Numbers 12:1-16

F. FOOLISH CONDUCT OF MIRIAM AND AARON AND RESOLUTION OF THE PROBLEM (Numbers 12)

TEXT

Numbers 12:1. And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married: for he had married an Ethiopian woman. 2. And they said, Hath the Lord indeed spoken only by Moses? hath he not spoken also by us? And the Lord heard it. 3. (Now the man Moses was very meek, above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.) 4. And the Lord spake suddenly unto Moses, and unto Aaron, and unto Miriam, Come ye out ye three unto the tabernacle of the congregation. And they three came out. 5. And the Lord came down in the pillar of the cloud, and stood in the door of the tabernacle, and called Aaron and Miriam: and they both came forth. 6. And he said, Hear now my words: If there be a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known unto him in a vision, and will speak unto him in a dream. 7. My servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine house. 8. With him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches; and the similitude of the Lord shall he behold: wherefore then were ye not afraid to speak against my servant Moses? 9. And the anger of the Lord was kindled against them; and he departed. 10. And the cloud departed from off the tabernacle; and behold, Miriam became leprous, white as snow: and Aaron looked upon Miriam, and, behold, she was leprous. 11. And Aaron said unto Moses, Alas, my Lord, I beseech thee, lay not the sin upon us, wherein we have done foolishly, and wherein we have sinned. 12. Let her not be as one dead, of whom the flesh is half consumed when he cometh out of his mother's womb. 13. And Moses cried unto the Lord, saying, Heal her now, O God, I beseech thee.

14. And the Lord said unto Moses, If her father had but spit in her face, should she not be ashamed seven days? let her be shut out from the camp seven days, and after that let her be received in again. 15. And Miriam was shut out from the camp seven days: and the people journeyed not till Miriam was brought out again. 16. And afterward the people removed from Hazeroth, and pitched in the wilderness of Paran.

PARAPHRASE

Numbers 12:1. Then Miriam and Aaron criticized Moses because of the Ethiopian woman he had married (for he had married an Ethiopian woman). 2. And they said, Has the Lord indeed spoken only with Moses? Has he not spoken with us as well? And the Lord heard it. 3. Now the man Moses was very humble, more so than all the men upon the face of the earth. 4. And the Lord spoke suddenly to Moses, and to Aaron and to Miriam, You three come out to the Tent of Meeting! And the three came out. 5. Then the Lord came down in a pillar of cloud, in the door of the Tent, and He called Aaron and Miriam. When they came out, He said, Now hear my words: If there is a prophet among you, I the Lord will make myself known to him in a vision, and speak to him in a dream. But not so with my servant Moses: 7. he is the reliable one in all my household. 8. I speak with him mouth to mouth, openly, and not in veiled messages; and he sees the very likeness of the Lord. Why, then, were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses? 9. So the anger of the Lord burned against them, and He left. 10. Now the cloud was removed from the Tent, and lo, Miriam was show white, stricken with leprosy. Aaron looked at Miriam, and behold, she was diseased. 11. And Aaron said to Moses, Oh, my Lord, I beg you, do not lay this sin upon us; we have behaved foolishly: we have sinned. 12. Do not let her become as a dead person whose flesh is half consumed when he emerges from his mother's womb! 13. And Moses pleaded with the Lord, saying, Heal her now, O God, I pray you. 14. But the Lord said to Moses, If her father had only spit on her face, should she not be ashamed seven days? Let her be shut out of the camp seven days; after that she may be received back again. 15 And Miriam was excluded from the camp for seven days, and the people did not travel until Miriam was returned to them 16. Afterward the people left Hazeroth, and camped in the, wilderness of Paran.

COMMENTARY

Life is plagued by many types of problems. We now face one of the more common and troublesome: Miriam turns upon her brother in a vicious, verbal assault with two thrusts. She is critical of his wife, and she is envious of his special and unique relationship with God. PC gives five reasons for laying the sin specifically at Miriam's feet: she is named first in the account; the verb is in the feminine, and properly says, she spoke out against; the attack is a peculiarly feminine one; she alone was punished; and, Aaron never led out in anything. The third and fifth arguments seem very thin and inconclusive; it is the fourth which would especially establish her great guilt. No penalty of any kind visits Aaron.

Commentators are much divided over the identification of Moses-' wife in the passage. Some contend that the reference could not conceivably be to Zipporah, who was a Midianite, not a Cushite or Ethiopian. They suggest, therefore, that Zipporah was dead and Moses had but recently remarried. The argument is altogether from silence, unless one reads such an inference into this passage. Others suggest Moses had taken a second wife, a most improbable proposal, and one the Lord certainly could not have approved without comment of any kind anywhere in the record. Yet others believe Moses-' wife's beauty is being compared to that of a Cushite woman'S. This is the position of RCP, which uses a process of numerology to establish the claim. The word for Cushite has a numerical value of 736, the same numerical value as yefat mareh (a woman of beautiful appearance). Numerologists may give some credence to such speculation, but they must stand alone.

As for the criticisms themselves, they were of a most unkind sort. The criticism of Moses for having married a woman other than an Israelite should have come from the Lord, not Miriam; if there were grounds for any criticism. It is generally assumed that Miriam's motivation was jealousy, which may well be correct. With all the other burdens Moses was carrying, the last thing he needed was for members of his own family to turn upon him with such a vindictive spirit. After all, Miriam herself had been distinguished above all the other women when she was made a prophetessthe only one of whom we have record among the people; and Aaron was established as the high priest, than which there was no higher office of permanent nature among the Israelites. Only pride and envy could account for the manner in which the two unite in their criticisms. God had, after all, also spoken through them as well as through Moses, as they confess, Numbers 12:2.

The next verse, (Numbers 12:3), has bothered countless commentators, as in IB: This verse gave much difficulty to those who were concerned to assert the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch. The point is, simply, that Moses would not have written so of his own meekness; this would be the most certain indication that he lacked humility. But such a position ignores other possibilities. If God deemed it appropriate that the account should make such a note at this point, where it surely fits, and instructed Moses to state the fact, in no sense could we understand this to have been a boastful assertion of the great man. It has been asserted that the verse was added to the original, and was not the work of Moses himself. We cannot deny the possibility; and, in fact, the KJV puts the verse in parentheses as an apparent indication of this. Whatever the actual explanation, one fact is supremely clear, and that is the truth of the statement itself. Moving from year to year and incident to incident throughout the life of Moses, we cannot but marvel at the unbounded humility of so significant a man. This would make the onslaught against him even more difficult to bear, and virtually impossible for the man himself to counter successfully.

God's manner of calling specially to the three is unusual and unexpected. It is thought that the call came simultaneously, and to them at their individual residences. They meet at the Tent, and from that point Aaron and Miriam are separated from Moses.

The divine message is prefaced by a well-understood fact: when God spoke to the ordinary prophet, He used the technique of dreams or visions. Neither of these methods should be limited to day-time occurrences, however, since nocturnal revelations are a distinct rarity in the Scriptures. They were, nevertheless, less distinctive than the method God used in speaking to Moses: mouth to mouth. The thought is identical to that of Exodus 33:11, face to face. Messages to others came darkly, as in riddles or mysterious utterances. To Moses, He spoke clearly, unambiguously.

Even Moses did not look directly upon the face of God. He beheld His similitude, or the aftereffects, as in Exodus 33:22-23. After having lived forty days in intimacy with God, some of the glory of God Himself was infused upon Moses-' own face, and the Israelites could not look upon him until he was veiled (Exodus 34:29-35). This transmitted glory must yet have been grossly less than that of God Himself. Aaron and Miriam ought to have been totally ashamed of having expressed themselves derogatorily.

When the cloud of the Divine Presence was lifted, Aaron noticed the leprous condition of Miriam. It is an indication that she had led the verbal assault upon Moses. The fact that her skin was white would indicate she had been visited by a milder form of leprosy. Even so, leprosy in any form is to be greatly dreaded, and this would be sufficient to cut her off from her people for life, or for the duration of the plague itself. Aaron is quick to confess his part, and their mutual guilt; he pleads for pardon of their rash foolishness, and for Miriam's healing. They are compelled to seek the mediation of the very one they have offended!

Moses-' intercessory prayer is but partially recorded, only the most briefly relevant summary being contained in the text: but it is all we need. The Lord's answer impresses all of them both with His mercy and His justice. In His mercy, the leprosy is removed. In his justice, it is necessary for Miriam to endure one week of the circumstances of a leper. She would never forget this. It was a sure way of seeing that she remembered the humiliation brought upon herself by haughtiness. Seven days outside the camp and in the company with others whose bodies were ravaged by such a dreadful disease would be quite long enough for her to learn this lesson. This was the same period of time required of any disrespectful one whose father was required to rebuke her publicly, see Deuteronomy 25:9.

During Miriam's isolation, the people did not move. RCP understands this delay to have been a demonstration of God's reward for the time she had spent watching Moses when he was placed in the river (Exodus 2:4). The incident reminds us that she was, after all, only human, and that when she and Aaron were confronted forcefully with their sins, they were brought to repentance and a form of restitution before they could be reinstated in God's good graces.

Leaving Hazeroth, they come into the region of Kadesh, in the desert of Paran. It is on the southernmost border of the land of Canaan. They reached the spot just one and one-half years after leaving Egypt, and might as easily as not have crossed immediately into the Promised Land. The fact that they did not is a reflection upon their small faith.

QUESTIONS AND RESEARCH ITEMS

218.

Why is it usually assumed that Miriam was the ring-leader in complaining about Moses-' wife?

219.

Is there a contradiction in the accounts which identify the wife of Moses as an Egyptian (our present passage), a Midianite (Exodus 2:21), and a Cushite (RSV)?

220.

What were Miriam and Aaron attempting to accomplish or to prove by their words?

221.

If Moses was truly meek, as Numbers 12:3 affirms, how could he possibly have written this of himself?

222.

How might Moses himself have successfully answered his sister and brother?

223.

Compare and contrast the manner in which God spoke with Moses with the more ordinary methods of communicating with the prophets.

224.

Review the provisions which applied to an individual who was thought to have leprosy, and show how it was appropriate that Aaron should have made the discovery.

225.

Why does Aaron ask Moses to intercede for himself and for Miriam, rather than directing his own prayer to the Lord.

226.

Might a lesser man than Moses have refused this request?

227.

For what probable reasons did God insist that Miriam's leprosy should remain upon her for a week?

228.

What is the significance of the Lord's words about the time of isolation if one were spit upon by his father?

229.

How important was the factor of repentance in God's dealings with the offenders?