROUGHT US UP OUT OF EGYPT TO DIE IN THE WILDERNESS? FOR THERE IS NO BREAD, NEITHER IS THERE ANY WATER; AND OUR SOUL LOATHETH THIS LIGHT BREAD._ Our soul loatheth this light bread - i:e., bread without substance or nutritious quality. The refutation of this calumny appears in the fact, that on the strength of this food they performed for 40 years so many and toilsome journeys. But they had been indulging a hope of the better and more varied fare enjoyed by a settled people: and disappointment, always the more bitter as the hope of enjoyment seems near, drove them to speak against God and against Moses (1 Corinthians 10:9)....

5._And the people spake against God and against Moses. _Either because they murmured against God in the person of Moses, or else because their impiety broke forth to such a furious extent, that they openly blasphemed against God; and this latter opinion is most in accordance with the words, because by their use of the plural number they accuse two parties together. (120) But, inasmuch as Moses had nothing separate from God, no one could enter into a contest with him without warring also against God Himself. Here, however, as I have said, their insolence proceeded still further, so as not only to rail against the minister, but to vomit forth also their wicked blasphemy against God Himself, as if He had injured them most grossly by their deliverance....

4-9 The children of Israel were wearied by a long march round the land of Edom. They speak discontentedly of what God had done for them, and distrustfully of what he would do. What will they be pleased with, whom manna will not please? Let not the contempt which some cast on the word of God, make us value it less. It is the bread of life, substantial bread, and will nourish those who by faith feed upon it, to eternal life, whoever may call it light bread. We see the righteous judgment God brought upon them for murmuring. He sent fiery serpents among them, which bit or stung many to death. It is to be feared that they would not have owned the sin, if they had not felt the smart; but they relent under the rod. And God made a wonderful provision for their relief. The Jews themselves say it was not the sight of the brazen serpent that cured; but in looking up to it, they looked up to God as...

Verse Numbers 21:5. _THIS LIGHT BREAD._] הקלקל _hakkelokel_, a word of excessive scorn; as if they had said, This innutritive, unsubstantial, cheat - stomach stuff....

THIS LIGHT BREAD - i. e. “this vile, contemptible bread.”...

EXPOSITION THE FIERY SERPENTS (Numbers 21:4). NUMBERS 21:4 THEY JOURNEYED FROM MOUNT HOR. It appears from comparison of Numbers 33:38 and Numbers 20:29 that their departure was not earlier than the beginning of the sixth month of the fortieth year. This season would be one of the hottest and most trying for marching. BY THE WAY OF THE RED SEA, _i.e; _down the Arabah, towards Ezion-geber, at the head of the Elanitic Gulf. Septuagint, ὁδὸν ἐπὶ θά_. _Not far from this place they would reach the

AND THE PEOPLE SPAKE AGAINST GOD,.... Who went before them in the pillar of cloud and fire, for leading them in such a way; that is, against Christ, as the apostle has taught us to interpret it, 1 Corinthians 10:9, and is no inconsiderable proof of the deity of Christ; and so the Targum of Jonathan paraphrases it, "and the people thought in their heart, and spake against the Word of the Lord,'' the essential Word and Son of God: AND AGAINST MOSES; his servant, for obeying the orders of the Lord, and leading and guiding the people as he directed him: WHEREFORE HAVE YE BROUGHT US UP OUT OF EGYPT TO DIE IN THE WILDERNESS? ascribing this equally to God and to Moses; using a strange word, as Aben Ezra calls it, being in a great passion, and not considering well what they said; showing great ingratitude for s

Numbers 21:1. _And when king Arad the Canaanite, which dwelt in the south, heard tell that Israel came by the way of the spies; then he fought against Israel, and took some of them prisoners. And Israel vowed a vow unto the LORD, and said, If thou wilt indeed deliver this people into my hand, then I will utterly destroy their cities. And the LORD hearkened to the voice of Israel, and delivered up the Canaanites; and they utterly destroyed them and their cities: and he called the name of the place Hormah. And they journeyed from mount Hor by the way of the Red Sea, to compass the land of Edom: and the soul of the people was much discouraged because of the way._ They were not allowed to go through the land of Edom, they had therefore to turn round, and go right away from the land where they one day hoped to dwell, and the road was a particularly trying one, over hot and burning sand

CHAPTER 21 Murmuring and Conquest _ 1. Opposition of King Arad (Numbers 21:1)_ 2. Murmuring and the fiery serpents (Numbers 21:4) 3. The serpent of brass (Numbers 21:8) 4. Journeying and singing again (Numbers 21:10) 5. Sihon and Og (Numbers 21:21) The first victory is here recorded. The Lord delivered Canaanites into the hands of Israel, and according to their vow they utterly destroyed them and their cities. But in spite of this victory the people became again discouraged because of the w

THE FIERY SERPENTS. This incident is alluded to by Paul in 1 Corinthians 10:9. The serpents are described as fiery by reason of the inflammation caused by their bite. The means whereby the injury they inflicted was remedied was perhaps originally an instance of sympathetic magic inverted (like the cure of a dog's bite by a hair of the dog), though in antiquity serpents were widely credited with healing virtues in general, and were by the Greeks associated with Asclepius. The writer of Nu. naturally assigns the cure of the snake-bite not to magic but to Yahweh (_cf._ Wis_16:5; Wis_16:7). It is held by several scholars that the present story is mainly an æ tiological legend (p. 134) to explain the practice of the serpent-worship recorded in 2 Kings 18:4. By our Lord the uplifting of the brazen