16. § 4. The March Through the Wilderness Until the Giving of the Law on Sinai

§ 4. The March Through the Wilderness Until the Giving of the Law on Sinai The result of the former leadings of God is thus given in Exodus 14:31 : “And Israel saw that great work which the Lord did upon the Egyptians: and the people feared the Lord, and believed the Lord and His servant Moses.” The song in Exodus 15 is an expression of fear and of faith, with the love arising, therefrom. The same love is also attributed to the people in Jeremiah 2:2, “I remember thee, the kindness of thy youth, the love of thine espousals, when thou wentest after me in the wilderness, in a land that was not sown,” which must be regarded as having reference to the first time of the sojourn in the wilderness before the giving of the law on Sinai, on account of the mention of the youth and espousals which are replaced by marriage on Sinai. The whole behaviour of the people at the giving of the law also bears testimony to this love, the extreme readiness with which they promise to do everything the Lord may command. Then again, the great zeal in presenting the best they had for the construction of the sacred tabernacle.

It seems at the first glance that the people might now have been put in possession of the inheritance promised to them by the Lord; and so they themselves believed, as we see from their murmuring on every opportunity. But because God knew the disposition of human nature. He chose a different course. The state of almost entire estrangement from God was succeeded by one of temptation and trial, the necessity of which rests on the circumstance that the influence of Egypt was not limited to the surface, but had penetrated to the lowest depths.

It is expressly stated in Deuteronomy 8:2-5, the principal passage bearing on the subject, that temptation and trial formed the centre of the entire guidance through the wilderness: “And thou shalt remember all the way which the Lord thy God led thee these forty years in the wilderness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to know what was in thine heart, whether thou wouldest keep His commandments, or no.” The same thing appears also from the comparison of Christ’s sojourn in the wilderness; for its essential agreement with the guidance of Israel is indicated by the external similarity of time and place—the wilderness, and the forty years corresponding to the forty days. It is shown also by the history itself, which only comes out in its true light when we start from the idea of trial. And finally it is made manifest by the predictions of the prophets, who announce the repetition of the three stations—Egypt, the wilderness, and Canaan: Hosea 2:16; Ex. 20:34-38; Jeremiah 31:1-2. The first is complete bondage to the world, first as guilt and then as punishment; the second is trial and purification; the third is the induction into full possession of divine grace. But what is the nature of temptation? It presupposes that there is already something in man, that the fire of love to God is already kindled in him, and is the means which God’s love employs to strengthen and purify this love. First love is only too often, indeed always more or less, but a straw-fire. Sin is not quite mortified; it is only momentarily overpowered. The true rooting out of sin, the changing of the love of feeling and of phantasy into a heartfelt, profound, moral love, demands that sin should be brought to the light, that the inner nature of man should be perfectly revealed, that all self-deception, all unconscious hypocrisy should be made bare. True self-knowledge is the basis of true God-knowledge. From it springs self-hatred, the condition of love to God. We learn to know our own weakness, and are by this means brought closer to God. So also in temptation we learn to know God in the continuous help which He vouchsafes to us, in the long-suffering and patience that He has with our weakness, in the expression of His punitive justice towards our obduracy; and this knowledge of God forms the basis of heartfelt love to Him.

God proves in a double way—by taking and by giving. By taking. As long as we are in the lap of fortune, we readily imagine that we love God above everything, and stand in the most intimate fellowship with Him. While adhering to the gifts, the heart believes that it is adhering to God. God takes away the gifts, and the self-deception becomes manifest. If it now appear that we do not love God without His gifts, at the same time it becomes clear that we did not formerly love Him in His gifts. Again, in happiness we readily imagine that we possess a heroic faith. We say triumphantly, “Who shall separate us from the love of God?” But as soon as misfortune comes, we look upon ourselves as hopelessly lost. We place no confidence in God; we doubt and murmur. It is impossible to determine the character of our faith until we are tried by the cross. But just as Satan seeks to make pleasure as well as pain instrumental to our ruin, so God tries by that which He gives no less than by that which He takes. We are only too ready to forget the Giver in His gifts, we become accustomed to them, they appear to us as something quite natural; gratitude disappears, we ask “Why this alone? why not that also? “The heart which is moved to despair by the taking becomes insolent on the giving. God allows us to have His gifts in order to bring to light this disposition of the heart. The second station is, for many, the last. Many fall in the wilderness. But while a mass of individuals are left lying there, the church of God always advances to the third station—to the possession of Canaan. The state of purification is for them always a state of sifting. Ezekiel says, Ezekiel 20:38, “And I will purge out from among you the rebels, and them that transgress against me: I will bring them forth out of the country where they sojourn, and they shall not enter into the land of Israel: and ye shall know that I am the Lord.” In Ezekiel this appears as a promise. That which is a misfortune to individuals is a benefit to the church. The rooting out of obdurate sinners by trial is for the church what the rooting out of sin is for the individual. Let us now investigate somewhat more closely the locality of the temptation. Much light has been thrown on this subject by recent travellers, especially Burckkardt, Travels in Syria and the Holy Land, London 1822, in German by W. Gesenius, Weimar 1823; Rüffell, Reisen in Nubien, Kordofan, und dem Peträschen Arabien, Frankfurt 1838-40; Laborde, Voyage de l’Arable Pétrée, Paris 1830-34; Robinson, who does not, however, afford so much information here as on Canaan. The best summary is contained in the map of v. Raumer: Der Zug der Israeliten aus Aegypten nach Canaan, Leipzig 1837; comp. his Beiträge zur biblischen Geographie, Leipzig 1843, and the latest edition of the Geographe von Palästina, 1860. Then Ritter’s Erdkunde, 14ter Theil, die Sinai-Halbinsel, Berlin 1848. Close to the fruitful country on the eastern side of the Lower Nile, at a short distance from Cairo, the barren desert of Arabia begins, and extends from thence to the bank of the Euphrates. The Edomite mountains, extending from the Aelanitic Gulf to the Dead Sea, divide this desert into the Eastern Arabia Deserta and the Western Arabia Petraea. The latter is bounded on the north by the Mediterranean Sea and Palestine, on the south it runs out into a point between the Gulf of Suez and of Aila; and on the end of this point is Mount Sinai, in the language of Scripture, Horeb. This mountain has springs, luxuriant vegetation, and noble fruits, but north of it the country at once assumes a dreary aspect. First comes a barren and waterless plain of sand, then the mountain-chain et-Tih, and beyond it the dreadful desert et-Tih, occupying the greater part of the peninsula. Here bare chalk hills alternate with plains of dazzling white, drifting sand, extending farther than the eye can reach; there are a few springs, mostly bitter—not a tree, not a shrub, not a human dwelling. On the wide stretch from Sinai to Gaza there is not a single village.

Towards the east this waste table-land et-Tih sinks down into a valley fifty hours’ journey in length and two hours’ journey wide, which extends from the southern point of the Dead Sea to the Aelanitic Gulf; the northern half is now el-Ghor, the southern, el-Araba. In Scripture the name Araba is employed of the entire district. On the whole it is waste, yet not without a few oases. In this valley the Israelites had their principal camp during the thirty-eight years of exile. The Edomite range, which forms the eastern boundary, rises abruptly from the bottom of the valley, but on the other side it is only slightly elevated above the higher desert of Arabia Deserta. The country, where for forty years the Israelites were kept in the school of temptation, was in two respects better adapted to their object than any other; and in this choice we see clearly the divine wisdom. (1.) The land was a true picture of the state of the Israelites, and was therefore calculated to bring it to their consciousness. That this formed part of the divine plan is shown by the analogous sojourn of John in the wilderness. Although already in Canaan in the body—this is the virtual testimony of John—yet the nation is essentially still in the wilderness. They do not yet possess God in the fulness of His blessings and gifts. They are still in the barren wilderness, in the state of trial, sifting, and purification. But now the entrance into Canaan is at hand. Happy is he who does not remain lying in the wilderness. (2.) The Arabian desert was by its natural character peculiarly adapted to serve as the place of trial for a whole nation. Where natural means are in existence, God, who is also the originator of the natural world, makes them subservient to His purpose, and does not by miracles interfere with a nature, independent, and existing beside Him. In the trial by taking there was no necessity for any extraordinary exercise of power. The barren and waste desert gave opportunity enough. It also presented a natural substratum for the trial by giving, though less than might have been found elsewhere. This very circumstance, however, was specially adapted to God’s plan. By this means He manifested Himself the more clearly as the giver. He who tries no man beyond what he is able to bear, would not expect a nation still weak to recognise Him as the giver of those gifts which came to them in the ordinary course of nature. He gave them bread from heaven to teach them that the common bread also came from heaven. This mode of thought characterizes the lawgiver himself. In Deuteronomy 8:3 we read, “He suffered them to hunger, and fed them with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know; that He might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live.” Ewald says, “The desert is like the sea, exactly adapted, as it were, to remind man in the strongest way of his natural helplessness and frailty, teaching him at the same time to place a truer and higher value on those strange alleviations and deliverances which he often encounters so unexpectedly, even in the wilderness.” The beginning of the temptation occurred at the bitter waters of Mara. “The water,” says Burckhardt, “is so bitter that men cannot drink it, and even camels, unless very thirsty, cannot endure it.” This was the more felt by the Israelites, because they were accustomed to the excellent water of the Nile, highly lauded by all travellers. God might previously have deprived the water of its bitterness, but in this case Israel would neither have murmured nor have expressed gratitude; and the design was that they should do both, as long as they still retained their morbid temper of mind. The bitterness of their heart was to be revealed by the bitterness of the water. So also in its sweetness they were to become sensible of the sweet love of God towards them. The antithesis to the wood by which the water is here made sweet, is to be found in the Apocalypse, Revelation 8:10-11, in the wormwood which is thrown by God into the water of the world and makes it bitter. For His own, God makes the bitter water sweet; for the world, He makes the sweet water bitter. How far the means by which the water was made sweet were natural, and to be looked upon as a gift of God only as they pointed out that which had hitherto been unknown, we cannot determine. The present inhabitants, from whom Burckhardt and Robinson made inquiries, are not acquainted with any means of sweetening the waters, which still continue bitter; and the accurate researches of Lepsius led to just as little result. After God had helped the people by Moses, and had put their murmuring to shame, He gave them “a statute and an ordinance,” Exodus 15:25,—that is to say, He brought home to their hearts the truths which had been brought to light by these events, the condemnation attached to unbelief, and the unfailing certainty of divine help if they only walked in the way of God. Exodus 15:26 shows that the words are to be understood in this sense. The history will only gain its proper educating effect when it is rightly interpreted and applied by the ministers of the word. As the first temptation had reference to drink, the second was connected with food. This was natural. The carnal people who had taken such pleasure in the flesh-pots of Egypt must be attacked on their sensitive side. They could not yet be tempted by spiritual drought and spiritual hunger. God first allows their unbelief to appear in a very gross form, and then shames them by miraculous help, which is again a temptation. The Israelites had longed not only for Egyptian bread, but also for Egyptian meat. God showed that He was able to give them both, by granting them manna and quails on one and the same day; the latter merely as a token of His power. For the present, manna only was to be the permanent food of the people, lest by the too great abundance of the gifts they should be led to despise them. The quails disappeared after having served as their food for only one day, to be given to them afterwards, however, for a longer period.

It is well known that there is a natural manna in the Arabian desert. But this does not exclude the fact that in this manna the Israelites recognised the glory of the Lord, to use a scriptural expression, and were able to call it מן—present, gift of God; a name which afterwards passed over to the natural manna. For them it was bread from heaven. In Exodus 16:4 it is called “bread of the mighty ones,” and in Psalms 78:25, bread of the angels, i.e. bread from the region of the angels, or, as the Chaldee paraphrases it, “food which came down from the dwelling of the angels.” To make use of this natural manna to do away with the miracle, is nothing less than to throw suspicion on the miraculous feeding of the 5000, because of the fewness of the loaves and fishes which formed the natural substratum of it. According to Burckhardt, the quantity of manna now collected on the peninsula, even in the most rainy years, amounts only to 500 to 600 pounds. We must, therefore, ask with the apostles, ταῦτατίεἰςτοσούτους; In years which are not rainy scarcely any is to be found. But, on the other hand, we must take care not to follow the course recently pursued by v. Raumer and Kurtz, respecting the manna, who, in their fear of the worship of miracles, go beyond the statements of Scripture. We must enter somewhat more fully into these misunderstandings (with reference to the discussions in our work on Balaam). (1.) It has been often assumed, owing to a misunderstanding of Joshua 5:11-12, that manna was given to the Israelites, not only on the Sinaitic peninsula, but also in the trans-Jordanic country, and even during the first period of their residence in Canaan proper. But it is clear that the passage refers to a definite cessation, from the circumstance that the period of manna now definitively ceases, and is replaced by the period of bread. That it must be so understood follows from Joshua 1:11, and still more decisively from Exodus 16:35, where the inhabited land appears as the natural limit of the manna, which is spoken of as something already past. In Deuteronomy 8:2-3, Deuteronomy 8:16, the manna and the wilderness appear inseparably connected. It is thus certain that the manna did not follow the Israelites into Canaan. It even appears probable, from Deuteronomy 2:6, that manna was not given to them beyond its usual district, the Sinaitic peninsula. (2.) In accordance with the prevailing opinion, manna formed the sole food of the Israelites during the forty years’ sojourn in the wilderness, coming to them without any interruption, and always in the same abundance. But we are led to a contrary result, first, by the statements of the Pentateuch itself, from which it appears that the desert was the abode of many peoples, who found their sustenance in it, and further, by a consideration of the natural resources offered by the wilderness, which are expressly mentioned in Exodus 15:27. And we know from Deuteronomy 2:6-7, that they possessed pecuniary means which enabled them to procure by trade all that was necessary, as soon as they came into the neighbourhood of inhabited districts. The accounts of recent travellers, moreover, confirm the statements of the Israelites themselves, that the Arabian desert is rich in resources; and there are many indications that these resources were at one time considerably more abundant. Such indications are collected in my essay, Moses and Colenso, in the year 64 of the Evan. Kirchenzeitung, which enters minutely into the means of subsistence afforded to the Israelites in the wilderness. Notwithstanding all this, however, there must unquestionably have been times and places in which the maintenance of so large a multitude necessarily demanded extraordinary divine assistance, and at such times and in such places the Israelites received the gift of manna.

We only remark further, that Ehrenberg’s assumption, that natural manna is the honey-like secretion of a small insect, is now almost universally rejected. Wellsted, Lepsius, and Ritter, who have given us the most complete account of the manna, have declared against it. The opinion that the natural manna exudes from a twig of the manna-tamarisk is also subject to considerable suspicion. From the analogy of the biblical manna, which “the Lord rained from heaven,” according to Exodus 16:4, and which “fell upon the camp in the night with the dew,” according to Numbers 11:9, it seems more probable that the manna-tamarisk merely exercises an attractive influence upon the manna which comes out of the air, and that this latter is not absolutely connected with it. But we cannot follow those who do away with this connection between the natural and the biblical manna. We are led to uphold it from the circumstance that manna is not found in any part of the earth, except where it was given to the Israelites, and that the natural manna is found in the very place where the Israelites first received it, and finally from the identity of name. This connection is already recognised by Josephus. He relates that in his time, by the grace of God, there was a continuance of the same food which rained down in the time of Moses. The differences—among which the most important is that the present manna contains no proper element of nutrition, but, according to Mitscherlich’s chemical analysis, consists of mere sweet gum—prove nothing against the connection, since the same natural phenomenon may appear in various modifications. The giving of the manna—which served as a continual reminder to the nation that the milk and honey so abundant in the promised land were also the gift of God, a remembrance which was kept alive by the enjoined laying up of a pot with manna before the ark of the covenant in the Holy of holies—was also highly important in another aspect. It formed a preparation for the introduction of the Sabbath, which had hitherto not been generally observed among the Israelites. The gathering of a double portion on Friday, mentioned in Exodus 16:22-30, and the gathering of none on the Sabbath, were not a result of caprice on the part of the people, as the defenders of the pre-Mosaic observance of the Sabbath have falsely assumed. The people gathered on each occasion as much manna as had fallen; and by the decree of God this sufficed for their wants. On Friday there was unexpectedly so much, that double the usual portion could be gathered. Amazed, the elders of the people hasten to Moses and ask him what is to be done with this superabundance. He tells them that it must serve for the following day also, on which, as the day holy to the Lord, no manna would fall. Taken in this sense, the event stands in remarkable parallel with another: the command to eat unleavened bread was not given to the people at the first passover, but, contrary to expectation, God so disposed events that they were obliged to eat unleavened bread against their will. This divine institution served as a sanction to the Mosaic arrangement for the later celebration of the feast. In a similar way God hallowed the Sabbath before allowing the command to hallow it to reach the nation through Moses. He took from them the possibility of work on the Sabbath, to show them that in future they must abstain from it voluntarily. At the same time He made them understand that it was not designed to injure their bodily health. By the circumstance that a double portion was given on Friday, and that those who were disobedient to the word of God and went out on the Sabbath to collect manna, found nothing, it was made evident that God’s blessing on the six days of acquisition may suffice for the seventh; and that he is left destitute who selfishly and greedily tries to snatch from God the seventh day also, and to use it for his own ends. The Lord, it is said, gives you the Sabbath. Here the Sabbath already appears not as a burden but as a pleasure, Isaiah 58:13, as a precious privilege which God gives to His people. To be able to rest without anxiety,—to rest to the Lord and in the Lord,—what a consolation in our toil and travail on the earth which the Lord has cursed! But just because the day of rest is a love-gift of the merciful God, contempt of it is the more heavily avenged. We cannot assume that with this event the Sabbath received its full meaning among Israel. It certainly implies the observance of the Sabbath, but in this connection only with reference to the gathering and preparation of the manna. The injunction of a comprehensive observance of the Sabbath first went forth on Mount Sinai. The Sabbath could only unfold its benignant power in connection with a series of divine ordinances. It is significant only as a link in a chain. But, since the Sabbath is here actually hallowed, it is the proper place to speak of its design and significance, to which so much importance is attributed in the Old Testament economy. The whole idea of the Sabbath is expressed in the Mosaic “God hallowed the Sabbath,” and “Remember the Sabbath, to keep it holy.” From this it is plain that the observance of the Sabbath did not consist in idle rest, which is proved also by the fact that not only was a special sacrifice presented on the Sabbath, comp. Numbers 28:9-10, but also a holy assembly was held, Leviticus 23:3; a fact which has been quite overlooked by Bähr, who makes the observance to consist in mere rest. Let us enter somewhat more fully into this passage. Jewish scholars, beginning with Josephus and Philo, have justly regarded this verse as the first origin of synagogues. In the wilderness, the national sanctuary was the natural place for holy assemblies on the Sabbath. After the occupation of the land, assemblies for divine worship were formed in different places on the authority of this passage alone. From 2 Kings 4:23 we learn that on the Sabbaths those who were piously disposed among the twelve tribes gathered round the prophets. In the central divine worship the sacrifices to be presented on the Sabbath formed the nucleus for these sacred assemblies. The natural accompaniment of sacrifice is prayer, by which it is interpreted and inspired. Even in patriarchal times invocation of the Lord went hand in hand with sacrifice; and we are led to the conclusion that sacred song was also associated with it, from the fact that among the Psalms we find one (Psalms 92) which, according to its superscription and contents, was specially designed for the Sabbath-day. And the reading of the law must unquestionably have formed part of the service, if we judge from the significance attributed to it in the law itself; which could not fail to be soon followed by exposition and application. Only the presentation of sacrifice, however, was limited to the national sanctuary; no such limits were set to other acts of worship. So much for Leviticus 23:3. We now return to the exposition of those Mosaic passages which treat of the hallowing of the Sabbath. In accordance with the prevailing idea attached to hallowing, to hallow the seventh day can only mean “to consecrate it to God in every respect.” That day alone can be truly consecrated to the holy God on which we consecrate ourselves to Him, withdraw ourselves completely from the world, with its occupations and pleasures, in order to give ourselves to Him with our whole soul, and to partake of His life. The people, only too ready to be satisfied with mere outward observance of the Sabbath, were continually reminded of this, the true meaning of consecration, by the prophets, whom Moses himself had raised to be the legal expositors of the law. Isaiah, in his discourse on entering upon office, Isaiah 1:13, declares that the mere outward observance of the Sabbath is an abomination to God. He gives a positive definition of the true hallowing of the Sabbath in Isaiah 58:13 : “If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy pleasure on my holy day; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord, honourable; and shalt honour Him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words.” Doing thine own pleasure and thine own ways is here placed in opposition to the “keeping holy;” and their “own pleasure” he employs in its full extent and meaning, making it inclusive of the speaking of words, i.e. of such words as are nothing more than words, and tend neither to the honour of God nor to the edification of themselves and their neighbours—idle words. He insists so strongly on the inward disposition of mind, that he makes it a requisition that the Sabbath shall not be regarded as a heavy burden by which a man is taken away from his own work against his will, but as a gain, as a merciful privilege which God, whose commands are so many promises, gives to His own people as a refuge from the distractions and cares of the world. Moreover, Ezekiel says repeatedly in Ezekiel 20, of the Israelites in the wilderness, that they grossly polluted the Sabbath of the Lord. There is no mention in the Pentateuch of the neglect of the outward rest of the Sabbath; on the contrary, Numbers 15:32 sqq. shows that it was strictly observed. The prophet can, therefore, only have reference to the desecration of the Sabbath by sin.

These remarks suffice to explain the main design of the institution of the Sabbath. It was the condition of the existence of the church of God. Human weakness, only too apt to forget its duties towards God, requires definite, regularly-recurring times devoted to the fulfilment of these duties only, setting aside all external hindrances. In order that the people might be enabled to observe every day as a day of the Lord, on one definite, regularly-recurring day they were deprived of everything that was calculated to disturb devotion. Ewald justly characterizes the Sabbath as “the corrective of the people of God.” Their business is to be holy, to live purely to the “Holy One:” “Be ye holy,” is already in the Pentateuch set forth as an indispensable requirement, “for I am holy.” But amid a life of toil and trouble the church cannot comply with this demand, unless with the help of regularly-recurring times of introspection, of assembly, and of edification. Among all the nations of antiquity Israel stands alone as a religious nation; in them alone religion manifests itself as an absolutely determining power. This, its high destination, its world-historical significance, it could only realize by the institution of the Sabbath. In the divine law, in the command relating to the Sabbath, after the general meaning of consecration had been set forth, among all the particulars included in it, rest alone is made primarily prominent and copiously developed. The religious day of the Old Testament also bears the name of rest. שַׁבָּת, an intensive form, means wholly resting, a day of rest. This leads us to the fact that rest is of the highest importance for the observance of the Lord’s day, and especially for life in God, and for the existence of the church. Incessant work makes man dull and lifeless, and destroys his susceptibility for salvation. According to Exodus 31:13-17, the Sabbath is intended as a sign between God and His people; on the side of God, who instituted the Sabbath, a symbol of His election; on the side of the chosen, a confession to God—an oasis in the wilderness of the world’s indifference to its Creator, of the non-attestation of God to the world; a nation serving God in spirit and in truth, whose beautiful worship was entrusted to them by God Himself. From the definition of the nature of the observance of the Sabbath under the Old Testament it follows that, by virtue of its essence, it must be eternal, and is an exemplification of what our Lord says in Matthew 5:18. We, too, must consecrate ourselves to God; and in order to do this daily and hourly, in the midst of our work, we also must have regularly-recurring days of freedom from all occupation and distraction, for the weakness which made this a necessity under the Old Testament is common to human nature at all times. We, too, must make public confession to God. But just as the whole Mosaic law is a particular application of an eternal idea to a definite people, so it is also with the command relating to the Sabbath. Therefore, side by side with the eternal moment, it must contain a temporal moment. This consists mainly in the following points:—(1.) The truths laid down as subjects of meditation for the Old Testament nation and for us, on the Lord’s day, are various. Devotion has always reference to God as He has revealed Himself. Under the Old Testament it conceived of God as the Creator of the world and the Deliverer of Israel out of Egypt. The latter is set forth in Deuteronomy 5:12-15 as a subject of meditation in the observance of the Sabbath, Afterwards the subject became more extended, even under the Old Testament itself, by each new benefit of God, every new revelation of His nature. But the nucleus remained always the same. Nothing which occurred had power to supersede these two notions of God. Under the New Testament an essential change took place. God in Christ, this was now the great object of devotion. (2.) And with this the change of day is closely connected. The day on which the creation was ended, was now naturally superseded by the day on which redemption was fulfilled. The religious day of the Old Testament can only be the κυριακῇ ἡμέρᾳ, Revelation 1:10. (3.) The punishments attached to the neglect of the command respecting the Sabbath bear a specific Old Testament character: he who desecrates the Sabbath shall die the death. The punishments contained in the Mosaic law are essentially distinct from its commands. Their severity is in a great measure based on the presupposition of the weakness and spiritual lifelessness of the Old Covenant. But since Christ appeared in the flesh, and chiefly since He accomplished eternal redemption, since He poured out His Spirit upon flesh, the church is released from the necessity of dealing so roughly with the sinner—a necessity imposed upon it by sin. (4.) Nor can the details of the legal determination respecting the observance itself be transmitted unconditionally to the Christian church. This is evident from the command to kindle no fire, which had its foundation in the climatic relations peculiar to that nation to whom it was first of all given. Briefly, to sum up the matter, the law concerning the Sabbath was expressly given to Israel alone, and hence in the letter it is binding upon them only; but, because it was given by God, it must contain a germ which forms the foundation of a law binding upon us also. Of the spirit of the command respecting the Sabbath, not a jot or a tittle can perish. What belongs to the kernel and what to the shell must be determined from the general relations which the Old and the New Testament bear to one another. That which cannot be reduced to anything peculiar to the Old Testament must retain its authority for us also. A new temptation followed in the lack of water. The people had by their own fault neglected to drink of the spiritual rock which followed them, 1 Corinthians 10:4; therefore they were unable to rise to the belief that God would assuage their bodily thirst. When for a moment they lost sight of the outward signs of God’s presence, they ask, “Is Jehovah in our midst, or not?” An actual answer to the question was given in the water from the rock. The name of the place served for a perpetual memorial of the weakness with which they succumbed to the temptation, as a perpetual accusation against human nature, which is prone to quarrelling and contention, and as a warning to be on their guard against it. The fact is of importance, in so far as it gave rise to the first actual revolt of the people who had so shortly before beheld the glorious acts of God. And this circumstance explains the emphatically warning reference to the event contained in Psalms 81:8.

Formerly Israel had been tempted by hunger and thirst; now they are tempted by fear. They are attacked by the Amalekites. Here they are taught how Israel conquers only as Israel, how they can conquer men only in conquering God, and this by a living picture—Moses praying in sight of the whole nation, as its representative. If in weariness he allows his hands to sink, then Amalek gains the upper hand, however Israel may contend; if he raises them to heaven, Israel prevails. Raising the hands is the symbol of prayer among Israel, Psalms 28:2, as well as among the heathen, though Kurtz has most unaccountably denied it. The raising of the hands symbolizes the raising of the heart on the part of an inferior to a superior. Already, in the book of Judith, emphasis is laid on the fact that Moses smote the Amalekites not with the sword, but with holy prayer. 1 Timothy 2:8, βούλομαι οὖν προσεύχεσθαι τοὺς ἄνδρας ἐν παντὶ τόπῳ ἐπαίροντας ὁσίους χεῖρας, refers back to this passage. The meaning is the same which the Saviour brings out in Luke 18:1, by a parable: τὸ δεῖν πάντοτε προσεύχεσθαι αὐτοὺς καὶ μὴ ἐγκακεῖν. Here we have the counterpart to Jacob’s struggle, equally rich in meaning. Amalek is to be regarded as the representative of the enemies of the kingdom of God. For this he was exactly adapted. He attacked Israel not as one Arab-Bedouin tribe now attacks another which shows signs of disturbing it in the occupation of its pasture. His attack was directed against Israel as the people of God. In this character they were confirmed by everything which had happened in Egypt and in the wilderness. All this Amalek knew, comp. Exodus 15:14-15; but it only served to increase his hatred towards Israel, his desire to try his strength with them. As Moses says, he wanted to lay his hand on the throne of God, Exodus 17:16, where כֵּס is the poetical form for כִּסֵּא. This fighting against God, which had its origin in profound impiety, involved the Amalekites already at that time in defeat, and later in complete destruction, as was here solemnly prophesied, and fulfilled especially by Saul. We learn from Deuteronomy 25:18 with what cruel anger and malice the Amalekites treated Israel. They would have been forgiven if they had ceased from their hatred towards the people of God, which was the more punishable because they were connected by ties of blood; but in this very circumstance we must look for the cause of the intensity of the hatred—they were envious of the undeserved preference given to Israel. But because the omniscient God foresees that no such change will take place, their destruction is unconditionally predicted. The same thing is afterwards repeated by Balaam in Numbers 24:20, “Amalek was the first of the nations (i.e. the mightiest among the heathen nations which at that time stood in connection with Israel), but his latter end shall be that he perish for ever,”—words in which Balaam only changes into a verbal prophecy the actual prophecy, which lay in the conduct of the Amalekites themselves. At the close of the section let us glance once more at the way which the Israelites took from the exodus till their arrival at Sinai. They set out from the territory of Goshen, the eastern part of Lower Egypt, principally from the town Raamses, where they were assembled waiting for permission to set out: comp. Exodus 12:37. V. Raumer, Beitr. S. 4, here makes Raamses to stand for the country Raamses, in defence of a preconceived opinion; but the Pentateuch knows only the town Raamses. This town, which probably got its name from its founder, the king Raamses, is only mentioned per prolepsin in Genesis 47:11, where the land of Goshen is called the land of Raamses, i.e. the land whose principal town is Raamses: comp. Rosellini i. Monumenti, etc. i. 1, p. 300. For the Egyptian kings who bear the name Raamses probably belong only to the time after Joseph. The town was therefore built in the time between Joseph and Moses. The command to depart was not given to the children of Israel suddenly; it had already long been understood that they were soon to set out, and already for fourteen days everything had been prepared for it in Raamses, the central-point, the residence of Moses and Aaron, and throughout all the land of Goshen, through which the instructions of Moses had spread with the rapidity consequent on the unsettled condition of the people. The march began at Raamses, and in their progress they were joined on all sides by accessories. On the second day of the march the Israelites reached the northern point of the Arabian Gulf, Etham, which probably occupied the site of the present Bir Suez. From Etham they journeyed up the western side of the Arabian Gulf as far as Suez, where they crossed it. From this point they reached Mara in three days, passing through the wilderness Sur, the south-west part of the desert et-Tih, and along the eastern coast of the Gulf of Suez. Burckhardt (followed by Robinson, part i. p. 107) has rightly identified Mara with the well Howara, which he discovered on the usual route to Mount Sinai, about eighteen hours from Suez. The remoteness and the character of the water favour his view. Ritter says, p. 819, “In the space of this three days’ march there is no spring-water, and this Ain Howara, which lies on the only possible route, is the only absolutely bitter spring on the whole coast, which accounts for the complaining and murmuring of the people, who were accustomed to the salutary and pleasant-tasted water of the Nile.” From Mara the Israelites penetrated to Elim, Exodus 15:27, where they found wells of water and palm trees. Burckhardt has identified this Elim with the valley of Ghurundel, which is almost a mile in width, and abounds with trees and living springs, and is about three hours’ journey from the well Howara, So also Robinson, who remarks (p. 111) that this place is still much resorted to for water by the Arabs. Ritter says of the Wadi Ghurundel (p. 829): “In times of rain the wadi pours great masses of water to the sea. Therefore it still afforded good pasturage in October. It was thickly covered with palms and tamarisk trees, and wild parties in the solitary valley gave a romantic character to the Elim of the ancients.” We remark, in passing, that Moses probably gives prominence to the fact that the wells of water in Elim were twelve, and the palms which grew so luxuriantly out of them were seventy, because he looked upon it as a symbol, a representation of the blessing which should proceed from Israel, as the source of blessing, upon all nations of the earth. Twelve is the signature of Israel, and seventy is the number of the nations in the table of nations, Genesis 10. The twelve apostles and the seventy disciples rest upon the same numerical symbolism. According to Numbers 33:6, the Israelites next came to a station which lay on the sea-coast. Even now the caravan-route touches on the sea just at the mouth of the Wadi Taibe, about five hours from Ghurundel. Formerly the Israelites had repaired to the neighbourhood of the Red Sea; now they turned eastwards in order to reach Sinai. The caravan-route to Sinai, accessible from ancient times, leads through the valley Mocattab. This is probably the station of the wilderness of Sin, Exodus 16:1 (notwithstanding Robinson’s objections). The valley is wide, and contains wells and manna-tamarisks. Here the Israelites first received manna. From Sin they passed on to Rephidim, a plain at the foot of Mount Horeb, from whence they repaired to the wilderness of Sinai, and encamped opposite this mountain, which has been characterized by Robinson as a sanctuary in the midst of a great circle of granite district, having only one entrance, which is easy of access. It was a secret, sacred spot, cut off from the world by solitary, bare mountains, and therefore well adapted as a place for the nation that dwelt alone, with whom the Lord desired to hold converse in their solitude.