Moses the Prophet

ON ST. MOSES THE PROPHET, LEADER AND LAWGIVER OF THE PEOPLE OF ISRAEL,

AT MOUNT NEBO IN ARABIA.

PRELIMINARY COMMENTARY.

Moses, prophet, leader and lawgiver of the people of Israel, on Mount Nebo in Arabia.

BY J. S.

§ I. The memory of the Saint in the sacred calendars, and his ecclesiastical cult:

the principal monuments from which this Commentary is to be composed.

[1] The memory of Moses announced on the fourth day of September, The chief Martyrologies, both Latin and Greek, announce the memory of the most holy Prophet and Lawgiver of the Hebrews on the fourth day of September, excepting, however, the Hieronymian ones, Bede, and Rabanus. The old or little Roman has it briefly thus: Of Moses the prophet; and Ado, Usuard, and Notker have used the same brevity. Wandelbert adorns Moses with a fuller elogium in this manner:

The bearer of the divine Law, its receiver and its author,

Deemed worthy of frequent converse with God and of the sight of him,

Yesterday thou art entombed, Moses, upon the lofty * mountain;

Whose burial-place it was granted to none thereafter to know.

The place of his death is added in the Roman Martyrology of today in these words: On Mount Nebo in the land of Moab, of St. Moses the lawgiver and prophet. From the Greek Menologium I add one elogium, as it was rendered into Latin in the most recent edition of the most eminent Cardinal Annibale Albani: Moses the prophet and lawgiver was born of a Hebrew father in Egypt. When Pharaoh, king of Egypt, had commanded that of the Hebrew nation the male infants should be put to death but the female preserved, his mother enclosed him in a little basket and cast him into the river. But when Pharaoh's daughter had come down to the river to bathe, and had caught sight of the basket, and of the infant weeping in it, she adopted him as her son, and took care that he should be instructed in all the learning of the Egyptians. When he had grown up, God appeared to him and commanded him to lead forth the people of the Hebrews out of Egypt. When therefore he had led the people out, and had performed many signs and prodigies, and had cleft the sea in the midst, and had passed over on dry ground; and, striking the rock also with his staff, had drawn forth waters from it; and had at last [ ] forty years of service; he died one thousand four hundred and eighty-five years before the Resurrection of Christ, and was buried in a certain mountain of the desert by Michael, the great prince of the host of God.

[2] The Menaea and the other Greek calendars agree upon the same day; and on other days also: so too the Greco-Muscovite Ephemerides, published before the first volume of May, the manuscript Synaxarium of the Ruthenians, and the Arabo-Egyptian Martyrology which Gratia Simonius rendered into Latin. But the calendars of the Copts of Egypt and of the Ethiopians of the kingdom of the Abyssinians, both as published by Job Ludolf and as we have them in manuscript, announce the memory of Moses the prophet on the eighth day of September. The Syriac or Chaldaic Calendar makes mention of Moses, the prince of prophets, on the fifth day of August. Moses also, together with Aaron and Elisha, was commemorated on the twentieth day of July by the manuscript Synaxarium on parchment of Sirmond, by the Turin manuscript codex ^b of the duke of Savoy, and by the Arabo-Egyptian Martyrology already praised above, as our Predecessors observed in the Prætermissi for that same day. Certain Latins too have assigned other days to St. Moses, namely the twenty-sixth of February, the first and the twelfth of March, and the fifth of August, as has been noted at each of those days in the Prætermissi.

[3] [his cult at Jerusalem and at Venice, where there is a magnificent and ancient church:] St. Moses is honored with an ecclesiastical Office both in the East and in the West. Wadding, in the Annals of the Minors, volume 1, page 499, at the year 1342, gave the Calendar of the proper feasts of the church of Jerusalem, in which, at the fourth day of September, the festival of St. Moses is prescribed in these words: Of St. Moses the prophet and confessor, duplex. At Venice, in the patriarchal church, he is honored on the same day with a semi-duplex Office, as I learn from various directories of that same church. But with greater solemnity the festival of St. Moses is celebrated there in the church consecrated to him, which is a parish of priests and is altogether magnificent. A recent author describes this sacred edifice of St. Moses in the Thesaurus of the Antiquities and Histories of Italy, volume 5, part 2, page 15, from which I transfer some particulars hither: In the year of Salvation 796, by the care and at the expense of the most noble Scopari family, this temple was erected in honor of St. Moses, and after a long space of time was restored by the Viara family. But in the year 1637, by the alms of the parishioners, with the help of Don Antonio Abramo, most deserving parish priest and pastor of that same church, it was rebuilt from the foundations and reduced to an ample and august form… In this temple seven magnificent altars are set up: of which the chief is the high altar, completed last of all, … which has, in Veronese marble, the mountain on which Moses received the tables of the Law from God, but the figure of Moses in white Carrara marble. There too is carved in relief the history of the adoration of the calf… On the stalls of the choir, of walnut wood and of carved work, the whole Life of St. Moses is set forth. And in the coffered ceiling of the temple there is an image of Moses bringing forth water from the rocks with his staff.* The remaining ornaments of the church, which for brevity's sake I pass over, and along with them an exact representation of its form, the curious reader will find in the same place.

[4] No less ancient was the church erected to Moses on Mount Tabor, a monastery on Mount Tabor formerly, in all likelihood, dedicated to him: if one of the three built there of old was sacred to Moses, as some believe. Concerning these, Bede, in his work On the Holy Places, chapter 17, has the following: Mount Tabor, in the middle of the plain of Galilee, rising three miles to the north, stands apart from Gennesaret, on every side rounded, very grassy and flowery, of a height of thirty stadia. Its summit itself is level and very pleasant, and is spread out over twenty-three stadia, where a great monastery is surrounded also by a great wood, having three churches, beside which Peter says, Let us make here three tabernacles. The place is girt with a wall and bears great buildings. Adrichomius, in the Theater of the Holy Land, page 143, says that a temple was built there by St. Helena in memory of the Transfiguration of Christ, dedicated to Peter, James, and John: To this temple, he says, there were afterwards added two monasteries, that here there might be as it were three tabernacles, according to the desire of St. Peter. Of these I find that one belonged to the Greeks and was consecrated to St. Elias: it is likely that the other was dedicated to Moses; and each of them appears to have had its abbot. Now of these three temples, and throughout the circuit of the level ground … of the other palaces, towers, and most noble buildings, only great ruins are to be seen, in which lions and other wild beasts lie hid.* Something concerning these was said also in the Commentary on St. Job the prophet, volume VII of May, page 670.

[5] Quaresmius, in his Elucidation of the Holy Land, book 6, chapter 3, relates that at about the mid-point of the road between Jerusalem and the Jordan there is found a mosque of the Turks, [a mosque of the Turks distinguished by his name, perhaps because it had been a church of the Christians.] which is called St. Moses, and which they hold in great veneration. They say that it is distinguished by that name because they believe St. Moses, the promulgator of the old Law, to have been buried there. But when he had observed that this reason is false, he offers these conjectures concerning the name: Either because a church was there built by the faithful in honor of St. Moses the lawgiver, or of some other Saint called by the same name, etc. The first conjecture appears sufficiently probable, since we cannot doubt that various churches were erected to St. Moses, and especially in Palestine. But to investigate them all would be a matter of more labor than profit. Wherefore let these things suffice concerning the cult of the holy Lawgiver among Christians, so that we may proceed to gather and to elucidate his deeds, when we have first assigned the chief sources from which we shall gather them.

[6] The chief deeds of St. Moses the Prophet himself described, The whole Life of Moses is to be drawn from the sacred Scriptures: under the inspiration and guidance of the Holy Spirit, in the four latter books of the Pentateuch. There are added also other books of sacred Scripture in which Moses and his deeds are treated, and which were written no less by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. Concerning all those things which are related of Moses in the sacred Writings it is impiety to doubt: but not all of them are so clearly set forth, nor are all so joined in order, that it should be easy for anyone to

learn the Life of St. Moses from sacred Scripture, even should he wish to employ the help of learned interpreters. Further, although not all the deeds of Moses have been narrated in the sacred Writings — for of all that time in which he lived in the court of the king of Egypt sacred Scripture has recorded very little, and not a few other matters it has touched upon only briefly — nevertheless the sacred Writings afford no scanty material for the writing of a Life of Moses, provided that all things be set in their own order, and the more obscure be elucidated with the help of the holy Fathers and of the other interpreters of sacred Scripture. For this reason I profess that I shall aim at this: that those sacred monuments be arranged in order, and be somewhat elucidated where it shall seem necessary. The Life of Moses, therefore, will be gathered from the very words of sacred Scripture with such brevity that the events which do not concern him are omitted, and the questions about his deeds are illustrated.

[7] [Philo also and Josephus are to be examined separately: and finally the Life by Nyssen is to be published.] But since two Hebrew authors not altogether to be despised have also written not a little concerning Moses — namely Philo the Jew, On the Life of Moses, and Flavius Josephus in the Jewish Antiquities — I shall take account of them also. For each is not only praised by St. Jerome in his Catalogue of Ecclesiastical Writers, but each has also always been held in high esteem. They wrote, indeed, not a few false things, and things repugnant to the sacred Writings; but they have also handed down more that is true, and they have some things omitted in the sacred Writings which, though they are not certain, yet appear probable. For this reason I shall not mingle their assertions with the words of sacred Scripture; but, after some part of the life has been set forth from the sacred Writings, I shall inquire in a separate paragraph how probable or improbable are the things which Philo and Josephus, or other writers of the like sort, have related of Moses. By this method neither shall the sacred and certain be mingled with the profane and uncertain, nor shall those things be omitted which writers not sacred were able to learn from other quarters. St. Gregory of Nyssa likewise composed a Life of Moses in brief. This Life I shall leave untouched in the Commentary, but I shall subjoin it entire to the Commentary, divided after the usual manner and illustrated with annotations.

* that is, the day before the Nones

* Venieria according to others

* space

§ II. The Saint's birth and genealogy, his parents, his brother and sister: he is hidden for three months and then exposed; and, being found by Pharaoh's daughter, is entrusted to his own mother as nurse: afterwards, when grown, he is given back to Pharaoh's daughter.

[ ] The persecution against the Israelites in Egypt. St. Moses was born of Hebrew parents in Egypt, while the Israelites, that is, the descendants of the patriarch Jacob, were being oppressed there in the hardest servitude by Pharaoh; who a little before had commanded that all their male infants, as soon as they were brought into the world, should at once be put to death. Now it is known from the sacred Writings that the patriarch Jacob came into Egypt with all his household while his son the patriarch Joseph flourished there in the highest power and favor with king Pharaoh. But when Joseph was dead, and all the sons of Jacob; when those kings too were dead who had made much of Joseph and for his sake had cherished the Israelites — there broke out little by little a most grievous persecution against the Israelites, because they were so multiplied as to strike fear into the new king Pharaoh. The occasion of the persecution and the persecution itself is thus narrated in Exodus, chapter 1: After he (Joseph) was dead, and all his brethren, and all that generation, the children of Israel increased, and sprung up into multitudes, and growing exceedingly strong they filled the land. In the mean time there arose a new king over Egypt, that knew not Joseph: and he said to his people: Behold the people of the children of Israel are numerous and stronger than we. Come, let us wisely oppress them, lest they multiply: and if any war shall rise against us, join with our enemies, and having overcome us, depart out of the land.

[9] And therefore he set over them masters of the works, to afflict them with burdens: wherein it is commanded that their male infants be slain: and they built for Pharaoh cities of tabernacles, Phithom and Ramesses. But the more they oppressed them, the more they were multiplied and increased: and the Egyptians hated the children of Israel, and afflicted them and mocked them: and they made their life bitter with hard works in clay and brick, and with all manner of service, wherewith they were overcharged in the works of the earth. Further, when that king who knew not Joseph (that is, who did not consider the benefits conferred upon the Egyptians by Joseph) saw that the Israelites were not diminished by that hard servitude, he first attempted to kill their male infants by means of the midwives, as follows in the same place. But being deceived by the midwives, he gave a law which Moses sets forth thus in the same place: Pharaoh therefore charged all his people, saying: Whatsoever shall be born of the male sex, cast into the river: whatsoever of the female, save alive. St. Luke, in Acts, chapter 7, from the mouth of St. Stephen, has it of these same matters more briefly thus: And when the time of the promise drew near, … the people increased and were multiplied in Egypt, till another king arose in Egypt, who knew not Joseph. This same, dealing craftily with our race, afflicted our fathers, that they should expose their children, to the end they might not be kept alive. At the same time was Moses born, etc. In what year of the creation of the world, or how long before the birth of Christ, these things were done, I do not inquire; nor who was that king of Egypt who first stirred up that persecution. For I have determined to abstain from questions belonging to general chronology, lest this Commentary become longer than is right.

[10] The parents of Moses were Amram and Jochabed; his elder brother was Aaron, the genealogy of Moses, who was then born and hidden for three months, and his sister, born before Aaron, was Miriam. He sprang from the tribe of Levi, and had Kohath for his grandfather, Levi for his great-grandfather, Jacob for his great-great-grandfather, Isaac for his great-great-great-grandfather, so that he was the seventh from the patriarch Abraham. The genealogy of Moses is handed down in the first book of Chronicles, chapter 6, in these words: The sons of Levi: Gershon, Kohath, and Merari. The sons of Kohath: Amram, Izhar, Hebron, and Uzziel. The sons of Amram: Aaron, Moses, and Miriam. In Exodus, chapter 6, after the genealogy of Amram has been handed down, his wife is thus set forth: And Amram took to wife Jochabed his father's brother's daughter: and she bore him Aaron and Moses. In Numbers 26, verse 59, Amram is said to have had to wife Jochabed the daughter of Levi. But since here she is called the daughter of Amram's paternal uncle, interpreters commonly explain "daughter of Levi" as born of the tribe of Levi: for otherwise she would have been not the daughter of Amram's uncle, but his aunt. Of Amram and Jochabed there is treatment in Exodus 2, where the birth of Moses is related thus, together with what followed: After this there went a man of the house of Levi; and took a wife of his own kindred: and she conceived and bore a son: and seeing him a goodly child, hid him three months. The Apostle praises this deed in Hebrews, chapter XI, verse 23, and attributes it to the faith of his parents in this manner: By faith Moses, when he was born, was hid three months by his parents, because they saw he was a comely babe, and they feared not the king's edict. St. Stephen, in Luke, Acts 7, speaks of these things thus: At the same time was Moses born, and he was acceptable to God, who was nourished three months in his father's house.

[11] Nevertheless the Child was afterwards exposed, because he could no longer be hidden, as Moses himself relates in Exodus 3, subjoining to the foregoing these words: And when he (Amram his father) could hide him no longer, [at last he is exposed on the bank of the river, where, being found by Pharaoh's daughter, he is given to his mother to be nursed.] he took a basket made of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and pitch: and put the little Babe therein, and laid him in the sedges by the river's brink, his sister standing afar off, and taking notice what would be done. And behold the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself in the river: and her maids walked by the river's brink. And when she saw the basket in the flags, she sent one of her maids for it: and when it was brought, she opened it, and seeing within it an Infant crying, having compassion on him, she said: This is one of the babes of the Hebrews. And the Child's sister (Miriam, that is, who had before been watching from afar, and for this cause had drawn near) said to her: Shall I go, and call to thee a Hebrew woman, to nurse the Babe? She answered: Go. The maid went and called her mother. And Pharaoh's daughter said to her: Take this Child, and nurse him for me: I will give thee thy wages. The woman (Jochabed, that is, his mother) took and nursed the Child: and when he was grown up, she delivered him to Pharaoh's daughter. And she adopted him for a son, and called him Moses, saying: Because I took him out of the water. Again more briefly St. Stephen, in Acts 7, in these words: And when he was exposed, Pharaoh's daughter took him up, and nourished him (by the aid of a nurse) for her own son.* Thus far concerning the beginnings of Moses from the sacred Writings. Now let us examine what has been added to these by Philo, Josephus, and others: but only those things which most nearly concern Moses.

* that is, her handmaids

§ III. There are discussed the things which Josephus, Philo, and others have added to the Scriptures concerning the beginnings of Moses.

[ ] [The persecution against the Hebrews: the reason why Pharaoh commanded the male infants to be slain;] Flavius Josephus, in book 2 of the Jewish Antiquities, chapter 5, explains more fully with what labors the king of Egypt strove to oppress the Israelites, writing thus: For they were commanded both to draw off the river into many ditches, and to build up walls, and to raise up mounds by which the inundations of the river might be kept off. With the mad substructures of the pyramids also they harassed our nation, forcing them to learn various crafts and to accustom themselves to the bearing of labors. These things are not contrary to sacred Scripture, but are probably added. But it is false that he says the Hebrews were oppressed in this manner for four hundred years. He then attempts to render the reason why Pharaoh commanded all the male stock of the Hebrews to be slain, continuing thus: There arose afterwards something else, on account of which they desired still more that our race should be extinguished. A certain one of that class of men whom that nation calls scribes of the sacred things, and to whose predictions it attributes much, foretold to the king that there would be born at that time among the Israelites one who should one day grievously afflict the affairs of the Egyptians, if only he should come to full age: for he would be both most excelling in virtue and famous in glory throughout every age.

[13] which Josephus alleges, is refuted: This prediction, assuredly, if it be true, could easily have driven the tyrant to the slaughter of the infants. But the prediction seems fictitious, since sacred Scripture alleges as the whole reason of the persecution the envy and the dread of Pharaoh, arising from the excessive multiplication of the Israelites, and seems to attribute to this three distinct persecutions, all of which tended to the diminishing of the number of the Hebrews. Of these the first was oppression by hard and continual labors. The second was the command given to the midwives about the killing of the male infants. But when these devices did not suffice, and the Hebrew nation was multiplied even so, the tyrant had recourse to a public edict, and gave it to all his people, that the male infants of the Hebrews should be cast into the river: which was the third persecution.

But there is no counsel against the Lord: not even in this manner were the Israelites much diminished, as is plain from the very great multitude which afterwards went out of Egypt with Moses; so that it is likely that this cruel edict was not scrupulously observed, or at any rate did not remain long in force.

[14] Josephus next relates at length another prediction concerning Moses, made to his father Amram, as also the vision of Amram, written by the same with little probability, Some think that the words of the Apostle in Hebrews, chapter XI, verse 23, favor this oracle, because he is asserted to have been hidden by faith. The words of St. Stephen too are brought forward, Acts 7, verse 25, And he thought that his brethren understood that God by his hand would save them, in order that credit may be won for these oracles. But neither proof appears to me so cogent that I should dare to hold that oracle for certain, even when its superfluities have been cut away. For the Apostle alleges plainly the same reason for the hiding of Moses which Moses himself had alleged in Exodus 2, verse 2, where he says: And seeing him a goodly child, she hid him three months. And the Apostle: He was hid three months by his parents, because they saw he was a comely Infant. The reason, therefore, for hiding the Infant was not an oracle upon which the parents relied in believing that he was to be saved; but the more than human comeliness of the Child so aroused their faith that they hoped he could be saved, and hid him for three months. Let us hear St. Chrysostom, Homily 26 on the Epistle to the Hebrews, where he explains the passage: Whence, then, did they (the parents of Moses) hope that they would save the infant? From faith. From what faith? They saw, he says, that the Infant was goodly. The very sight of him drew them to faith. Thus from the very beginning, and from his very swaddling-bands, much grace had been poured into the Just One, nature not effecting this, but God. St. Stephen favors this, Acts 7, verse 20, saying of the newborn Moses: and he was acceptable to God. In Greek: ἦν ἀστεῖος τῷ θεῷ, that is, he was fair unto God, by a Hebraism which is to be explained thus: He was of a certain supreme and divine grace or beauty. As regards the words of St. Stephen cited above, neither do these seem to me effectively to favor Josephus: for by killing the Egyptian he gave the Israelites occasion to hope that they were to be delivered by his aid. So Chrysostom again explains the passage, Homily 16 on the Acts, writing thus: And by his works (the slaying of the Egyptian) his patronage was shown forth, nor was there need of reasoning: and yet not even so did they understand. This exposition is clearly drawn from the words that follow: for after the words already given, And he thought that his brethren understood (that is, would understand), etc., there is at once subjoined: But they understood it not; that is, not even when they had seen the Egyptian slain did they understand that Moses had been given them for their deliverance.

[15] Wherefore there was no need of any oracle, either that Amram should by faith hide his son, [whereby it is asserted that his preservation and the future greatness of the Moses to be born were foretold to him:] or that Moses should suppose that the Hebrews understood that God willed to give them salvation by his hand. Nevertheless that vision, as being less probable and destitute of the authority of sacred Scripture, I shall subjoin for the greater part out of Josephus, because not a few writers have admitted it in some fashion: Amram, he says, a Hebrew man noble among his own people, being anxious both at the public danger, lest through the failure of its youth the nation should be reduced to nothing, and privately because he had a pregnant wife at home, labored under a lack of counsel, and turning to implore the divine protection, prayed that He would at length have mercy upon men by whom alone He had ever been worshipped: and that He would put an end to the present affliction, which threatened destruction to the whole race. But God, moved to mercy by the prayers of the suppliant, stood by him in sleep and bade him hope well for the future. He was mindful, He said, of their piety received from their forefathers, and rewards would not be wanting to them, even as they had not been wanting to their progenitors… And after a few things interposed he continues thus: Now too know thou that both your public safety and privately thine own glory are at my heart. For that Boy shall be born to thee, for fear of whose birth the Egyptians have condemned your offspring to death. He shall neither be caught by the watchers, and after he has escaped, having found rearers beyond expectation, he shall in his own time deliver the Hebrews out of Egyptian servitude, and shall win everlasting memory by this illustrious deed, not among his own people only but among strangers also, I conferring this benefit upon thee and thy posterity. He shall also have such a brother as shall be worthy of my priesthood, both he himself and his posterity for all time.*

[16] [the birth of Moses and the hiding of the Infant: Josephus is corrected in the foregoing:] When these things had been made known by the vision, Amram awoke and told them to Jochabel his wife, which matter increased the anxiety of both. For now they feared not only for the Boy, but lest in some way the promised felicity should be cut off. But soon the woman's child-bearing gave credit to the oracle, for she brought forth so easily as to deceive the watchers, who perceived nothing of those things which are wont to be perceived in ordinary child-births. This little infant they nursed secretly for three months. Then Amram, fearing lest the matter should be discovered and he should incur the wrath of the king, and lest presently he himself, taken out of the way together with the Boy, should make God's promise void, chose rather to commit the whole safety of his Son to His providence: judging that even if the Boy should lie hidden, which nevertheless was exceedingly difficult, it was still grievous to live in continual danger, and that not only his own but his father's. Of God, however, he had sure hope that He would provide that the outcome should show the truth of the oracle. Thus Josephus. That the aforesaid vision rests upon no foundation of sacred Scripture I have already shown. But how little it hangs together with itself, learn in few words. First, God says to Amram: He shall neither be caught by the watchers. And yet afterwards, if we believe Josephus, Amram, fearing lest the matter should be discovered and he should incur the wrath of the king, etc. If God had promised that the Boy would not be caught, how could Amram, whose faith the Apostle praises, fear lest he should be caught? Secondly, of the easy delivery of Jochabed nothing is read in Scripture. Thirdly, these words of God, He shall also have such a brother, sound as if Aaron had not yet been born, who was then three years old. But this error is rather the translator's than Josephus's, whose words you may more fitly render into Latin thus: And his brother shall be such a one. For in Greek it is: ἔσται δὲ αὐτῷ καὶ ὁ ἀδελφὸς τοιοῦτος, where the article ὁ shows that a certain brother is meant, and therefore αὐτῷ, "to him," if it be not corrupt, signifies nothing else than αὐτοῦ, "his."

[17] the exposing of Moses, The exposing of the Infant Josephus narrates thus: After this counsel had sufficiently pleased them, they devised something of this kind. Having woven a little cradle of papyrus, as large as could conveniently hold the Infant, and having daubed it with bitumen so that the water could not penetrate, they laid the Boy in it, and thus, having cast it into the river, committed his safety to the divine providence. As he was being borne along in this manner by the river, Mariamne (that is, Miriam) the little Infant's sister, at her mother's bidding, went down along the bank on the opposite side, to observe whither at length that papyrus vessel should be carried by the river. But here God most manifestly declared that nothing is accomplished by human wisdom, but all things by His own almighty goodness; and that those who for their own advantage or security contrive destruction for others, however great the diligence they employ, yet often do not obtain their wish: and again, that those who commit their safety to God emerge beyond expectation out of the midst of dangers. This is a prudent and most true observation of Josephus. But he sins against the sacred Writings in relating the exposing of the Infant, when he wrongly asserts not only that he was cast into the river, but also that he was carried off by the current, and ineptly feigns that his sister Miriam followed along the bank: for in Exodus 2, verse 3, it is stated that the basket of bulrushes, in which the little Boy was, was placed in the sedges by the river's brink, his sister standing afar off. The Infant, therefore, was placed in the sedges, where there was little or no water by which he could be carried off; and his sister stood, nor was she obliged to follow a basket carried off by the river, since it remained in the same place until it was found.

[18] Besides, the Hebrew writer has substituted, for a basket made of bulrushes, a little cradle woven of papyrus, and his finding: the errors of Josephus in these matters. an Egyptian plant. Yet here the difference is slight, and the Hebrew word has been variously explained by various men. The Greek words of Josephus themselves also need not necessarily be explained of papyrus, but are ambiguous. It is enough that we know that it was a basket or hamper woven of rushes and secured against the waters with bitumen, in which the Infant was exposed. The author subjoins the finding of Moses, in which he more often slips, narrating it thus: There was a daughter of the king named Thermuthis. She, while she was playing by the banks of the river (nay rather, when she had come thither to bathe in the river) and caught sight of the vessel floating, sent swimmers and bade the cradle be drawn out to her upon the bank. Neither was the basket floating, nor was there need of swimmers; but a single handmaid brought to the princess the basket set near the bank among the papyrus, that is, in the place where the papyrus was growing. When it had been brought as she had commanded, Josephus says, the Boy pleased her wonderfully, because he was large and beautiful. For with so great favor did God attend Moses, that He caused him to be nursed and brought up by those very persons who on account of his birth had decreed that the rest of the Hebrews also should be destroyed. These last things he says in reliance upon the prediction of the Egyptian magician concerning the future greatness of Moses: but that this prediction is little probable I have already said.

[19] Philo, in the Life of Moses, suggests a probable reason [The finding, from Philo, who asserts that Moses was saved and adopted by Pharaoh's daughter,] by which the king's daughter could have been moved to save and adopt Moses. Take his own words: The king had one only beloved daughter. They relate that she, long married, had not been able to become a mother, though desirous of children, and especially of the stronger sex, that there might be one to succeed to the fortunate lot of her grandfather's kingdom, which otherwise would pass into another family through the lack of grandchildren. Pressed by this care, and on that day especially anxious, though hitherto she had been wont to keep herself at home and not even to cross the threshold, she hurried forth with her attendant maidens to the river where the Boy had been exposed: then, as she bathed and sprinkled herself among the shady and thick growth of the pools, she caught sight of him and bade the Boy be brought; then, having gazed upon him from head to foot and marvelled at his form and his condition, she grieved with him as he wept, her affection already inclining toward a mother's tenderness, as though the Infant had been born of herself: and when she had learned that he was born of Hebrew parents, then terrified by the king's edict, she took counsel about the rearing of the Boy (for it did not seem safe to carry him at once into the palace); and as she thus hesitated the Infant's sister came upon her as it were from a watch-tower, and, guessing at the cause, asked whether she would bid him be nursed by a certain Hebrew woman, not long since delivered of a child: and when she assented, she commended the Infant, as though another's, to her own mother: and she gladly promised her service in nursing him, as though for the sake of the wage, God providing that the first

rearing should befall the Infant at home among those very persons of whom he had been begotten.

[20] [because she was childless, and others assert the same with sufficient probability:] Artapanus, an ancient historian whom Eusebius frequently praises, agrees with Philo about the barrenness of Pharaoh's daughter, whom he calls Merris: for Eusebius, in book 9 of the Preparation for the Gospel, has this to our purpose: And Artapanus says that Merris, the daughter of Chenephres king of the Egyptians, adopted a Jewish Boy, because she herself bore no children, whom the Jews, he says, call Moses, and the Greeks Musaeus, from whose teaching Orpheus learned many things. The Alexandrian Chronicle, at the year of the world 3837, hands down the following concerning these matters: In this year Pharaoh king of Egypt commanded that all the males of the Hebrews be cast into the river. And since many kings were then reigning, Palmanothes reigned about Heliopolis. He, together with the other kings, was hostile to the Hebrews, and had a daughter named Merrhis, whom he had given in marriage to Chenebron king of Memphis. She, being barren, took up Moses when he had been exposed in the river, and brought him up in the place of a son. St. Epiphanius, in Heresy 78, page 1055, calls that daughter of Pharaoh Thermuthis, the daughter of Amenophis, that is, of Pharaoh: for Pharaoh is a name common to all the kings of Egypt of those times, who were each also distinguished by their own proper names. Now I do not inquire whether the Alexandrian Chronicle rightly sets up several kings in Egypt; nor do I examine whose daughter that Thermuthis, or Merrhis, was; but I only observe that she was in all likelihood childless, as Philo has handed down, since it is agreed that Moses was adopted by her.

[21] [the reason alleged by Josephus, why the Boy was given to a Hebrew woman to be nursed, is rejected.] But again I cannot approve Josephus, who, about to render a reason why Moses was delivered to a Hebrew woman to be nursed, frames a narrative of this kind: And so Thermuthis bids a woman be brought from somewhere, to give the breast to the Boy. And when he would not take the breast, but refused it, and this though one woman after another was brought, Mariamne, as though she had come up to look on not of set purpose but by chance, said: Thou dost nothing, O queen, in setting women of an alien race as nurses to the Infant. But if thou wert to send for some Hebrew woman, then perhaps he would take the breast of one of his own people. And since the girl seemed to advise rightly, she was bidden herself to execute this business, and to bring some nursing woman. And presently, using the power granted her, she returned bringing their common mother, unknown to all who were then present. Then the Infant seemed most gladly to cling to the breast: and, at the queen's request, the woman undertook the care of the Infant committed to her. This account has no authority from the sacred Writings: nay rather, the matter is so narrated in Exodus 2 that it seems to be intimated that Miriam, as soon as the Boy had been brought to Thermuthis, at once offered herself to seek a nurse for the Infant. And if we are willing to look at the matter itself, it is more credible that Miriam, who was a girl of about ten or twelve years, ventured to offer her service in seeking a nurse, than that she suggested the counsel, after others had been brought, that a Hebrew woman rather than an Egyptian should be sought. For these reasons the account of Philo, as being conformable to Scripture, is far more probable than this invention of Josephus, who wished to contrive some reason why the Boy was committed to a Hebrew nurse.

[22] Of the name given to Moses Philo speaks thus: After this a name is given to him, taken from the very fact, the name given to Moses, whose etymology is set forth, because he had been taken up out of the water. For in the language of the Egyptians water is called MOS. But Josephus: And because he had been cast into the running stream, from this chance he obtained his name. The Egyptians call water MO, and YSES those who are saved. Wherefore from a word compounded of both was the name given to the Infant, who afterwards without controversy came forth the wisest of the Hebrews. Moses therefore had an Egyptian name, if we believe these writers, who knew the Hebrew tongue and perhaps the Egyptian also: which of Philo seems certain, since he was by birth an Alexandrian, unless the language of the Egyptians of that time had afterwards wholly died out. Clement of Alexandria agrees with these in book 1 of the Stromata, writing as follows: Then the queen gives the Boy the name Moses, by a fitting etymology, because she had taken him up out of the water. For the Egyptians call water MOY, in which he had been exposed to die: for they call Moses him who, having emerged from the water, has drawn breath again. As Clement of Alexandria here, so also Josephus, in his book against Apion, asserts that water was called moy by the Egyptians, so that it is likely that μῶ crept into the text in the former passage for μωῦ by the fault of the copyists.

[23] Nevertheless various moderns, especially those who Hebraize, have wished the name Moyses, which is with less probability denied by certain persons: or Moses, as others write it, to be Hebrew, and derive it from the Hebrew root masa, which signifies "to draw out," or "he drew out." I confess that the name Moses is rightly so derived, but not Moyses, except corruptly. But it is in no way likely that Pharaoh's daughter gave to Moses a Hebrew rather than an Egyptian name. Besides, sacred Scripture rather favors the opinion of the ancients, since it intimates that the name was formed from a word signifying water and from another signifying to draw, to take up, to save, or something of the sort: for it is said in Exodus 2, verse 10: And she called his name Moses, saying: Because I took him out of the water.

[24] Others think that that Egyptian name was given to Moses by the Egyptian princess [others hold that there was another Egyptian name, to which the Hebrew Moyses answers;] because it signified the same in Egyptian as the name Moses in Hebrew. Abenezra, in Scipio Sgambatus, book 2 of the Archives of the Old Testament, title 8, has this of the matter: The name of Moses is Hebrew, translated from an Egyptian name. In the Egyptian tongue he is called Munios, and so it is written in the book On the Cultivation of the Earth, which was translated from the Egyptian tongue into the Arabic. Huet, in the Evangelical Demonstration, proposition 4, chapter 13, number 4, builds up this opinion as though certain, and charges with manifest error those who have believed that the name of Moses is not Hebrew: And yet, he says, the name which was first imposed upon him was drawn from the Egyptian. For no one, I suppose, will imagine to himself that an Egyptian girl, the daughter of Pharaoh, ignorant, as is most likely, of the Hebrew tongue, attributed to Moses a Hebrew name sought from the Hebrew tongue.

[25] but more probably the name Moyses is itself Egyptian. I do not deny that this last opinion is much more probable than that which holds that a Hebrew name was imposed upon Moses by an Egyptian woman. Nevertheless the opinion of the ancients pleases me more, especially on account of the authority of Philo, of whom St. Jerome, in the preface to his book On the Interpretation of Hebrew Names, speaks thus: Philo, the most eloquent man of the Jews, is proved also by the testimony of Origen to have published a book of Hebrew names, and to have joined their etymologies alongside according to the order of the letters. Calmet, in the Biblical Dictionary, reciting a full elogium of Moses, agrees about the Egyptian origin of the name, and brings forward these things to our purpose: The distinguished abbé Renaudot, after diligent labor upon the Egyptian tongue, observes that MOOOU is water, and that "si" signifies drawn out or received: this, that is, at that time. And from the fact that the name Moyses has its origin from Egyptian words I suspect it has come about that Jerome assigns its various Hebrew significations so doubtfully: for in his book On the Hebrew Names of Exodus he has it thus: Moses, handling or touching, or taken out of the water, or a taking up. In the Names found in Luke, again thus: Moses, a taking up, or handling or touching, or urging, but better, out of the water.

[26] [Moses did not have that name of his from the beginning, but had in all likelihood received another at his circumcision;] Further, it appears doubtful whether Moses received that name as soon as he was found by Pharaoh's daughter, or rather afterwards, when, being grown, he was delivered to her by his mother: for sacred Scripture relates the imposing of the name together with the adoption, when it narrates that Moses was given back by his mother to Pharaoh's daughter; but Philo and Josephus say that the name was imposed upon the Boy when he was committed to his mother to be nursed. But whatever be truer about this difference of time, which cannot be certainly determined, it is agreed that that name did not belong to Moses from the beginning, nor was it given him by his parents. For this reason Clement of Alexandria, already praised, continues thus in book 1 of the Stromata: It is clear, therefore, that his parents imposed some name upon the Boy when he was first circumcised. And he was called Joachim. And he had a third name also in heaven, after he was taken up, as the Initiated say, namely Melchi. That inference about a name imposed at circumcision is probable; but Clement does not say whence he learned that it was Joachim; and what he subjoins about the third name seems Rabbinic and fabulous.

[27] but that name is unknown, as many other names also seem fabulous. The aforesaid Sgambatus recounts many more names given to Moses by certain persons, but from sources no better. Rabbi Godolias in the Chain of the Kabbalah records many more (names), he says, subjoining these his own words: Pharaoh's daughter called him Moses. His father called him Cheber. His mother called him Jekuthiel. His sister called him Jether. His brothers called him Abizenoach. Kohath called him Abisocho. Israel called him Semaiah the son of Nathanael. Often too they called him Tobias, or Sopher. Other names too Sgambatus recounts in the same place from other writers of the same bran, and at last exhibits a catalogue of those names of this sort: Moyses, Munios, Joachim, Melchi, Cheber, Jekuthiel, Jether, Abizenoach, Abisochi, Semaias, Tobias, Sopher, Musæus, Hermes (that is, Mercury), Osarsiph, Psom-thon-phan-chthe, Heman, Alpha. Huet, proposition 4, chapter 3, number 5, also recounts these names and many more; and he adduces a passage of St. Jerome (as he believes) from book 1 of the Hebrew Questions on the books of Chronicles, where still other names are attributed to Moses and explained. But neither are those books St. Jerome's, as the recent editor Jean Martianay has rightly proved in the Appendix to volume 2, column 10; but of a certain Hebrew not very ancient: nor can I admit any one of all those names for certain, save the name Moyses itself, or Moses, and that which the Greeks derived thence, who have often named him Musaeus. It is indeed likely that another name was imposed upon him by his parents at his circumcision; but we do not know what it was.

* that is, Amram

§ IV. Moses, adopted as a son by Pharaoh's daughter, is instructed in all the learning of the Egyptians: he afterwards denies that he is the son of Pharaoh's daughter, and, having slain a certain Egyptian, flees out of Egypt.

[ ] He was adopted as a son of Pharaoh's daughter by a complete adoption, That Moses was adopted as a son by Pharaoh's daughter the sacred Writings hand down in the words adduced at number XI: for Moses himself says: And she adopted him for a son. And St. Stephen: And she nourished him for her own son. But each passage leaves the time of the adoption uncertain: for Stephen in some fashion intimates that he was adopted as soon as he was found; but Moses narrates the adoption

at that time when, being grown, he was restored to Pharaoh's daughter. Yet Moses does not deny that the adoption took place earlier; nor does Stephen speak so clearly that the adoption cannot be deferred to the time at which it was related by Moses. This time, therefore, we leave among things uncertain. But from the Apostle in Hebrews, chapter XI, it is gathered that this adoption was of such a kind as designated him heir, as though he had been the proper son of Pharaoh's daughter: for Moses, when he was grown up, denied himself to be the son of Pharaoh's daughter, … esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasure of the Egyptians, etc. Moses saw, therefore, that he could enjoy the treasure of the Egyptians, that is, the wealth of Pharaoh's daughter, if he were willing to abide by the adoption. Yet I do not see that from this passage it can be certainly inferred that Moses was believed to be the natural son of the king's daughter, or that he had been destined for the kingdom: for those words, He denied himself to be the son, are to be understood in another manner, as we shall see below; nor is the treasure of the Egyptians, which Moses despised for the love of God, the kingdom of the Egyptians itself.

[29] Further, from the foregoing it is gathered that Moses was brought up in the royal court, [and brought up in the court, where he is instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians:] or at least in the palace of Pharaoh's daughter. But it is not expressed in what year of his age he was led by his mother to the court. Those words, And when he was grown up, she delivered him to Pharaoh's daughter, seem to suggest not only that he was suckled by his mother, but also that he passed the years of boyhood with his parents, and was delivered as a youth to the king's daughter, that by her care he might be trained in the best disciplines. That this was done St. Stephen testifies, Acts 7, verse 22, in these words: And Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and he was mighty in his words and in his deeds. Moses therefore learned all the sciences in use among the Egyptians of that time, and, furnished with them, came forth mighty in words and in deeds. Gather from what has been said that Moses was imbued with the sciences both of the Hebrews and of the Egyptians: for it cannot be doubted that his parents taught the Boy not only the Hebrew tongue and all that pertains to the worship of the one God and to the religion of the Hebrews, but also those sciences in which the boys and youths of the Hebrews were wont to be instructed, at least so far as with his excellent talent he could take in for his age. Thus did divine providence dispose all things, that Moses, whom it was designating leader of its people, should come forth most perfect in every kind of learning. What further Moses did up to the fortieth year of his age, sacred Scripture, to which we here cleave, does not set forth.

[30] [in his fortieth year he renounces the court and the adoption, and joins himself to the Hebrews:] And when the time of forty years was fulfilled to him (that is, in the fortieth year of his age), it came into his heart to visit his brethren the children of Israel, says St. Stephen, Acts 7, verse 23. But these words do not signify a visitation so made as if Moses had wished after it to return to the court: for in that manner he had in all likelihood often visited the Israelites before. But Stephen affirms that Moses in the fortieth year of his age left the court entirely and joined himself to the Israelites, whom he had known from boyhood, under the training of his parents, to be his brethren. This explanation of the passage the Apostle makes certain in Hebrews, chapter XI, verse 24, where he attributes so heroic an act to the faith of Moses, writing thus: By faith Moses, when he was grown up, denied himself to be the son of Pharaoh's daughter, rather choosing to be afflicted with the people of God than to have the pleasure of sin for a time, esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasure of the Egyptians: for he looked unto the reward. Both passages treat of the same matter, and Moses himself also, whose words I shall give below. But certain more obscure points are here to be set forth. He denied, says Chrysostom on this passage, that is, he hated, he turned away from it. For heaven being set before him, it was superfluous to admire the palace of Egypt. Moses therefore declared that he was an Israelite, and, renouncing the adoption, went out from the court to his brethren the Israelites, choosing rather to suffer with them whatever must be borne than to remain in the court with the danger of sinning. But what the Apostle understands by the reproach of Christ is not fully agreed among interpreters. To me, that I may be brief, the Apostle seems to speak thus because he writes to Christians, whom he exhorts to patience by the example of Christ; and therefore by the reproach of Christ I understand a reproach such as Christ also endured. What is the reproach of Christ? says Chrysostom: The opprobrium which you suffer, which Christ endured. This, namely, Moses chose rather to bear for the sake of the reward than to possess the treasures of Egypt.

[31] he slays an Egyptian on account of an injury done to a Hebrew, What he did among his brethren Moses himself narrates in Exodus 2, verse XI, in these words: In those days, after Moses was grown up, he went out (having left the court) to his brethren: and saw their affliction, and an Egyptian striking one of the Hebrews his brethren. And when he had looked about this way and that way, and saw no one there, he slew the Egyptian and hid him in the sand. Stephen, Acts 7, verse 24, relates the same deed thus: And seeing one of them suffer wrong, he defended him: and striking the Egyptian, he avenged him who suffered the injury. And he thought that his brethren understood that God by his hand would save them: but they understood it not. Of this deed of Moses the holy Fathers have spoken variously. St. Hilary, in book 5 On the Trinity, speaks of it thus: Moses, adopted as the queen's son, and instructed in all the doctrines of the Egyptians, although out of the affection of nature he had avenged the injury of the Hebrew by the death of the Egyptian, nevertheless knew not the God of his fathers' blessings. Hilary is to be understood of so great a knowledge of God, or of the divine nature, as Moses afterwards obtained at the bush. For he subjoins in proof these words: For, forsaking Egypt through fear because the slaying had been betrayed, when he was a shepherd of sheep in the land of Midian, beholding fire in the bush without the burning of the bush, he heard God, and asked his name, and knew his nature.

[32] But since Hilary says that the Egyptian was slain out of the affection of nature, which deed St. Ambrose praises, he does not seem to have attended to the words of St. Stephen, And he thought that his brethren understood, etc., which are of chief force for excusing the slaying; but he seems to have considered that slaying in nearly the same way as St. Ambrose, book 1 of the Hexaemeron, chapter 2, writing thus of it: In fine, before he (Moses) was called to the office of delivering the people, provoked by a natural zeal for equity, having avenged one of his own people who was receiving an injury, he gave himself over to envy and snatched himself away from pleasure, and, avoiding all the tumults of the royal house, betook himself into the solitude of Ethiopia, etc. The same Father declares his opinion in book 1 On the Duties, chapter 36, in these words: Not therefore in the strength of the body and in the arms alone is the glory of fortitude, but rather in the virtue of the soul: nor is the law of virtue in inflicting an injury, but in driving it off. For he who does not repel an injury from his companion, if he can, is as much in fault as he who does it. Whence holy Moses made this the first beginning of his trials of warlike fortitude. For when he had seen a Hebrew receiving injury from an Egyptian, he defended him, so that he laid the Egyptian low and hid him in the sand. Solomon also says: Deliver him that is led to death. The deed, therefore, Ambrose not only excuses but also praises, because Moses was defending one unjustly oppressed: which is doubtless lawful, if it be done with the moderation of blameless self-defense, as the theologians speak; as Ambrose supposed the deed to have been.

[33] Gregory Nazianzen, letter 81 to Theodore bishop of Tyana, says of the same deed: Nazianzen, Chrysostom; but Augustine did not at first dare to defend the deed, Moses likewise was honored with praises because, moved with grief at the injury done to the Israelite, he cut down the Egyptian. Chrysostom too, on Psalm 131, reconciles that slaying, against the heretics who carp at it, with the meekness of Moses, and praises it at some length. But St. Augustine, in book 22, chapter 70, against Faustus the Manichaean, who cast this slaying in Moses' teeth, did not so dare to defend it as to say that the slaying had been just. Let us hear a few of his words out of the many by which he commends the noble disposition of Moses from this very deed. To pass over for the present, he says, that when he had struck down the Egyptian, although God had not commanded him, yet in his prophetic character it was divinely permitted that this should be done, in order to prefigure something to come: whence I do not now argue; but I discuss those deeds altogether as though they signified nothing; and, having consulted that eternal law, I find that a man ought not to have been slain by one who bore no ordained authority, however injurious and wicked he might be. Nevertheless souls capable and fertile of virtue often send forth beforehand vices by which they show for what virtue especially they are fitted, if they shall have been cultivated by precepts… So that motion of the mind by which Moses did not endure that a brother from abroad, suffering injury from a wicked citizen, should go unavenged, without regard to the order of authority, was not unfruitful of the fruits of the virtues, but, being as yet uncultivated, it poured forth signs indeed vicious, but of great fertility… This vice was to be cut back or rooted out; but nevertheless so great a heart was to be cultivated for the bearing of virtues, as the earth for the bearing of crops. These things and many like them Augustine says in the same place.

[34] [afterwards, however, he brought forward doubtfully an argument by which it seems it may be defended.] Nevertheless the holy Doctor, when he afterwards wrote the Questions on Exodus, did not firmly cleave to this opinion: for there, in question 2, he has it thus: Of the deed of Moses, when he slew the Egyptian in defense of his brethren, we have disputed sufficiently in that Work which we wrote on the life of the patriarchs against Faustus: whether the disposition in him was praiseworthy by which he committed this sin, as a rich soil is wont to be praised, even before useful seeds, for a certain fruitfulness in herbs, however useless; or whether the deed itself is altogether to be justified. Which does not seem so, because he as yet bore no lawful authority, neither received from God nor ordained by human society. Yet, as Stephen says in the Acts of the Apostles, he thought that his brethren understood that God by him would give them salvation; so that by this testimony Moses may seem, having already been divinely admonished (which Scripture in that place passes over in silence), to have been able to venture this.* This latter opinion of Augustine's, though brought forward by him with hesitation, seems most agreeable to the sacred Writings. For if Moses believed that his brethren understood him to be chosen by God for their salvation, he himself knew that he was chosen: and therefore he seems to have made a beginning of a certain judicial power from this deed, although that power was not yet declared, and was afterwards suppressed for forty years. Others hold that Moses slew the Egyptian by divine inspiration: which appears to me nearly the same thing, since we suppose him to have been admonished by divine inspiration that he had been appointed by God the avenger of his people. Certain other things too are brought forward to excuse that slaying of the Egyptian, the equity of which would in all likelihood be more clearly discerned if all the circumstances of the deed had been related.

[35] [On the following day, while he strives to reconcile two who are quarrelling, he hears that the slaying is known, and flees:] That the Hebrews did not understand, in the way Moses had thought they would understand, that a defender was being prepared for them by God, the following incident presently intimates, which Stephen narrates in these words, Acts 7, verse 26: And the next day he showed himself to them as they were at strife: and would have reconciled them in peace, saying: Men, ye are brethren; why hurt you one another? But he that did the injury to his neighbor thrust him away, saying: Who hath appointed thee prince and judge over us? What, wilt thou kill me, as thou didst yesterday kill the Egyptian? And Moses fled upon this word, etc. Moses himself agrees, explaining the matter thus in Exodus 2, verse 13: And going out the next day, he saw two Hebrews quarrelling; and he said to him that did the wrong: Why strikest thou thy neighbor? But he answered: Who hath appointed thee prince and judge over us? Wilt thou kill me, as thou didst yesterday kill the Egyptian? Moses feared, and said: How is this word become known? And Pharaoh heard of this word, and sought to kill Moses; but he fled from his sight, and abode in the land of Midian, etc. Each passage clearly asserts that Moses fled out of fear: for what Stephen says, upon this word, signifies "for this cause," namely because, the slaying having been made public, he feared punishment. Chrysostom acknowledges this fear in his exposition on the Epistle to the Hebrews, chapter XI, explaining these words: By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the fierceness of the king*, which some bring forward as apparently contrary to this fear, laboring much to reconcile Moses with Paul.

[36] But if we consider the Apostle's passage attentively, it will appear clearly enough this flight was undertaken out of fear, and that laudably, that he is not speaking of this flight of Moses, but of his departure out of Egypt with all the Israelites, as I shall show in its own place. The aforesaid Chrysostom reconciles the fear of Moses with his faith thus: What sayest thou? He did not fear. And yet Scripture says this, that when he had heard, he feared, and therefore consulted his own safety by flight, and fled away, and withdrew himself secretly, and afterwards was full of dread. Attend diligently and accurately to what has been said. That word, "Not fearing the wrath of the king," he said with regard to what happened afterwards, that he stood before him. For it belonged to one who feared not to take up again the defense and patronage, nor to attempt the matter. But to take it up again belonged to one who committed all things to God… It was therefore of faith to flee. Why then did he not remain? he says. Lest he should cast himself into a foreseen danger, etc. These reasons prove that Moses fled laudably, and that that flight is in no way repugnant to faith. Nay, not even fear is repugnant to faith, so that faith can easily be reconciled both with flight and with fear. But the Apostle seems clearly to say that Moses did not fear when by faith he left Egypt. Yet Moses likewise clearly affirms that he feared when he fled out of Egypt into the land of the Midianites. But to fear and not to fear cannot rightly be reconciled, if we are treating of the same time. Wherefore neither does the exposition given seem sufficiently plain, nor have I found any others which appear so clear as that which says that the Apostle is speaking of the departure of Moses with all his people: for in urging on and carrying out that departure the faith of the Prophet appeared most of all, as he steadfastly made light of the king's utmost fierceness.

[37] One thing can be objected against this exposition, but the Apostle to the Hebrews is not speaking of that flight. and it is that very thing, I think, which has led many interpreters to understand the Apostle's passage of this flight. The Apostle, after the words cited, at once subjoins: By faith he celebrated the Pasch, etc. And yet the Pasch was celebrated for the first time before Moses departed with the Israelites out of Egypt. The order, therefore, which the Apostle observed in that place seems to require that the passage be understood of the flight out of Egypt, which long preceded. But I answer that the Pasch was indeed celebrated one day before the departure, but not before Moses was urging that departure before Pharaoh: for he began to do this many days before the celebration of the Pasch. And so, since the faith of Moses shone forth most of all in urging Pharaoh to grant the departure, and since he wrought many prodigies to this end, the Apostle is not speaking merely of the deeds of the one day on which the children of Israel went out of Egypt, but of all those things which Moses did before an angry and indignant king, in order that he might leave Egypt with his own people. And since these things for the greater part happened before the celebration of the Pasch, they are also commemorated in right order before the celebration of the Pasch. Besides, the order in that place is not so scrupulously observed in all things by the Apostle that this one reason ought to prevail over the reasons brought forward on the contrary side, even if the order here were inverted by the Apostle. For the rest, whither Moses fled, and where he afterwards dwelt, I shall set forth below in its own place.

* that is, Exodus 2

* that is, the deed

§ V. There are related and examined those things which others have added to what is related in Scripture.

[ ] [Philo holds that Moses was believed to be the king's son and destined for the kingdom,] Philo not only admits with the sacred Writings that Moses was adopted by Pharaoh's daughter, but affirms also that by the art and pretense of the aforesaid princess he was held for a true son and destined for the kingdom of Egypt. Let us hear in what manner he explains himself: But when he had grown with increases greater than befitted his age, and was early weaned, the same woman who was both mother and nurse gave him back to her from whom she had received him, endowed indeed with an excellent disposition. He was restored to Pharaoh's daughter later than Philo suggests by these words, When … he was weaned: for sacred Scripture calls him grown up, which may be referred to the fourteenth or fifteenth year of his age. Philo continues in these words: She (Pharaoh's daughter), seeing him make progress beyond his age, her goodwill renewed and kindled by the sight of him, makes him a supposititious son, having already before feigned herself pregnant by a womanly art, so that he might be thought her natural and not an adopted son. So easily does whatever pleases God succeed, however difficult it be. But after many things concerning the training and character of the Youth, to be recited hereafter, he again has this of the Saint: But he, raised to the highest pinnacle of affairs, held to be the grandson of so great a king, destined by the hope of all as successor to his grandfather's throne, and called nothing else than the younger King, followed the heathen institutions of his forefathers, etc. Thus he.

[39] but neither is sufficiently likely. But neither is that pretense, although it is not altogether contrary to sacred Scripture, at all likely; nor is the destination to the kingdom itself: for if the princess had wished to feign that Moses was born of her, she would not seem to have been about to choose a Hebrew nurse to bring up a son substituted in hope of the kingdom; which does not hang together well with the monstrous hatred with which Pharaoh persecuted the Hebrews. But if, as is likely, it was known in Egypt that Moses had been born of a Hebrew mother, in no way does it become likely that the kingdom had been destined for him. What treasure of the Egyptians, then, someone will say, did Moses despise? None other, I think, than the wealth of the king's daughter, of which he could have been heir if he had been willing to abide by the adoption and to bear himself as her son. With this wealth, and with the admirable dexterity of his mind, he could have held a place among the chief princes of Egypt, if he had been willing to conform himself to their manners, and to harass and oppress his own nation along with them. For the favor of Pharaoh's daughter could have brought this about with her father the king, or with his successor, that they should suffer her beloved Moses, adorned with the highest gifts of nature, to be held as her son and heir, God especially moving their hearts and disposing all these things for the salvation of the Israelites. Josephus has nothing about the aforesaid pretense, and does not even speak consistently of the destination of Moses to the kingdom — he who would not have been ignorant of the pretense, or have passed it over, if Philo had drawn it from suitable monuments and had not rather handed down his own conjectures.

[40] Further, Josephus narrates the adoption in another manner, and, so far as appears, not without fables mixed in. Take his words: But the Boy made progress in understanding beyond his age, Josephus, in narrating the rearing and adoption of Moses, and even amid his play he seemed to be wiser than the rest of his equals, and whatever he did he showed forth by a certain new disposition great deeds to be done one day. And after the third year of his age God added to him a wonderful grace. For no one was so austere as not to be astonished at the sight of the beauty of Moses: and it very often happened that, while he was carried about, he turned upon himself all who met him, so that, leaving their serious business, they preferred to feast their eyes upon his surpassing form. So great was the boyish grace that men departed unwillingly from this spectacle. Whence it came about that Thermuthis adopted him for her son, since otherwise she had no children of her own: and bringing him to her father she displayed him, saying that she was thinking of a successor, even though God had granted her to bear no son. This Boy, she said, I have brought up, excelling no less in disposition than in divine beauty, whom the Nile itself may seem to have delivered into my bosom: whom I have determined to adopt as my son, and as thy successor in the principality and the empire; and with the word she placed the Infant in her father's hands.

[41] But he, after he had received him and pressed him to his breast, to gratify his daughter courteously placed his own diadem upon his head. mixes in various fables. But Moses, having childishly pulled it from his head, suffered it to fall to the ground, and even trampled it with his feet; which presently seemed ominous, and to portend nothing good for the kingdom. And presently that scribe of the sacred things, who had foretold that his birth would bring destruction upon Egypt, wished to kill the Boy, crying out: King, this Boy, by whose death God promises us security, has now confirmed the prophecy by insulting thy kingdom and trampling the diadem. By putting him to death take away both fear from the Egyptians and hope and confidence from the Hebrews. But Thermuthis at once snatched him away, the king too being not unwilling, into whom God had put such a mind, providing for the safety of Moses. And so he was brought up with the greatest care. Wherefore the Hebrews indeed hoped for felicity for their race, but to the Egyptians this rearing was suspect. But since there was no one, either of the king's kindred or of the other nobles, who, even if Moses were taken away, seemed likely to procure the advantages of the Egyptians in any great degree, they refrained from slaying him. All these things do not merit much credit, especially what is said about the crown placed upon the head of Moses and trampled by him. No more likely is it that Pharaoh's daughter hoped that Moses would be advanced to the kingdom in the place of her father, as I have already noted. Nay rather, it is more probable that the father of Thermuthis was no longer living when Moses was delivered to her. For from the Chronicle of Eusebius that king of Egypt under whom Moses was born died three years after, and another succeeded. How

hope, then, could Thermuthis have of advancing Moses to the kingdom, especially since she could not be ignorant that the Egyptian princes would not easily confer the kingdom upon one whom they knew to have been born of Hebrew parents?

[42] Concerning the character and the instruction of Moses Philo has written much. Philo attributes to Moses Egyptian and Greek teachers, And his character indeed he has excellently expressed by probable conjectures; but concerning his learning he has mixed the false with the true. Let us hear the writer's own words, that we may correct his errors, so far as may be, more clearly. Having thus obtained a royal upbringing, he was in no wise delighted, after the manner of children, with flatteries, jests, and games, although he was indulgently treated by those who reared him: but even then showing modesty and gravity, he preferred to hear and to look upon what was useful. For at once teachers came in from elsewhere, some coming of their own accord from the neighboring prefectures of Egypt, others invited from Greece by great rewards. These, within a short time, he surpassed, outrunning their instruction by his native aptness, so that he seemed to remember, not to learn, devising something of his own in the more difficult matters: for excellent talents make many innovations about the sciences. And just as bodies of good habit, agile in all their limbs, make their trainers free from care by affording them either no trouble or the least, and likewise noble plants, growing of themselves into good trees, make farmers so: thus a well-born soul, offering itself to meet instruction, is helped by itself more than by its masters, and, having seized the rudiments of any science, the horse (according to the proverb) is borne over the plain.

[43] Chaldeans and Assyrians: And so arithmetic and geometry, and the whole of music — rhythmic, harmonic, metric, whether contemplative or setting itself forth in various modes through instruments and voices — he received from Egyptian teachers: and besides, the hidden philosophy written in letters (as they call them) hieroglyphic, that is, in signs of animals, which they venerate even as deities. The remaining liberal arts the Greeks taught. And of those called in from the neighboring regions, the Assyrians their letters, the Chaldeans the science of the stars. This he learned also from the Egyptians, who are among the foremost devotees of mathematics: and, observing wherein the two agree and wherein they differ, untouched by their contentions he sought the truth: for he admitted nothing besides it, far otherwise than those who, once they have received doctrines of whatever kind, obstinately defend them, whether approved or disapproved, after the manner of hireling advocates who neglect right and equity.

[44] [but the Greeks are certainly to be rejected, since Moses is more ancient than the Greek teachers;] In these things correct first what is said of teachers summoned from Greece: for Moses is far more ancient than all the Greek teachers. Hear St. Augustine, learnedly discoursing upon the antiquity of the Greek teachers compared with the Hebrews, in book 18 On the City of God, chapter 37: In the time, therefore, of our Prophets, whose writings had already come to the knowledge of almost all nations, there were not yet philosophers of the nations who were called even by this name, which began with Pythagoras of Samos, who at that time in which the captivity of the Jews was loosed began to be eminent and to be known. Much more, therefore, are the other philosophers found to have been after the Prophets. For Socrates the Athenian himself, the master of all who then were most renowned, holding the chief place in that part which is called moral or active, is found in the Chronicles after Ezra. Not long after, Plato also was born, who far surpassed the other disciples of Socrates. And if to these we add also their predecessors, who were not yet called philosophers, namely the seven Sages, and then the natural philosophers who succeeded Thales, imitating his zeal in searching out the nature of things — namely Anaximander and Anaximenes and Anaxagoras, and certain others — before Pythagoras first professed himself a philosopher, not even they precede all our Prophets in antiquity of time: since Thales, after whom the rest were, is said to have been eminent in the reign of Romulus, when out of the fountains of Israel there burst forth the river of prophecy in those Writings which were to flow over the whole world. Those poet-theologians alone, therefore — Orpheus, Linus, Musaeus, and whoever else there was among the Greeks — are found to be earlier in years than these Hebrew Prophets whose writings we hold in authority. But not even they anticipated in time our true theologian Moses, who truly preached the one true God, whose writings are now the first in the canon of authority; and thereby, so far as concerns the Greeks, in whose tongue the letters of this world have most of all seethed, they have nothing whereof to boast their wisdom, whereby it may seem, if not superior to our religion, in which is the true wisdom, at least more ancient. Origen also testifies in various places that Moses is more ancient not only than the Greek teachers, but even than the invention of letters among the Greeks; as also Tertullian, Justin, Eusebius, Epiphanius, and many others, so that this matter is not at all doubtful: but some say too much about the antiquity of Moses, as will be said on another occasion.

[45] It seems, secondly, that what is said of Chaldean and Assyrian teachers is to be corrected: Moses in all likelihood did not make use of Assyrians and Chaldeans either: for Stephen affirms only that Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and would not seem to have been about to omit Chaldean and Assyrian teachers, if he had learned more from them than he could learn from the Egyptians or the Hebrews. Nay, these Assyrian and Chaldean teachers seem to have been attributed to Moses rather by the translator Gelenius than by Philo. Certainly thus it is read in Greek: Οἱ δ᾽ ἐκ τῶν πλησιοχώρων, τάτε Ἀσπύρια γράμματα, καὶ τὴν τῶν οὐρανίων Χαλδαἳκὴν ἐπιστήμην. These words you may render more exactly thus, with Pietro Francesco Zino in Surius: But those who had come from the neighboring places taught both the Assyrian letters and the Chaldean science concerning the heavenly bodies. But by "the neighboring" the Hebrews themselves can be understood, who do not all seem to have been ignorant of the sciences of the Assyrians and Chaldeans. Clement of Alexandria, in book 1 of the Stromata, passes over the Assyrian masters; but he wrongly adopts the Greeks from Philo, and likewise joins the Chaldeans to the Egyptians. But the sciences of Moses he sets forth in this manner: But when he was of riper age, he was taught arithmetic and geometry, rhythmic and harmonic, and besides medicine together with music, by those who were distinguished among the Egyptians: and besides, that philosophy which is handed down by symbols or signs, which they display in hieroglyphic letters.. But he learned the letters of the Egyptians, and the science of the heavenly bodies, from the Chaldeans and from the Egyptians. Clement adds: But Eupolemus, in his book on the kings of Judaea, says that Moses was the first wise man, and first handed down grammar to the Jews, and that the Phoenicians received it from the Jews, and the Greeks from the Phoenicians. But these things lack a suitable foundation: for the patriarchs, the forefathers of Moses, were not devoid of wisdom, nor were all the other nations in the time of Moses, as Augustine observes in the place just indicated, writing thus: But, as must be confessed, not indeed in Greece, but among barbarian nations, as in Egypt, there had already been before Moses some learning which might be called their wisdom: otherwise it would not have been written in the holy books that Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians.

[46] The wisdom of Moses the aforesaid Clement of Alexandria briefly and rightly depicts a little after in these words: the manifold learning of Moses, And so our Moses is prophetic, skilled in the making of laws, versed in the marshalling and drawing up of a battle-line, holding the art of leading an army, a statesman and a philosopher. Further, there have not been lacking those who attributed magic also to Moses. These Salian rightly refutes in the Annals of the Old Testament, at the year of the world 2470, writing thus: But far be it from us to believe that a most holy Man either ever learned or handed down such arts, which it is wicked not only to practice but even to wish to learn. Clement of Alexandria does indeed recite from certain Initiated and from Artapanus some Works of Moses which may seem to savor of magic, of which there will be speaking in their own places, but he only recites them; and if they were done, he wishes them rather to be ascribed to the power of God. Certain impostors too, in our own Del Rio's Magical Disquisitions, feigned a certain book on the manner of making gold, published by Moses and Miriam his sister, worthy of as much credit in that matter as is due to wicked rascals. For the rest, those things which are contained in natural magic, and are by no means disapproved, and are compassed within the bounds of natural philosophy, could for the greater part have been known by Moses, according to the subtlety of his genius and the skill of his masters.

[47] and his most approved character. Of the character of Moses Philo continues thus: Then, having passed out of boyhood, he bent his care the more, not, like some, loosing the reins to his desires, although there were not lacking very many incitements which offer themselves abundantly in the houses of kings: but restraining them by sobriety and temperance as by certain bridles, lest they should be borne along with too great an impulse, and thus he tamed, so far as he could, each of the passions, of their own nature unruly and untamed. And if anywhere he had fallen short of duty or given any offense, he severely exacted penalties of himself: and in general he gave heed to resist the first impulses of the mind, watching them as a stubborn horse, lest, forsooth, hastening their course more than enough against the will of reason their driver, they should confound and disturb all things: for these are the origins of good and evil things: of good, if reason hold the command; of the contrary, if the passions unlearn obedience. Deservedly, therefore, was he a marvel to all his household, as a new miracle of nature, they being uncertain what mind dwelt in his body — human, or divine, or mixed of both — since he had nothing common, but all things more august than the rest. For neither did he give anything to the belly beyond the necessary tribute of nature, nor did he remember the pleasures born beneath the belly save for the sake of children; he cultivated frugality as no other man, wholly abhorring dainties. For he preferred to live by the mind rather than by the body, and daily set forth the precepts of philosophy in his deeds, expressing his mind by his words and accommodating his deeds to his sayings, so that his life agreed with his speech. In sum, such as was his life, such also was his discourse, since nothing was out of tune, no otherwise than in a musical instrument. Thus far Philo, whose words I do not here sift too curiously, though some are exaggerated.

§ VI. There is discussed the Ethiopian war, which Josephus and others write that Moses waged successfully: the occasion of his forsaking the court and fleeing out of Egypt.

[ ] Josephus writes that the Ethiopian war was committed to Moses, Josephus, after the foregoing, about to celebrate the warlike fortitude of Moses, frames a narrative of this kind: And so, thus born and thus brought up, when he had come to manhood he shortly gave a proof of his valor, and of how much weight he was to bring either to his own people or to the Egyptians, having obtained an occasion of this kind. The Ethiopians, who dwell above Egypt, were plundering and carrying off the goods of the Egyptians. They, moved with indignation, led an army against them, to avenge the insult joined with the injury: presently, when battle had been joined, they fell partly in the line of battle, and partly, having been shamefully driven into flight, betook themselves back to their own people. Elated by this success, the Ethiopians pressed upon the fugitives, and, thinking it cowardly if they should not use their fortune, having conceived the hope of subjugating Egypt, they laid it waste far and wide: and, having tasted the sweetness of plunder, not restraining themselves, they were kindled to dare greater things. And when, as they roamed the neighboring regions, no one came against them in arms, they went further on, even to Memphis and the sea,

no city being strong enough to resist. Pressed by these calamities, the Egyptians send men to seek a remedy from the oracles. And when the answer had been given that a Hebrew must be called in to their aid, the king asks Moses of his daughter, that he might command all the forces with full authority. She obeyed, but only after the king had been bound by an oath that he would contrive nothing to the destruction of the Youth, reckoning this aid a great thing and casting it as a reproach upon the priests, that they were not ashamed now to implore the help of him whom before they had advised and commanded to be slain as an enemy. That caution and reproach of Thermuthis is brought in by Josephus because he always wishes to write things agreeing with the oracle about the future greatness of Moses, already examined above. But the cause of the Ethiopian war is so set forth, as also the reason for the choice of Moses as leader, that it contains nothing contrary to the sacred Writings. But it does not hang together well with the Chronicle of Eusebius that that king under whom Moses was born should be supposed to have been alive at that time. Yet, even if we believe that Josephus erred in this, it is not necessary that we should say that that whole war is fictitious.

[49] Artapanus, in Eusebius, book 9 On the Preparation for the Gospel, chapter 4, relating the same war more briefly, as also Artapanus, who narrates many uncertain things about it: asserts that Chenephres (the king of Egypt) committed that war to Moses out of envy, that he might perish in it. As the cause of the envy he alleges the illustrious works of the Saint and the fame that arose from them. Take the words of Eusebius, but with the credit left with Artapanus, which here indeed does not deserve to be great. But Artapanus says that Merris, the daughter of Chenephres king of the Egyptians, adopted a Hebrew boy, because she herself bore no children, whom the Jews call Moses and the Greeks Musaeus, from whose teaching Orpheus learned many things. He affirms that this Moses invented instruments of war, and letters also, which he handed on to the priests, and that he divided the city of the Egyptians into sixteen parts, and set prefects over each: all of which, forsooth, he had done lest the peoples, conspiring as they were wont, should drive now this man, now that, from the kingdom. Whence he says it came about that he was worshipped by the Egyptians as though a god, and, on account of his interpretation of the sacred letters, was called Mercury: by which things Chenephres, moved with envy, sought a cause for killing Moses: and thus sent him with full authority against the Ethiopians who were breaking into Egypt, and enrolled his army chiefly from the Jews, in order that on account of the inexperience of the soldiers he might perish together with them. Thus far Artapanus concerning the cause of Moses being sent to the war; and we readily believe him that Moses was not idle in Egypt up to the fortieth year of his life. But we do not think that all the things are true which he has related of his deeds there: nor do we know which of the two has more rightly set forth the cause of Moses being chosen for the war: nay, I would not even dare to affirm that it has been rightly set forth by either. Still less likely is what is said of an army enrolled chiefly from the Hebrews, since the king of Egypt could not so far trust the Hebrews, whom he was most grievously oppressing.

[50] the stratagem of Moses, But of the war waged by Moses Josephus subjoins the following: But Moses gladly undertakes this business at the request both of Thermuthis and of the king. Which deed brought gladness to the seers of both nations. The Egyptians hoped that, after the victory over the Ethiopians won by his valor, there would not be lacking an occasion of taking him off by guile: the Hebrews, on the contrary, hoped that, with Moses set over the forces, there would be for them the means of escaping out of Egyptian servitude. But he, wishing to crush the enemy before he should learn of his coming, made his expedition not along the bank of the river but through the interior of the land. In which matter he sufficiently declared how greatly he excelled in wit and in prudence. For since this route was difficult on account of the multitude of serpents (for this tract breeds very many, and some kinds too which are found nowhere else, all noxious and dreadful in their very look, and among them certain winged ones, so that they not only lie in ambush hidden on the ground, but also do harm on high unexpectedly), he devised, for the safe journeying of the army, a stratagem worthy of admiration. For he had not a few woven vessels of papyrus made in the shape of a chest: which, when they had been filled with ibises, he carried with him. Now this animal is most hostile to the race of serpents. Wherefore they flee their pursuit, and in fleeing, being drawn back as by stags, they are devoured: but they are gentle birds, and fierce against serpents alone. Of which I now cease to say more, as they are not unknown among the Greeks. When therefore they had come into a land swarming with venomous creatures, he let loose the ibises upon them, and using their good service, having accomplished the journey unharmed, he fell upon the Ethiopians unawares: and, battle being joined, he routed and put them to flight, and, frustrated of their hope of seizing Egypt, drove them back into their own region.

[51] Nor content with this, he overthrew their towns, and his deeds in that war, from Josephus, and everywhere a great slaughter of the enemy was wrought; whence it came about that, after these things had been successfully done under the auspices of Moses, the army showed forth such eagerness that it seemed likely to endure every labor, and already either destruction or captivity threatened the Ethiopians. At the last, driven into Saba, the royal city of that nation, which afterwards Cambyses king of the Persians called Meroe from his sister's name, they were surrounded with a siege. Now it was almost impregnable, being girt on every side by the Nile, and other rivers besides adding to its fortification, the Astapus and the Astoborras, which by their interposition made the crossing more difficult. And so, situated on an island and enclosed by a strong wall, it kept off the enemy not only by the rivers but also by the mounds which, built between the walls and the rivers to keep off their inundations, were then of use for this also, that they denied the enemy, even after the rivers had been overcome, an approach for assaulting the city. Thus far Josephus. True are the things which he relates of the ibis: for the ibis, or black stork, is an Egyptian bird of huge size, most hostile to serpents, of which it eats many and kills others.

[52] Eusebius continues the account of Artapanus thus: Which war, likewise from Artapanus; in the account of both there is much that is uncertain: as he asserts he received it from the men of Heliopolis, was waged for ten years: and on account of its length a city was founded in that place where they sat holding down the empire of the Ethiopians: which, he says, they call Hermopolis, that is, the city of Mercury: and that the ibis was there first consecrated, because it kills harmful serpents. It is agreed indeed that the ibis was worshipped by the Egyptians; but we do not know whether that idolatry began at Hermopolis, of the building of which by Moses Josephus has nothing. This can certainly be said, that the cult of the ibis was not begun by Moses. But again it is uncertain whether those birds afterwards began to be worshipped on account of that service which Josephus says was rendered by them to Moses. This indeed would appear likely, if it were altogether agreed that ibises were employed by Moses against the serpents, and that Hermopolis was founded by him: but neither is Josephus of such authority that we should hold the first for certain, nor do we reckon Artapanus of so much account that we should think much credit is to be attributed to the second. But if Hermopolis was indeed built in that expedition, it does not seem to have been done when Moses with his army was besieging the city of Meroe: for the distance between the two cities is huge. Nor does Artapanus say that it was founded then; but only in that ten-year expedition. Now, as Josephus has nothing about the founding of Hermopolis, so Artapanus is silent about the besieging of Meroe; so that each seems equally uncertain. No more certain is it whether Meroe is the same as the royal city Saba, which some say and others deny.

[53] The end of the war Josephus relates as less probable than all the foregoing, the end of the war improbably narrated by Josephus: continuing thus: Here (at the city Saba, afterwards called Meroe), when Moses bore it ill that the army sat idle, the enemy not daring to join hands with him, something of this kind meanwhile came to pass. The king of the Ethiopians had a daughter named Tharbis. She, catching sight of Moses as he brought his army up to the walls and fought excellently, and admiring the valor of the Man who had both restored to soundness the tottering fortune of the Egyptians and brought the lately victorious Ethiopians into the utmost peril, was seized with a violent love of him: and as this grew from day to day, she sends to him the most faithful of her servants, offering her hand in marriage. He assented, on this condition confirmed by an oath, that after the city had been delivered to him he would take her to wife: and presently the deed follows the word. Nevertheless severity was used against the enemy, and, thanks having been given to God and the marriage celebrated, the army of the Egyptians was led home victorious. Artapanus, omitting this marriage, which is not probable, affirms that the Ethiopians, in admiration of his valor, so honored Moses that they even learned circumcision from him. Thus far they concerning this war, whether true or fictitious, about which the learned do not agree: for both the holy Fathers have gone off into different opinions, and the interpreters and other moderns. And indeed it cannot be determined with certainty whether Moses truly waged a war against the Ethiopians, or whether there has been attributed to him what was done by some other man, or was not done at all.

[54] nevertheless it appears more probable that something true underlies that war: But that something true underlies it appears to me more probable, for these reasons. Josephus and Artapanus, ancient writers who do not seem to have copied from one another, agree about the waging of the war: nor can these be convicted of falsehood from the sacred Writings, since that war is not contrary to sacred Scripture. Nay rather, Moses is everywhere so exhibited in Scripture that he was most fit for warlike affairs: for he had been instructed, as the adoptive son of the king's daughter, in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, of which military science was doubtless a part; and he excelled in greatness of soul, as is sufficiently gathered from the slaying of the Egyptian and the defense of Jethro's daughters against the shepherds: besides, his prudence was wonderful and he was in the flower of his age, so that we should believe nothing strange or unusual if we suppose that Moses, some years before his departure from the court, was sent on some warlike expedition against the Ethiopians. The silence of Moses himself is here of no weight: for he was silent about all that he did while he lived in the court; nor yet can we think that he was idle there for twenty-five years. What seems to press more with some is that Josephus, as well as Artapanus, has inserted into his account certain things which appear wholly fabulous. But each writer, while he records the true deeds of Moses which are related in the Scriptures, likewise disfigures them with not a few fables. In no way, therefore, can it be inferred from certain fabulous circumstances that that whole war is fictitious. Further, the disagreement of Josephus and Artapanus in certain principal circumstances chiefly moves me to think that not all is fictitious. For it can hardly be believed that the same history was made up by two writers distant in time and place. And here it cannot be said that Josephus borrowed the fable from Artapanus and augmented it, according to his own liberty, with fictitious ornaments. For if Josephus

had had Artapanus for his guide, he would not have omitted the illustrious deeds of Moses in Egypt before the Ethiopian war, nor would he have kept silence about the founding of Hermopolis and the other things related by Artapanus, whether those things be true or fictitious. Wherefore, all things having been attentively considered, that that Ethiopian war was waged by Moses appears to me more probable; but I cannot doubt that many fables have been made up in the account of that same war. I know indeed that the most holy Prophet is far too great to have need of that profane praise; but I only wished to inquire what appears more conformable to the truth.

[55] but the wife taken in that war, who was said to be the king's daughter, Among the fables of Josephus there are to be discussed and refuted before all others the nuptials which he writes were contracted by Moses on this occasion. Perhaps that fiction came into Josephus's mind because the wife of Moses is called an Ethiopian woman in Numbers 12, verse 1. Certainly the Abulensian, on chapter 4 of Numbers, question 4, follows Josephus, writing thus: It must be said that there is no doubt that Moses had for his wife Tharbis the daughter of the king of the Ethiopians, because Josephus, in book 2 of the Antiquities, relates most fully how Moses, as leader of the war of the Egyptians against the Ethiopians, received in marriage the daughter of the king of the Ethiopians: but in those things which are purely historical and do not conflict with sacred Scripture, Josephus is to be believed, who was a man most skilled in these matters. Our own doctors too, such as Isidore and certain others who relate histories, say that Moses had the daughter of the king of the Ethiopians for his wife, which they say partly moved by the authority of Josephus, who wrote it first, and partly on account of sacred Scripture, which here says that Moses had an Ethiopian wife. Thus far the Abulensian, who had not yet sufficiently discerned the fictions of Josephus; but they have since been more fully uncovered. Now, however, there is no support for Josephus or the Abulensian from the passage of Numbers alleged, because it is certain that Zipporah the Midianite is there named an Ethiopian woman, as the Abulensian himself confesses in question 6, and as we shall see below. The account of Josephus also has no foundation from any other quarter, since no writer contemporary with Josephus or earlier relates those nuptials — not even Artapanus, although he treats of the Ethiopian war and relates the true nuptials of Moses with Zipporah a little after.

[56] The silence of Artapanus is in this matter of no small weight, plainly seems fictitious. since he both speaks of the city of Meroe and of the wife of Moses taken not long after, whom he calls the daughter of Raguel king of Arabia; so that it would be strange that he should have been ignorant of that first wife of Moses, if he had indeed married her at all. There is added the silence of Philo, from which we understand either that that first wife of Moses was unknown to the Jews, or that the things which the Hebrews had handed down concerning her seemed fabulous to Philo. Besides, it is not likely that Moses advanced so far into Ethiopia with an army as to reach the city of Meroe, which lies at an immense distance from Egypt, especially since Artapanus kept silence about such great advances of Moses, and rather intimated that the war was long continued about the borders of the two empires, or in upper Egypt, affirming that Hermopolis was meanwhile founded, which was in Egypt and was far distant from the border of Ethiopia. Finally Josephus, when he writes that the nuptials were celebrated and that nevertheless severity was used against the enemy, badly mingles peace and war; and when he says that after the nuptials Moses returned with the army, and does not add whether the bride accompanied him, he shows that he has composed a fable for which he found no easy exit. Assuredly it is not likely either that the daughter of the king of Ethiopia set out with Moses into Egypt, and was a little after abandoned by him, when, the court being forsaken, he betook himself to the Israelites. Nor is it any more likely that a marriage was contracted so that the spouses should presently forsake one another, and the wife remain in Ethiopia and the Husband in Egypt, and that they should thereafter never see one another again. Another little tale some have here devised, namely that Moses gave his wife a ring by which she should forget him, and thus returned free into Egypt. But those inventions are doubtless the Rabbis', and are not merely fictitious but plainly impious. Wherefore, with most of the learned, I hold those nuptials of Moses to be altogether fictitious.

[57] The flight of Moses out of Egypt Josephus narrates as a sequel of the Ethiopian expedition in this manner: [The flight from the court and from Egypt confused by Josephus, and not exactly related;] But they (the Egyptians), having received their safety, repaid Moses with hatred for thanks, and with greater zeal contrived snares against him: and suspecting lest, elated by his successful deeds, he should attempt a revolution in Egypt, they accused him of murder before the king. For he himself too had already begun to hold the man suspect, moved partly by envy on account of the war bravely and prudently administered, partly also by fear of some disaster, the scribes and the sacrificers unceasingly urging and provoking him hither; so that Moses was now but a very little away from destruction, and would without doubt have been crushed had he not, scenting the matter, withdrawn himself secretly at the very nick of time: and when he understood that the roads were being watched, he snatched his flight through the deserts, by which his enemies least suspected he would escape. Artapanus too, praised partly in Eusebius and partly in the Alexandrian Chronicle, says that snares were laid for Moses on his return, and that for this cause he fled, after he had killed Chanetothes, an Egyptian who was plotting against him. It is added in the Alexandrian Chronicle that Pharaoh's daughter, who had adopted Moses, had died not long before. But, although it is likely enough that Moses suffered from envy, which is frequent in the courts of princes, they do not express the cause of his flight exactly, and they seem to suppose that the court and the whole of Egypt were forsaken by Moses at once, whereas from the order of sacred Scripture it seems clear that Moses first withdrew from the court and professed himself an Israelite: and then, after the Egyptian was slain, fled out of Egypt. But since it is agreed that the Hebrews were hateful to Pharaoh, no other cause was necessary why he should likewise pursue Moses with hatred, than that he chose the fellowship of the Hebrews before the court.

[58] for he first forsook the court, and then fled out of Egypt; Philo, page 472, probably describes the occasion on which Moses turned away from the court. But he, he says, raised to the highest pinnacle of affairs, … followed the heathen institutions of his forefathers, judging the goods of his adoptive parents, though splendid, to be nevertheless spurious; and on the contrary those of his natural parents, though for the time meaner, to be nevertheless true and his own. And so, a most incorrupt judge of both parties, both of that from which he was born and of that into which he had been adopted, to the one he showed goodwill, to the other gratitude: and he would have returned thanks abundantly, had he not observed in that land the impious cruelty of the king. Then he excellently describes the most unjust harassing and oppression of the Hebrews, on account of which he not only turned away from the court but even wholly abandoned it, as St. Basil rightly observes, Homily 1 on the Hexaemeron, describing the matters in order in these words: Who, hating the pride of tyranny and returning to the lowliness of his tribesmen, chose rather to be harassed together with the people of God than to enjoy the temporary sweetness of sin. Who obtained the love of justice from his very nature; since even before the leadership of the people was committed to him, he is found, on account of his natural hatred of wickedness, to have pursued the evil even unto death. Who, put to flight by those whom he had loaded with benefits, and gladly abandoning the tumults of Egypt, and coming into Ethiopia, and there wholly at leisure from other business, gave a full forty years to the contemplation of things. These things I wished to give together, that the order of events, not observed by very many, might be confirmed from Basil.

[59] [the cause of forsaking the court could have been the cruelty of the Egyptians toward the Hebrews;] This going out from the court Philo also did not observe, or at least did not distinguish from the flight, elsewhere probably expressing the occasion and cause of both thus: These things he continually bore most indignantly, since he could neither hinder the injury (done to the Hebrews by the Egyptians) nor succor the oppressed: yet with words, so far as he could, he relieved them, admonishing the overseers from time to time to moderate and relax their excessive harshness in driving them on: and the workmen, to bear their present state bravely, as befits men, and not to fail in their souls together with their bodies, and to hope for a change for the better, for all worldly things turn to their contrary — clouds into fair weather, storms into calm air, tempest into tranquillity — and human affairs the more so, the more unstable they are. With such charms, like a good physician, he thought to relieve evils however grievous: which, nevertheless, being soothed for a time, were presently exasperated anew, and after an interval were increased by new accessions of hardships: for there were among the overseers certain men savage with rage, differing in nothing from venomous and flesh-eating beasts, brutes under a human shape, beneath which they hid their bestial manners, harder than iron and adamant. One of these, most monstrous, because, remitting nothing, he was exasperated even by prayers unless his orders were swiftly done, striking the wretched men, beating them, torturing them — him he slew, judging it lawful: and in very truth it was lawful to kill him who lived for the destruction of men.

[60] When the king heard this he bore it ill, as an unworthy deed, but the cause of his fleeing was fear. not that anyone had been slain, or had slain, whether justly or unjustly: but because his Grandson dissented from him, and did not hold the same men as he for allies and for enemies, loving those whom he hated, but hostile to those beloved by him; and pitying those whom the king unmercifully harassed. Seizing this occasion, the courtiers, holding the Youth suspect, whom they knew would one day exact penalties for the present cruelty as soon as he could, filled the ready ears of his grandfather with very many calumnies, whispering on this side and that, so that they made him anxious about the losing of his sovereignty. For they said: He will attack thee thyself, he purposes nothing moderate, he is always contriving something, he aspires to the kingdom before his time, he promises to some and terrifies others, he slays men uncondemned: the more anyone loves thee, the more he persecutes him. Why dost thou delay? Is it that he may accomplish what he attempts? This delay will profit the plotter. Moses meanwhile withdrew into neighboring Arabia, where he could live more safely.* What Philo says, that it was one of the overseers of the works whom Moses slew, is indeed not read in sacred Scripture; yet it is likely. But it does not appear equally probable that he calls the king of Egypt the grandfather of Moses, supposing that the same man under whom Moses had been born was alive at that time; which does not rightly hang together with the chronology of the kings of Egypt. As regards the accusations of the nobles before the king, these can be held for not improbable conjectures.

* the king's

§ VII. The deeds of Moses in the land of Midian: the wife there taken, and two sons begotten.

[ ] [Moses after his flight out of Egypt dwelt in the land of Midian about the Red Sea,] Of the place to which Moses fled out of Egypt it is said in Exodus 2, verse 16: He abode in the land of Midian. But Stephen, Acts 7, verse 29, says: And Moses fled, .. and became a sojourner in the land of Midian. Very many writers hold that two cities,

called Midian, existed, placing the one not far from the Dead Sea, the other near the Red Sea. That opinion indeed I find everywhere among the moderns, so that it now seems to be held as it were for certain that there was not only a twofold Midian but also a twofold land of Midian. Nevertheless the matter appears to me in no way certain, but worthy of a more diligent examination. This meanwhile is certain, that that land of Midian to which Moses fled was near the mountains Horeb and Sinai: for, feeding his flock, he came to Mount Horeb, as is said in Exodus 3. From this observation it again follows that the land of Midian was not far distant from the Red Sea, or from the Arabian gulf, as it is otherwise called: for Mount Sinai is near the aforesaid sea, from which some interpreters in their geographical Tables have removed it further than is right. Further, that Moses lived in this land of Midian for forty years is certain, nor can it be doubted at all. That part is of Arabia Petraea; and therefore profane authors say that Moses fled into Arabia. St. Jerome, in the Hebrew Places, writes thus of the metropolis of this region: Midian, a city so called from one of the sons of Abraham by Keturah. It is beyond Arabia to the South, in the desert of the Saracens, over against the East of the Red Sea: whence they are called Midianites, and the region Midianite. All these things agree with the nearness of Mount Sinai, which likewise is in the most Southern part of Arabia Petraea, and to the East of the Red Sea. By the words beyond Arabia he understands the border of Arabia to the South, yet in such a way that it is reckoned a part of Arabia; unless he preferred to distinguish those deserts, neighboring upon Egypt, from Arabia.

[62] the moderns think there was another land of Midian also, about the Dead Sea: Jerome, after the words given, subjoins that another city too is found, called Midian, beside the Arnon (a small river) and Areopolis (the metropolis of the Moabites), of which, he says, now only ruins are shown. I have not adduced all the words of Jerome, because writers fight over the right reading of them. But the opinion of Eusebius and Jerome may be seen explained in the latest Verona edition. But from this passage of Jerome the modern writers set up not only another city Midian, but also a different region of the Midianites to the East of the Dead Sea, and understand of that nation all the things which will hereafter have to be narrated of the Midianites partly cut down by Moses. Calmet, in the Biblical Dictionary at the word Midian, not only embraces two lands of Midian; but besides strives to prove that the Midianites placed to the East of the Dead Sea were the posterity of Abraham and Keturah, descending namely from Midian, their fourth son; but that the Midianites neighboring on the Red Sea in all likelihood descended from Cush, the son of Ham: from which it follows that the wife of Moses was not of the posterity of Abraham; and in this he opposes St. Jerome. Further, no reason for distinguishing two lands of Midian in the Scriptures occurs to me, save this one only, from which I think that whole opinion has arisen, namely that the Midianites are sometimes mentioned near the Red Sea and sometimes near the Dead Sea, and that that extent seemed greater than that one nation should have inhabited the whole of that tract.

[63] [but it is more probable that the same nation extended itself from the Red Sea as far as the land of Moab.] But if we are willing attentively to consider all the things which are related of the Midianites in the sacred Writings, it will not seem improbable that they were extended from the Red Sea as far as the Dead Sea, or as far as the borders of the Moabites and Idumaeans: which alone is required, that all things related of the Midianites may easily be understood. First, in Genesis 25, verse 2, and 1 Chronicles 1, verse 32, among the sons of Abraham by Keturah, Midian is numbered fourth. And presently five sons of Midian are enumerated, namely Ephah, and Epher, and Hanoch, and Abida, and Eldaah. And so Midian was the brother of Isaac, so that we could not wonder if the Midianites in the time of Moses had been as numerous as the Israelites and the Idumaeans together, who were all the posterity of Isaac by two sons only. Nay, if we compare the five sons of Midian with the two of Isaac, we shall easily see that it would not even be a matter for wonder if they had been more numerous than both the aforesaid peoples. But it is by no means necessary to assert that the Midianites surpassed the Israelites alone in number, in order that we may understand that that tract of Arabia which lies between the Red Sea and the Dead Sea was inhabited by them, since its length is not greater, but rather less, than the length of the Promised Land, throughout which the Israelites extended themselves under the leadership of Joshua. Besides, the Midianites could inhabit that tract of Arabia even if we were willing to think that they were far inferior in number to the Israelites, since they had less frequent cities, and in all likelihood for the greater part lived under tents and wandered hither and thither for the convenience of their flocks. These reasons suffice to show that two nations of Midianites are not to be set up, even though we find Midianites near the Red Sea, and again that Moses was in their neighborhood when he encamped in the plains of Moab: for from the Red Sea as far as the Moabites they were extended. Scripture too persuades us that there was only one nation of Midianites: for nowhere does it distinguish Midianites from Midianites. Nay, from Calmet himself these his own words may be added: Of the Midianites, those only seem known to the Orientals who held the places by the Red Sea near Sinai, whither Moses came and married Zipporah. For no other reason, I think, are these Midianites alone known to the Orientals, than that there never were any others; but these only extended themselves a little further. This observation can shed light upon various things to be narrated hereafter.

[64] Moses sets forth his first deeds in the land of Midian thus, from verse 15: [Moses, coming into the land of Midian, takes to wife Zipporah, daughter of Raguel the priest;] He abode in the land of Midian, and he sat down by a well. And the priest of Midian had seven daughters, who came to draw water: and when the troughs were filled, desired to water their father's flocks. And the shepherds came and drove them away: and Moses arose, and defending the maids, watered their sheep. And when they returned to Raguel their father, he said to them: Why are ye come sooner than usual? They answered: A man of Egypt delivered us from the hands of the shepherds: and he drew water also with us, and gave the sheep to drink. But he said: Where is he? Why have ye let the Man go? Call him that he may eat bread. Here Scripture for brevity's sake omits that Moses came to Raguel, and was invited by him to remain with him: for the sequel abundantly indicates this, Moses continuing his narrative thus: And Moses swore that he would dwell with him: and he took Zipporah his daughter to wife. From these things the studious reader will easily gather that there must have been a wonderful grace in Moses, since he was invited to remain as soon as he was seen; and afterwards received the daughter of a leading man to wife. But a few things are here to be observed about the father-in-law and the wife of Moses.

[65] First, interpreters doubt whether Raguel is the same as Jethro, this Raguel is in all likelihood the same as Jethro, who in chapter 3, verse 1, is likewise called the father-in-law of Moses, because that same Jethro is in chapter 18 named the kinsman of Moses. The Hebrew word Chothen is everywhere the same, but in the earlier passages it is rendered in Latin father-in-law, and in the later kinsman, so that the Hebrew word seems to be of such signification as to designate someone joined by affinity, and from it it cannot be determined whether he be a father-in-law or only a kinsman by affinity. But if we consider the Vulgate Scripture, it must be said that he is the same man who is elsewhere called Raguel and elsewhere Jethro, because both Raguel and Jethro is called the father-in-law of Moses, who certainly had but one father-in-law, as he had but one wife. And that Jethro is afterwards called a kinsman by affinity does not overturn the reason given: for a father-in-law can in a wider signification be called a connection, or a kinsman by affinity; but no one can truly be named a father-in-law unless he really be one. And so our Vulgate holds Raguel and Jethro for the same man. With the Vulgate agree the Seventy interpreters, who already in Exodus 2, where the father-in-law of Moses is called Raguel in the Vulgate, have Jethro for Raguel. Besides, Symmarhus, Aquila, Josephus, and generally all the ancients seem to have conspired in that opinion, since I have not found any of the ancients alleged for the opposite. And so, although the Hebrew word is ambiguous, and elsewhere is read otherwise expressed in Latin, I judge that we must here rest in the ancient interpreters of sacred Scripture, and say that Raguel and Jethro are one and the same father-in-law of Moses. The very deeds between Jethro and Moses in Exodus 18 persuade to this opinion by a likely reason: for Jethro would not seem to have been about to admonish the Leader of a numerous people with so great freedom as he used in that place, unless he had been his father-in-law and had therefore had more authority than a connection of equal or lesser age would have.

[66] [a priest of the true God, and of the posterity of Abraham: the reasons brought against the last part,] It is to be observed, secondly, that Raguel, or Jethro, was not a priest of idols but of the true God, such as Melchizedek was: for Jethro, having afterwards returned to Moses, offered holocausts and sacrifices to God, as is said in Exodus 18, verse 12. Thirdly, from what we have said of the Midianites it follows that Jethro and his daughter Zipporah were of the posterity of Abraham. Origen agrees, Homily XI on Genesis, writing thus: But neither ought this to escape us from the things which are related in the history — what and of what sort are the generations which are propagated from it. For if we remember these, we shall be able more easily to recognize the different nations which are spoken of in the Scriptures: for example, when it is said that Moses took to wife the daughter of Jethro the priest of Midian; which Midian is found to have been the son of Keturah and Abraham. We recognize therefore that the wife of Moses is of the seed of Abraham, and was not a foreigner. Although these things seem certain enough, I shall nevertheless briefly answer the arguments of those who hold that these Midianites sprang from Cush, or at least think the matter doubtful. Their chief reason is that Zipporah in Numbers 12, verse 1, is called an Ethiopian woman, or a Cushite: for the Ethiopians derive their origin from Cush, the son of Ham. Another reason Calmet adds at the word Midian, to confirm his doubt; and he expresses it in these words: Arabic writers reckon the Midianites to be foreign nations, who established a seat for themselves in Arabia, alien therefore to the number of the tribes of those ancient nations which frequented that region, and whose history besides those writers have set out at length in their Commentaries and Genealogies. And this greatly favors the opinion which refers Midian to Cush as parent. So reasons the learned man, whose observation is true: but the consequence to be deduced was altogether the contrary,

as we shall presently see.

[67] [for the solution of which certain things are observed about the ancient inhabitants of Arabia;] The most learned Assemani, in the Oriental Library, volume 3, part 2, chapter 10, §1, disputes at length about the nations which first inhabited Arabia; and proves each assertion from monuments especially Oriental, of which Calmet speaks. Further, Assemani divides the inhabitants of Arabia into natives and newcomers. The natives he again divides into two parts, of which he says the first arises from Joktan, the son of Eber. This can be confirmed from sacred Scripture, Genesis [ ], verse 26, where it is thus stated: And Joktan (the son of Eber and brother of Peleg, as is set down before) begot Almodad, and Sheleph, and Hazarmaveth, Jerah and Hadoram, and Uzal, and Diklah, and Obal, and Abimael, Sheba, and Ophir, and Havilah, and Jobab. All these were the sons of Joktan. And their dwelling was from Mesha as thou goest as far as Sephar, a mountain of the east: that is, says Assemani, from Musa or Muza, an emporium of the Arabian gulf, as far as Sapphar or Tapphar, a city of the Homerites. Of the other nation the same author then subjoins these things: The other origin of the Arabs, likewise natives, is derived from Cush the son of Ham, etc. From these were born the Cushaeans or Cushites, and the Sabaeans, who inhabited Arabia by the gulf of Persia and by the Red Sea, etc. Pursuing these things more at large, he at last concludes thus: Finally from Cush the Cushaeans, who by Greeks and Latins are called Ethiopians: for although the name of the Cushaeans began in a later age to be used for the inhabitants of African Ethiopia, whom we call Abyssinians, yet that the Cushaeans, before they crossed the Arabian gulf and migrated into the opposite part of Ethiopia, dwelt in Arabia, Bochart demonstrates by most certain arguments, book IV, chapter 2.

[68] These things about the native Arabs having been set forth, he proceeds to the newcomers, which partly show that the Midianites are truly of the posterity of Abraham, or immigrants, who derive their origin from Abraham and Lot. The posterity of Abraham are partly by Hagar, as the Ishmaelites, who afterwards obtained various names; partly by Keturah, among whom the Midianites are found; partly also by Sarah, such as the Idumaeans, descending from Esau the son of Isaac. But from Lot arose the Ammonites and the Moabites. From these, says Assemani, namely from Abraham, Lot, and Esau, arose the best-known peoples of Arabia, the Ishmaelites, Midianites, Moabites, Ammonites, and Edomites or Idumaeans, whom the Arabs call newcomers and adventitious, because forsooth they came afterwards to the place where the first Arabs dwelt, with whom they contracted marriages and treaties. These things can be evidently proved not only from the history of the Arabs, but even by reason alone; for neither Abraham nor Lot dwelt at first in Arabia. And so their posterity were carried thither after it had long been inhabited by nations far more ancient. Wherefore from the fact that the Midianites are held by the Arabs for newcomers it evidently follows that the Midianites are not of the posterity of Cush, who were natives; but of the posterity of Abraham, who came afterwards.

[69] Now, that it may be better understood for what cause Zipporah is called an Ethiopian woman, and partly are not opposed to it. or in Hebrew a Cushite, I subjoin still a few words of the aforesaid Assemani which he has in the same place, number 4: The chief city of the Midianites is Midian, in the desert of the Saracens of the Red Sea, whence the region is called Midianite, where the ancient Cushaeans dwelt… Their city is Midian, which is the Modiana of Ptolemy. And so it does not seem to be doubted that she was called an Ethiopian, or a Cushite, from the place which the Cushaeans had inhabited and which the Midianites then inhabited. Thus the Franks from Gaul are often called Gauls, the Goths from Spain Spaniards, the Angles from Britain Britons; and all peoples everywhere, after they have occupied new seats, have sometimes obtained the ancient name of their nation, sometimes that of the region they had occupied. Both names Habakkuk seems to have expressed, chapter 3, verse 7, in these words: For iniquity I saw the tents of Ethiopia, the curtains of the land of Midian shall be troubled. Thus St. Ambrose, cited at number 32, and Basil at number 58, call the land of Midian Ethiopia.

[70] Two sons of Moses born in the land of Midian. Moses begot in the land of Midian two sons by the wife he had taken, as he himself narrates in this manner: And she (Zipporah) bore him a son, whom he called Gershom, saying: I have been a stranger in a foreign land. And she bore another, whom he called Eliezer, saying: For the God of my father, my helper, hath delivered me out of the hand of Pharaoh. For forty years Moses abode there, as is agreed from Acts 7, verse 30. What he did meanwhile he briefly sets forth thus in chapter 3, verse 1: Now Moses fed the sheep of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. Nor did St. Basil at number 58 wish, I think, to exclude this pastoral life, although he says: There wholly at leisure from other business, he gave a full forty years to the contemplation of things. For the care of feeding a flock does not greatly hinder contemplation, but rather affords leisure for contemplating. Toward the end of these years Pharaoh died, as Moses intimates in chapter 2, verse 23, writing thus: Now after a long time the king of Egypt died: and the children of Israel groaning, cried out because of the works: and their cry went up unto God from the works. And he heard their groaning, and remembered the covenant which he made with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And the Lord looked upon the children of Israel, and he knew them. All these things signify that the time had drawn near in which God had determined to deliver the Israelites according to the promise made to the patriarchs.

§ VIII. The narrative of certain others concerning the foregoing is given and examined.

[ ] Josephus, the flight of Moses and his coming into the land of Midian, Josephus explains the things related from the Scriptures, and augments them with certain conjectures which appear likely enough. Wherefore I transfer hither his words about the flight of Moses and his earlier deeds in the land of Midian. When he understood, he says, that the roads were being watched, he snatched his flight through the deserts, by which his enemies least suspected he would escape: and although he found food nowhere, he overcame hunger by patience. And when he had come to the city Madiene, situated on the shore of the Red Sea, named from one of the sons of Abraham and Keturah, sitting by a certain well he refreshed the weariness contracted from his laborious journey. For it was the hour of noon, and he now had the city in sight. In this place there befell him a business arising from the manner of life of the inhabitants, by which he both declared his valor and found an occasion of better fortune; for since that region labors under a scarcity of waters, the shepherds gave heed to be the first to seize the wells, lest perchance, the water being drawn off by others, their flocks should be forced to lack drink.

[72] There come therefore to the well seven maiden sisters, as also the aid given to the daughters of Raguel the priest, the daughters of Raguel the priest, who was held in great honor by the inhabitants of that place: who, bearing the care of their father's flocks — which among the Troglodytes is by custom done even by women — having drawn as much water as seemed enough, pour it out for the flocks to drink into troughs made for this use. And when the shepherds had come up and, driving off the girls, were taking the water for themselves, Moses, judging it unjust not to bring help to maidens suffering injury, and that under his own eyes the violence of men should prevail more than the right of girls, drove off the usurpers and gave them help as was fitting. But they, having received the benefit, after they came to their father related to him both the injury of the shepherds and how they had been helped by a stranger: and they begged that this benefit might not be lost to him.

[73] Then he, having praised the gratitude of the girls toward their benefactor, and the thanks rendered to Moses for this cause, he probably sets forth. bade them bring Moses, that he might receive the thanks he had deserved. And when he came, he showed him how he had learned from his daughters of the aid which he had brought them, and, admiring his valor, said that this benefit had been bestowed upon men not ungrateful. For he would return thanks not only equal but somewhat greater; then, having adopted him as a son, he gave him one of his daughters in marriage: besides this he appointed him keeper and master of the cattle, in which of old the whole possession of the barbarians consisted. Having obtained this fortune, Moses lived with Jetheglaeus, which was the surname of Raguel, feeding the cattle with his father-in-law. What Josephus asserts above about the Troglodytes is true; but care must be taken lest anyone think that the Midianites are confounded by him with the Troglodytes: for he adduces the Troglodytes, who dwelt chiefly in Africa on the shore opposite the Arabian gulf, or the Red Sea, only to show that not among the Midianites alone is the care of cattle committed also to women.

[74] Philo, having briefly related the flight of Moses, reasons thus about the aid given to the girls: but Philo narrates the aid given to the girls in a freer paraphrase, But he, having entered upon a different way, followed his own sound mind, not suffering himself to be carried aside; and therefore sometimes more daring than his strength warranted, he trusted in justice, relying on which he brought aid of his own accord to the weaker. I shall tell one deed of his which fell in this time, small in appearance, but an index of a great soul. The Arabs practice cattle-keeping, and men, women, young men and maidens feed the flocks alike, not the common people only but the noble also. Seven girls, the daughters of one priest, had brought their flock to a certain spring, and, letting down their urns by a rope, drew in turn and in rivalry, and poured the water into the nearest troughs until they were filled. Other shepherds came up, who, despising the weakness of the maidens, attempted to remove them together with their flocks; driving their own cattle to the drink already prepared, meaning to enjoy the labors of others. Moses, who was not far off, catching sight of this, at once ran up, crying out: Will you not desist from your injuries in a solitude which you abuse for fraud? Are you not ashamed to carry about idle arms and sluggish shoulders? Hair, beards, and manly flesh I see; men I do not see: the girls handle in a manly fashion what must be handled; you young men are more delicate than girls. Will you not depart? will you not yield to these who came first, who have a right to the water drawn by their own labor, that the supply might be more abundant? Will you thus carry off what is made ready? You shall not do it, by the heavenly eye of justice, which sees whatever is done even in the most deserted places: you shall not carry it off unpunished. He beyond expectation has sent me to their aid, for I will not fail those who suffer injury, trusting in that great hand which you, blinded by greed, do not discern, nor is it lawful for you to discern it, yet you shall feel it striking from a hiding-place, unless you come to your senses. Terrified by these words, which seemed those of a man inspired with divine frenzy, and fearing lest he should prophesy truly, they obeyed: and, the flocks of the maidens being admitted to the troughs, they suffered their cattle to drink first.

[75] They, returning home joyful, told out to their father the unlooked-for chance, so that he was seized with a great desire of seeing that Guest. He therefore rebuked their ingratitude: and accuses them of ingratitude, and the shepherd's craft also Why did you let the man go? why did you not bring him? and if perchance he refused, why did you not entreat him? Are you conscious to me of any inhumanity? or do you not fear lest you fall again upon other violent and unjust men?

It must be that you are left destitute of help, being so forgetful toward those who have deserved well. Run back whence you came, while the fault can be corrected: go quickly; call him not so much to hospitality as to the receiving of thanks: for they are owed. Returning to the spring, they find him near at hand, and, persuaded by their father's words, they lead him home. He, having first admired his appearance and presently his mind also (for a happy natural gift has no need of long experience), gives him for wife the most beautiful of his daughters, by this one deed approving his virtue, which was lovable of itself, so that it needed no outward commendation, provided it were granted to become known. After that marriage he was set over the flocks, preparing himself for sovereignty. For the pastoral art is a prelude to kingship, that is, to the governance of men, the gentlest of flocks: just as warlike natures exercise themselves beforehand in hunting: for future commanders of armies make trial upon wild beasts, the brutes affording matter of exercise both in time of war and in time of peace. For the charge of a gentle flock has something like to a kingdom over subjects. Therefore kings are surnamed shepherds of peoples, not for the sake of reproach but of honor.

[76] Nay, so far as I understand — not according to common opinion, but tracking the truth of the matter (let him laugh who will) — he alone can be a king perfect on every side who thoroughly knows the pastoral art, and by caring for the lesser animals has learned how he ought to preside over the more excellent: for it is impossible that great things be brought to perfection before small ones. he extols beyond measure; in these things certain matters are to be corrected, Having become therefore the best of all the shepherds of his time, and most provident of the advantage of the cattle, since he shuns no labor but of his own accord and unbidden looks eagerly to their good, he promptly and in good faith increased the abundance of the flocks, so that he was now an object of envy among the other shepherds, who saw nothing like it in their own flocks, and thought it went excellently with them if they took no loss, wondering that his number grew day by day, and that not only did each sheep grow beautifully fat, but that besides an excellent condition of body they were praised also for fruitfulness, and enjoyed by far the most healthful pastures. In this discourse of Philo's certain things are to be observed. First, he wrongly traduces the daughters of Raguel as ungrateful: for it is likely, as Josephus observes, that they were grateful and desired that the benefit of Moses should be acknowledged; but that they did not dare to lead him to their father's house without their parent's bidding. Secondly, he extols the pastoral art too much, when he defines it as necessary to princes for the governing of their subjects. I would rather think that Moses was called from the pastoral art to the deliverance and governance of the Israelites, as the Apostles were from fishing to the conversion of the world, so that the wisdom and power of God might shine forth the more. Thirdly, Josephus and Philo so relate the nuptials of Moses with Zipporah as though they had been contracted at once, and the same thing St. Gregory of Nyssa, to be published below, asserts more clearly. Yet it is uncertain whether the nuptials came together so quickly, the time of which Moses himself did not express. Nay rather, they do not seem to have been contracted so quickly, since the two sons of Moses were little children when after forty years he returned into Egypt.

[77] Artapanus, in the place already indicated in Eusebius, calls Zipporah the daughter of Raguel king of Arabia. In the same place, in the Annotations, number 13, Ezekiel the ancient poet brings in Zipporah speaking thus to Moses: [Raguel is by some called a prince, and could indeed have been prince of his own city:] But the king of the land is one, and governor and leader alone. But over this city presides and judges men a priest, who is my father and theirs. The Chaldee interpreter too has rendered the passage of Moses, where in the Latin Vulgate is read to the priest of Midian, as to the prince of Midian. On this occasion interpreters note that the Hebrew word cohen signifies not only a priest properly, but also a prince, because the principality was often joined with the priesthood. For this reason it is probable that Raguel was at once prince and priest; not indeed prince of the whole nation of the Midianites, but prince of the city in which he dwelt: such princes of the Midianites were Evi, Rekem, Zur, Hur, and Reba, five princes of the nation, whom the Israelites afterwards slew, Numbers [ ], verse 8, and who in the same place are also named kings. But it is more certain that he was a priest of the true God, because, as I have already said at number 66, he sacrificed to God: which Moses would not have permitted, unless he had been a priest of the true God. Those who hold that he was a priest of idols allege for a reason that the Midianites were idolaters. But they do not prove that all the Midianites were already idolaters in the time of Moses, when idolatry had not yet been so widely scattered, nor was it so universal that some worshippers of the true God were not to be found, even among nations infected with that pestilence.

[78] In the Alexandrian Chronicle, at the eightieth year of Moses, such a genealogy of Zipporah is woven. From Abraham and Keturah is born Jezanus; from Jezanus, Dadanus; from Dadanus, Rhaguel; from Rhaguel, Jothorus and Jacobus; from Jothorus, Zipporah, whom Moses married. her genealogy faulty in the Alexandrian Chronicle, Therefore Moses is reckoned the seventh from Abraham, and Zipporah the sixth. But this genealogy appears to me fictitious, and can easily be convicted of error. For Jokshan indeed (here Jezanus) is the second son of Abraham by Keturah: and he had a son Dedan (who is here Dadanus). But among the sons of Dedan, who are enumerated in 1 Chronicles 1, verse 32, there is no Raguel. It is also false that Raguel is the father of Jothor, or Jethro: whom I have already proved to be the same man as he. Whence the author of that Chronicle took this we understand from Eusebius, who in book 9 On the Preparation for the Gospel, chapter 4, has it thus: Demetrius the historian … says that Moses fled from Egypt into Midian, and there took to wife the daughter of Jethro, Zipporah by name: whom, on a conjecture drawn from the names, he affirms to have drawn her race from Abraham: for Abraham begot Jokshan by Keturah, and of Jokshan was born Adam, from whom Raguel (add, and from Raguel) Jethro and Rab, and that Jethro's daughter was married to Moses. He says too that the generations so agree that it is likely that Zipporah and Moses, descending from Abraham, lived in the same times: for Moses was the seventh from Abraham, and Zipporah the sixth, and the city Midian was named from one of the sons of Abraham. That these things are faulty I have already shown. Nay, it is even more likely that Raguel was of the posterity of Midian, the fourth son of Abraham: for from him the nation has its name. Yet I would not assert this for certain, since among the Midianites some perhaps were the posterity of the other sons of Keturah.

[79] Hugo Grotius, I think, had read the foregoing when he gathered from what is said in Numbers 10, verse 29, that Raguel was not the father but the grandfather of Zipporah. For on the words of Exodus 2, verse 18, Raguel their Father (Zipporah's, that is), he thus notes: [from which Grotius seems to have asserted that Raguel was the grandfather of Zipporah.] That is, grandfather, as is gathered from Numbers X, verse 29. Compare what is in Genesis XXIV, verse 48. But the words of Numbers 10, verse 29, And Moses said to Hobab the son of Raguel the Midianite, his kinsman, by no means prove that Raguel is the grandfather of Zipporah: for Hobab was the brother of Zipporah, and therefore the kinsman, or rather the brother-in-law, of Moses. The passage of Genesis 24, verse 48, helps the opinion of Grotius no more. In that place, indeed, Abraham's servant says: that I might take the daughter of my master's brother for his son, meaning Rebecca, to be joined in marriage to Isaac, who was truly not the daughter of Nahor the brother of Abraham, but the daughter of Bethuel, the son of Nahor. But neither is Nahor, who was the grandfather, here called the father of Rebecca, nor is Rebecca called the daughter of Nahor; but Bethuel rather is called the brother of Abraham, although he was only his brother's son. So in Genesis 13, verse 8, Abraham himself likewise says to Lot his brother's son: For we are brethren. Yet I would not deny that someone is now and then called a father in the Scriptures, even though he be not truly a father, but one of the forebears or great-grandfathers: but those words, And the priest of Midian had seven daughters, designate a father too clearly to be understood of a grandfather. Consult therefore what was said at number 65.

* Dedan

§ IX. The vision of the burning bush: the sending of Moses into Egypt, and the controversies pertaining to this.

[ ] [The vision of the bush burning and not consumed, as it is related by St. Stephen:] At what time the most celebrated vision of Moses happened, and his sending into Egypt to deliver the Israelites from their long servitude, St. Stephen declares in Acts 7, verse 30, briefly narrating the whole matter thus. And when forty years were expired (in the land of Midian, when Moses was eighty years old), there appeared to him in the desert of Mount Sinai an angel in the fire of a flame of a bush. And Moses seeing it, wondered at the sight: and as he drew near to behold it (the flame not consuming), the voice of the Lord came unto him, saying: I am the God of thy fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob: that is, I am the God whom thy fathers worshipped, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And Moses, trembling (at this voice), durst not behold — the flame of the bush, namely, as he had purposed to do before he heard the voice. For a reverent fear was struck into him both by the voice preceding and by what is subjoined in this manner: And the Lord said to him: Loose the shoes from thy feet: for the place wherein thou standest is holy ground — on account of the extraordinary presence and manifestation of God. And when Moses had composed himself to the utmost reverence, the divine voice continues thus: Seeing I have seen the affliction of my people which is in Egypt, and I have heard their groaning, and am come down to deliver them. And now come, and I will send thee into Egypt. Thus far St. Stephen, narrating the vision, to which he subjoins this epiphonema: This Moses, whom they refused, saying: Who hath appointed thee prince and judge? him God sent to be prince and redeemer, by the hand of the Angel who appeared to him in the bush.

[81] it is asked whether an angel appeared to Moses, or the Son of God: From the words of St. Stephen a difficult question arises, which has place also in many other passages of sacred Scripture: for the person who appeared to Moses is sometimes called an angel, sometimes the Lord and God. St. Augustine, in question 3 on Exodus, sets forth two opinions doubtfully thus: The Lord in an angel; or was the Lord that angel who was called the Angel of great counsel, and is understood as Christ? Augustine therefore doubted at that time whether the Son of God himself, or some angel, spoke with Moses. The same holy Doctor, in book 2 On the Trinity, chapters 13, 14, and 15, also disputes this question on both sides, but in that place seems less to approve what is said expressly of the Son of God. More strongly does St. Augustine reject it in the Work against Maximinus the Arian, which he wrote toward the end of his life, disputing thus of this vision in book 2, chapter 26: Then I ask who appeared to Moses in the fire, when

the bush was set aflame and was not burned? Although that an angel appeared there too, Scripture itself declares, saying: And the angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the bush. But who would doubt that God was in the angel? Then he proves that the Son can no more be understood than the Father, who would have spoken to Moses by himself, because each alike is the God of Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob. And therefore a little before he had said to Maximinus: In vain therefore dost thou assert that the Son of God was seen by men, but that the Father was not seen; since through a creature subject to himself both the Father could be seen, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit; but through his own substance none of these has been seen. And then he thus concludes: Wherefore acknowledge it to be true, that the Godhead has appeared to the eyes of mortals, not through its own substance, in which it is invisible and unchangeable, but through a creature subject to it, when it willed, etc.

[82] In Tract 3 on John the holy Doctor briefly and clearly expresses his mind in these words: but St. Augustine, who had once doubted of it, proves at length, An angel therefore, my brethren, was speaking with Moses, bearing the type of the Lord. Finally, in book 5 On the Trinity, Augustine shows at large that not the Son of God by himself, but an angel representing the person of God, dealt with Moses and the other patriarchs or prophets; so that he seems to have altogether repudiated the contrary opinion, and to have set it forth at first only doubtfully on account of the authority of the more ancient Fathers who had embraced it. Various arguments to this end he takes from the Scriptures in chapter XI. A few of the clearer ones I transfer hither. First, in the words cited it is most clearly said that an angel appeared, as Augustine has already observed above: and yet the same is presently called both Lord and God. Secondly, Stephen also, in Acts 7, verse 53, says to the Jews: Who have received the Law by the disposition of angels. About to bring forward this testimony, Augustine speaks thus: But why do we longer delay to stop their mouths with another most evident and most weighty document, where not an angel in the singular, nor men in the plural, but angels altogether are spoken of, by whom it is most manifestly shown that not any chance discourse was made, but the Law itself was given: which certainly no one of the faithful doubts that God gave to Moses for the subjugating of the people of Israel, but nevertheless gave it through angels. In the same way, in Galatians 3, verse 19, the Law is said to have been ordained by angels: which passage Augustine also adduced. Hebrews 2, verse 1: For if the word spoken by angels became steadfast, etc. Having brought forward this testimony, the holy Doctor says that he wished to give a testimony in which it should be said not "by an angel" but "by angels," because the Son of God is sometimes in Scripture called an angel — namely in Malachi 3, verse 1, he is named the Angel of the testament; and because some used that argument to understand by "angel" the Son of God.

[83] that an angel who represented God dealt with Moses and the other prophets. Many other arguments the aforesaid Father uses in the same place, and then concludes his disputation in this manner: But now enough, as I judge, has been disputed and demonstrated according to our capacity, … that to our ancient fathers before the Incarnation, when God was said to appear, those voices and bodily appearances were made by angels; either themselves speaking or doing something in the person of God, as we have shown the Prophets also to have been wont to do; or taking from the creation what they themselves were not, that God might be figuratively shown to men, which kind of significations Scripture teaches by many examples that the Prophets did not omit either. The chief objection he solves a little before in this manner: But someone says: Why then is it written, The Lord said to Moses, and not rather, The angel said to Moses? Because when the herald pronounces the words of the judge, it is not written in the Acts, That herald said, but, That judge. So also, when a holy Prophet speaks, even if we say, The Prophet said, we wish nothing else to be understood than that the Lord said it. And if we say, The Lord said, we do not take away the Prophet, but we point out who spoke through him. Further, that the Son of God in Malachi 3, verse 1, is called the Angel of the testament is weak for proving that he himself appeared to Moses: for Malachi is treating of the coming of the Son of God in human flesh, not of the Son of God considered according to the divine nature alone. Calmet here adds a third objection, from Deuteronomy 33, verse 16, where Moses prays for the tribes of Joseph the blessing of him who appeared in the bush; and yet, says Calmet, he could pray for them no other than the blessing of God. But it is easily answered that God appeared in the bush through an angel, and not by himself, just as he gave the Law through angels, and not by himself. And so the opinion of St. Augustine, which afterwards prevailed, seems to me far preferable to the opposite. More may be seen in the theologians, who dispute of this matter more at length.

[84] [God, appearing to Moses in the bush through an angel, promises the deliverance of the Israelites,] Now, this admonition being sent before, let us hear Moses himself speaking in Exodus 3: Now Moses fed the sheep of Jethro his father-in-law, the priest of Midian: and he drove the flock to the inner parts of the desert, and came to the mountain of God, Horeb. And the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he saw that the bush was on fire and was not burnt. And Moses said: I will go and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt. And when the Lord saw that he went forward to see, he called to him out of the midst of the bush, and said: Moses, Moses. And he answered: Here I am. And he said: Come not nigh hither: put off the shoes from thy feet: for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground. And he said: I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Moses hid his face: for he durst not look at God. And the Lord said to him: I have seen the affliction of my people in Egypt, and I have heard their cry because of the rigor of them that are over the works: and knowing their sorrow, I am come down to deliver them out of the hands of the Egyptians, and to bring them out of that land into a good and spacious land, into a land that floweth with milk and honey; to the places of the Canaanite, and the Hethite, and the Amorrhite, and the Pherezite, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite. For the cry of the children of Israel is come unto me: and I have seen their affliction, wherewith they are oppressed by the Egyptians.* Thus far the speech of the angel representing God was most welcome to Moses: for we cannot doubt that he vehemently desired the deliverance of his people, and had demanded it with many prayers.

[85] But when he understood that he himself was being designated the leader of so great a work, [the charge of which some hold that Moses sinned by long refusing: which is uncertain:] he long hesitated, and objected many difficulties, and at last began to beg off from that command, but in vain. For Moses knew of how great difficulty it was to lead the Israelites out of Egypt, both because, having lived long in the Egyptian court, he had thoroughly discerned the mind of the king and the nobles on this matter, and because he held the Israelites themselves suspect, mindful of that answer, Who hath appointed thee prince and judge over us? Besides, he knew that he was known to the Egyptians, by whom he had been sought for death; and perhaps he had not yet learned of that king's death. To these reasons for fear there could be added a weariness of public offices and a love of the private and almost solitary life, the difference of which he had learned by long experience; and especially a profound humility, by which he thought himself unequal to so great a province. Yet all these things ought to have been overcome by the choice and appointment of God, who bestows fit and abundant strength upon those whom he deigns to call to some lofty office; nor ought Moses to fear any longer or to beg off from the burden, when he had been made more certain of God's choice and will. For this cause some think that Moses, out of excessive faint-heartedness, begged off the office enjoined longer than was right, and sinned at least venially by his resistance, because below, in chapter 4, verse 14, it is said, The Lord being angry, etc. But that opinion is not held by all, nor is it altogether certain: for the word angry can signify that the angel began to speak in a graver tone, as of one growing angry, that Moses might not go on begging off — who indeed presently acquiesced, after he had thoroughly discerned the will of God. Certainly St. Augustine, book 22 against Faustus, chapter 69, looking to this, calls Moses humble in refusing so great a ministry, submissive in undertaking it, faithful in keeping it, etc. Wherefore, since other Fathers too have here praised the humility of Moses, I judge it by no means certain that he sinned here even in the lightest degree: on the contrary, that it is most certain, as St. Hilary observes in his tract on Psalm 138, that Moses at that time attained a familiar knowledge of God. Now let us again hear his own words.

[86] But come, and I will send thee to Pharaoh, says the angel representing God, God bids Moses go into Egypt to deliver the people, that thou mayest bring forth my people, the children of Israel, out of Egypt. And Moses said to God: Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh, and should bring forth the children of Israel out of Egypt? And he said to him: I will be with thee: and this thou shalt have for a sign that I have sent thee. When thou shalt have brought my people out of Egypt, thou shalt offer sacrifice to God upon this mountain. Moses said to God: Lo, I shall go to the children of Israel, and say to them: The God of your fathers hath sent me to you. If they should say to me: What is his name? What shall I say to them? God said to Moses: I AM WHO AM. He said: Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: HE WHO IS hath sent me to you. And God said again to Moses: Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: The Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath sent me to you: this is my name for ever, and this is my memorial unto all generations. Go, and gather together the ancients of Israel, and thou shalt say to them: The Lord God of your fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath appeared to me, saying: Visiting I have visited you, and I have seen all that hath befallen you in Egypt: and I have said the word to bring you forth out of the affliction of Egypt, into the land of the Canaanite, and the Hethite, and the Amorrhite, and the Pherezite, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite, to a land that floweth with milk and honey. And they shall hear thy voice: and thou shalt go in, thou and the ancients of Israel, to the king of Egypt, and thou shalt say to him: The Lord God of the Hebrews hath called us: we will go three days' journey into the wilderness, to sacrifice unto the Lord our God. That journey of three days signifies the distance of Mount Horeb, or Sinai, from Egypt. The Hebrews indeed afterwards spent more days on that journey, but this came about because they did not go by the straight way, and because in all likelihood they did not accomplish each day the usual journey of one day.

[87] [and foretelling the difficulties to come, to be overcome by prodigies, he finds him reluctant,] Then the angel continues thus: But I know that the king of Egypt will not let you go, but by a mighty hand. For I will stretch forth my hand, and will strike Egypt with all my wonders which I will do in the midst of them: after these he will let you go. And I will give favor to this people in the sight of the Egyptians: and when you go forth, you shall not depart empty: but every woman shall ask of her neighbor and of her that is in her house, vessels of silver and of gold, and raiment, and you shall put them upon your sons and daughters, and shall spoil Egypt. By these things the Lord signifies that he wills not only to snatch the Israelites out of their present calamity, but also in some measure to make compensation for the past, and to give them some sort of wage for the unjust servitude and the most grievous labors with which they had long been oppressed by the Egyptians. Further, Moses, having heard all this, became more timid than he was at the beginning. For in chapter 4: Moses answered and said: They will not believe me, nor hear my voice, but they will say: The Lord hath not appeared to thee. Then he said to him: What is that thou holdest in thy hand? He answered: A rod. And the Lord said: Cast it down upon the ground. He cast it down, and it was turned into a serpent, so that Moses fled from it. And the Lord said: Put out thy hand and take it by the tail. He put forth his hand and took hold of it, and it was turned into a rod. That they may believe, saith he, that the Lord God of their fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, hath appeared to thee. And the Lord said again: Put thy hand into thy bosom. And when he had put it into his bosom, he brought it forth leprous as snow. Put back, said he, thy hand into thy bosom. He put it back and brought it out again, and it was like the other flesh. If they will not believe thee, saith he, nor hear the voice of the former sign, they will believe the word of the latter sign. But if they will not even believe these two signs, nor hear thy voice: take of the river water, and pour it out upon the dry land, and whatsoever thou drawest out of the river shall be turned into blood.

[88] and excusing himself, After the foregoing excuse had been taken from Moses by these signs, he turned to another in his entreaty. For he thus continues: Moses said: I beseech thee, Lord, I am not eloquent from yesterday and the day before: and since thou hast spoken to thy Servant, I am of a more hindered and slower tongue. The obvious sense of these words is: Already before this I was not eloquent or fluent: but now, perhaps for fear, my tongue is more hindered and slower for speaking. But the Hebrew text, as it stands today, presents this sense: Neither before was I eloquent, nor even now, since thou hast begun to speak to thy Servant, am I eloquent. It may also be doubted here whether that defect of eloquence arose from some impediment of the tongue, such as a stammer, as many understand the passage, or rather from a defect of learning, which Moses here confessed. St. Ambrose embraced the second sense in book 2 On Abraham, chapter 10, although he acknowledges that Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, since Moses himself reckoned it as nothing. Hence Ambrose says: In fine, as to one unlearned it is answered that he should be taught by the Lord: "I will open thy mouth, and will instruct thee what thou oughtest to speak." Indeed the words which follow, And I will teach thee what thou shalt speak, favor this opinion. But whether Moses pleaded a defect of tongue or of learning, the angel satisfied his excuse in this manner: The Lord said to him: Who made man's mouth? or who made the dumb and the deaf, the seeing and the blind? Did not I? Go therefore, and I will be in thy mouth: and I will teach thee what thou shalt speak.

[89] But he said: I beseech thee, Lord, send whom thou wilt send. and asking that one more fit, or even the Messiah, be sent, but at last obeying. The obvious sense is: Send one more fit, whom thou hast determined to send. But many Fathers and interpreters understand the passage of the Messiah, who is called the Sent or the One to be Sent in Genesis 49, verse [ ], Until he come that is to be sent, that is, until the Messiah come. Indeed this exposition is not incongruous: for the deliverance of the Israelites could appear to Moses of such great moment, and at the same time of such great difficulty, that he should think there was need of the Messiah, whom God had determined to send, and who was not unworthy of it. Moses could demand the coming of the Messiah, because he knew the hardness of the Israelites and thought it not sufficiently to be corrected by his own labor, and because he hoped that the people would be by the Messiah not only led forth from Egyptian servitude, but also loosed from wickedness, from perverse manners, and from the bonds of sins. But the Lord did not hear Moses, and cut off his further excuses, declaring his will in a graver tone: The Lord being angry with Moses, said: Aaron the Levite is thy brother, I know that he is eloquent: behold he cometh forth to meet thee, and seeing thee shall be glad at heart. Speak to him, and put my words in his mouth: and I will be in thy mouth and in his mouth, and will show you what you must do. He shall speak in thy stead to the people, and shall be thy mouth: but thou shalt be to him in those things that pertain to God. And take this rod in thy hand, wherewith thou shalt do the signs. At last, daring to object nothing, since he had wholly discerned the divine will, Moses went (with his flock) and returned to Jethro his father-in-law, and said to him: I will go and return to my brethren into Egypt, that I may see if they be yet alive. And Jethro said to him: Go in peace.* Thus the humble Moses hides the divine vision from his father-in-law, at the same time bringing forward an honorable and a true cause for going away, in which the other acquiesced.

* that is, had led

* that is, with which or through which

§ X. The vision and mission of Moses as related by Josephus, Philo, and Artapanus.

[ ] Josephus narrates the vision in the bush not without errors, Josephus, in book 2, chapter 12, about to narrate the vision and the mission, at once stumbles in designating the time: for, having related the coming of Moses into the land of Midian and the nuptials with Zipporah contracted, as he supposes, at once in that place, he assigns the time of the vision by the words some time after, whereas forty years had come between. What he adds a little after about the widespread report that a Deity dwelt on Mount Sinai appears likewise fabulous. Besides, he wrongly charges Moses with rashness for having come thither. It may indeed be that Josephus looked to the words of Moses, who calls Mount Horeb the mountain of God: but he wrongly gathered from those words that already then Mount Horeb or Sinai (which are two peaks of the same mountain) was sacred to God, whereas Moses called it the mountain of God only on account of the things which were afterwards done there. These things having been observed, I subjoin the words of Josephus, about to correct his other lapses below. But some time after he drove his flocks to pasture upon the mountain which is called Sinai, the highest of all in that region, and very convenient for pasture; for it abounded in grass, because, by the widespread report that a Deity dwelt there, it had hitherto been inaccessible to shepherds on account of the religious awe of the place. On that mountain he saw a marvellous prodigy: for a fire, though it seemed to feed upon the shrub of a bush, harmed neither the leaves, nor the flowers, nor the branches at all, though nevertheless a very great and most blazing flame flashed forth from it. He, not moderately astonished at so unlooked-for a spectacle, was still more amazed after he heard a voice sent forth from the fire and addressing words to him by name: by which it both rebuked his boldness, in that he had not feared to tread a place hitherto inaccessible to men by reason of religious awe, and counselled him besides to withdraw as far as possible from the flames: and to be content indeed with this vision, being held not unworthy of it on account of his own virtue and that of his forebears, but for the rest to inquire curiously no further.

[91] It foretold also what honor and glory he was to obtain among men, with the divine favor assisting: the mission of Moses, and bade him set out confidently into Egypt, where he was to be the leader and conductor of the multitude of the Hebrews, and to deliver his kindred people from the unjust domination of that nation. For they shall dwell, it said, in that land which Abraham the prince of your race held, and shall obtain all its goods, thy prudence leading them to this felicity. But see that thou remember, when the Hebrews have been brought out of Egypt, to offer in this place a sacrifice of thanksgiving for the happy outcome. And such indeed was the oracle that came forth from the fire. But Moses, terrified as much by what he saw as by what he heard, begins: Of thy power indeed, O Lord, whom both I venerate and my forebears worshipped, I am not so mad as to hesitate to obey: yet I do not understand how I, a private Man endowed with no forces, shall be able either to persuade my own people, so that, leaving the land which they now inhabit, they should follow me as leader; or, even if I persuade them, how Pharaoh is to be compelled to permit those to depart by whose work and labor the felicity of the Egyptians stands. But God bade him be secure about this whole business, promising that he would never fail to be at hand for him, and that whether there were need of words he would bestow the power of persuading, or of deeds he would add strength enough. Presently he bade him take assurance of the promises by casting his rod upon the ground. And when this was done, a dragon crept upon the earth, and, coiling itself into spirals, lifted up its head as though to fight back if anyone should pursue it: and presently was again changed into a rod. After this, being bidden to put his hand into his bosom, when he had obeyed, he drew it out white and like the color of lime, which presently returned to its former color. Then, being bidden to pour out upon the ground water drawn from near by, he saw it turned into the color of blood.

[92] and the other things done there: As he stood amazed at these things, it exhorts him to be confident, since he knew that a most mighty helper would be at hand for him, and that by using these prodigies he should give all men assurance that he had been sent by God and did all things at his bidding: let him go without delay, and hasten swiftly into Egypt, interrupting his journey neither by day nor by night, nor by long wasting of time make the servitude and affliction of the Hebrews the longer. But Moses, doubting nothing further about the promises, whose certainty he sufficiently gathered from so many arguments heard and seen, prayed that he might experience the same power in Egypt when there should be need of its exertion: and as a suppliant he asked this also, that He who had deigned to grant him His sight and converse would willingly and gladly show him His name also, so that, when he should one day perform the divine service to Him, he might be able to invoke Him by name at the sacrifice. Then God opens to him His name, never before heard or known by any of men, which I judge it neither lawful nor right to utter. But to Moses the power of such prodigies was present, not only then, but as often as there should be need: and thus, doubting nothing about the truth of the oracle rendered from the fire, and about God his helper,

he conceived a great hope that at last both his own people would be delivered and the Egyptians would be afflicted with some signal disaster. Thus far Josephus, whose first lapses I have already noted above, and whose others I shall observe here.

[93] First, then, he departs from Scripture when he says that Moses was counselled some of his errors are pointed out: to withdraw as far as possible from the flames: for Moses writes only that it was said to him, Come not nigh hither. There are also added to Scripture, and with little congruity invented, the things which follow: And to be content indeed with this vision, and the rest to the end of the number. Secondly Josephus slips when, having related the first two signs with some curtailment, he writes that the third also, that is, the water turned into blood, took place at the bush: for the angel only enjoined that he should perform that third one in Egypt, if the first were not believed; but it was not performed at the bush. Thirdly this writer inverts the order of certain matters, especially when he writes that Moses asked the name of God after he was already certain of God's promises: for the name of God was asked earlier. He also alleges a false reason for the asking of the name, writing that it was asked so that he might be able to invoke Him by name at the sacrifice. Fourthly and finally, he omits various things, as the reader will easily see, provided he be willing to compare the words of Scripture with the words of Josephus.

[94] Philo too has set forth this history not without some lapses; the account of Philo concerning the vision, but we shall correct them after his own words have been given. It happened once, he says, that while he was following after grassy places, well-watered and rich in pasture, he saw in a certain grove a fearful vision. There was a bush, a thorny and feeble shrub; and it, though no one brought fire near, was suddenly kindled: and, seized wholly from root to top, the flame gushing after the manner of a fountain, it remained whole and unharmed, as though it were not the matter of the burning, but were itself fed by the fire. From the midst there flashed forth a certain most beautiful form, like to nothing visible, a divine image, shining with the clearest light, so that one might suspect it to be an image of God. Let us call it an angel, since it foretold things to come the more clearly the more magnificent the vision was: for the burning bush signified those oppressed by injury, and the burning fire the oppressors. But that the matter was not consumed portended that those who were afflicted would not perish by the violence of their enemies; but that their enemies' attempt would be vain, and that they would come off unharmed. Further, the messenger of divine providence gave hope that of so many dreadful perils there would be a glad and easy issue. Let that conjecture be sifted more diligently. The bush (as I have said) is a feeble and thorny shrub, so that by its very touch it wounds. Nor is it consumed by the devouring nature of fire, nay, it is even preserved, remaining such as it was before, so far from losing anything that it even shone the brighter. All these things marked out a certain exhortation, all but crying aloud to those pressed by calamity: Do not sink down: this weakness of yours is a power which will prick and wound very many. Those who desire to destroy you will unwillingly preserve you; you shall escape so many evils unharmed, and when you shall seem most of all to be laid waste, then most of all shall your glory shine forth. You too, O cruel ones and like to devouring fire, be not too confident in your own strength: consider that the most unconquerable powers have one day been destroyed, and come to your senses. Behold, the flame, by its own nature burning, is burned as wood is; but the wood, which is combustible, plainly burns after the manner of fire.

[95] the mission of Moses, After God by this marvellous portent had manifestly forewarned Moses of things to come, he adds an oracle also, that without delay he should return to the care of his nation, promising that he would be not only the author of their liberty, but also the leader of a new colony to be led forth a little after; and offering his ready favor for all things. Long since, he said, I have had pity on those oppressed by intolerable injuries, whom no one either pities or relieves, and I see both individually and all together, with one mind, that they implore and hope for my aid as suppliants. But I am to be entreated and propitious to those who ask pardon from the heart. Go, approach the king, being altogether anxious for nothing. He who then reigned, when thou didst flee for fear, is dead: another has succeeded to the kingdom, with whom thou hast no quarrel. Approaching him, together with the elders of thy nation, say that the whole nation is commanded by my oracle to go forth beyond the borders of the kingdom a three days' journey, and to perform sacred rites to me after the manner of their fathers. He, not unaware that his tribesmen and all the rest would by no means believe these words, said: What if they shall ask what is the name of him who has sent me, and I shall not be able to say, shall I not seem an impostor? To whom God: First say to them, I am who am: that they may learn the difference between being and not being, and that no name is properly spoken of me, to whom alone it belongs to be. But if, as they are weaker in understanding, they shall require an appellation, tell them that I am not only God, but also the God of the three men named from virtue, the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob: of whom one is the rule of virtue sought by teaching, another by nature, another by meditation.

[96] the prodigies then wrought, But if even then they will not believe, they will be bent by the teaching of three prodigies which before this no one ever either saw or heard. And these were as follows: he was bidden to cast upon the ground the rod which he held: it presently, being animated, crept, turned into a dragon, the prince of serpents. He, terrified by the monster, and preparing flight for fear, is called back, and, being strengthened by God, is bidden to seize its tail: which done, the dragon, still creeping, stood still at the touch, and, stretched out at length, was presently again turned into a staff, the Man wondering at each change, and hardly discerning which was the more dreadful: so much was he doubtful in mind. There followed at once another prodigy. He was bidden to put his other hand into his bosom, and a little after to take it out: which done, the hand suddenly appeared whiter than snow, and again, being hidden in his bosom and brought forth, it received its former appearance and native color. These things he alone learned from Him alone, as a disciple from a master, having with him the instruments of prodigies, his hand and his staff, with which he was equipped as with a viaticum. The third he could neither carry about with him nor learn beforehand, because it was reserved for Egypt, no less dreadful and astounding. It was of this kind. Take, he said, of the water of the river, and pour it out upon the ground, and it shall be most gory blood, the other properties being changed along with the color. And this too seemed credible, not only on account of the sure faith of the Author, but also on account of the past miracles of the hand and the rod.

[97] Nevertheless he begged off from this function, pleading the thinness of his voice and the excuse of Moses, and the obedience that followed, and the slowness of his tongue, and denying that fluency was present in him, especially after he had heard God speaking: for judging that human eloquence is dumb when compared with Truth, and being endowed with a modest disposition, he withdrew himself from a burden heavier, as he thought, than his strength; and asked that another more fit be chosen for executing the commands. God, delighted with his modesty, answered: Dost thou not know who has given a mouth to man, and set in a tongue, who has made the throat and the other instruments of rational speech? I am he; fear not, at my nod thou shalt discourse of all things distinctly, thy eloquence being changed for the better and ever advancing, and flowing without impediment and bringing forth thy thoughts no otherwise than the clearest springs flow. But if there shall be need of an interpreter, thou shalt have thy brother as the minister and vicar of speech, who as a messenger shall carry thy sayings to the people, but thou shalt teach him the commands of God. Having heard these things, because it was dangerous to contradict further, he set out, etc. Upon this whole discourse of Philo's I subjoin a few observations.

[98] First, what he says at number 94 about a certain most beautiful form flashing forth from the midst of the fire it is shown to need some correction. Philo could neither draw from the sacred Writings, nor is it likely, but plainly seems fictitious. But the explanation subjoined of the bush burning without being consumed has pleased others also, and seems agreeable enough. Some alter it thus, that by the fire they understand God, who by the Egyptians indeed kindled and purged his people, but did not consume them. Secondly, at number 95 he joins together things which were said to Moses at different times: for Moses was made certain of the death of Pharaoh later than is here intimated. Then what the author subjoins about the name of God will receive light from St. Jerome, who discourses thus to our purpose on the Epistle to the Ephesians, chapter 3: The Lord speaks in Exodus: I am who am. And: "Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: He who is hath sent me to you." Was God alone, and were the rest not? Surely the angels, heaven, earth, or the seas, and Moses himself to whom the Lord was speaking, and Israel, and the Egyptians, to whom and against whom the Prince and the Adversary was being sent, did exist. And how does God claim as proper to himself a name common to substance? For that cause, as we have said; because the rest have taken from the bounty of God that they should be. But God, who always is, and has no beginning from elsewhere, and is himself the origin of himself and the cause of his own substance, cannot be understood to have from elsewhere that which subsists. In briefer words the theologians will explain it thus: Because God alone is Being from himself, and all other things are beings from another. Thirdly and finally, Philo has omitted some of the commands and promises of God, as also the return of Moses to Raguel. But the rest is set forth rightly enough.

[99] Artapanus narrated a few things about the death of the Egyptian king and the vision and mission of Moses, expressed by Eusebius thus in book 9, chapter 4: [Artapanus had heard something of all these things, and thence mingled true with false.] (He asserts) that meanwhile the king of the Egyptians died of the disease of elephantiasis, because he oppressed the Jews in many ways. For besides the other works which he commanded them to build, he willed also that they should put on a garment different from that of the Egyptians, that being more easily recognized they might be punished by all as impious. But that Moses daily besought God for the deliverance of the people, and that on a certain day fire suddenly broke forth before him out of the earth, where there was no matter fit for burning, and that a voice was uttered, that the Jews must be delivered by him and led into their ancient fatherland. Thus far Eusebius, reciting the opinion of Artapanus, who heard something of all these matters, but mingled the false with the true. First, that Pharaoh died at that time is certain; but it is uncertain whether he made an end of living by elephantiasis: it is equally uncertain whether Pharaoh commanded the Hebrews to change their dress. Nay, it appears more likely that they were always clothed after their own manner, and that different from the Egyptians. It is clearer, however, that Artapanus errs when he affirms that fire suddenly broke forth from the earth: for Moses saw a bush kindled, not fire breaking forth from the earth. Many more fictions of this same writer we shall refute in their own order.

§ XI. The journey of Moses into Egypt, and what befell him on that journey: the mission of Moses proved before the Israelites.

[ ] [Moses learns from the angel of the death of Pharaoh, and that the new king would stubbornly resist:] Although Moses had brought forward various excuses

lest he should be sent into Egypt to deliver the Israelites from their long servitude, he is nevertheless not read to have said anything about the peril of his own life, although he seems to have been somewhat anxious about that too, since he thought he must approach that king by whom he had been sought for death. Certainly, after he had returned to the city of Midian, the divine goodness willed to take away this scruple also from him by an angel. For Moses in Exodus 4, verse 19, thus continues his narrative: And the Lord said to Moses in Midian: Go, and return into Egypt: for they are all dead that sought thy life. Moses therefore took his wife and his sons, and set them upon an ass, and returned into Egypt, carrying the rod of God in his hand. And the Lord said to him as he was returning into Egypt: See that thou do all the wonders before Pharaoh which I have put in thy hand: I shall harden his heart, and he will not let the people go. A few things are here to be observed about the hardening of Pharaoh, which frequently recurs, and which has afforded occasion of dispute both to Catholics and to heretics. I would not disapprove the many things which have been said by Catholic doctors to elucidate the passage, but a few from St. Augustine will suffice me, lest I be longer than is right.

[101] [on which occasion it is shown from Augustine that God is said to harden someone when he does not give him congruous grace,] The holy Doctor, in book 1 to Simplicianus, question 2, examines at length like expressions of sacred Scripture, and, turning over those words of the Apostle in Romans 9, verse 16, So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy, and those at verse 18, Therefore he hath mercy on whom he will, and whom he will he hardeneth, he observes that the latter sentence can so agree with the former sentence that the hardening of God is to be unwilling to show mercy; so that nothing is inflicted by him (by God) whereby a man may be worse; but only that whereby he may be better is not bestowed. And so St. Augustine clearly seems to declare that here for God to harden and not to show mercy are the same thing. Now, what it is for God to show mercy he declares a little before in these words: Likewise it is true: "It is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy": because, even though he call many, yet he has mercy on those whom he so calls as it is fitting for them to be called, so that they may follow. And presently: But him on whom he has mercy he so calls as he knows to be congruous to him, so that he does not reject the caller. From these things it manifestly seems to follow that those words, I shall harden his heart, signify: I shall suffer the heart of Pharaoh to be hardened, nor shall I give him congruous grace, that is, such grace as should soften the hardness of his heart and make him obey my precepts. With this exposition can easily be reconciled the things which St. Augustine has more at large in the Questions on Exodus, question 18 and some of those following.

[102] Let us proceed, therefore, with Moses, who continues his narrative thus: [Setting out into Egypt he is in peril of his life, and is delivered by the circumcision of his son;] And thou shalt say to him (to Pharaoh, namely): Thus saith the Lord: Israel is my son, my firstborn (that is, beloved as a firstborn). I have said to thee: Let my son go, that he may serve me; and thou wouldst not let him go: behold I will kill thy son, thy firstborn. Thus far concerning God's commands to Moses as he set out into Egypt. But marvellous and obscure is what follows: And when he was in his journey, in the inn, the Lord met him, and would have killed him. Immediately Zipporah took a very sharp stone, and circumcised the foreskin of her son, and touched his feet, and said: A bloody spouse art thou to me. And he let him go after she had said: A bloody spouse, on account of the circumcision. It may first be asked here whether the angel who met him wished to kill Moses or his son Eliezer: for there are different opinions on this matter. But the phrasing seems to require that we understand the peril of slaying of Moses, since it is said: The Lord met him, and would have killed him, whereas nothing precedes about his son. It is doubted, secondly, why the angel threatened Moses with death. But Scripture in some measure removes this doubt too: because Zipporah would not have circumcised her son on account of this peril, unless she had understood, either from a sign or from the angel's words, that Moses was in danger on account of the son not yet circumcised.

[103] From this cause of the peril a third doubt arises, namely whether Moses sinned by not circumcising his son sooner: [nor yet must he necessarily on that account be charged with sin for not having circumcised his son sooner:] for the threatened death casts a suspicion of sin: and indeed many interpreters so speak of this deed as to seem to acknowledge some negligence in Moses in the circumcision of the son omitted thus far. Yet I do not see that this can or ought to be said for certain, because it is not likely that the circumcision of his son was deferred by Moses without a cause which he believed just and lawful. Cornelius a Lapide, on this passage, judges with others that the circumcision was deferred by Moses because this younger son, namely Eliezer, had but lately been born, for whom accordingly either Moses, or rather his mother, feared grave harm from the journey if he should circumcise him. Moses therefore put off the matter until he should come into Egypt. For it was for this same cause that the Hebrews, sojourning in the desert for forty years, were not circumcised, as is plain in Joshua, chapter V. But the angel, threatening Moses with death, shook out of him this excessive fear, and that lest Moses, who was to be the lawgiver, should seem to have been the more remiss in keeping the law. For Moses, as leader, ought to have gone before the rest by a perfect example in the fulfilling of the law. If the matter so befell, we can easily absolve Moses of all fault: nor yet ought we to think that that terror was cast upon him by the angel without cause. For the example of the Lawgiver could have harmed those who were to be ignorant of the cause of the deferring of his son's circumcision. Perhaps too the Lord willed by this terror to drive Zipporah to circumcise her son, so that Moses might send her back home with his sons not unwilling, lest they should be a hindrance in Egypt. Certainly Augustine, in question 12 on Exodus, believes that Zipporah was sent back by Moses, thus reconciling two things seemingly contrary, namely that in Exodus 4 she was set upon an ass to be led into Egypt, and in Exodus 18 she returned to Moses. Take his own words: But it is to be understood that after that killing of Moses or of the infant which was to come from the angel, she (Zipporah) returned with the little ones. For some have thought that the angel terrified him for this reason, lest the female sex should accompany him to the hindrance of the ministry which Moses bore as divinely imposed. Moses in all likelihood wished to take his wife and sons with him, lest he should seem to be putting her away; and therefore perhaps thought that the circumcision of his son could be deferred at his wife's prayers. But the Lord, by casting in this terror, upset that whole business, and drove out fear by fear. These things from conjecture, as in an obscure matter.

[104] the obscure text adduced above Fourthly, writers who have interpreted the following words, And touched his feet, have gone off into very various opinions: for some understand the feet of the angel, which Zipporah touched as a suppliant for her Husband's life; others interpret it of the feet of the boy; and finally others of the feet of Moses. The opinion of these last pleases me more, because the whole phrase is thus better connected. Indeed it seems to me hardly to be doubted that Zipporah touched the feet of him to whom she said: A bloody spouse art thou to me. And yet she did not say these words to the angel, and therefore did not touch the angel's feet. Wherefore I think that Zipporah cast herself as a suppliant at the feet of Moses, and said to him, A bloody spouse art thou to me, in order by those words to intimate that she preferred to remain at home, from which she was not yet far distant, than to accompany him into Egypt with so great peril. Thus also the following words are rightly understood of Zipporah: And he let him go after she had said: A bloody spouse, on account of the circumcision: Zipporah, namely, let him go, that is, suffered Moses to set out alone, so that she herself with her sons might return to her father; after she had said, A bloody spouse, which we have already seen was said to Moses, and which she said on account of the circumcision, that is, because she had been compelled at the circumcision to shed the blood of her own son. Others understand those words and he let him go of the angel letting Moses go, that is, no longer wishing to kill him. But they must strangely twist and dislocate the phrasing of the Vulgate, and change the persons acting and speaking without just cause, since the Vulgate clearly seems to refer every action and speech to Zipporah.

[105] is explained by a probable paraphrase, Take therefore the words again, that we may subjoin a convenient paraphrase of the whole: And when he was in his journey, in the inn, the Lord met him, and would have killed him. Immediately Zipporah took a very sharp stone, and circumcised the foreskin of her son, and touched his feet, and said: A bloody spouse art thou to me. And he let him go after she had said, A bloody spouse, on account of the circumcision. Now I subjoin also the paraphrase which appears to me more probable: When Moses had committed himself to the journey with his wife Zipporah and his two sons, and had turned aside to a certain lodging, an angel met him threatening him with death. Zipporah, when she understood that that peril hung over Moses on account of the son not yet circumcised, at once seized a very sharp stone, which chanced to be at hand, or had already before been prepared for the circumcision, and with it circumcised her son. The angel being thus appeased, and perhaps disappearing, Zipporah fell as a suppliant at the feet of Moses, saying that he had not been saved but by the blood of her son, and intimating that she preferred to return rather than to accompany him with so great peril. And since Moses himself preferred that his wife should remain at home with the sons, he gladly assented to her prayers. Wherefore Zipporah suffered Moses to pursue his journey, purposing to return home with the little ones. Rupert, on Exodus, book 1, chapter 20, embraced this exposition, and it doubtless agrees rightly with the text of the Vulgate. It also favors the exposition given that it is agreed that Zipporah with her sons was sent back by Moses, and that that sending back is not known to have been done at any other time. Yet I confess that very many interpreters have not without reason embraced another opinion; and for this cause their arguments must be briefly answered.

[106] First they object the words of the Seventy interpreters, who, and answer is made to the reasons opposed to this explanation: they say, have for And he let him go, And the angel departed from him, or, and the angel went away from him. But in very many editions the added word angel is not read, so that it may be doubted whether that word belongs to the text, especially since in the Hebrew text it was neither found in the time of St. Jerome nor is found now. They object, secondly, the present Hebrew text, which is: And he let him go, that is, the angel let Moses go, not going on to threaten him with death. This argument would plainly prove that Zipporah cannot here be understood, if the present Hebrew text were plainly uncorrupted: for the Hebrew verb, according to the property of that tongue, denotes

the masculine gender, which does not agree with Zipporah. But who shall make us plainly secure about the soundness of the Hebrew text? Certainly St. Jerome, most skilled in the Hebrew tongue, if he had found the same Hebrew phrase in his own codices, does not seem to have been about to express the Latin phrase in the manner in which we now have it expressed. It is said of Zipporah, She took … and circumcised … and touched .. and said, and presently, with no indication of another person added, and let go. Who would not understand that let go of the same person of whom all the preceding things have been said, especially since again, with no indication of a changed person, there is subjoined after she had said, and this likewise must be understood of Zipporah? The phrasing will be plainly gaping, if we understand the verb let go of any other than Zipporah.

[107] Further, whatever be the proper understanding of that passage, [Zipporah sent home: Aaron meets Moses, who with him sets forth the will of God to the Israelites.] which I confess to be uncertain, since several other explanations too are given; nevertheless I altogether think, with St. Augustine, that Zipporah with her sons was on that occasion sent home by Moses, who pursued his journey and found his brother Aaron coming to meet him at God's bidding. For Moses at verse 27 continues thus: And the Lord said to Aaron: Go into the desert to meet Moses. And he went forth to meet him in the mountain of God (Horeb or Sinai), and kissed him. And Moses told Aaron all the words of the Lord by which he had sent him, and the signs that he had commanded. And they came together (into Egypt, or into the land of Goshen, in which the Israelites dwelt), and they gathered together all the ancients of the children of Israel. And Aaron spoke all the words which the Lord had said to Moses: and he (Moses, namely) wrought the signs before the people, and the people believed. And they heard that the Lord had visited the children of Israel, and that he had looked upon their affliction: and falling down they adored. The Israelites readily believed Moses when he wrought the signs commanded by God, because they feared no evil for themselves: but as soon as they began on that occasion to be more grievously oppressed by the Egyptians, they at once murmured against Moses and Aaron, as we shall see.

§ XII. The accounts of Josephus and Philo concerning the foregoing: whether Moses thereafter abstained from his wife.

[ ] The narrative of Josephus about the journey and the first deeds in Egypt, The journey of Moses into Egypt, and his first deeds with Aaron and the elders of the Israelites, Josephus narrates neatly enough: but he omits those things which we have already seen were done on the occasion of the angel threatening Moses with death; and beyond Scripture he says that the elders of the Israelites went forth to meet him. Take his own words: And when he (Moses) had learned that Pharaoh the king of the Egyptians, under whom he had fled, was dead, he asks leave of Raguel that with his peace and favor unimpaired it might be permitted him to set out into Egypt for the public advantage of his kindred and tribesmen: which having obtained, and having taken with him the daughter of Raguel whom he had there married, and their common children, Gerson and Eleazar, he snatched his journey into Egypt. Of which names the former signifies "a stranger," the latter, "the help of God," because by divine aid he had escaped the snares of the Egyptians. And when they were now not far from the borders, his brother Aaron came to meet him, God so bidding: to whom he presently disclosed whatever he had seen upon the mountain, and all the commands which he had there received from God. Presently, having gone further, he found coming to meet him all the most eminent of the Hebrews, who had had a presentiment of his coming: and presently, lest they should doubt any further of the faith of Moses, the prodigies attesting to the divine will were displayed before their eyes: at the sight of which, beyond all expectation, they were astonished, and now began to hope that the providence of God would not be wanting to their security and safety. And thus, having found the Hebrews more compliant, and promising that they would be in his power, kindled forsooth by the love of liberty, he betakes himself to the new king.

[109] as also that of Philo: each omits some things. Philo too did not narrate all the things which befell Moses on the journey; but expressed only a few of the aforesaid matters briefly thus: Having set out together with his wife and children, he made his journey into Egypt: and, having found his brother who had come to meet him, he joined him to himself as a companion, the oracles being shared with him. He already before had a soul divinely prepared for obedience, so that without hesitation he assented and followed. Thus entering Egypt with one mind, they first, having secretly called together the elders of the nation, disclose the oracle: that by God's mercy liberty and a removal to better seats were at hand; and that God himself promised this, and offered himself as the leader of the journey. Thus Philo, recording nothing of the angel who met him, nor explaining whether Zipporah with the sons accompanied him as far as Egypt.

[110] It is the opinion of some that Moses, after hearing the divine oracles at the bush, thereafter kept himself from his wife. [Some Fathers hold that Moses after the vision of the bush abstained from the use of his wife,] St. Gregory Nazianzen, Oration 47, speaks thus of this matter: They report that Moses, after hearing the oracles of God, never had intercourse with his wife, nor begot children. The same St. Epiphanius asserts more strongly, in Heresy 78, number 16, in these words: For Moses, after he began to be a prophet, had no further intercourse with his wife; nor did he beget children in that state: since indeed he lived with the Lord for the greater part of his life. Or, if he had wished to give himself to marriage, could he have persevered forty nights and days on Mount Sinai? Could he for forty whole years in the wilderness have bent himself to the administration of divine things? have given himself to the priesthood? have set forth the mysteries of God? could he in fine have conversed perpetually with God, bound by the burden of marriage? St. Jerome, in book 1 against Jovinian, suggests the same, writing thus: It is manifest concerning Moses that he would have been in peril in the inn, had not Zipporah, which is interpreted BIRD, circumcised her son, and cut off the foreskin of marriage with the evangelical knife. This same is that Moses who, when he had seen the great vision, and the angel or the Lord speaking in the bush, was by no means able to approach him unless he had loosed the latchet of his shoe and cast off the bonds of marriage. Nor is this a wonder concerning the Friend and prophet and lawgiver of God, since all the people, about to approach Mount Sinai, were commanded to be sanctified for three days and to abstain from their wives.

[111] St. Ambrose, in book 1 On Cain and Abel, chapter 2, has this of Moses: [and that opinion is likely, because he is not read to have begotten any children afterwards.] He surpassed the dignity of the human condition so far that he was endowed with the name of God, as we have it written, the Lord saying: "I have appointed thee the god of Pharaoh." For, victor over all the passions, and captured by no allurements of the world, having overlaid all that dwelling according to the body with the purity of a heavenly conversation, ruling his mind, subjecting his flesh, and chastising it with a certain royal authority, he was called by the name of God, to whose likeness he had formed himself by the richness of a perfect virtue. Ambrose does not indeed clearly assert that Moses abstained from his wife after the vision in the bush; yet he so celebrates his purity and continence as to afford a suspicion that he was of the same opinion as the Fathers cited. And this opinion, besides the reasons brought forward by the Fathers, is made especially probable by the fact that Moses is not read to have had any children save the two sons before begotten; and that Zipporah was sent back to her father. She was indeed brought back to Moses with the sons in Exodus 18; but nowhere is it read that Moses received her back to the use of marriage, nor is any further mention made of Zipporah in the Scriptures, save in Numbers 12, where on her account Miriam the sister of Moses, together with Aaron, spoke against Moses. But that this murmuring of Miriam by no means favors the contrary opinion we shall see in its own place. Yet I confess the matter is uncertain.

§ XIII. Moses and Aaron set forth the commands of God to Pharaoh: the Israelites, more grievously oppressed for this cause, murmur against Moses and Aaron: but these, at the Lord's bidding, work signs before Pharaoh; but in vain: the first plague of the Egyptians.

[ ] Moses and Aaron set forth the commands of God to Pharaoh, What Moses and Aaron did after they had found the elders of the Israelites agreeing with them is set forth in Exodus 5 in this manner: After these things Moses and Aaron went in, and said to Pharaoh: Thus saith the Lord God of Israel: Let my people go, that they may sacrifice to me in the desert. But he answered: Who is the Lord, that I should hear his voice, and let Israel go? I know not the Lord, and I will not let Israel go. And they said: The God of the Hebrews hath called us, to go three days' journey into the wilderness, and to sacrifice to the Lord our God: lest a pestilence or the sword fall upon us. The king of Egypt said to them: Why do you, Moses and Aaron, draw off the people from their works? Get you gone to your burdens. These things Pharaoh said not without indignation and grave wrath: nor can it be doubted that Moses and Aaron at once withdrew, to consult the Lord what further was to be done.

[113] who oppresses the Israelites with a heavier burden: But Pharaoh, not content with this, took counsel with his own people, and determined to oppress the Israelites more grievously, lest they should thereafter presume to ask the like, as follows in the sacred text: And Pharaoh said: The people of the land are numerous: you see that the multitude is increased: how much more (will it increase) if you give them rest from their works? Therefore he commanded that same day the overseers of the works and the taskmasters of the people, saying: You shall give straw no more to the people to make brick, as before: but let them go and gather stubble. And you shall lay upon them the task of bricks which they did before, neither shall you diminish anything thereof: for they are idle, and therefore they cry out, saying: Let us go and sacrifice to our God. Let them be oppressed with works, and let them fulfil them: that they may not regard lying words. And the overseers of the works and the taskmasters went out and said to the people: Thus saith Pharaoh: I allow you no straw: go, and gather it where you can find it, neither shall anything of your work be diminished. And the people was scattered through all the land of Egypt to gather straw. And the overseers of the works pressed them, saying: Fulfil your work every day, as before you were wont to do, when straw was given you. And they that were over the works of the children of Israel were scourged by Pharaoh's taskmasters, saying: Why have you not made up the task of bricks, both yesterday and today, as before? From these things the tyrannical cruelty of the Egyptians wonderfully shines forth, since in all likelihood they exacted more work than the Israelites with all their effort could accomplish: for the gathering of straw, which was chopped and mixed with the clay for the solidity of the bricks, doubtless consumed much time.

[114] For this cause the officers of the Israelites, who were punished in the stead of the others because they did not labor beyond their strength, went to Pharaoh himself [whose officers first complain in vain before Pharaoh, then murmur against Moses and Aaron:] to complain of that tyrannical manner of proceeding, and to excuse themselves for the work commanded not being fulfilled; but they gained nothing with the tyrant. Hear Moses relating these things: And the officers of the children of Israel came, and cried out

to Pharaoh, saying: Why dealest thou so with thy servants? Straw is not given us, and bricks are required of us as before: behold we thy servants are beaten with whips, and thy people is unjustly dealt withal. And he said: You are idle, and therefore you say: Let us go and sacrifice to the Lord. Go therefore and work: straw shall not be given you, and you shall render the accustomed number of bricks. Having received this answer, the officers of the Israelites, not knowing whither to turn, laid their affliction to the charge of Moses and Aaron. And the officers of the children of Israel saw that they were in evil case, because it was said to them: There shall not a whit be diminished of the bricks for every day. And they met Moses and Aaron, who stood over against them as they came out from Pharaoh: and they said to them: The Lord see and judge, because you have made our savor to stink before Pharaoh and his servants, and you have given him a sword to kill us.

[115] Having heard this reproach, Moses was moved rather to compassion than to anger, but Moses, having recourse to God, confirms his hope by new promises, because he was not ignorant that he had in truth afforded Pharaoh an occasion or pretext for oppressing the Israelites more cruelly. And so, touched with grief and compassion, he reverently laid his complaints before God, and implored his help with confidence, and not in vain: for the sacred text thus continues: And Moses returned to the Lord, and said: Lord, why hast thou afflicted this people? Wherefore hast thou sent me? For since the time that I went in to Pharaoh to speak in thy name, he hath afflicted thy people: and thou hast not delivered them. And the Lord said to Moses: Now thou shalt see what I will do to Pharaoh: for by a mighty hand (being pressed) shall he let them go, and with a strong hand (compelled) shall he cast them out (that is, compel them to go out) of his land. And the Lord spoke (further) to Moses, saying: I am the Lord, that appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, in almighty God: and my name Adonai I did not show them. As though he should say: To thee I have afforded a greater cause of confidence than to thy forefathers, to whom I did not show my tetragrammaton name (which, being ineffable to the Hebrews, is wont to be rendered in Latin Adonai, or Lord), as I have shown it to thee at the bush. Let us proceed with the text: And I made a covenant with them, to give them the land of Canaan, the land of their pilgrimage, wherein they were strangers. I have heard the groaning of the children of Israel, wherewith the Egyptians have oppressed them: and I have remembered my covenant. Therefore say to the children of Israel: I am the Lord, who will bring you out from the work-prison of the Egyptians, and will deliver you from bondage: and redeem you with a high arm, and great judgments. And I will take you to myself for my people, and I will be your God: and you shall know that I am the Lord your God, who brought you out from the work-prison of the Egyptians; and brought you into the land, concerning which I lifted up my hand to give it to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob: and I will give it you to possess, I the Lord. [and having consoled the Israelites in vain, he is bidden to assail Pharaoh with prodigies.]

[116] This consolation raised the somewhat depressed confidence of Moses the more: but the Israelites had so cast down their spirits by their present calamity that not even by these promises did they take them up again, not sufficiently considering that great things are nowhere reached save through great labors. Take the words of Moses: Moses therefore told all this to the children of Israel: but they did not hearken to him, for anguish of spirit and most painful work. And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Go in and speak to Pharaoh king of Egypt, that he let the children of Israel go out of his land. Moses answered before the Lord: Behold the children of Israel do not hearken to me: and how will Pharaoh hear me, especially as I am of uncircumcised lips? The faint-heartedness of the Israelites caused Moses to fall back into his former excuse. But the Lord in chapter 7 cut off his further excuses, and bade Moses assail Pharaoh with the showing of signs, and assume a greater authority with the proud king. Moses relates the matter in these words: And the Lord said to Moses: Behold I have appointed thee the god of Pharaoh: and Aaron thy brother shall be thy prophet. Thou shalt speak to him all that I command thee: and he shall speak to Pharaoh, that he let the children of Israel go out of his land. But I shall harden his heart, and shall multiply my signs and wonders in the land of Egypt, and he shall not hear you: and I will lay my hand upon Egypt, and will bring forth my army and my people the children of Israel out of the land of Egypt by very great judgments. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, who have stretched forth my hand upon Egypt, and have brought forth the children of Israel out of the midst of them. And Moses and Aaron did as the Lord had commanded; so did they. And Moses was eighty years old, and Aaron eighty-three, when they spoke to Pharaoh.

[117] Moses turns his rod into a serpent, which the magicians imitate: These things having been set forth in general, Moses proceeds thus to narrate the particulars: And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron: When Pharaoh shall say to you, Show signs: thou shalt say to Aaron: Take thy rod, and cast it down before Pharaoh, and it shall be turned into a serpent. So Moses and Aaron went in unto Pharaoh, and did as the Lord had commanded: and Aaron took the rod before Pharaoh and his servants, and it was turned into a serpent. And Pharaoh called the wise men and the magicians: and they also by Egyptian enchantments and certain secrets did in like manner. And they every one cast down their rods, and they were turned into serpents: but Aaron's rod (turned into a serpent) devoured their rods. And Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he did not hearken to them (to Moses, namely, and Aaron), as the Lord had commanded. The chief of these magicians are believed to have been Jannes and Mambres, of whom the Apostle says in 2 Timothy 3, verse 8: Now as Jannes and Mambres resisted Moses, etc. And these by their tricks brought it about that Pharaoh could think that Moses and Aaron used a like art, and were only magicians more skilled than his own magicians, and for that reason was not moved to consent, just as the Lord had foretold would happen when he was giving his precepts to Moses and Aaron. This first prodigy wrought before Pharaoh is not counted among the ten plagues of Egypt: for from it no evil befell the Egyptians.

[118] But the first plague of the Egyptians is at once subjoined in this manner: he turns the water into blood throughout all Egypt, And the Lord said to Moses: Pharaoh's heart is hardened, he will not let the people go. Go to him in the morning, behold he will go out to the waters: and thou shalt stand to meet him upon the bank of the river: and thou shalt take in thy hand the rod that was turned into a serpent. And thou shalt say to him: The Lord God of the Hebrews sent me to thee, saying: Let my people go to sacrifice to me in the desert: and hitherto thou wouldst not hear. Thus therefore saith the Lord: In this thou shalt know that I am the Lord: behold I will strike with the rod that is in my hand the water of the river, and it shall be turned into blood. And the fishes that are in the river shall die, and the waters shall be corrupted, and the Egyptians shall be afflicted when they drink the water of the river. The Lord also said to Moses: Say to Aaron: Take thy rod, and stretch forth thy hand upon the waters of Egypt, and upon their rivers, and streams and pools, and all the ponds of waters, that they may be turned into blood: and let blood be in all the land of Egypt, both in vessels of wood and of stone. And Moses and Aaron did as the Lord had commanded: and lifting up the rod he struck the water of the river before Pharaoh and his servants: and it was turned into blood. And the fishes that were in the river died: and the river corrupted, and the Egyptians could not drink the water of the river, and there was blood in all the land of Egypt. Of this plague the Psalmist sings thus in Psalm 77, verse 44: And he turned their rivers into blood, and their showers, that they might not drink. And Psalm 104, verse 29: He turned their waters into blood: and destroyed their fish.

[119] But after the aforesaid, Moses adds the cause why the obstinacy of Pharaoh was not bent, [which likewise the magicians imitate: whether this first plague was also in the land of Goshen?] writing thus: And the magicians of the Egyptians with their enchantments did in like manner; and Pharaoh's heart was hardened, neither did he hear them, as the Lord had commanded. And he turned himself away and went into his house, neither did he set his heart to it this time also. It is commonly asked here whence the magicians took that water which they turned into blood, since all the water of Egypt had been turned into blood by Moses. This could have come about in various ways: for that water could have been sea-water, which had not been turned into blood, as being unfit for drinking. A well could have been dug, as indeed the Egyptians did dig wells, and that water drawn from it. That water could have been taken by the magicians before all the water had been turned into blood: for the whole conversion is not said to have been done in one moment of time. Interpreters recite still more ways in which that water could have been had by the magicians; but I have chosen briefly to recount only the more probable. St. Augustine, in question 23 on Exodus, thinks that the land of Goshen was exempt from the plague of blood and from those that followed, and that there the water was taken by the magicians which they turned into blood. And indeed I do not see that it can be proved from the Scriptures that the land of Goshen was touched by that same plague, although various interpreters wish to prove it from these words: And there was blood in all the land of Egypt. For in chapter 8, verse 24, in like manner the fly is said to have come into all the land of Egypt: and yet from the same chapter it is agreed that the land of Goshen was free from the plague of flies. And so that opinion of St. Augustine seems to me probable before the rest: for no fit reason can easily be assigned why all the land of Egypt should in one place comprehend the land of Goshen rather than in another. Finally, what the Egyptians did when smitten by this plague Moses relates thus: And all the Egyptians dug round about the river for water to drink: for they could not drink of the water of the river. And seven days were fully ended, after that the Lord struck the river. Thus far concerning the first plague of the Egyptians from the sacred Writings.

* that is, by a hand

§ XIV. The accounts of Josephus, Philo, and Artapanus concerning the foregoing examined.

[ ] Josephus, the deeds at the first and second meeting Josephus wonderfully confounds the first meeting of Moses with Pharaoh with the second, and the order of the things done: he also attributes to Moses various sayings which are neither true nor probable. Take his words, to be corrected by our observations: He betakes himself, he says, to the new king. There, after he had recounted the service he had rendered on behalf of the Egyptians against the Ethiopians, who were contemptuously laying waste their fields, and the labors

he had exhausted, when he administered the war no otherwise than on behalf of his own countrymen, he adds the ill favor rendered him for so many benefits. Then he opens to the king the oracle received on Mount Sinai, and enumerates one by one the prodigies also by which, being confirmed about the will of God, he had laid aside all hesitation; then he adds prayers that the king would not through unbelief be willing to stand as an obstacle to the decrees of God. But when he perceived that he was heard contemptuously by the king, he displays to him a specimen of the prodigies which he had seen on Sinai. Those prodigies were displayed to the king not at the first meeting but at the second. Besides, it is not likely that Moses cast his own merits in the king's teeth, or set forth his vision to him so distinctly at once. I return to Josephus.

[121] of Moses with Pharaoh, not only by his own conjectures, But the king in anger calls him a wicked man, who, once a fugitive from the Egyptians, had now come, furnished with magical tricks, to deceive the rest. He too had priests who knew how to represent the same wonders, and were no less skilled in arts of this kind: nor was there any reason why Moses should boast himself as though he alone excelled the rest in divine power, and thus among the rude multitude vaunt himself as though set above the mortal condition: and forthwith, when they too had cast down their rods, they were turned into serpents. Then Moses, nothing moved by these things, said: Neither am I myself ignorant of, or do I despise, the arts of the Egyptians: yet I say that the things I work are more excellent than their magic by as great an interval as divine things leave human things behind them: and now I shall manifestly declare that these are not tricks imposing upon the incautious by an appearance of truth, but the very power of God, which shall be to the unbelieving an argument of his almighty will: and with the word he casts his rod upon the ground, bidding it become a dragon; and it, presently obeying the word, attacked the rods of the Egyptians which were creeping in the likeness of dragons, one after another, and devoured them all to the last; and presently, when it had returned to its former shape, Moses took it up again. Here again Josephus slips in various ways. For first, he brings in Pharaoh speaking from mere conjecture and reproaching Moses. Secondly, when he says, When they too (the magicians) had cast down their rods, he supposes that Moses had done this before, as indeed he did through Aaron; and he narrates the same thing done again, as though Moses had done the same twice. Thirdly, he keeps silence about Aaron, as though he had not been present, and attributes all the words and works to Moses alone; whereas it is agreed that all was done by Aaron at the bidding of Moses. Fourthly, he brings in Moses speaking most ill, as though he had approved the magical arts of the Egyptians.

[122] But the king, Josephus continues, moved by this deed to indignation rather than to admiration, but corrupts them also by a confused order: when he had answered that he would do nothing, and would gain nothing by Egyptian arts, commands the exactor of the works, who was set over the Hebrews, to remit nothing of their labor, but to press them with difficulties of work even heavier than before. And he, who before was wont to supply them straw for the moulding of bricks, thereafter ceased to do so: but keeping them at work by day, he sent them out by night to carry in straw, purposing to double the burden of their former labor. But Moses was neither deterred from his purpose by the threats of the king, nor was he in the least bent by the constant complaints of his own people to desist from what he had begun: but with his mind set firm against both, he was wholly bent on this, that he might restore his own people to a most longed-for liberty. And so he approaches the king anew, urging him to let the Hebrews go to Mount Sinai, there to sacrifice to God, for this very thing he had commanded, nor could anyone resist his will: wherefore he must take heed lest he seem to despise his favor, and must grant the people the power of going out, lest perchance by striving against it he should hereafter transfer the blame upon himself, if any such thing should befall him as is wont to befall those who resist the will of God. For calamities necessarily seize upon those who provoke the divine anger against themselves: and both earth and air become hostile to them, and the procreation of children proceeds with little success, the elements too being stirred up to take vengeance upon them. And that the Egyptians could not avoid these evils, even if it should happen that the Hebrews went out of their region, unless they obtained this departure by their own goodwill. Thus far Josephus, who rightly indeed places the greater oppression of the Hebrews after the first meeting; but wrongly places it after the signs which happened at the second meeting, because he has confounded the two, as we have already seen. Then he does indeed narrate a second meeting of Moses with Pharaoh: but he attributes to that meeting only certain threats of Moses, invented from conjecture; although Moses does not seem to have threatened Pharaoh so soon. Take the rest of Josephus's assertions about these matters.

[123] But since the king, he says, made nothing of the words of Moses, the first plague narrated by him, and his error corrected. nor gave the least heed to his entreaties, most grievous evils fell upon the Egyptians: which I shall recount one by one, both on account of their novelty and that it may the more appear that the predictions of our Seer were not empty: lastly, because it concerns men to know such things, that they may the more beware of those things by which God, being provoked, is wont to be moved to inflict punishments. First, the river, flowing down with bloody streams, reduced them to a want of drink, since besides it they have no spring: nor was that only a fault of color, but if anyone, compelled by thirst, tasted it, he was at once seized with a sharp pain: and it was such to the Egyptians alone, but to the Hebrews sweet and drinkable, and altogether retaining its former nature. At which miracle the king, at a loss for counsel, fearing for the safety of his nation, permitted the Hebrews to depart; and when the evil had ceased, he returned again to his former mind, revoking his sentence. Josephus errs when he asserts that after this plague Pharaoh permitted the Hebrews to depart, but revoked his sentence. He ought rather to have related that the water was turned into blood by the magicians too; and that thus it came about that Pharaoh persisted stubbornly in his resolve.

[124] Philo too in the narration of the same history from time to time departs from sacred Scripture, and adds his own observations after his manner. We shall sift the particulars after his words have been given, which his translator has rendered into Latin thus: Philo, the first meeting of Moses with Pharaoh, and its outcome, After these things they (Moses and Aaron) dare to address the king himself, that he should send the people out beyond the borders of the kingdom for sacrifice. For they said there was need of solitude for the performing of the rites of their fathers, which were different from the ceremonies of others, and therefore required retirement, lest they should either offend others, or be profaned by the eyes of foreigners little favoring the spectacle. But the king, nourished from his cradle in the pride of his forefathers, and believing in no God besides those visible things, answered contumaciously: Who is he whom you bid me obey? I do not know this new Lord whom you proclaim: I do not let go a nation which under the pretext of a festival and of sacrifices desires to shake off the yoke. Then, being a wrathful and unmerciful man, he marks with ignominy the overseers of the works, who suffered the people to grow wanton in idleness, who otherwise would not have longed for feasts and sacrifices. For these things belonged not to men intent upon necessary work, but to those living pleasantly and delicately. Therefore, when the people was pressed more grievously than before, and was indignant with Moses and his companions as impostors, casting impiety in their teeth both secretly and openly, and lying oracles; at last the Prophet undertakes to put forth the miracles he had learned, that he might take away unbelief from the beholders: the king too was present with his band of courtiers. By the overseers of the works whom Pharaoh marked with ignominy are to be understood the overseers from among the Hebrews, over whom in turn the Egyptians were set. But what he asserts about the murmurings against Moses, as though he with his companions had been held for an impostor by the Hebrews, is somewhat exaggerated beyond the account of holy Scripture; although otherwise it does not lack all likelihood, and may be held for conjecture.

[125] the prodigy of the rod changed into a serpent, Philo then continues thus: And so, the multitude flowing together to the palace, the brother of Moses casts upon the ground the staff, first raised aloft that it might be visible to all; which presently is changed into a dragon. Then the ring of spectators, unstrung with fear and amazement, scattered in flight. But the sophists and magicians, as many as were present, said: What terrifies you? Neither are we unskilled in such arts: we too can do such things. Then, when each had cast down his own rod, many dragons rolled about that first one in winding coils; but he, with neck upraised and with a monstrous gape, swallowed them, attacked on every side, no otherwise than fishes thrown to him: and thus, when they had been gulped down, he returned to the former nature of a rod. So magnificent a spectacle took away from even hostile minds all suspicion that they should think these things were done by human cunning or by arts devised for mockery, but by divine power, by which nothing is not easily accomplished. What is here asserted about the dragon made from the rod of Moses, which he affirms was again changed into a rod after the serpents from the magicians' rods had been devoured, is said upon a probable conjecture: for Scripture does not express how or when that second change was made. The change could have been made by Aaron's seizing the tail of the serpent, as happened to Moses at the bush; or even of its own accord, as Philo seems to have believed, whom let us hear again.

[126] the plagues in general, Nevertheless, since not even by so manifest an efficacy could it be wrung from them that they should confess themselves overcome; but they nonetheless resisted with stubborn boldness, given over to an obstinate inhumanity and impiety as though to praiseworthy virtues; neither pitying those oppressed by an unjust servitude, nor bringing themselves to execute the divine commands, declared both by manifest oracles and by the wonders and prodigies that followed: there was need of a graver censure, that by afflictions rushing on in troops those dullards might be chastised who disdained to be taught by good reasons. Ten punishments were inflicted upon the region, so that they who in sinning had left themselves nothing wanting to the height of malice should be punished in every way, and stricken with the perfect number of punishments. Nor were the kinds of punishment common ones. For the elements of the world — earth, water, air, fire — conspired against the impious, God being the avenger, to declare his power, who turns those things which he used for the creation and the safety of things, whenever he will, to the destruction of the impious. These punishments were distributed in three parts: three pertaining to the grosser elements, earth and water, of which bodies with their qualities consist, were committed to the brother of Moses: as many to Moses alone, which he inflicted through fire and air: … one common to both, seventh in order; the three remaining, to complete the number ten, were reserved to God. The beginning was from water: this, since the Egyptians honor it before the rest as the principle of all things, God employed first for the terrifying and chastising of the guilty. Thus far Philo. That division of the ten plagues pleased Origen also, Homily 4 on Exodus. Of these, although God chiefly inflicted them all, the first three, namely of blood, of frogs, and of gnats, are attributed to Aaron, because in them he stretched forth his hand or his rod — in two over the waters, in the third over the dust of the earth. In dividing the rest Philo does not keep the order in which they were inflicted, but that in which he was himself about to narrate them. Three he ascribes to Moses alone, because in them Moses is read to have stretched forth his hand or rod toward heaven,

as was done in the seventh plague of hail, in the eighth of locusts, and in the ninth of darkness. The sixth plague of boils, which Philo calls and reckons the seventh, Origen attributes to Moses alone, because he alone scattered the ashes toward heaven; but Philo ascribes it to both, because both together gathered the ashes. Finally the other three, namely the fourth of flies, the fifth of the pestilence of animals, and the tenth, that is, the death of the firstborn, are attributed to God alone, because in these the others wrought nothing.

[127] What then presently happened? When the brother of Moses at God's bidding struck the river with his rod, it is turned into blood, for all its length from Ethiopia to the sea; and in relating the first one by one, he mingles conjectures and some errors. the same befell in the pools, ditches, wells, springs, and all the waters of Egypt, so that, drinkable water failing, no one sought the banks, and for those who opened new veins there gushed forth, instead of a clear liquid, blood as from a wound: all the kinds of fishes too were destroyed, their vital faculty being turned into a pestilent one, so that all places were filled with stench, so many bodies rotting at once; a great number too of men killed by thirst lay in heaps at the crossways, their households not sufficing for the offices of burial: for this evil lasted seven days, until, the Egyptians suppliantly invoking Moses, and he entreating, God had mercy on those who were perishing. He, since he is to be entreated, changed the blood into sweet water, the streams of the river being restored to healthfulness such as they had been before. In narrating this plague Philo slips twice, or at least has no fit foundation in Scripture. He asserts, first, that blood gushed forth for those who opened new veins, that is, who dug wells. But this seems repugnant to these words of Exodus 7, verse 24: And all the Egyptians dug round about the river for water to drink: for they could not drink of the water of the river. This text clearly intimates that water was found by digging, the mercy of God affording that remedy to the Egyptians, lest all should be killed by thirst. Secondly, nowhere does Scripture assert that this plague of blood ceased through the prayers of Moses, as Philo affirms. It can be said with more likelihood, and more agreeably to the sacred Writings, that the first plague ceased only that the second might take its place.

[128] Concerning these things some matters are related also by Artapanus, a heathen, Artapanus, a heathen man, had heard something of these things, in all likelihood from the tradition or report of the Egyptians: but he has published fables rather than true history. Eusebius expresses his opinion in this manner, in the place often indicated: (He asserts that Moses,) relying on this thing (the divine voice, namely), before he had provided an army, went down at his father-in-law's counsel to the king of the Egyptians, and said that at the bidding of the Lord of the world the Jews must be delivered. Which having been heard, he was thrust into prison: whence by night, the guards being dead, and the gates suddenly standing open, and all the doors that were there broken, he went out, and by a straight way into the palace, even to the king's chamber, the doors being opened, entered to the king himself: and, being asked by the astonished king what was the name of the God by whom he had been sent — and when, with neck inclined, Moses had said it into his ear, that the hearer fell dumb, and was raised up by Moses; he says also that he wrote the name of God on a tablet: which letters, when some of the priests derided them, not knowing how to read, he says that all expired in convulsions: then too, the king asking a sign, the staff was by Moses turned into a serpent, and, when all were struck with great fear, he seized the dragon by the tail and turned it again into a staff: then the Nile, being struck with the staff, so overflowed that all Egypt feared submersion, and from that time each year it overflowed in like manner: afterwards, when the water, being again struck with the staff, had returned into its channel, all the animals in the river being destroyed by death, the water so reeked with a great stench that the Egyptians labored at once with thirst and with pestilence; and that the king, terrified, was now inclined to let the people go: but that the priests of Memphis, being called and bidden to die unless they too should produce some sign, having by magical arts brought forth a dragon and changed the color of the river, brought it about that the king, elated, dealt cruelly with the Jews. Thus far he, mingling true with false.

[129] but disfigured by many errors and fables. First he is deceived when he says that Moses went to Pharaoh by the counsel of his father-in-law: and what is said about an army not provided is absurd. Secondly, that prison of Moses, and all the things related on the occasion of the prison, appear plainly fictitious, though it is otherwise to be wondered at that Pharaoh did not command Moses to be shut up in prison. But it is likely that Pharaoh at the first meeting rather despised the words of Moses than feared him: and afterwards, on account of the signs he had seen, feared him too much to dare to shut Moses in prison. Thirdly, for the waters of the Nile turned into blood he so substitutes a huge overflow that he nevertheless acknowledges that the waters were corrupted and the fishes dead; nay, and that a pestilence arose, which sacred Scripture does not acknowledge. Fourthly, that the waters were again struck and thus returned into their channel, and that the king by those signs was inclined to let the Israelites go, Moses himself again does not have, nor does he here declare how the river was afterwards changed back from blood into water. Fifthly, it is fabulous that the yearly overflow of the Nile has its origin from that fictitious overflow. Sixthly and finally, certain other things are related less exactly and in a disturbed order, yet in a manner in some sort tolerable. But from these things we can gather that the wonders wrought by Moses in Egypt were related by profane writers also, but not without errors, as has commonly happened in ancient profane histories.

§ XV. The second plague of frogs, the third of gnats, the fourth of flies, the fifth the pestilence of beasts, the sixth of boils, the seventh of hail.

[ ] The second plague of frogs, which the magicians imitate, After the first plague of the Egyptians, continued for seven days, had not moved Pharaoh, the Lord also said to Moses (Exodus 8): Go in to Pharaoh, and thou shalt say to him: Thus saith the Lord: Let my people go to sacrifice to me: but if thou wilt not let them go, behold I will strike all thy coasts with frogs. And the river shall bring forth an abundance of frogs: which shall come up and enter into thy house, and thy bedchamber, and upon thy bed, and into the houses of thy servants, and into thy people, and into thy ovens, and into the remains of thy meats: and the frogs shall come in to thee, and to thy people, and to all thy servants. These commands, with the threats joined to them, Moses through Aaron declared to Pharaoh, although Scripture does not relate it, but rather leaves it to be understood. And the Lord said to Moses — namely because Pharaoh was not bent — Say to Aaron: Stretch forth thy hand upon the streams, and upon the rivers and the pools, and bring forth frogs upon the land of Egypt. And (at the bidding of Moses) Aaron stretched forth his hand upon the waters of Egypt, and the frogs came up and covered the land of Egypt; in so great abundance, namely, that according to the threat sent before they entered the houses, the chambers, and the very beds, and other places. And the magicians also by their enchantments did in like manner, and they brought forth frogs upon the land of Egypt. Indeed it was not difficult for the demon, God permitting, to bring frogs from elsewhere and to set them before the magicians.

[131] Yet the pride of the king was somewhat lowered by this prodigy, afterwards taken away at the prayers of Moses: as follows: But Pharaoh called Moses and Aaron, and said to them: Pray ye to the Lord to take away the frogs from me and from my people: and I will let the people go to sacrifice to the Lord. And Moses said to Pharaoh: Set me a time when I shall pray for thee, and for thy servants, and for thy people, that the frogs may be driven away from thee and from thy house, and from thy servants, and from thy people: and may remain only in the river. And he answered: Tomorrow. But he said: I will do according to thy word, that thou mayest know that there is none like to the Lord our God. And the frogs shall depart from thee, and from thy house, and from thy servants, and from thy people: and shall remain only in the river. And Moses and Aaron went forth from Pharaoh: and Moses cried to the Lord for the promise which he had made to Pharaoh concerning the frogs. And the Lord did according to the word of Moses: and the frogs died out of the houses, and out of the villages, and out of the fields. And they gathered them together into immense heaps, and the land was corrupted. And Pharaoh, seeing that rest was given, hardened his own heart, and did not hear them, as the Lord had commanded. Pharaoh did not stand by his promises after the plague was taken away, either because he had promised only with a feigned mind, or because, being an inconstant man, he presently changed his purpose. But that obstinacy at once felt another plague.

[132] the third plague of gnats, which the magicians could not imitate: For Moses proceeds thus: And the Lord said to Moses: Say to Aaron: Stretch forth thy rod, and strike the dust of the earth: and may there be gnats in all the land of Egypt. And they did so. And Aaron stretched forth his hand, holding the rod: and he struck the dust of the earth, and there came gnats on men and on beasts: all the dust of the earth was turned into gnats through all the land of Egypt. Interpreters dispute what kind of insect is designated by the word sciniphes, or, as others write it, ciniphes: for the word seems to be derived, somewhat softened, from the Greek word which is written σκνίφες, σκνίπες, and κνῖπες, in the singular σκνὶψ or κνὶψ. Some explain them as midges, others as lice, others as fleas, others as new living creatures never before seen. But the opinion of Philo pleases me more, whose words I shall give in the following §. Further, it is a hyperbole when all the dust is said to have been turned into gnats: but that hyperbole shows that the multitude of gnats was innumerable, which by their stings doubtless stirred up a huge annoyance both to men and to beasts. The magicians of Pharaoh wished to imitate this prodigy also; but in vain, God not permitting it. Hear the sacred text: And the magicians with their enchantments did in like manner, to bring forth gnats, and they could not: and there were gnats as well on men as on beasts. And the magicians said to Pharaoh: This is the finger of God. And Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he did not hear them, as the Lord had commanded. It may be observed here, first, that Pharaoh was not forewarned of this plague, or at least that this is not said in the sacred Writings. Secondly, that the magicians here acknowledged the power of God, and professed it before Pharaoh, who nevertheless not even by this confession of theirs laid aside his obstinacy. Hence after this third plague a fourth at once followed, Pharaoh being again forewarned.

[133] the fourth plague of flies of every kind, This Moses relates in these words: The Lord also said to Moses: Arise early, and stand before Pharaoh: for he will go forth to the waters: and thou shalt say to him: Thus saith the Lord: Let my people go to sacrifice to me. But if thou wilt not let them go, behold I will send in

upon thee, and upon thy servants, and upon thy people, and into thy houses, all kinds of flies: and the houses of the Egyptians shall be filled with flies of divers kinds, and the whole land wherein they shall be. And I will make marvellous in that day the land of Goshen, in which my people is, that there shall be no flies there: and thou shalt know that I am the Lord in the midst of the earth. And I will put a division between my people and thy people: tomorrow shall this sign be. And the Lord did so (namely when Pharaoh had been warned by Moses in vain). And there came a very grievous swarm of flies into the houses of Pharaoh and of his servants, and into all the land of Egypt: and the land was corrupted by this kind of flies. Of this plague, as also of the second, it is said thus in Psalm 77, verse 45: He sent among them the dog-fly, and it devoured them (by sucking their blood and torturing them sharply with its bites); and the frog, and it destroyed them. Again, in Psalm 104, verse 31, of this and of the third: He spoke, and there came the dog-fly: and gnats in all their coasts. The Greek word κοινομῦια, which has here been kept by the Latin translator, signifies to the letter the common fly, that is, every kind of fly, as St. Jerome with others rightly renders it. Men also are said in Wisdom 16, verse 9, to have been killed in Egypt by the bites of flies.

[134] St. Augustine, in question 26 on Exodus, speaks thus of the exemption of the Hebrews from the plagues, here first indicated: [which was not in the land of Goshen, as in all likelihood neither were the preceding ones:] What Scripture has here disclosed, lest it should say it everywhere, we ought to understand to have been done both in the later and in the earlier signs, namely that the land in which the people of God dwelt was harassed by no such plagues. But it was opportune that this should be here plainly set down, whence now begin the signs which the magicians did not even attempt to imitate. For without doubt, because there were gnats everywhere in the kingdom of Pharaoh, but there had been none in the land of Goshen, there the magicians attempted to do the like, and could not. Up to the point, therefore, where they failed (the magicians), nothing is said about the setting apart of that land; but from the point at which those things began to be done in which they would not dare even to attempt the like. This observation of St. Augustine appears to me very probable; yet it is not altogether certain: for if anyone should wish to think that the three preceding plagues, namely of blood, of frogs, and of gnats, were also in the land of Goshen, he will be able to say that the water was not bloody for the Hebrews but for the Egyptians alone; and that neither frogs nor gnats brought any annoyance upon the Hebrews: but that now the very land in which the Hebrews were is excepted from the common plague, so that the exemption of the Hebrews might become more clearly known to the Egyptians.

[135] Further, this plague of flies moved Pharaoh; [Pharaoh during this plague promises the Hebrews liberty to depart, but afterwards does not stand by his promises.] but it did not so move him that he was willing wholly to obey the commands of God: for he consented to a sacrifice of the Hebrews, but not to their going out of Egypt. Let us hear Moses: And Pharaoh called Moses and Aaron, and said to them: Go, and sacrifice to your God in this land. And Moses said: It cannot be so: for we shall sacrifice to the Lord our God the abominations of the Egyptians: and if we should kill those things which the Egyptians worship, before them, they will stone us. We will go three days' journey into the wilderness: and we will sacrifice to the Lord our God, as he hath commanded us. And Pharaoh said: I will let you go to sacrifice to the Lord your God in the desert: but go no farther; pray for me. And Moses said: I will go forth from thee, and will pray to the Lord: and the fly shall depart from Pharaoh, and from his servants, and from his people tomorrow: but do not deceive any more, in not letting the people go to sacrifice to the Lord. And Moses went forth from Pharaoh, and prayed to the Lord. And he did according to his word: and he took away the flies from Pharaoh, and from his servants, and from his people: there was not left so much as one. And Pharaoh's heart was hardened, so that neither this time would he let the people go. It is commonly asked here what Moses understands by the abominations of the Egyptians. But the matter seems to me to be elucidated by the following words: And if we should kill those things which the Egyptians worship, etc. By the abominations of the Egyptians, therefore, are understood those animals which the Egyptians worshipped; and the abominations of the Egyptians are the abominable deities of the Egyptians. Thus they worshipped Apis in the form of an ox and of a calf; Jupiter Hammon in a ram. They worshipped other living creatures also, such as crocodiles, ibises, and many more. But in this manner there is no inquiry.

[136] The obstinacy of Pharaoh and his perfidy in not keeping his promises presently brought on another plague, The fifth plague, the death of the animals, which Moses sets forth thus in Exodus 9: And the Lord said to Moses: Go in to Pharaoh, and speak to him: Thus saith the Lord God of the Hebrews: Let my people go to sacrifice to me. But if thou still refuse, and withhold them: behold my hand shall be upon thy fields: and a very grievous murrain upon thy horses, and asses, and camels, and oxen, and sheep. And the Lord will make a wonderful difference between the possessions of Israel and the possessions of the Egyptians, that nothing at all shall die of those things that belong to the children of Israel. And the Lord appointed a time, saying: Tomorrow will the Lord do this thing in the land. Moses announced these things to Pharaoh, but in vain. The Lord therefore did this thing the next day: and all the beasts of the Egyptians died: but of the beasts of the children of Israel there died not one. Observe here that the word all is not to be understood strictly of absolutely all the beasts of the Egyptians, since some are afterwards read to have been killed by the hail, but either of all which were in the fields, on account of the preceding words, My hand shall be upon thy fields; or of all which had been touched by the murrain; or finally that the word all here signifies many or most, only a few being left. The sacred text adds: And Pharaoh sent to see: and there was not anything dead of that which Israel possessed. And Pharaoh's heart was hardened, and he did not let the people go. Of this plague it is read thus in Psalm 77, verse 50: He made a way for a path to his anger, he spared not their souls from death: and he shut up their cattle in death.

[137] the sixth of boils. Moses assails Pharaoh with a grave threat, But Moses proceeds thus to the sixth plague: And the Lord said to Moses and Aaron: Take to you handfuls of ashes out of the furnace, and let Moses sprinkle it in the air in the presence of Pharaoh. And be there dust upon all the land of Egypt: for there shall be boils and swelling blains both in men and in beasts in the whole land of Egypt. And they took ashes out of the furnace, and stood before Pharaoh, and Moses sprinkled it in the air: and there came boils with swelling blains in men and in beasts: neither could the magicians stand before Moses for the boils that were upon them, and in all the land of Egypt. And the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he hearkened not to them, as the Lord had spoken to Moses. Pharaoh himself is not said to have been smitten with this plague of boils: but Moses was bidden to press him with a terrible threat before he foretold the following plague by name. Take the words: And the Lord said to Moses: Arise in the morning, and stand before Pharaoh, and thou shalt say to him: Thus saith the Lord God of the Hebrews: Let my people go to sacrifice to me. For at this time I will send all my plagues upon thy heart, and upon thy servants, and upon thy people; that thou mayest know that there is none like me in all the earth. For now I will stretch out my hand to strike thee and thy people with pestilence, and thou shalt perish from the earth. By pestilence here is not designated pestilence properly so called, but any evil whatsoever bringing death: for a pestilence of men is not reckoned among the Egyptian plagues. Pestilence, therefore, is put for death, as the Seventy have it, making mention not of pestilence but of death: and death was indeed brought upon Pharaoh and upon many of the chief nobles and of his people [foretelling in general all the evils which God would inflict for the manifesting of his name,] when he pursued the Israelites through the Red Sea.

[138] Some, says Cornelius a Lapide on this passage, from the Hebrew render the words given thus and connect them with what follows: And indeed, if I had willed, I could have killed thee with pestilence, and thou wouldst have perished from the earth; but I have therefore set thee up and preserved thee, that I might show in thee my strength. The following words seem in some sort to favor this exposition, which are read thus in the common Bibles: And therefore have I set thee up, that I may show my strength in thee, and that my name may be told throughout all the earth. But, as the aforesaid interpreter observes, the Hebrew phrase does not have the particle if, and the Hebrew words threaten Pharaoh with pestilence and destruction assertively, and not conditionally: .. as though he (the Lord) should say: I will add plagues to plagues, until thou be cut off from the earth. This interpretation therefore is to be held, nor does the Chaldee seem to be followed, who is the first author of the other interpretation: for far preferable to him is the version of St. Jerome and of the Seventy interpreters, with whom many others are in accord. Besides, an absolute threat of evils to come, up to the destruction of Pharaoh, coheres more rightly with the preceding words: At this time I will send all my plagues, etc.: nor is it in any way repugnant to those words: And therefore have I set thee up, that I may show my strength in thee, and that my name may be told throughout all the earth: for by these words the Lord renders the reason why he smites Pharaoh with so many plagues before he punishes him with death, namely that by the multitude of the plagues he may make his name more illustrious throughout the whole world. This sense the Seventy require, in whom for I have set thee up is read thou hast been preserved.

[139] The Apostle in Romans 9, verse 17, cites those words in this manner: suffering for this cause the obstinacy of Pharaoh to grow. For the Scripture saith to Pharaoh: To this purpose have I raised thee, that I may show my power in thee: and that my name may be declared throughout all the earth. St. Augustine, in question 33 on Exodus, weighing these words, observes that God permits evils and spares the evil for a time, that the elect may be instructed, subjoining these things: God therefore knows how to use evils well, in whom nevertheless he does not create human nature unto malice, but bears with them patiently as long as he knows to be fitting; not emptily, but using them for the admonition or the exercise of the good. For behold, that the name of God should be declared throughout all the earth surely profits the vessels of mercy. For their advantage, therefore, was Pharaoh preserved, as Scripture also testifies,

and the outcome teaches. Further, that God did not stir up Pharaoh to that obstinacy the same holy Doctor declares in many places, and expressly in question 36 he acknowledges that the words of Exodus 10, verse 1, For I have hardened his heart, … that I may work these my signs in him, have indeed in appearance a harder signification. But, he says, it is thus to be understood, as though he should say: For I was patient with him and with his servants, so that I did not take them away, in order that my signs might come upon them in order. For because by the patience of God the evil mind was made the more obstinate, therefore for that which is, "I was patient toward him," it is said, "I made his heart heavy." So he had said in question 24 that the very patience of God, by which he spared, could be numbered among the causes of the hardening of Pharaoh. For the patience of God, he says, according to the hearts of men, is useful to some for repenting, useless to others, for resisting God and for persevering in evil: yet it is not useless of itself, but according to the evil heart, as we have already said. This the Apostle too says: Knowest thou not that the patience of God leadeth thee to penance? But according to thy hardness of heart, and thy impenitent heart, thou treasurest up to thyself wrath, etc.

[140] After that general threat, Moses was bidden to foretell to Pharaoh the plague of hail, The seventh plague of hail, which is seventh in order, and which he doubtless foretold in those words with which the Lord instructed him from verse 17: Dost thou still hold back my people: and wilt thou not let them go? Behold I will cause it to rain tomorrow at this same hour an exceeding great hail, such as hath not been in Egypt from the day that it was founded until this present time. Send therefore now presently, and gather together thy cattle, and all that thou hast in the field: for men, and beasts, and all things that shall be found abroad, and not gathered together out of the fields, and which the hail shall fall upon, shall die. Some gave credence to this threat to their own good, but others neglected it to their own harm, as follows: He that feared the word of the Lord among Pharaoh's servants made his servants and his cattle flee into houses: but he that regarded not the word of the Lord left his servants and his cattle in the fields. And the Lord said to Moses: Stretch forth thy hand toward heaven, that there may be hail in the whole land of Egypt upon men, and upon beasts, and upon every herb of the field in the land of Egypt. And Moses stretched forth his rod toward heaven, and the Lord sent thunder and hail, and lightnings running along the ground: and the Lord rained hail upon the land of Egypt. And the hail and fire mixed with it drove on together: and it was of so great bigness as never before was seen in the whole land of Egypt since that nation was founded. And the hail destroyed through all the land of Egypt all things that were in the fields, both man and beast: and the hail smote every herb of the field, and it broke every tree of the country. Only in the land of Goshen, where the children of Israel were, the hail fell not.

[141] which was manifold, This plague sacred Scripture has briefly touched in various places. Psalm 77, verse 47: And he destroyed their vineyards with hail, and their mulberry trees with hoarfrost. And he gave up their cattle to the hail, and their stock to the fire. Again Psalm 104, verse 32: He gave them hail for rain, a burning fire in their land. And he destroyed their vineyards and their fig trees: and he broke in pieces the trees of their coasts. In Wisdom 16, verse 16, it is more fully explained how manifold and marvellous this plague was: For the wicked that denied to know thee were scourged by the strength of thy arm: being persecuted by strange waters, and hail, and rain, and consumed by fire. And which was wonderful, in water, which quencheth all things, the fire had more force: for the world is the defender of the just. For at one time the fire was tamed, that the animals which were sent against the wicked might not be burnt: but that they seeing might know that they suffer persecution by the judgment of God. And at another time it burneth even in water above the power of fire, that it might destroy the fruits of an unjust land. And at verse 22: But snow and ice endured the force of fire, and melted not: that they might know that fire, burning in the hail and flashing in the rain, destroyed the fruits of the enemies. Finally, chapter 19, verse 19: Fire had power in water above its own virtue, and the water forgot its quenching nature. From these things it is easily gathered that the tempest was terrible, since almost all the injuries of the air conspired against the Egyptians: hail, namely, of unwonted size, dreadful thunders, and harmful lightnings running along the earth and consuming whatever they met: joined too, that the tempest might appear the more marvellous, with ice, snow, and rain, so that the Egyptians might clearly recognize that they were smitten by the almighty hand of God.

[142] Pharaoh himself acknowledged this, and was seized with so great terror that the proud man humbled himself before Moses and confessed his fault, yet not so as to be seriously converted. Let us hear Moses relating the outcome of the matter in chapter 9, verse 27: and terrified Pharaoh vehemently: and brought on very many And Pharaoh sent and called Moses and Aaron, saying to them: I have sinned this time also: the Lord is just; I and my people are wicked. Pray ye to the Lord that the thunderings of God and the hail may cease: and I will let you go, and you shall stay here no longer. Moses said: As soon as I am gone out of the city, I will stretch forth my hands to the Lord, and the thunders shall cease, and the hail shall be no more: that thou mayest know that the earth is the Lord's: but I know that neither thou nor thy servants do yet fear the Lord God. The loss of the Egyptians in the fruits of the earth he then subjoins thus: The flax therefore and the barley were hurt, because the barley was green, and the flax was now bolled: but the wheat and other winter corn were not hurt, because they were lateward. Bonfrère on this passage observes, first, that the Hebrew words which St. Jerome rendered because the barley was green could otherwise be rendered because the barley was in the ear; and that they are rendered by the Seventy, the barley had budded, so that the barley then seems, he says, to have had stalk and ear, but that ear still tender and green. Secondly, he says that for the word bolled some put stalk: But, he says, it comes to the same thing: for the boll is the sheath or outermost part of the bursting stalk, which covers the ear of grain or the enfolded seed of the flax. And so the barley and the flax were broken and crushed by the hail: and this loss was added to the harm of the men and beasts who had been killed in the fields; and of the trees, which had been broken partly by the lightning and partly by the hail.

[143] Thirdly he observes that the word far (winter corn) is expressed by others as spelt or emmer. losses; nor yet did it bend Pharaoh. Then he elucidates thus that reason for the wheat and the winter corn being unhurt, because they were lateward: The reason … is rendered why the hail did not harm these, because they burst forth and budded later. It is to be understood therefore either that these had not yet broken out of the earth, or that they were still in the blade, so that the hail and lightnings could not much harm them; for these harm those things which resist; but those which still lie hid in the earth, or easily yield, they cannot much harm… But I have said that these either still lay hid in the earth, or were in the blade, so that the shoot still lay hid in its root; for so the Hebrew sounds, "Because they were still dark and obscure," that is, they did not yet appear, or, as the Zurich translators render it, "they still lay hid." The end of the plague and the obstinacy of Pharaoh Moses relates in the following words: And when Moses was gone from Pharaoh out of the city, he stretched forth his hands to the Lord: and the thunders and hail ceased, neither did there drop any more rain upon the earth. But Pharaoh, seeing that the rain and the hail and the thunders were ceased, increased his sin: and his heart was hardened, and the heart of his servants, and it was made exceeding hard: neither did he let the children of Israel go, as the Lord had commanded by the hand of Moses.

§ XVI. What Josephus, Philo, and Artapanus have written about the second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, and seventh plague.

[ ] The plague of frogs from Josephus, The second plague of the Egyptians Josephus narrated in these words: But God, moved by the ingratitude of the man who, even when freed from danger, would not be wise, inflicts another plague upon Egypt. An immense force of frogs laid waste their land, and the river was crammed with them, so that water could be drawn from it only tainted with their corruption, since very many of them died in it and rotted. The land too was full of foul slime, out of which they were born, and into which again they were dissolved: nay, they defiled the household food as well, being found everywhere among things to eat and to drink: and wandering about too in the bedchambers: so that all things stank, infected with the reek exhaled from the dead frogs. When the Egyptians were harried by these evils, the king bids Moses depart with the Hebrews whither he will: and no sooner had he said this than the frogs vanished, and both the land and the river were restored to their former nature. Scarcely had this evil ceased when Pharaoh, changed anew and forgetful of what had gone before, began to hold back the people: and as though he wished to make trial of the natures of the other afflictions too, he denied the departure which he had before granted, driven rather by fear than from the judgment of his own mind. Thus far Josephus, whom the reader will easily notice to omit some things, from a comparison with the sacred Writings.

[145] and from Philo. Philo too relates the same plague in this manner: But not long after the penalty was remitted, the wicked returned to the same cruelty, as though justice had altogether departed from the earth, or as though, having slipped out of one punishment, they could not fall into another. And so, after the manner of children not yet wise for their age, they learned by their own hurt not to despise; for vengeance, following at their heel, as it had been slow while they were slack, so it forestalled them as they hastened to iniquity. For again the brother of Moses, being bidden, stretched forth his rod toward the ditches and pools and marshes. Scarcely had he stretched out his hand when so great a force of frogs crept forth that it filled not only the market-places and the open spaces, but also the houses and farms, and all the buildings, sacred as well as profane, private as well as public, no otherwise than as if this kind of water-creature had been sent into a colony of a different element, nature changing the vicissitudes of things: for earth is contrary to water. And so, since men could neither go forth out of doors, the streets being filled; nor remain within, since even the innermost chambers were crammed and frogs were creeping up even to the highest ceilings, being reduced to the utmost desperation, they flee again to the same men as before, the king promising that he would permit the Hebrews to depart unharmed and free. God being thus entreated by the prayers of his people, the frogs partly betook themselves back into the river, partly lay heaped up dead in the crossways, being gathered thither even out of the houses on account of the intolerable

stench exhaling from the carcasses of the little creatures, which even alive are troublesome to the senses. Artapanus, in Eusebius, mentions the plague of frogs very briefly.

[146] In the third plague Josephus strays from the sacred Writings: In the third plague Josephus wrongly substitutes lice for gnats: for instead of gnats or midges he substitutes lice, which the Latin translator names pedunculi, expressing the Greek words of Josephus in Latin thus: Again therefore God takes vengeance upon the deceitful man with another disaster, for a great force of lice swarmed out of the bodies of the Egyptians, by which the wicked were wickedly destroyed, they being able to kill them neither by bathings nor by anointings with medicaments. Troubled by this new pest, and terrified not so much by the danger itself as by its foulness and shamefulness, the king, wicked as he was, hardly came to his senses by half. For, having permitted the Hebrews to depart, and the evil presently ceasing, he demanded of them their children and wives as hostages for their return, by which deed he exasperates God still more, thinking that he could circumvent his providence, as though Moses and not rather God were exacting penalties of the Egyptian oppressors of the Hebrews. This opinion of Josephus about lice the Hebrews commonly and those who Hebraize imitate, so interpreting the Hebrew word chinnim. But, says Pererius on chapter 8 of Exodus, disputation 2, that opinion about lice is made improbable by the very narrative of Moses describing this plague: for he says that the gnats were generated out of the dust of the earth when it was struck. But lice are generated out of the human body itself; as Josephus too wrote in the words above, saying that by this plague lice swarmed out of the bodies of the Egyptians, recording the sacred History assuredly unfaithfully, which says that the gnats were generated not out of the bodies of the Egyptians but out of the dust of the earth. The other fault of Josephus in the foregoing words is that he asserts that Pharaoh promised he would grant the Hebrews leave to depart: but of that promise Moses himself was silent.

[147] Philo reasons about that third plague far more rightly and truly than Josephus, but Philo describes the gnats, describing the gnats exactly, as it seems: After they had breathed again a little from this punishment (of frogs), he says, like athletes who have gathered their strength to press the harder, returning to their accustomed malice, they forgot what they had endured. But God, having bidden the waters cease, brought in a punishment of the land, using the same chastiser: who, when he had struck the earth with his rod, so many gnats were poured forth from it that, like an outspread cloud, it covered all Egypt. That creature is most troublesome, though exceedingly minute. For it not only injures the surface of the skin with a noxious itching, but also penetrates the inward parts through the ears and nostrils, and flies into the eyes too, unless one takes care: but how could so many dreadful swarms be guarded against? Perhaps someone will ask why God chose to use such vile creatures for vengeance, rather than bears, leopards, lions, and the other flesh-eating beasts: or, if these did not please him, at least the asps familiar to Egypt, whose bite kills without delay. If he does not know, let him learn that God wished to chastise the inhabitants, not to destroy them. For if he had wished to destroy them altogether, there was no need of the service of animals, but of famine and pestilence sent from heaven. Besides, let him learn this too, which will profit him in all his life. What, then? That men, when they wage wars, take to themselves the mightiest auxiliaries, by which they may supply their own weakness: but that God, almighty and needing the help of none, if ever he wishes to use certain things as it were for instruments in exacting punishments, chooses not the strong, whose strength he cares nothing for, but furnishes the vile and the little with unconquerable powers, and thus chastises the guilty — which has now also happened.*

[148] For what is viler than a gnat? Yet it wrought so much that all Egypt, failing, was compelled to cry out [as does Origen also, so that the insect seems to have been known to the Egyptians.] that this was the finger of God: for the hand (of God) could not be sustained even by the whole earth, great as it is, nay, nor by the whole world. These things were inflicted through the ministry of his brother. Thus Philo, whose authority in describing the gnats is for this reason the greater with me, that as a Hebrew he could understand the Hebrew word, and as an Egyptian could know the little creature itself, which, unless he had known it, he does not seem to have been about to describe so fully. With Philo Origen sufficiently agrees, describing the gnats thus in Homily 5 on Exodus: This animal is indeed suspended by wings, flying through the air, but is so fine and minute that it escapes the sight of the eye, unless it see keenly: yet when it has settled on the body, it bores with a most sharp sting, so that he who cannot see it flying feels it stinging. Their opinion I hold more probable than all the rest; and that the gnats were some insect not unknown to the Egyptians, whether they were a certain kind of the smallest midges, or a species of insect distinct from midges as well.

[149] Josephus in the fourth plague has adopted various wild beasts instead of flies; Of the fourth plague of the Egyptians Josephus wrote briefly rather than exactly thus: He therefore sends in various and manifold kinds of little creatures (in Greek θηρίων, that is, wild beasts), such as no one before that day had ever seen, in so great abundance that the whole region was filled with this evil; by whose thronging both very many men were destroyed and the land could in no way be tilled: and those who escaped an immediate death were nevertheless, being infected with their venom, seized with diseases. Josephus seems to err first when he says that this was a plague of wild beasts: and secondly, when, insisting upon this opinion, he affirms that very many men were destroyed by these beasts. For although certain persons perished by the bites of flies, as is said in Wisdom 16, verse 9, of men killed in this plague there is no other mention in the Scriptures; nor is it likely that the number of the slain was so great as the word very many intimates. But as regards the kinds of wild beasts, Josephus has been followed by some who Hebraize, who interpret the Hebrew word harob as a mixture, and explain it of a mixture of any harmful beasts whatsoever, both venomous and rapacious, such as serpents, dragons, lions, wolves, scorpions, and others like them. But to this explanation not only are the common Bibles contrary, but also the Seventy and other ancients, as I shall prove after the words of Philo about these matters have been given.

[150] but Philo and others understand the dog-fly: Philo records this fourth plague later, not keeping the order of Scripture, because he reckons it among those which God inflicted without employing the service of Aaron or Moses, as Origen also observed to have been done here, Homily 4 on Exodus. But Philo begins to narrate it thus: There remain three kinds inflicted by God himself, without any human ministry, each of which I shall set forth so far as I can; the first by the boldest of all creatures, the dog-fly, on which those skilled in names, being most wise, imposed its true appellation, compounded from two most shameless living creatures, the fly and the dog, the one surpassing all winged things in temerity, the other all four-footed things of the earth. For they run up fearlessly, and if anyone drives them off, they do not yield in stubbornness, until they are sated with flesh and blood. And the dog-fly, sharing the boldness of both, is a biting and treacherous creature. For from afar it flies up with a whirring, like a dart, with great impetus, and, having fixed itself in the skin, clings stubbornly. But then, driven on by the avenging powers, they were far more troublesome, being armed beyond their native thirst for blood, divinely, for vengeance against impious men. So he, following the Seventy interpreters, who likewise interpret the Hebrew word as cynomyia, or dog-fly. So too read Origen, St. Augustine, and other Fathers, who followed the Seventy interpreters and are more ancient than the version of St. Jerome.

[151] But St. Jerome, wherever this word is found, but St. Jerome contends that it must be read the common fly, not the dog-fly. wishes κοινόμυια to be read, not κυνόμυια, that is, the common fly, that is, every kind of fly, not the dog-fly. Take his own words in his Letter to Sunnia and Fretela: Κοινόμυἳα is not, as the Latins have translated it, called MUSCA CANINA through the Greek letter υ; but according to the Hebrew understanding it ought to be written with the diphthong οι, so that it be κοινόμυἳα, that is, every kind of flies. Aquila translated it πάμμικτον, that is, an all-mingled fly. By these things St. Jerome suggests that a fault has crept into the reading of the Seventy interpreters, and that in them κοινόμυια is rather to be read than κυνόμυια: yet this is uncertain, since all have generally read κυνόμυια in the Seventy, and that reading is more usual than κοινόμυια. For this cause interpreters think that the Seventy expressed one species of flies, and that the most troublesome and most shameless, for the whole kind of flies; and thus they reconcile the Seventy interpreters, Philo, and the ancient Fathers with the common Scripture. For the rest, that flies are meant, and not beasts or larger wild animals, becomes likely also from this, that from the other plagues it is agreed that God willed to tame the ferocity of the Egyptians by minute creatures, and not to crush them all by an innumerable multitude of wild beasts. Artapanus, in Eusebius, also reckons venomous flies among the plagues of the Egyptians.

[152] Josephus, about to proceed to another plague, slips in narrating the effect of the fourth, Josephus omits the pestilence of animals, but Philo relates it: when he says that Pharaoh after the fourth plague was indeed willing to let the men and women go, but to keep back the children: which offer of Pharaoh happened later. Of the fifth plague he is wholly silent, but leaps from the fourth to the sixth. But Philo narrates the fifth plague, or the pestilence of the animals, briefly in this manner: After this punishment (of flies) another succeeded, no one then either being the minister of the angry Deity, namely the destruction of the cattle: for herds and flocks of sheep and goats; and besides, beasts of burden of every kind, died in droves in one day as though by agreement, portending the pestilence of men that would follow a little after: just as they say that public pestilences are wont first to rage among the brute animals. What he here says of a future pestilence of men he understands of the sudden death of all the firstborn, as is gathered from his own following words.

[153] The sixth, or the plague of boils, Josephus narrates in this manner: the plague of boils from each, But since the king did not even then come to his senses so as to yield to the divine will, … there were not wanting to God various penalties, heavier even than the former, by which on account of the king's malice he punished the whole nation severely: but, their bodies being ulcerated within beneath the skin, no small number were consumed in a pitiable manner. Philo, observing that Aaron and Moses concurred in the sixth plague, philosophizes about it more exactly in this manner: One (plague) both brothers inflicted by common counsel in this manner. At God's bidding they took ashes from the furnace in their hands, which Moses alone cast into the air. And presently the dust, being raised and scattered far and wide, burned dreadful ulcers over the whole skin of men and beasts, their flesh at once swelling and swarming with foul pustules, as though they were secretly boiling with kindled fire. Oppressed by this torment, as was fitting in ulceration and inflammation, they labored no less in soul than in body, being wretchedly harassed with pains. For there seemed to be one ulcer from the crown to the soles of the feet, those which were scattered limb by limb

coalescing into one by a continuous creeping spread: until again, the Lawgiver making supplication for the afflicted, the disease was lightened. For the rest, this chastisement was committed to both: to the brother on account of the dust, with whom lay the charge of the punishments arising from the earth; to Moses on account of the air changed for the afflicting of the inhabitants, for he was the minister of the calamities born from the air and the sky.

[154] as also of hail, which Philo, after relating the constitution of Egypt, Of the seventh, or plague of hail, Josephus again writes these things meagerly: And when not even so did the king come to his senses, hail such as was never before seen in the Egyptian sky, but then greater than among others in wintertime or in a Northern region, rushing down from above when the spring was already full grown, crushed all their fruits. Philo, to show how new and unwonted this plague of hail must have seemed to the Egyptians, reasons at length about the constitution of Egypt, which is almost wholly without rains, and still more without hail, lightning, thunder, and like injuries of the air; the overflow of the Nile, which begins each year at fixed seasons, making the lands fruitful. The reasons which he brings forward about the rarity of rain in Egypt I do not discuss: but I transfer his whole reasoning hither. Now let us see, he says, what punishments Moses himself exacted, and from what parts of nature. Air and sky, the purest portions of the world, succeeded to the waters and the earth in the chastisement of the Egyptians, of which Moses was chosen administrator. The air first began to be troubled. For Egypt almost alone among the regions situated in the southern tract knows nothing of one of the four seasons of the year, winter; either because (as is reported) it is not far from the torrid zone, by whose hidden breath the neighboring lands grow warm: or because about the summer solstice the flooding river consumes the clouds. For it begins to rise at the beginning of summer, and toward its end ceases: at which time the etesian winds too drive against the mouths of the Nile from the opposite quarter, and the outlet of the waters is hindered, the sea swelling by the violence of the winds and the waves setting themselves as it were for a wall, so that the streams of the river are driven back. Thus it comes about that, the waters meeting one another, both those which come down from above from the source and those which are driven back from the mouths, and being unable to spread out because of the higher and heaped-up banks, at length of necessity it overflows.

[155] There is another cause too why winter is superfluous to Egypt. strives to elucidate further. For what rains do elsewhere, here the standings of the river do, making the fields fruitful for the yearly produce of crops. But nature is not wont so to work in vain as to bestow rains upon a land that does not need them, and at the same time she delights in the variety of her craftsmanship, tempering a harmony out of contrary qualities, and therefore to some she affords the benefits of waters from above out of heaven, to others from below out of springs and rivers. In this state of a region which is verdant in months not its own, which about the winter solstice is bedewed with small and rare rains only in the places by the sea, but above the royal city of Memphis feels none at all, suddenly the air took on a new face, so that the tempests customary to wintry regions rushed on at once — rains, hails, storms and whirlwinds, collisions of clouds, continual lightnings and thunders of prodigious aspect. For the hail, mingled with them, neither melted itself nor quenched the lightnings, but both were borne down with one and the same impetus. Nor did the inclemency of the sky alone grieve the inhabitants, but the novelty of the thing also. For they believed, and not falsely, that all things were being changed by an angry God, by unwonted tempests laying waste the orchards and the crops, and at the same time not a few animals perishing, some consumed by cold, some crushed by the hail falling like stones, some too struck by lightning; of which, if any survived, they carried about their scorched wounds to the terror of those who saw them.

* in Greek, may press

§ XVII. The eighth plague of locusts and the ninth of darkness are narrated from sacred Scripture.

[ ] Moses threatens the plague of locusts, Since Pharaoh went on to kick against the goad, Moses was bidden to threaten him with a new plague, as he relates in chapter 10 in these words: And the Lord said to Moses: Go in to Pharaoh: for I have hardened his heart and the heart of his servants: that I may work these my signs in him, and thou mayest tell in the ears of thy son and of thy grandsons how often I have crushed the Egyptians and wrought my signs among them: that you may know that I am the Lord. Therefore Moses and Aaron went in to Pharaoh, and said to him: Thus saith the Lord God of the Hebrews: How long refusest thou to submit to me? Let my people go to sacrifice to me. But if thou resist, and wilt not let them go: behold I will bring in tomorrow the locust into thy coasts: to cover the face of the earth, that nothing thereof may appear; but that which the hail hath left may be eaten: for it shall gnaw all the trees that bud in the fields. And they shall fill thy houses, and the houses of thy servants and of all the Egyptians: such a number as thy fathers have not seen, nor thy grandfathers, from the time that they were born upon the earth until this present day. And he turned himself away and went forth from Pharaoh. The king seems to have heard this whole threat coldly; but not so his nobles, taught by past evils that the threats of Moses had never been empty.

[157] These therefore persuaded Pharaoh that he should at last satisfy Moses, and while the nobles persuade Pharaoh in vain to obey, and should not suffer all Egypt to perish utterly. Pharaoh, not daring openly to gainsay the counsel of his nobles, yet unwilling to let the Israelites go, used a device, and bade Moses set forth his whole demand distinctly before the nobles, that thus he might seem to have deferred to the counsel of his nobles, and rightly to refuse what was asked, as being too much, and by no means to be granted. This mind of Pharaoh I gather from the account of Moses, who subjoins these things to the foregoing: And Pharaoh's servants said to him: How long shall we endure this scandal? Let the men go to sacrifice to the Lord their God. Dost thou not see that Egypt is undone? And they called back Moses and Aaron to Pharaoh: who said to them: Go, sacrifice to the Lord your God. Who are they that shall go? Moses said: We will go with our little ones and our elders, with our sons and daughters, with our sheep and herds: for it is the solemnity of the Lord our God. And Pharaoh answered: So be the Lord with you, as I shall let you and your little ones go. Who can doubt but that you intend most wickedly? It shall not be so, but go ye men only, and sacrifice to the Lord: for this yourselves also asked. And immediately they were cast out from Pharaoh's presence. Thus Pharaoh eluded not only Moses and Aaron, but his own counsellors also; yet not unpunished.

[158] there follows this ninth plague, the locusts laying all waste, And the Lord said to Moses: Stretch forth thy hand upon the land of Egypt unto the locust, that it come upon it, and devour every herb that is left after the hail. And Moses stretched forth his rod upon the land of Egypt: and the Lord brought a burning wind all that day and night: and when it was morning, the burning wind raised the locusts. And they came up over the whole land of Egypt: and rested in all the coasts of the Egyptians, innumerable, the like as had not been before that time, nor shall be hereafter. And they covered the whole face of the earth, laying all things waste. And the grass of the earth was devoured, and what fruits soever were on the trees, which the hail had left: and there remained not anything that was green on the trees or in the herbs of the earth, in all Egypt. The Psalmist too records the losses of this plague, Psalm 77, verse 46: And he gave up their fruits to the blast, and their labors to the locust. And Psalm 104, verse 34: He spoke, and the locust came, and the bruchus, of which there was no number. And they devoured all the grass in their land: and consumed all the fruit of their ground. The word blast signifies the corruption or spoiling of grain, which is wont to be brought on by rain. But St. Jerome and others have interpreted the Hebrew word, which the Seventy rendered blast, as bruchus; and thus each passage of the Psalmist is in accord, and adds nothing to the account of Moses: for the bruchus is a certain species of locusts.

[159] and harassing men also unto death: the king is humbled; but not converted. The Wise Man, chapter 16, verse 9, seems to say that the locusts, as the flies before, brought death also upon men: For them (he says) the bitings of locusts and of flies killed, and there was found no remedy for their life: because they were worthy to be destroyed by such things. I should believe that the Egyptians were not indeed killed by a single bite of those little creatures, but either were harassed even unto death by their bites multiplied beyond measure, or that from their bites there arose a corruption or some evil in the bodies of the Egyptians, by which they afterwards met their death. Some hold that the Egyptians were killed by famine, because the locusts had consumed everything: but that is not conformable to the words given, since it is said that the bitings killed, not a famine afterwards arising from the bitings. So great a loss as was brought upon all Egypt by this plague moved Pharaoh to seek a remedy for the evil, yet not to acquiesce in the divine command. Let us hear Moses: Wherefore Pharaoh in haste called Moses and Aaron, and said to them: I have sinned against the Lord your God, and against you. But now forgive me my sin this time also, and pray to the Lord your God, that he take away from me this death. And Moses going forth from the presence of Pharaoh, prayed to the Lord. And he made a very strong wind to blow from the West, and it took the locust and cast it into the Red Sea: there remained not so much as one in all the coasts of Egypt. And the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, neither did he let the children of Israel go. The ninth plague of darkness,

[160] There followed the ninth plague, which brought indeed less loss, but more terror. The Lord did not forewarn Pharaoh, and on this head too the terror of Pharaoh and of the Egyptians was increased. This plague Moses narrates briefly in these words: And the Lord said to Moses: Stretch out thy hand toward heaven: and may there be darkness upon the land of Egypt so thick that it may be felt. And Moses stretched forth his hand toward heaven: and there came horrible darkness in all the land of Egypt for three days. No man saw his brother, nor moved himself out of the place where he was: but wheresoever the children of Israel dwelt there was light. However brief this description be, yet it abundantly appears how vehement was the dread of the Egyptians, since for three whole days no one moved himself from his place. But the Wise Man in chapter 17 describes more fully all the evils of this plague, from which I shall unfold them somewhat more at large, lest the text alone should appear too obscure to some. First they were so astounded by the horror of the darkness that they were as though bound with cords and chains. This the Wise Man, having set down before it the justice of the divine judgments, thus relates: For thy judgments, O Lord, are great, and thy words unspeakable: therefore undisciplined souls have erred. For while the wicked are persuaded that they can rule over the holy nation; with the bonds of darkness and of a long night

they were fettered, shut up under roofs, fugitives from the everlasting providence, they lay there. So great a dread restrained them that they did not dare to move themselves from their place. The words fugitives from the everlasting providence signify, lacking that perpetual providence of God by which at fixed seasons light is brought back after night.

[161] Secondly, their fear was increased by a sound striking terror, whose dreadful and by mournful visions, as the Wise Man subjoins: And while they thought to lie hid in their obscure sins, they were scattered under a dark veil of forgetfulness, being horribly afraid and troubled with exceeding great astonishment. For neither did the den that held them keep them from fear: because the noise coming down troubled them, and sad visions appearing to them affrighted them. Thirdly, the darkness could be dispelled by no light: but, to increase their dread, flashes of fire appeared from time to time, which alone were seen, together with certain terrifying spectres, so that the magicians languished for trembling. Take the words: And no force of fire could give them light, neither could the bright flames of the stars enlighten that horrible night. But there appeared to them a sudden fire, very dreadful: and being struck with the fear of that face which was not seen, they thought the things which they saw to be worse: and the delusions of their magic art were laid low, and there was a shameful reproach of the glory of their wisdom. For they who promised to drive away fears and troubles from a sick soul, were sick themselves of a fear worthy to be laughed at.

[162] Fourthly, at any voice of any animals whatever, and at the noise of other things even natural, on account of the consciousness of their crimes effects and on account of their immobility, they were stricken with a huge horror, as the Wise Man sets forth, continuing thus: For though nothing of the monsters troubled them: yet, being moved by the passing of beasts and the hissing of serpents, they died for fear: and denied that they saw the air, which by no means could be avoided. For whereas wickedness is fearful, it beareth witness of its own condemnation: for a troubled conscience always forecasteth grievous things. For fear is nothing else but a yielding up of the succors from thought. And while there is less expectation from within, the greater doth it count the ignorance of that cause which bringeth the torment. But they that during that night, in which nothing could be kept, and which came upon them from the lowest and the deepest hell, slept the same sleep, were sometimes molested with the fear of monsters, sometimes fainted away, their soul failing them: for a sudden and unlooked-for fear had come upon them. Moreover, if any of them had fallen down, he was kept shut up in prison without irons. For if anyone were a husbandman, or a shepherd, or a laborer in the field, and was suddenly overtaken, he endured a necessity that could not be avoided. For they were all bound together with one chain of darkness. Whether it were a whistling wind, or the melodious voice of birds among the thick branches of the trees, or the force of water running down with violence, or the mighty noise of stones tumbled down, or the running that could not be seen of beasts playing together, or the strong voice of bellowing beasts, or a rebounding echo from the highest mountains; these things made them to swoon for fear.

[163] are set forth, These things sufficiently indicate that all things struck fear into the Egyptians, because, seeing nothing, they held the very least things suspect, and because both from the consciousness of their crimes and from the experience of past plagues they suspected that all things savage and sad hung over them. But some of the words given, as being more obscure, must be somewhat elucidated. First, those words, Though nothing of the monsters troubled them, seem to have the same sense as if it were read had troubled them: as though he should say, Even if they had not seen those terrifying spectres, the mere passing of animals and the hissing of serpents brought a deadly fear upon them. Secondly, those words, For fear is nothing else but a yielding up of the succors from thought, I interpret thus: Fear does nothing but cast away all thought, or all hope, of succors to be obtained: for yielding up here is a casting away. Thirdly, the following verse, And while there is less expectation from within, the greater doth it count the ignorance of that cause which bringeth the torment, seems to be expounded thus: The less the expectation, or hope of help, is in the mind, the greater does it believe to be the unknown cause which torments it with its own fear: for the words ignorance of that cause signify the same as a cause unknown, or not rightly known. Fourthly, the following verse is again obscure, in which the night is called impotent, because it made the Egyptians impotent, and is said to have come upon them from the lowest and the deepest (that is, the most profound) hell, because the darkness was like the darkness of hell; then the word sleeping is put for they slept, or were sleeping: finally, the failing of the soul is the same as a swoon of the soul. These things being laid down, I expound the whole verse thus: Those who during that three days' darkness, which, being like to infernal darkness, made all men as it were impotent, remained in the same manner fixed to their place like men sleeping, were sometimes driven on by the fear of monsters, sometimes for the vehemence of their dread suffered a swooning of the soul. The rest is clear enough.

[164] the Hebrews suffering nothing: Pharaoh persists in his obstinacy, Fifthly, the Hebrews enjoyed light, and among them all things were carried on after the wonted manner: for the Wise Man continues thus: For the whole world was enlightened with a clear light, and none were hindered in their labors. But over them only was spread a heavy night, an image of that darkness which was to come upon them. But they were to themselves more grievous than the darkness. But thy saints had a very great light, and they heard their voice indeed, but did not see their shape. And because they also did not suffer the same things, they glorified thee: and they that before had been wronged (by the Egyptians), because they were not hurt, gave thanks: and that there might be a difference, they asked a gift, namely that it might be continued. Thus far of this terrible plague, which doubtless cast no small fear into Pharaoh: yet it did not so move him that he assented to all the demands. Hear Moses relating the outcome of the matter at verse 24: And Pharaoh called Moses and Aaron, and said to them: Go, sacrifice to the Lord: let your sheep only and herds remain, let your little ones go with you. Moses said: Thou shalt give us also victims and holocausts, to offer to the Lord our God: namely by permitting us to lead all our animals with us, as he subjoins: All the flocks shall go with us: there shall not a hoof remain of them: for they are necessary for the worship of the Lord our God: especially as we know not what must be offered, till we come to the very place. And the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, and he would not let them go. And Pharaoh said to Moses: Get thee from me, and beware thou see not my face any more: in what day soever thou shalt come in my sight, thou shalt die. Moses answered: So shall it be as thou hast spoken, I will not see thy face any more: namely, unless thou of thy own accord shalt call me, as was done.

[165] Two things may here be asked: first, in what manner Pharaoh called Moses and Aaron, [and did not call Moses while the darkness lasted, but after it was taken away at the end of three days.] if no one moved himself from his place during the whole three days of darkness. Interpreters have gone off into various opinions; but only one answer appears to me solid, plain, and easy, namely that Moses and his brother were not called by Pharaoh while the darkness lasted, but after light had been restored to Egypt. The darkness arose without the king being forewarned, and it withdrew after three days, without Pharaoh either asking, or entreating, or promising anything, and this is sufficiently gathered from Moses himself. For he says that the darkness lasted three days, and that no one of the Egyptians moved from his place. And having related the gravity and length of the evil, he at last briefly narrates the effect which it had left in Pharaoh's mind; not saying that Pharaoh asked to be freed from the darkness: which is a sign that he had already then been freed from it, and only summoned Moses lest he should again suffer anything of the sort. Secondly, how did Moses foretell the tenth plague to Pharaoh, as it is agreed from chapter XI that he did, since he was not called by Pharaoh before that plague, and here says that he would not come of his own accord? I answer that Moses, before he departed from Pharaoh, being warned by a divine revelation, foretold to him the tenth plague, or the death of the firstborn, as I shall say below when I treat of it. Now, passing over certain questions of less moment, I return to Josephus and Philo.

§ XVIII. The eighth and ninth plague from Josephus and Philo, whose lapses are corrected.

[ ] Josephus errs in the plague of locusts, Josephus hands down the plague of locusts briefly, and is to be corrected in this, that he subjoins to the eighth, in a disturbed order, the offer of Pharaoh which followed after the ninth plague. Take his own words: And if the hail left anything untouched, clouds of locusts coming upon them so consumed it that the hope of gathering fruits was altogether taken away from all the Egyptians. But if the king had been only foolish, and not also wicked, he could, admonished even by the disasters already spoken of, have come to his senses, so as at last to begin to think of some remedy for so many evils. But Pharaoh, although he was not so mad as not to understand the cause, yet so great a malice had beset his breast that he could in no way be brought to cease from resisting God as it were in a contest, and from sinning knowingly and willingly against the public good. And so at last he grants the Hebrews their children too along with their women, but on this condition, that they should leave their goods to the Egyptians as it were for a spoil, because they complained that nothing of their own goods was left after so many calamities. This reason for keeping back the goods of the Hebrews is not found in Scripture. The true reason was that, by keeping back the goods of the Hebrews, Pharaoh might be the more secure of their return.

[167] and Philo too disturbs the order. Philo also disturbs the order in relating this plague: for the conditions offered by Pharaoh to Moses, which came between the threatening of the plague and the plague itself, he wrongly places after the plague, which he rightly describes in this manner: But after the end of this disaster (of hail, and the threatening of another), the king with his people having returned to their contumacy, Moses at God's bidding stretched forth his rod into the air. And presently the south wind fell upon them most violently, growing stronger through the whole day and night, an evil in itself very harmful. For it is dry, bringing on headache and heaviness, and the weariness of languor, especially in Egypt, a region lying open to the South and exposed to the suns, so that, as soon as that wind is stirred, it burns up all things with heat. But then it brought in also armies of locusts for the destruction of the plants, which, flowing in unceasingly, consumed whatever had survived the tempests, so that in that most ample region nothing green was left. Reduced to these utmost calamities, they scarcely came to their senses, crying out to the king: How long dost thou not permit these men their departure? Dost thou not yet perceive that Egypt is undone? He, as it then seemed, assented: and, the disaster being relaxed at the entreaty of Moses, a wind arising from the sea drove the locusts away.

[168] In the darkness of the Egyptians Josephus slips in various ways, Josephus, about to relate the plague of darkness, at once stumbles, when he asserts that the darkness arose while Moses was disputing with Pharaoh; unless he means only to say that the controversy between Moses and Pharaoh was not yet ended when the darkness began. He has also mingled other things presently to be corrected into his narrative, conceived in these words: But when Moses denied that what was demanded was fair, since otherwise they would have nothing whereof to sacrifice, and when this controversy lasted a good while, so thick a darkness and destitute of all light was poured about the Egyptians that their sight

being wholly taken from them, some were consumed by one mishap, some by another, that fear too hanging over them, lest perchance they should be utterly swallowed up by that gloom. Then, when these had been dispersed after three days and as many nights, since Pharaoh was not yet bent to permit a free departure, Moses assails him with these words: How long wilt thou fight against the will of God, who altogether wills and commands that the Hebrews be let go, nor is there any other remedy but this against the evils by which you are afflicted? But the king, taking ill this freedom of speech, threatened that he should be punished with death, if hereafter he went on to be troublesome about this matter. Moses answered that he would speak no more upon this cause, but that the king himself with the Egyptian nobles would of their own accord entreat the Hebrews to set out thence as soon as possible; and having said this, he departed. Josephus errs in these things: first, in that he attributes to Moses other words than the sacred Writings relate to have been spoken by him at that time before Pharaoh. Secondly, although Pharaoh afterwards of his own accord called Moses and Aaron, yet Moses is not read to have foretold that he would do this, as Josephus too freely affirms. Thirdly, he errs when he says and having said this, he departed: for Moses first foretold to Pharaoh the death of the firstborn: which prediction he has omitted.

[169] Philo, in relating the darkness of the Egyptians, also needs some discussion, nor does Philo narrate them exactly, presently to be subjoined: for he reasons thus: But when they had gone through this evil also, because the king remained hard as before, a calamity came upon them greater than any hitherto. For on a clear day darkness was suddenly poured about them, either on account of an eclipse of the sun greater than usual, or by continuous and thick clouds overspreading the sky, and by their excessive crowding shutting out the rays, so that the day differed nothing from the gloom of night: which, being continued for three days, seemed one perpetual and very long night. Then they say that either they did not dare to rise from their beds; or, if the necessities of nature pressed them, that after the manner of blind men, groping the walls and whatever was at hand, they could hardly go forward. For the fire which we use daily was either quenched by the disturbed air, or overcome by the thickest darkness, so that, with their eyes safe, they wanted, as though blinded, the most necessary sense of seeing: which being taken away, there was no use of the rest. For it was permitted neither to speak, nor to hear, nor to enjoy food, but in silence they were tormented with hunger, giving themselves to no sense, the present evil weighing them down, until Moses, moved with compassion, entreated God. Then at last light succeeded to the darkness, and to the night a most serene day. They report that men smitten with these plagues by Moses — with hail mixed with lightnings, and with locusts, and with darkness admitting no light.

[170] Upon this exposition of Philo's I observe, first, [who recounts two causes from which the darkness could have arisen, but we disapprove both:] that a twofold cause is brought forward by him from which the Egyptian darkness could have arisen, but that neither is affirmed for certain. The first, drawn from an eclipse of the sun, is plainly to be rejected; for a natural and total eclipse cannot last even a whole hour, much less three days. Besides, an eclipse of the sun cannot bring on so thick a darkness: for when the sun is darkened by the interposition of the moon, the other stars afford some light. Finally, if a failing of the sun had taken away the light from the Egyptians, it would in like manner have been taken from the Hebrews. The other cause of the darkness, drawn from the density and excessive crowding of clouds, has pleased others also, both because the darkness is called palpable, and because neither the stars nor any other light whatsoever could illuminate that darkness, as sacred Scripture witnesses. But neither does this cause please me, because, since the Hebrews dwelt among the Egyptians, if the crowding of clouds alone had been the cause of the darkness, it would have been common to both. I would rather say that that darkness was plainly prodigious, and that its cause is unknown, save that God produced it for the punishment of the Egyptians, and that God could do this in various ways, some of which we might indicate, but none determine for certain, since nothing has been said of it in Scripture.

[171] Secondly, Philo asserts that at the time of this darkness almost nothing could be done by the Egyptians; his other errors are corrected, and yet he wished to attribute some action to them; not consistently enough, so far as appears to me. For if they could not speak, as he asserts; nor enjoy food, as is likely from the sacred Writings; why they should have been the more able to go forward to satisfy the necessities of nature I truly do not see. Nay rather, sacred Scripture denies that movement from place to place more openly than the foregoing: for Moses clearly says: No man .. moved himself out of the place — namely because, as the Wise Man says, they were all bound together with one chain of darkness. Thirdly, they had not lost the use of the other senses, as Philo seems to assert: nay, they were not even wholly destitute of the use of their eyes, since they saw spectres and other things striking fear. But by the darkness suddenly arisen, and by the other things related by the Wise Man, they were seized and snatched away with so great fear that this could greatly hinder the use of the senses. Fourthly, what he says, that the darkness ceased at the prayer of Moses, Scripture does not have.

§ XIX. The tenth plague foretold: the furniture of the Egyptians asked for: the Pasch first celebrated at the Lord's bidding: the tenth plague inflicted upon the Egyptians, that is, all the firstborn slain.

[ ] Moses, bidden under pain of death not to return to Pharaoh, before he departs, When after the plague of darkness Pharaoh, unwilling to let go the cattle of the Hebrews, had forbidden Moses and Aaron under threat of death to return to him any more, Moses, before he departed with his brother, was bidden by a divine revelation to foretell to Pharaoh the last plague, which he also did: for in no other way can two things written by Moses be reconciled — that he would not return to Pharaoh unless called; and that he foretold the last disaster to Pharaoh. The revelation of God commanding it and the prediction of Moses is related in chapter XI in this manner: And the Lord said to Moses: Yet one plague more will I bring upon Pharaoh and Egypt, and after that he shall let you go, and thrust you out. What this plague was the Lord likewise disclosed to Moses: for he, by the authority which he had obtained with all, presently foretold it, not fearing the threats of the king, as he narrates in these words: And Moses was a very great man in the land of Egypt. And he said: Thus saith the Lord: At midnight I will go into Egypt: and every firstborn in the land of the Egyptians shall die, from the firstborn of Pharaoh who sitteth on his throne, even to the firstborn of the handmaid that is at the mill: and all the firstborn of beasts. And there shall be a great cry in all the land of Egypt, such as neither hath been before, nor shall be hereafter. But with all the children of Israel there shall not a dog make the least noise, from man even to beast: that you may know how wonderful a difference the Lord maketh between the Egyptians and Israel. This is the prediction of the punishment, in which some things must briefly be elucidated.

[173] foretells the last plague, First, the handmaid that is at the mill, that is, who turns the hand-mill in the mill-house, is taken for the meanest person, and is set over against Pharaoh as the most excellent; as though it were said, From the firstborn of the highest to the firstborn of the lowest. Secondly, there shall not a dog make the least noise is a proverb, by which it is signified that all things would be quiet among the Hebrews. Further, the plague being foretold, Moses also foretells what effect it would have, which hitherto he had not done: for he continues thus: And all these thy servants shall come down to me, and shall worship me, saying: Go forth thou, and all the people that is under thee. After that we will go out. And he went out from Pharaoh exceeding angry. These sayings of Moses doubtless cast a huge terror into Pharaoh. But not even so could his pride and obstinacy be bent. And the Lord said to Moses: Pharaoh will not hear you, that many signs may be done in the land of Egypt. And Moses and Aaron did all the wonders that are written before Pharaoh. And the Lord hardened Pharaoh's heart, neither did he let the children of Israel go out of his land.

[174] But that last plague, of which Moses had not signified the day, [to be deferred for some days. The Hebrews ask for the precious furniture of the Egyptians:] was not inflicted at once on the following night, because the children of Israel had various things to do before they went out of Egypt. First the Lord bade them ask for the precious furniture of the Egyptians, as Moses narrates in chapter XI, verse 2, in this manner: Therefore thou shalt tell all the people (the Lord says to Moses) that every man ask of his friend, and every woman of her neighbor, vessels of silver and of gold. And the Lord will give favor to his people in the sight of the Egyptians. Moses set forth the Lord's commands to the people, and they gladly obeyed, as is related in chapter 12, verse 35, in these words: And the children of Israel did as Moses had commanded: and they asked of the Egyptians vessels of silver and gold, and very much raiment. And the Lord gave favor to the people in the sight of the Egyptians, so that they lent to them: and they stripped the Egyptians. For this cause it is said in Psalm 104, verse 37: And he brought them forth with silver and gold: and there was not among their tribes one that was feeble. This too may be noted as a singular and signal benefit of God, that all the Israelites were in good health when they had to go out of Egypt, although their multitude was huge.

[175] Further, the Manichaeans disapproved this stripping of the Egyptians, Augustine defends this stripping of the Egyptians against the Manichaeans, carping at Moses as unjust. Hence St. Augustine in book 22 against Faustus the Manichaean answers him thus: What then does Faustus now object about the Egyptians being stripped, not knowing what he says? In doing which Moses so far from sinning would have sinned by not doing it. For God had commanded, who surely knows, not only according to the deeds but also according to the heart of man, what each one ought to suffer, or by whom. That people, therefore, was as yet carnal, and taken up with the desire of earthly things: but the Egyptians were sacrilegious and unjust: for both, using that gold ill — that is, a creature of God — to the injury of the Creator, they served their idols, and they had unjustly and grievously afflicted strangers with unpaid labor. Worthy therefore were both these, that such things should be commanded them; and those, that they should suffer such things: and perhaps, according to their own wills and thoughts, the Hebrews were rather permitted to do these things than commanded: but God willed his permission to be made known to them through his servant Moses, when he commanded him to say it. But it may be that there are other most hidden causes why this was divinely said to that people: but to divine commands we must yield by obeying, not resist by disputing. The Apostle said: For who hath known the mind of the Lord, or who hath been his counsellor? Whether therefore this be the cause which I have said; or whether any other lie hid in the secret and hidden disposition of God, why he said this through Moses to that people, that they should ask of the Egyptians things to be lent them which they would carry off: this nevertheless I affirm, that it was said neither in vain nor unjustly,

nor was it lawful for Moses to do otherwise than God had said, so that with the Lord lay the counsel of commanding, but with the Servant the obedience of performing.

[176] More briefly the same holy Doctor writes thus of the same deed, in question 39 on Exodus: No one ought to think that an example is hence to be taken for stripping his neighbor in that manner. For God commanded this, this was a wage due for the labors undertaken for the Egyptians: who knew what each one ought to suffer: nor did the Israelites commit theft, but afforded a ministry to God commanding: just as when the officer of a judge kills him whom the judge has commanded to be killed: assuredly if he does it of his own accord, he is a homicide, even though he kill him whom he knows ought to have been killed by the judge. I add the words of the Wise Man, who in chapter 10, briefly touching upon the oppression of the Hebrews in Egypt and the signs and prodigies wrought there, seems to subjoin the reason why God commanded the goods of the Egyptians to be asked for and carried off, writing thus at verse 15 and the following: She (the divine Wisdom) delivered the just people, and blameless seed, from the nations that oppressed them. She entered into the soul of the Servant of God, and stood against dreadful kings in wonders and signs. And she rendered to the just the wages of their labors — of those labors, namely, in which they had been compelled to serve the Egyptians for nothing. And he gave that wage by commanding the stripping of the Egyptians: for that the Wise Man is treating of this is clear from the order in which he touches upon the several deeds, presently subjoining, of the going out of the Hebrews, And she conducted them in a wonderful way.* Let these things suffice concerning the justice and equity of this deed.

[177] [that stripping took place chiefly in the land of Goshen; yet in all likelihood in other places also.] St. Augustine also handles another question here, in question 39 on Exodus, writing these things: There is also this no small question. If the Hebrews dwelt apart in the land of Goshen, where the plagues did not take place by which the kingdom of Pharaoh was afflicted, how did each one ask of his neighbor, man or woman (in the Scriptures, neighbor, as he presently observes), gold, silver, and raiment?… Whence it is to be understood that not the Hebrews alone dwelt in the land of Goshen, but that some Egyptians were dwellers together with them in that land, to whom, by the merit of the Hebrews, those divine benefits also (of immunity from the plagues) could reach; so that hence those same Egyptian fellow-dwellers might both love them, and readily lend what they asked: nor yet did God judge them so free from the injuries and crushings which the people of God endured, that they should not be smitten with this loss also, who had not been struck by those plagues, because that land was spared. The whole conjecture of St. Augustine comes to this. It seems that the Egyptians dwelling with the Hebrews in the land of Goshen were the only ones exempt from the plagues of the Egyptians. And on the contrary, that they alone lost their precious furniture. But most interpreters do not admit that the Egyptians in the land of Goshen were exempt from the plagues; and since not a few Hebrews dwelt throughout the rest of Egypt, as being appointed there to various works, they too could ask precious vessels from other Egyptians whose neighbors they were, so that it appears more probable that that stripping was done also outside the land of Goshen, although it is likely that it chiefly had place in the land of Goshen.

[178] Moses is bidden to institute the Paschal solemnity, Besides, before the Lord smote the firstborn of the Egyptians, the Paschal lamb had to be sacrificed and eaten by the children of Israel — a festival which the Lord instituted in Egypt through Moses, and bade to be celebrated for the first time, so that thereafter the Paschal solemnity should be observed each year with the same rite for ever. Of the institution and celebration of this I shall treat briefly, as also of the other rites, ceremonies, and laws instituted by Moses and given to the Hebrew people, without an exact exposition of those rites or laws, lest this Commentary grow to an immense size, especially since the deeds of Moses can be conveniently explained without an exposition of the rites and laws instituted. Moses in chapter 12 sets forth the institution of the eating of the Paschal lamb and of the whole festival to be continued for seven days, and thus begins: The Lord also said to Moses and Aaron in the land of Egypt: This month (Nisan, answering for the greater part to our March) shall be to you the beginning of months: it shall be the first in the months of the year (at least as regards ecclesiastical matters). Speak ye to the whole assembly of the children of Israel, and say to them: On the tenth day of this month let every man take (every head of a household, unless he have so small a household that he ought rather to be joined to another) a lamb by their families and houses. But if the number (of the family) be less than may suffice to eat the lamb, he shall take unto him his neighbor that joineth to his house (or shall go to him), according to the number of souls which may be enough to eat the lamb.

[179] The lamb was not to be sacrificed on that same tenth day of the month Nisan, and to see that a lamb was sacrificed by each family; but to be kept four days and only then sacrificed, as follows at verse 6: And you shall keep it until the fourteenth day of this month: and the whole multitude of the children of Israel shall sacrifice it (each family its own, namely) in the evening. And they shall take of the blood thereof, and put it upon both the side posts, and on the upper door posts of the houses wherein they shall eat it… And I will pass through the land of Egypt that night, and will kill every firstborn in the land of Egypt, both man and beast: and against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments, I the Lord. And the blood shall be unto you for a sign in the houses where you shall be: and I shall see the blood, and shall pass over you: and the plague shall not be upon you to destroy you, when I shall strike the land of Egypt. And this day shall be for a memorial to you: and you shall keep it a feast to the Lord in your generations with an everlasting observance. What sort the lamb to be sacrificed ought to be, or, instead of a lamb, a kid; with what ceremonies either ought to be eaten; how religiously the seven days of unleavened bread were to be kept, and with how great solemnity the first and the seventh day to be celebrated, see set forth in the same place, or more at large in the interpreters.

[180] And Moses called, as follows at verse 21, [as, at the bidding of Moses, the Hebrews did, and for this cause were not to lose their firstborn.] all the ancients of the children of Israel, and said to them: Go take a beast (a lamb or a kid) by your families, and sacrifice the Phase. And dip a bunch of hyssop in the blood that is at the door, and sprinkle the transom of the door therewith, and both the door cheeks: let none of you go out of the door of his house till morning. For the Lord will pass through striking the Egyptians: and when he shall see the blood on the transom, and on both the posts, he will pass over the door of the house, and will not suffer the destroyer to come into your houses and to hurt you. Thou shalt keep this thing as a law for thee and thy children for ever. And when you have entered into the land which the Lord will give you, as he hath promised, you shall observe these ceremonies. And when your children shall say to you: What is the meaning of this service? you shall say to them: It is the victim of the passage of the Lord, when he passed over the houses of the children of Israel in Egypt, striking the Egyptians, and saving our houses. And the people bowing themselves adored; receiving with the utmost reverence the commands of the Lord and of Moses, whose authority God had abundantly established by the preceding prodigies. They also exactly fulfilled them, as follows: And the children of Israel going forth did as the Lord had commanded Moses and Aaron. Of the Pasch celebrated by Moses the Apostle speaks thus in Hebrews XI, verse 28: By faith he celebrated the Pasch and the shedding of the blood: that he who destroyed the firstborn might not touch them. In the assembly already related Moses could also have set forth the Lord's command about asking for the furniture of the Egyptians: and enjoined that they should prepare all other things for the journey, and gather at the city of Rameses, as soon as they should be warned that from there they should all set out together on the fifteenth day of the month.

[181] The tenth plague, in which all the firstborn of the Egyptians were destroyed: When the Paschal lamb had been eaten by the Hebrews, the Lord smote the Egyptians with the tenth plague, which Moses relates thus: And it came to pass at midnight (between the fourteenth and the fifteenth day of the month Nisan) the Lord slew every firstborn in the land of Egypt, from the firstborn of Pharaoh, who sat on his throne, unto the firstborn of the captive woman that was in the prison, and all the firstborn of cattle. And Pharaoh arose in the night, and all his servants, and all Egypt: and there arose a great cry in Egypt: for there was not a house wherein there lay not one dead. This plague the Psalmist records in Psalm 77, verse 51, in these words: And he slew all the firstborn in the land of Egypt, the firstfruits of all their labor in the tabernacles of Cham. And Psalm 104, verse 36: And he killed every firstborn in their land, the firstfruits of all their labor. By the firstfruits of all their labor he again understands the firstborn themselves, because they were first begotten by their fathers and borne by their mothers: by the tabernacles of Cham are designated the cities of the Egyptians, who drew their origin from Cham. In Psalm 135, verse 10, it is again said: Who smote Egypt with their firstborn.

[182] this was their just punishment, and was foreknown to the Hebrews; But the Wise Man has explained more about this calamity of the Egyptians in chapter 18. For first he observes at verse 5 that this was a most just punishment of the Egyptians, who had wished to kill the infants of the Hebrews when Moses was saved. For when they (the Egyptians) thought to kill the infants of the just: and one child being exposed (Moses) and delivered, to reproach them, thou tookest away a multitude of their children. Then he goes on to set forth thus that the disaster of the Egyptians was foreknown to the Hebrews, and their own safety and eating of the Paschal lamb, indicated by the word sacrificed: For that night was known before by our fathers, that assuredly knowing what oaths they had trusted to, they might be of better courage. So thy people received the salvation indeed of the just, but the destruction of the unjust. For as thou didst punish the adversaries: so thou didst also encourage and glorify us. For the just children of good men were offering sacrifice secretly, and they unanimously ordered a law of justice: that the just should receive both good and evil alike, singing now the praises of the fathers. These things the Hebrews were doing on that night, being forewarned of all by Moses, and gathered by families from the preceding evening for the eating of the Paschal lamb.

[183] how widely spreading But there sounded an ill-according cry of the enemies, and a lamentable mourning was heard for the children that were bewailed. And the servant suffered the same punishment as the Master, and a common man suffered in like manner as the king. So all alike had innumerable dead, with one kind of death. Neither were the living sufficient to bury them: for in one moment the noblest offspring of them was destroyed. For whereas they (in the preceding plagues) would not believe anything by reason of the enchantments (or the prodigious works of the magicians): then first when there was the destruction of the firstborn, they acknowledged (that is, confessed, as it stands in the Greek) the people to be of God. For while all things were in quiet silence, and the night was in the midst of her course, thy almighty Word leapt down from heaven from thy royal throne, a fierce

conqueror, into the midst of the land of destruction: a sharp sword carrying thy unfeigned commandment, and standing filled all things with death, and standing on the earth reached even to heaven.*

[184] Then at once visions of evil dreams troubled them, and how terrible this disaster was, and fears came upon them unlooked for. And one thrown here, another there, half dead, showed the cause of his death. For the visions that troubled them foreshowed these things, lest they should perish and not know why they suffered these evils. From these latter words it is gathered that the surviving Egyptians learned from the cries of the dying the cause of this pitiable slaughter, although otherwise they could have known the cause well enough from the prediction of Moses, if it had become known to all. But it is credible that Pharaoh and his nobles always took care that the predictions and threats of Moses should not become known to many, or be spread abroad through Egypt. Of this slaying of the firstborn various questions are handled; but since these do not properly concern Moses himself, for brevity's sake I pass them all by.

[185] At last Pharaoh, smitten by this plague, gave way, and did not dare any longer to hinder the journey of the Hebrews. conquered by which, Pharaoh bids the Hebrews depart. Nay rather, both he himself and the other Egyptians most vehemently pressed that they should set out without delay. Let us hear Moses himself relating these things in chapter 12, verse 31: And Pharaoh calling Moses and Aaron in the night, said: Arise and go forth from among my people, you and the children of Israel: go, sacrifice to the Lord, as you say. Your sheep and herds take along with you, as you demanded, and departing bless me. And the Egyptians pressed the people to go forth out of the land speedily, saying: We shall all die. How vehemently the Egyptians urged their departure will be told more fully when we narrate the going out of the Israelites. Further, since the Lord by the death of the firstborn of Egypt had brought it about that the Hebrews went out freely; and since at the same time he had spared their firstborn, in memory of so great a benefit he willed that every firstborn of the Hebrews should be sacred to him, as is related at length in chapter 13, whose first words I subjoin: And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Sanctify unto me every firstborn that openeth the womb among the children of Israel, as well of men as of beasts: for they are all mine. Moses made this law, explaining it more at large, as may be seen in the same place.

* of Moses

* that is, unfeigned

§ XX. The account of the foregoing from Josephus, Philo, and Artapanus examined.

[ ] Josephus, the eating of the lamb, Josephus relates the preparation of the Hebrews for the journey, the eating of the Paschal lamb, the death of the firstborn of the Egyptians, and the leave to depart granted to the Hebrews, in this manner: But God, having determined to compel the Egyptians, smitten by yet one plague, to let the Hebrews go, bade Moses proclaim to the people that they should have their sacrifice ready, prepared on the thirteenth of the month Xanthicus for the fourteenth, which among the Egyptians is called Pharmuthi, the same being Nisan to the Hebrews and Xanthicus to the Macedonians: and that he himself should lead the Hebrews forth, carrying all their goods with them. But he, having first equipped them for the departure and distributed them into companies, kept them in one place. And when the fourteenth dawned, all, being encouraged for the departure, sacrificed and purified their houses with the blood, sprinkled with hyssop (in Greek ὑσσώπου κώμας ἀναλαβόντες, that is, having taken bunches of hyssop, forsooth for a sprinkler) and, the supper being ended, they burned up the remnants of the flesh, as men about to depart; whence even now the same sacrifice remains solemn among us, who call the festival Pasch, which signifies a passage, because on that day God, passing over the Hebrews unharmed, struck the Egyptians with disease.

[187] For that pestilence in the night consumed the firstborn of the Egyptians, and relates other things not without errors: so that they ran together in throngs to the palace from the nearest parts, crying out that the Hebrews must be detained no longer. Then the king, having summoned Moses, commands that they depart, judging that after their departure the region, the calamities ceasing, would be relieved: they honored the Hebrews with gifts also, some that they might depart the more quickly, others on account of the familiarity of neighborhood. In these latter words the writer, more a politician than a religious man, dissembles that the furniture of the Egyptians was asked for by the Hebrews as necessary for the use of the sacrifice, and to be afterwards returned; and he substitutes gifts of the Egyptians, doubtless fearing lest the heathen should take offense and accuse the Hebrews of injustice, if he had narrated the matter candidly. Of dissemblings of this sort Josephus is full, who often consulted the honor of his nation more than the truth, and not seldom narrated deeds in the manner in which they would appear more likely, although they were less true. The time of the lamb's preparation and eating too he does not rightly express.

[188] Philo, the death of the firstborn Philo does not record in this place the eating of the Paschal lamb, but reasons at length about the plague of the firstborn and the other things done before the going out. At last, he says, there came the last, the tenth punishment, more dreadful than all the preceding, the Egyptians themselves dying, yet not all: for God did not wish to render the region a desert, which he willed only to be chastised. And so, sparing the greatest crowd of every age of men and women, he condemned to death the firstborn only, beginning from the king's eldest son and ending with the son of the meanest handmaid at the mill. For about midnight, as many as first brought to their parents the most delightful appellation of father and mother, and were in turn first named sons by them, being sound and strong, with no preceding sickness, suddenly perished to a man, so that no family was then found without domestic mourning. But at first light, when each saw his dearest ones taken off by an unlooked-for death, with whom the day before he had lived pleasantly until evening, as in a most grievous public mourning they filled all places with lamentation: for since no one was exempt from that calamity, there was one cry of all, one grief holding the whole region as far as it stretched: which, so long as it kept itself within private walls, each being ignorant of the ills of others, seemed to be private still. But when some learned from others, the lamentation was doubled, the public grief accruing and weighing upon them, so that there was not even a consoler; for who should console another, needing consolation himself?

[189] and the effect of that plague, and the stripping of the Egyptians, he narrates: For the rest, as is wont to happen in such a case, thinking these to be the beginnings of greater evils, and anxious about the destruction of the survivors, they flocked weeping to the palace, and, having rent their garments, laid the cause of the calamity to the king's charge, saying that they would have suffered no evil, if Moses had obtained what he had asked: now they had the rewards of an obstinate stubbornness and an untimely contention. Then each for himself eagerly urged the people that they should depart speedily out of the whole region, judging even a single day or hour of delay long, and dangerous besides. Being in this manner driven out and thrust forth, mindful of their former free birth, they dared a deed by which they might repay the injuries they had received: for having got much booty, they laid the packs partly on their own shoulders, partly on their beasts, not out of greed (as detractors would say) or out of desire of others' fortunes (for what could there be?), but first, that they might receive the necessary wage of long labor: then, that for the injuries received in the time in which they had served, they might, if not according to desert, yet lay down something of loss. For the loss of liberty and of money is not equal, since no sane man would not rather run the risk of his life than of his liberty: and so they can rightly defend either deed, whether as in peace they received the wage of which they had so long been defrauded: or as victors in war they stripped the vanquished of their goods, for from them the injury had arisen, who had reduced their guests and suppliants (as I said before) into slavery like captives. At last, when an occasion of better times offered itself, an unarmed people avenged the violence done to it, Justice herself protecting them. Thus far Philo, who excuses the spoils of the Hebrews by such reasons that the first seems probable enough and conformable to Scripture, but not equally the second, which savors more of vengeance. Yet he would have shown the justice of the Hebrews more briefly and more solidly, if with sacred Scripture he had declared that all was done at the bidding of God, with whom is the dominion of all things. He ought likewise to have added in what manner they obtained those spoils.

[190] Then the same author briefly recounts the Egyptian plagues, [then he rightly distinguishes the lots of the Egyptians and of the Hebrews in these plagues.] and elegantly distinguishes the lot of the Hebrews from the calamities of the Egyptians, writing thus: By so many plagues was Egypt chastised, of which nevertheless none touched the Hebrews, although they dwelt together in the same towns, villages, and houses, earth, water, air, and fire, the chief parts of nature, conspiring so that it was impossible to escape; which was most wonderful of all, that by the same things, in one and the same place and time, some were saved and others destroyed. The river was turned into blood, but not for the Hebrews: for when they drew from it, it became drinkable. Frogs creeping up from the waters onto the land had filled the market-places, farms, and houses; the Hebrews alone they avoided, as though they knew how to discern who were to be punished and who by no means. Neither gnats, nor dog-flies, nor locusts, which had brought devastation upon trees, crops, animals, and men, flew to these: not the continued force of rains, hails, and lightnings reached so far as these: the most troublesome ulceration they did not feel even in their dreams: when the thickest darkness was poured about others, they lived in the light of day and pure. When the firstborn of the Egyptians perished, no Hebrew died; and deservedly, since not even any contagions of the pestilence of the cattle came to their flocks. Nor could they at that time seem anything else than spectators of the calamities of others, from which they might take the most useful teaching of piety: for never has there been so manifest a judgment of the good and of the wicked, bringing destruction to the one and safety to the other.

[191] Artapanus too records some things about the calamities of the Egyptians in Eusebius, so often already cited, Artapanus handed down something about all these things confusedly, who, as he has been rendered into Latin, after relating the first plague, affirms that he writes these things about the rest: That then the earth, being struck with the staff by Moses, brought forth venomous flies: then, being struck again, frogs, locusts, and other monstrous things of the sort… At last, when it was struck with hail, and all Egypt was shaken with an earthquake, by which many houses and temples fell, the king, broken by the calamities, set the Jews free; who received from the Egyptians on loan vessels of silver and gold, raiment, and other treasure, etc. In these things many matters indeed are to be corrected, since there is no order of the plagues, and none is exactly related. Yet even so it is permitted from these to gather that the memory of their calamities long flourished among the Egyptians, even though it was confused and, as is wont to happen, not a little corrupted by popular traditions.

[192] and among the plagues he records earthquakes, which are not improbable. Whether among the calamities of the Egyptians there was an earthquake by which many houses and temples fell, I would not dare to determine for certain. For express mention of an earthquake is nowhere found in the Scriptures; but the plague of hail is related in a manner so terrible that certain shakings of the earth, with the lightnings and thunders, could have accompanied the hail, and this be passed over in silence in Scripture. Salian, from the Greek text of Eusebius which I wished to consult, renders the words of Artapanus more fully into Latin thus: But the king being still maddened, Moses stirred up hail and earthquakes by night, so that those who escaped the gapings of the earth perished by the hail, and those who avoided the hail were swallowed up by the gapings of the earth. Nevertheless

I should rather believe that the earthquakes were a part of the tenth plague, and that by them the idols and the temples of the idols fell on that night in which the firstborn of the Egyptians were smitten. Certainly the Lord foretold of this plague also: And against all the gods of Egypt I will execute judgments. That this was done when the firstborn perished is asserted in Numbers 33, verse 4. Scripture does not indeed express in what manner it was done: nor yet can it be doubted that it was done; nor does it seem that a fitter conjecture can be given than if we suspect that the temples of the idols fell by earthquakes. For the rest, the reader will easily see the various plagues passed over by Artapanus, and others related only confusedly, provided he be willing to compare our account, given from the sacred Writings, with his words.

[193] [Philo asserts that Moses was made king; but he is more rightly called leader, or lawgiver:] Further, Philo, before he narrates the going out of the Israelites from Egypt, discourses much about the sovereignty of Moses, whom he names king and prince, and asserts that he obtained the sovereignty of the Israelites at this time. Yet the name of king does not so well fit Moses as that of leader and lawgiver, as we shall afterwards see. But Moses was properly appointed leader of the Israelites by God when in the vision at the bush he was bidden to lead the people out of Egypt; and it may be said that at this time he was acknowledged by the Israelites, unless this had already been done in the assembly of the elders whom he called together as soon as he entered Egypt. But whatever be truer about the time at which the Israelites began to acknowledge Moses for their leader, he could not freely command the Israelites so long as he was placed with them under the dominion of Pharaoh, and therefore Philo rightly begins the sovereignty of Moses from the going out of the Israelites. Further, of how great a people he was leader he declares first in these words: And the men who removed were above six hundred thousand. He speaks of the men who were of such an age that they could bear arms; and these were afterwards numbered and there were found six hundred and three thousand five hundred and fifty men, as is read in Numbers 1, verse 46. Of the remaining crowd, says Philo, of old men, boys, and women, the number could not be reckoned. To this was added a mixed and as it were supposititious multitude of servants. These the Hebrews had begotten of Egyptian women, and reckoned to their father's race. Some too had joined themselves out of love of piety: and there were those who by so many continual chastisements had profited toward better things. How huge, then, the multitude was, anyone will easily see.

[194] Of all these, says Philo, Moses was chosen prince: having obtained sovereignty from God, with how great integrity, which power he received not, as others do, relying upon arms and engines, or upon forces of horse, foot, and ships: but being honored for his virtue and for the charity with which he unceasingly attended all men, God too favoring the honor of the best of Men. For because he had forsaken the kingdom of Egypt when he was the king's grandson, and, offended by the pride and violence of the inhabitants, had renounced those who had adopted him, and at the same time had cast away those hopes out of a noble magnanimity and love of justice, it seemed good to the almighty Governor of things to lay up for him the rule of a more numerous and better nation, which alone of all was to perform the priesthood and to make vows on behalf of the whole human race, by which both evils might be averted and prosperous things obtained. But having assumed the sovereignty, he did not act as some are wont, so as to enlarge his own family and exalt his sons, of whom he had two, meaning to have them as partners and presently as successors: but bearing himself everywhere incorruptly, in the least matters as in the greatest, he overcame the natural affection toward his children, choosing rather to obey the judgment of reason. For he had one necessary purpose, to help his subjects, and by words and deeds to consult their advantage, letting slip no occasion in advancing their affairs.

[195] He alone of all who ever held sovereignty with what continence, modesty, justice, laid up neither gold nor silver in treasuries, exacted no tributes, provided for himself no palaces, no wide estates, no flocks, no household of servants, no revenues, no other wealth, though he might have had abundance of all these things: but judging it the mark of a poor soul to admire material riches, these indeed he despised as blind, but those which are natural and clear-sighted he honored and loved, if ever any man did, showing forth in his daily clothing and food nothing of tragic pomp, but practicing the simplicity and frugality of a private man. But he played the king in those things alone which are truly royal, such as continence, fortitude, sobriety, shrewdness, prudence, knowledge, industry, endurance, justice, contempt of pleasure, exhortation to virtue, lawful rebukes and chastisements of sinners, and praises and rewards of those who do rightly. And so, because he had renounced avarice and the riches honored among men, God repaid him for these with perfect and greatest riches: that is, that he could do as much as earth and sea and rivers and the other elements, and the things created out of them.

[196] For he made him a partaker of his own power, subjecting the whole world to him as an inheritance. with what friendship with God, and with what other virtues, he administered it. Wherefore each of the elements obeyed him as their Lord, changing their powers at his bidding. Nor is it a wonder, since, according to the proverb, all things are common among friends, and a Prophet is called the friend of God: whence it follows that he has the use of the divine possession: for God needs nothing, since he possesses all. But a good man possesses nothing properly, not even himself: but he receives from the treasuries of God as much as he can, and deservedly. Since he is a citizen of the world, therefore he has no private fatherland in the world: for he has as his inheritance not any one region, but the whole world. What of this, that, having obtained a still greater fellowship with the almighty Father and founder of things, he was deemed worthy of a common appellation? For he is named the god and king of the whole nation, and is said to have entered into the darkness where God was, that is, into that invisible, incorporeal, exemplary essence lacking appearance and form, considering contemplations hidden from mortal nature. Himself too and his own life he set forth to be gazed upon like a picture most elegantly painted, a divine work and one to be imitated by posterity. Thus Philo discourses; nor in all those things which he affirms about the character of Moses do I see anything to be blamed. But I do not find where Moses was named the god and king of the whole nation. But whether Moses saw the divine essence will be discussed in its own place. Then Philo shows how much the good example of a prince profits a people, and how much a bad one harms it, subjoining thus of Moses: And perhaps, because he was to be a Lawgiver, he was himself long before made a living and rational Law by the providence of God, which was destining him, unknowing, for this office.

§ XXI. The going out of the Israelites: the first station at Rameses, the second at Succoth, the third at Etham, the fourth at Phihahiroth: the crossing of the Red Sea, and the destruction of Pharaoh with all his army.

[ ] The Israelites went out of Egypt 430 years after the promise made to Abraham, Moses in Exodus 12, verse 40, says: And the abode of the children of Israel that they made in Egypt was four hundred and thirty years. Which being expired, the same day all the army of the Lord went forth out of the land of Egypt. These words have given matter for many questions and controversies, since it can clearly be proved from the Scriptures that the Israelites did not remain in Egypt so long a time from the entry of Jacob or Joseph; and this St. Augustine abundantly shows in question 47 on Exodus, saying that those four hundred and thirty years are to be begun from the promise made to Abraham, according to the Apostle in Galatians 3, verse 17, where he says: The Law which was made after four hundred and thirty years (on Mount Sinai in the first year after the going out) doth not make void (the testament of God) to abolish the promise. Hear Augustine himself: From that promise, therefore, by which Abraham was called, and he believed God, the Apostle says the Law was made after four hundred and thirty years, not from the time in which Jacob entered into Egypt. Then Scripture itself in Exodus has sufficiently signified this: for it did not say, "The sojourn of the children of Israel" which they sojourned in the land of Egypt was four hundred and thirty years; but it plainly said, "Which they sojourned in the land of Egypt and in the land of Canaan, they and their fathers." (So it is added in the Seventy, and in the land of Canaan.) And the holy Doctor rightly concludes: And by this it is manifest that the time also of the patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, is to be reckoned, from the time when Abraham began to sojourn in the land of Canaan; that is, from that promise in which the Apostle praises his faith, up to that time in which Israel entered into Egypt. For during all that time the fathers sojourned in the land of Canaan, and then the seed of Israel in Egypt: and thus were completed four hundred and thirty years from the promise up to the going out of Israel from Egypt, when the Law was made on Mount Sinai, which does not weaken the testament so as to abolish the promises. This opinion of St. Augustine, as it has pleased many, so it seems to me sufficiently certain.

[198] But the Israelites went out on the fifteenth day of the month Nisan, [on the fifteenth day of the month Nisan, to the number of about six hundred thousand men, with no one infirm:] on the night preceding which the firstborn of the Egyptians perished; nor did they have sufficient time to prepare the food necessary for a long journey. The people therefore took, says Moses in chapter 12, verse 34, dough before it was leavened: and tying it in their cloaks, put it on their shoulders. Again at verse 39: And they baked the meal, which a little before they had brought out of Egypt in dough: and they made hearth cakes unleavened: for it could not be leavened, the Egyptians pressing them to depart, and suffering them to make no stay: neither did they think of preparing any meat. This haste, however, did not cause Moses to forget the charge of the patriarch Joseph, who in Genesis 50, verse 24, had commanded that his bones be carried out of Egypt. For in Exodus 13, verse 19, Moses also took Joseph's bones with him: because he had adjured the children of Israel, saying: God shall visit you, carry my bones from hence with you. In how huge a number, and from whence, they set out is narrated in chapter 12, verse 37, in these words: And the children of Israel set forward from Rameses to Succoth, being about six hundred thousand men on foot, beside children. And a mixed multitude without number went up also with them, sheep and herds and beasts of divers kinds, exceeding many. To this going out Psalm 104, verse 37, thus sings in accord: And he brought them forth with silver and gold: and there was not among their tribes one that was feeble. Egypt was glad when they departed: for the fear of them lay upon them.

[199] The first station of the Israelites is commonly set at Rameses, their first station, or place of gathering, Rameses: which was a city of Egypt, which they themselves built for Pharaoh, as is said in Exodus 1, verse XI. But this first station is so to be understood as to be the place to which the Israelites came together in order to go out of Egypt; and not the place

in which they encamped after the journey of the first day undertaken by the assembled host. St. Jerome, in his Letter to Fabiola on the 42 Stations of the Israelites, writes thus of Rameses: At this city, which was on the farthest borders of Egypt, the people was gathered together who desired to go out into the desert. Some believe that the Israelites had already been gathered at Rameses, or in its neighborhood, on the preceding day, and had eaten the Paschal lamb there. But I do not see how this can fitly be proved from Scripture, since it is nowhere said: for the city of Rameses in all likelihood did not hold so great a multitude, nor do they seem to have eaten the Paschal lamb in camps: for in the describing of that rite mention is made at various times of houses, not of tents. I would rather think that the Israelites flowed together from all sides to the city of Rameses in the morning time, and on the same day, after they had been gathered, set out thence to Succoth. The latter is by no means doubtful: for in Numbers 33, where the stations of the Israelites are enumerated, it is thus read: These are the stations of the children of Israel, who went out of Egypt by their troops under the conduct of Moses and Aaron, which Moses wrote down according to the places of their encamping, which they changed by the commandment of the Lord. Now the children of Israel departed from Rameses the first month, on the fifteenth day of the first month, the day after the Phase, with a mighty hand, in the sight of all the Egyptians, who were burying their firstborn, whom the Lord had struck (for on their gods also he had executed vengeance) and they camped in Succoth. That the idols of the Egyptians were destroyed at the same time in which the firstborn were slain, as the Lord had promised Moses, is proved from this passage, whether it was done by earthquakes or in any other manner whatsoever.

[200] how glorious and profitable this departure was to them: But as to what is said, that the Lord led out his people with a mighty hand, and what is expressed in Psalm [ ], verse 12, with a strong hand and with a stretched-out arm, or with a powerful right hand, by compelling Pharaoh to let the people go, I should think it must be understood not only of the last plague, but of all the plagues and prodigies considered together, which at last wrung consent from Pharaoh. So in Joshua 24, verse 5, Joshua says to the Israelites in the name of the Lord: And I sent Moses and Aaron, and I struck Egypt with many signs and wonders. And I brought you and your fathers out of Egypt. So too Stephen in Acts 7, verse 36, says of Moses: He brought them out, doing wonders and signs in the land of Egypt. Wherefore I judge that the passage of the Apostle also must be explained of all these things, who says of Moses in Hebrews XI, verse 27: By faith he left Egypt, not fearing the fierceness of the king: for he endured as seeing him that is invisible. Further, this departure was very glorious to the Israelites: for they departed, the Egyptians having been overcome and vanquished by plagues and by fear, as victors, as is intimated also in other passages of sacred Scripture. It was also most profitable, not only because they were freed from a most hard servitude, but also because they carried with them many riches of the Egyptians, as a wage for their long servitude. Then, because they were now to enjoy a more singular protection of God, as a people dedicated to God and to his service, as is said in Psalm 113, verse 1, in these words: When Israel went out of Egypt, the house of Jacob from a barbarous people; Judea was made his sanctuary, Israel his dominion.

[201] [the pillar of cloud by day, and of fire by night, going before, directed their journey;] This singular protection of the Almighty they could learn both from the prodigies wrought in Egypt and from the fact that in so great a multitude there was no one infirm. Another visible sign of the divine goodwill toward them was the pillar of cloud going before by day against the excessive heats of the sun, and the pillar of fire going before by night to dispel the darkness, and the same pillar at each time was the guide of the ways by which they had to set out. Hear Moses concerning these things in Exodus 13, verse 21: And the Lord went before them to show the way, by day in a pillar of a cloud, and by night in a pillar of fire: that he might be the guide of their journey at both times. There never failed the pillar of the cloud by day, nor the pillar of fire by night, before the people. Psalm 104, verse 39: He spread a cloud for their protection, and fire to give them light in the night. Wisdom 10, verse 17: And he was to them (the Lord by the pillar) for a covering by day, and for the light of stars by night. So Moses, entreating the Lord in Numbers 14, verse 14, says: Who have heard that thou, O Lord, art among this people, … and that thy cloud protecteth them, and that thou goest before them in a pillar of a cloud by day, and in a pillar of fire by night. In 2 Esdras 9, verse 19, it is said to God: But thou in thy many mercies didst not leave them in the desert: the pillar of the cloud departed not from them by day, to lead them in the way; and the pillar of fire by night, to show them the way by which they should go. Of this cloud the Apostle also makes mention in 1 Corinthians 10, verse 1.

[202] From this pillar it is plain that it is to be ascribed not to Moses but to God [it is therefore to be attributed to God, not to Moses, that they did not seek Palestine by the direct way: the reasons] that the Israelites did not set out from Egypt into Palestine by the direct way, but came thither at last through many circuits: for the office of Moses was to follow the pillar as guide. Further, of the journey not directed straight into Palestine, Moses in Exodus 13, verse 17, has this: And when Pharaoh had sent out the people, God led them not by the way of the land of the Philistines, which is near: thinking lest perhaps they would repent, if they should see wars arise against them, and would return into Egypt. But he led them about by the way of the desert, which is by the Red Sea: and the children of Israel went up armed out of the land of Egypt. The words went up armed have bred various controversies among interpreters, especially because the Seventy have for them, And they went up in the fifth generation; Oleaster, They went up five by five; elsewhere, Girded, Ranked by fives, Girded with arms, Equipped; others finally, Girded with five kinds of arms. Now the exposition of the Seventy interpreters does indeed contain a true sense, as various men have already shown: yet the exposition of the common Scripture is to be preferred, which other interpreters too have handed down. But that I be not here too lengthy, nothing else seems to me to be signified than that the Israelites were equipped with some arms, such as they had been able to procure; and that they undertook the journey in fair order like an armed host. But I should not believe that they were armed as soldiers are armed when they go forth to war; but only for their own defense, so far as could be done. More arms they obtained after the army of Pharaoh was drowned in the Red Sea; and after the Amalekites were conquered.

[203] I return to the reasons for which the divine providence willed to lead the Israelites for a very long time through desert places, of this circuit are given. when it could have brought them to the promised land in a few days. In Deuteronomy 8, verse 2, Moses thus addresses the Israelites: And thou shalt remember all the way through which the Lord thy God hath brought thee forty years through the desert, to afflict thee and to prove thee, and that the things that were in thy heart might be made known, whether thou wouldst keep his commandments or not. He afflicted thee with want, and gave thee Manna for thy food, which neither thou nor thy fathers knew: to show thee that not in bread alone doth man live, but in every word that proceedeth from the mouth of God. Thy raiment, with which thou wast covered, hath not decayed for age, and thy foot is not worn, lo, this is the fortieth year: that thou mayest consider in thy heart, that as a man traineth up his son, so the Lord thy God hath trained thee up, that thou shouldst keep the commandments of the Lord thy God. Again Moses in his Canticle, Deuteronomy 32, verse 9, sings thus of them: But the Lord's portion is his people: Jacob the lot of his inheritance. He found him in a desert land, in a place of horror and of vast wilderness: he led him about and taught him: and he kept him as the apple of his eye. As the eagle enticing her young to fly, and hovering over them, he spread his wings, and hath taken him and carried him on his shoulders. These reasons for leading the people about do not fight with the first: for all concur to the same end. The Lord did not will to bring the Israelites to the promised land in a few days, lest men made timid by long servitude should be terrified by the preparation for wars. But he willed that the same should tarry very many years in places so desert that they could not there find food to preserve life, and so from the sustenance divinely given might learn how much was to be hoped from the divine providence: then, that they might also learn his Laws better, when they were not distracted by other occupations in the solitude.

[204] The second and third station: in this the pillar is first recorded; St. Jerome writes thus of the second station of the Israelites in the Letter to Fabiola often praised and often to be praised, citing those words, They camped in Succoth: The second station. In this they bake unleavened bread, and first pitch tents, whence also from the fact the place received its name: for Succoth is interpreted in our tongue "tabernacles" or "tents." That there were baked there unleavened hearth cakes we have from Exodus 12, verse 39, and we have already given the words at number 198: nor is anything else read about this station. The third station is assigned in Numbers 33, verse 6, in these words: And from Succoth they came into Etham, which is in the utmost borders of the wilderness. And Exodus 13, verse 20: And marching from Succoth, they encamped in Etham in the utmost coasts of the wilderness. Of this the aforesaid Jerome says thus: The third station is offered after Tabernacles, in which the Lord is first seen by night in a pillar of fire, and by day in a pillar of cloud; that he may go before the people and become the guide of their journey. Another observation he presently adds in this manner: From which we understand that the place Succoth was still near the regions of Egypt: for in that which is said, "Which is in the utmost borders of the wilderness," it is shown to be between the confines of the desert and Egypt.

[205] nor yet can it be proved that it did not begin to go before them earlier. I should believe that both places were within the bounds of the Egyptian kingdom, but that Succoth was in the inhabited and cultivated part of Egypt, and Etham in the desert land toward the borders of Arabia, unless Etham was already in Arabia itself, where is the wilderness of Etham, otherwise called Sur, through which the Israelites set out after the crossing of the Red Sea. This seems certain, that Etham was either on the very border of Arabia, or nearer to it than the following station was. Further, the first observation of Jerome is not commonly admitted by all, because Scripture

does not say that the pillar of cloud and of fire first began to go before them at Etham, but only, after the arrival at Etham has been related, it is subjoined, And the Lord went before them … in a pillar, etc.; and that went before can be referred as well to earlier times, say to Rameses, as to Etham. The only reason which favors St. Jerome is that Moses had not spoken of that pillar before. But in the same manner Moses relates in the same place, at verse 19, that the bones of Joseph were carried off by him, after he had already narrated the arrival at Succoth. Wherefore that observation of Jerome appears to me neither certain, nor yet altogether to be rejected: for neither can it be proved that the pillar went before them earlier, and it may be said that the guidance of the pillar was not necessary in the inhabited and known region of Egypt, and that therefore it only seemed to begin to go before them when they came to the wilderness.

[206] [The fourth station, which, having turned back at God's bidding, they take near the Red Sea:] The fourth station was not far from the Red Sea, and is thus assigned in Numbers 33, verse 7: Departing from thence (from Etham) they came over against Phihahiroth, which looketh toward Beelsephon, and they camped before Magdalum. The journey to this station was undertaken at the express bidding of the Lord, who willed that the Israelites, who could have gone around the Red Sea and thus passed from Egypt into Arabia, should set out to the Egyptian side of the Red Sea, which afterwards had to be crossed that they might come into the wildernesses of Arabia. This journey afforded Pharaoh an occasion of so pursuing the Hebrews as to incur the punishment of his obstinacy. Hear Moses, Exodus 14, verse 1: And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying: Speak to the children of Israel: Let them turn and camp over against Phihahiroth, which is between Magdalum and the sea over against Beelsephon: you shall camp before it upon the sea. And Pharaoh will say of the children of Israel: They are straitened in the land, the desert hath shut them in. And I shall harden his heart and he will pursue you: and I shall be glorified in Pharaoh and in all his army: and the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord. And they did so.

[207] And it was told the king of the Egyptians that the people was fled: hence Pharaoh rashly pursues with his army: and the heart of Pharaoh and of his servants was changed with regard to the people, and they said: What meant we to do, that we let Israel go from serving us? So he made ready his chariot, and took all his people with him. And he took six hundred chosen chariots, and all the chariots that were in Egypt, and the captains of the whole army. And the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh king of Egypt, and he pursued the children of Israel: but they were gone forth with a mighty hand. And when the Egyptians followed the steps of them who had gone before, they found them encamped at the sea side: all Pharaoh's horse and chariots, and the whole army, were in Phihahiroth over against Beelsephon. The signal rashness of Pharaoh in pursuing the people of God the Wise Man weighs in chapter 19, observing that by the just judgment of God it was permitted that Pharaoh should act so inconstantly, and should be brought to a punishment worthy of his crimes. But as to the wicked, he says, even to the end there came upon them wrath without mercy. For he (God) knew before also what they would do: for when they (the Egyptians) had permitted them (the Hebrews) to go out, and had sent them away with great care, they repented and pursued after them. For whilst they were yet mourning, and lamenting at the graves of the dead, they took up another foolish device: and pursued them as fugitives whom they had entreated to be gone: for a just necessity led them to this end: and they lost the remembrance of those things which had happened, that punishment might fill up what was wanting to their torments: and that thy people might wonderfully pass through, but they might find a new death. These counsels of God were not unknown to Moses, nor did he fear the army of Pharaoh.

[208] But the multitude of the people, timid, and not so exactly instructed about the divine providence, for this cause the Israelites murmur against Moses, nor trusting with so great faith in the help of God as to dare to hope for things to come from benefits past, was seized with so great fear that it broke out into grave murmurings against Moses. Let us hear Moses himself relating the matter exactly, Exodus 14, verse 10: And when Pharaoh drew near, the children of Israel lifting up their eyes, saw the Egyptians behind them; and they feared exceedingly: and they cried to the Lord, and they said to Moses: Perhaps there were no graves in Egypt, therefore thou hast brought us to die in the wilderness: why wouldst thou do this, to lead us out of Egypt? Is not this the word that we spoke to thee in Egypt, saying: Depart from us, that we may serve the Egyptians? For it was much better to serve them, than to die in the wilderness. This murmuring of the children of Israel was not without sin, and is deservedly rebuked in Psalm 105, verse 7: Our fathers understood not thy wonders in Egypt: they remembered not the multitude of thy mercies: and they provoked to wrath going up to the sea, even the Red Sea.

[209] but Moses rouses them to confidence: Nevertheless so great was the goodness of God that he did not forsake them even when sinning, but in a wonderful manner protected them against their enemies, as is presently subjoined in the same place: And he (God) saved them for his own name's sake, that he might make his power known. And he rebuked the Red Sea, and it was dried up: and he led them through in the depths as in a wilderness. And he saved them from the hand of them that hated them: and he redeemed them from the hand of the enemy. And the water covered them that afflicted them: there was not one of them left. And (so at last again) they believed his words: and they sang his praises. These things Moses himself relates more fully, who first strove thus to take away the fear from the Israelites at verse 13: And Moses said to the people: Fear not: stand and see the great wonders of the Lord which he will do this day: for the Egyptians whom you see now, you shall see no more for ever. The Lord will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace. And the Lord said to Moses (praying doubtless for the safety of the people): Why criest thou to me? Speak to the children of Israel to go forward. But lift thou up thy rod, and stretch forth thy hand over the sea, and divide it: that the children of Israel may go through the midst of the sea on dry ground. And I shall harden the heart of the Egyptians to pursue you: and I shall be glorified in Pharaoh, and in all his host, and in his chariots and in his horsemen. And the Egyptians shall know that I am the Lord, when I shall be glorified in Pharaoh, and in his chariots and in his horsemen.

[210] [an angel, by the pillar of cloud set between the two armies, hinders the approach of the Egyptians:] Meanwhile the Lord provided that on that night, before the Hebrews had entered the Red Sea, the Egyptians could not harm them, as follows: And the angel of God, who went before the camp of Israel, removing, went behind them: and together with him the pillar of the cloud, leaving the forefront, stood behind, between the camp of the Egyptians and the camp of Israel: and it was a dark cloud (on the side of the Egyptians, namely) and enlightening the night (on the side of the Hebrews), so that they could not come at one another all the night. Of this dark cloud, which took away from the Egyptians the sight of the Hebrews, Joshua also makes mention, writing thus briefly of the deliverance of the Hebrews in chapter 24, verse 6: And I brought you, the Lord says to the Israelites, and your fathers out of Egypt, and you came to the sea: and the Egyptians pursued your fathers with chariots and horsemen as far as the Red Sea. And the children of Israel cried to the Lord: who put darkness between you and the Egyptians, and brought the sea upon them, and covered them. Of this cloud also the Wise Man makes mention in chapter 19, verse 7, whose words I shall presently give. Let us meanwhile see the marvellous dividing of the Red Sea and the crossing of the Israelites.

[211] then, at Moses's stretching forth his hand, the sea is divided, Moses in Exodus 14, verse 21, speaks thus of these things: And when Moses had stretched forth his hand over the sea, the Lord took it away by a strong and burning wind blowing all the night, and turned it into dry ground: and the water was divided. And the children of Israel went in through the midst of the sea dried up: for the water was as a wall on their right hand and on their left. The Wise Man in chapter 19 adds some things in this manner: For every creature according to its kind was fashioned again as from the beginning (that is, took on as it were a new figure), obeying thy commandments, that thy children might be kept without hurt. For a cloud overshadowed their camps, and where water was before, dry land appeared, and in the Red Sea a way without hindrance, and out of the great deep a springing field (or in that utmost depth of the sea): through which (field) all the nation (of Israel) passed, which was protected by thy hand, seeing thy miracles and wonders.

[212] The Psalmist too has not kept silence about these wonders, for in Psalm 113, looking to this, and opens a way for the Israelites, who cross unharmed; he cries out: The sea saw and fled. Psalm 76: Thou hast made known (O God) thy power among the peoples: thou hast redeemed with thy arm thy people, the children of Jacob and of Joseph. The waters saw thee, O God, the waters saw thee: and they were afraid, and the depths were troubled. Great was the noise of the waters: the clouds sent out a sound. For thy arrows pass: the voice of thy thunder in a wheel. Thy lightnings enlightened the world: the earth shook and trembled. Thy way is in the sea, and thy paths in many waters: and thy footsteps (because the waters presently returned) shall not be known. Thou hast conducted thy people like sheep, by the hand of Moses and Aaron. This whole passage seems to be understood of the crossing of the Red Sea: for the first and last parts are clear enough. But in the middle are described rains (Great was the noise of the waters) and thunders joined with them (The clouds sent out a sound) and lightnings (thy arrows) and again thunders overturning the wheels of the Egyptian chariots (the voice of thy thunder in a wheel) and finally the lightnings and the earthquakes in the following verse. These things therefore avail to set forth the words of Moses already given: And behold the Lord looking upon the camp of the Egyptians … slew their host: and overthrew the wheels of the chariots, etc. Again Psalm 77, verse 13: He divided the sea and brought them through: and he made the waters (not flowing away) to stand as in a vessel. Nay, that the Israelites crossed without fear he suggests in the same place at verse 53: And he brought them out in hope, and they feared not: and the sea overwhelmed their enemies. I shall bring forward more passages below, where the destruction of the Egyptians will be set forth.

[213] The foolish presumption of Pharaoh and his destruction Moses, continuing, narrates thus at verse 23: but the Egyptians following, the sea, returning to its former shape, And the Egyptians pursuing went in after them, and all Pharaoh's horses, his chariots and horsemen, through the midst of the sea. And now the morning watch was come, and behold the Lord looking upon

the Egyptian army through the pillar of fire and of the cloud, slew their host: and overthrew the wheels of the chariots, and they were carried into the deep. And the Egyptians said (wise too late): Let us flee from Israel: for the Lord fighteth for them against us. And the Lord said to Moses: Stretch forth thy hand over the sea, that the waters may come again upon the Egyptians, upon their chariots and horsemen. And when Moses had stretched forth his hand toward the sea, it returned at the first break of day to the former place: and as the Egyptians were fleeing away, the waters came upon them, and the Lord shut them up in the middle of the waves. And the waters returned, and covered the chariots and the horsemen of all the army of Pharaoh, who had come into the sea after them, neither did there so much as one of them remain. But the children of Israel marched through the midst of the sea upon dry land, and the waters were to them as a wall on the right hand and on the left: and the Lord delivered Israel on that day out of the hand of the Egyptians. And they saw the Egyptians dead upon the sea shore, and the mighty hand that the Lord had used against them; and the people feared the Lord, and they believed the Lord, and Moses his servant.

[214] Wisdom 10, verse 18: He (the Lord) carried them over the Red Sea, wraps them all up and drowns them. and carried them over through a great water. But their enemies he drowned in the sea, and from the depth of hell (that is, as it were from the depth of hell) he brought them out. Therefore the just took the spoils of the wicked, and sang, O Lord, to thy holy name, and they praised with one accord thy victorious hand: for Wisdom opened the mouth of the dumb (of the Israelites, hitherto as it were dumb for the praises of God), and made the tongues of infants eloquent. Of all the aforesaid these things are related in Judith 5, verse XI: And when the Egyptians had cast them out from them, and the plague had ceased from them, and they had a mind to take them again and to bring them back to their service, as these fled away, the God of heaven opened the sea, so that the waters were made to stand firm as a wall on either side, and these walking with dry foot passed through by crossing the bottom of the sea. In which place while an innumerable army of the Egyptians was pursuing them, it was so covered with the waters that there did not remain so much as one to tell what had happened to posterity. Judith herself, praying to the Lord in chapter 9, verse 6, thus makes mention of the dark cloud by reason of which the Egyptians could not see the camp of the Hebrews, and of their destruction: Look (O Lord) upon the camp of the Assyrians now, as thou wast pleased to look upon the camp of the Egyptians, when they ran armed after thy servants, trusting in their chariots, and in their horsemen, and in a multitude of warriors. But thou lookedst over their camp, and darkness wearied them. The deep held their feet, and the waters covered them. Finally Moses in Deuteronomy XI, verse 3 and following, bids the Israelites remember this deed, that they may be grateful to the Lord for so great a benefit.

[215] The Canticle, partly about the deed just related, But Moses himself at once composed a most beautiful Canticle in thanksgiving, and sang it with the whole people. The former part of this canticle elegantly relates the things done at the Red Sea, but the latter part foretells things to come, although after the prophetic manner all is spoken as though past. I am pleased to transfer hither the whole Canticle, as it is expressed in Exodus 15, these words being set before it: Then Moses and the children of Israel sung this canticle to the Lord, and said:

Let us sing to the Lord: for he is gloriously magnified, the horse and the rider he hath thrown into the sea.

The Lord is my strength and my praise, and he is become salvation to me: he is my God, and I will glorify him: the God of my father, and I will exalt him.

The Lord is as a man of war, Almighty is his name.

Pharaoh's chariots and his army he hath cast into the sea: his chosen captains are drowned in the Red Sea.

The depths have covered them, they are sunk to the bottom like a stone.

Thy right hand, O Lord, is magnified in strength: thy right hand, O Lord, hath slain the enemy.

And in the multitude of thy glory thou hast put down thy adversaries: thou hast sent thy wrath, which hath devoured them like stubble.

And with the blast of thy anger the waters were gathered together: the flowing water stood, the depths were gathered together in the midst of the sea.

The enemy said: I will pursue and overtake, I will divide the spoils, my soul shall have its fill: I will draw my sword, my hand shall slay them.*

Thy wind blew and the sea covered them: they sank as lead in the mighty waters.*

Who is like to thee among the strong, O Lord? Who is like to thee, glorious in holiness, terrible and praiseworthy, doing wonders?

Thou stretchedst forth thy hand, and the earth swallowed them; namely the bottom of the sea. Thus far concerning things past.

[216] Now follows the prediction of things to come: yet the following verse partly fits things past also. [partly about things to come, which Moses sang with all the people in thanksgiving.]

In thy mercy thou hast been a leader to the people which thou hast redeemed: and in thy strength thou hast carried them to thy holy habitation. *

Nations rose up and were angry: sorrows took hold on the inhabitants of Philistia.

Then were the princes of Edom troubled, trembling seized on the stout men of Moab: all the inhabitants of Canaan became stiff.

Let fear and dread fall upon them, in the greatness of thy arm: let them become immovable as a stone, until thy people, O Lord, pass by, until this thy people pass by, whom thou hast possessed.

Thou shalt bring them in, and plant them in the mountain of thy inheritance, in thy most firm habitation which thou hast made, O Lord: thy sanctuary, O Lord, which thy hands have established.

The Lord shall reign for ever and ever.

For Pharaoh went in on horseback with his chariots and horsemen into the sea: and the Lord brought back upon them the waters of the sea: but the children of Israel walked on dry ground in the midst thereof.

In this last verse Moses repeats what he set forth at the first. This same Canticle the women too sang, Miriam the sister of Moses leading, as is subjoined: So Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron, took a timbrel in her hand: and all the women went forth after her with timbrels and with dances, and she began the song before them, saying: Let us sing to the Lord, for he is gloriously magnified, the horse and his rider he hath thrown into the sea. Thus far of the glorious crossing of the Red Sea, which kept the people in their duty for some days. But the Israelites did not fix their tents there, nor were they long content with their lot, as we shall see.

* Pharaoh

* the wind

* the promised land

§ XXII. The things related by Josephus, Philo, and Artapanus about the journey of the Israelites as far as the Red Sea, and the crossing of the sea, are discussed.

[ ] Josephus narrates the departure of the Hebrews not without errors; Josephus describes the journey of the Hebrews as far as the Red Sea in such a way as to record nothing about the pillar going before, nothing about the ordering of God, thinking, I suppose, that so great a familiarity of God with man would be suspect to the heathen. I subjoin his own words: And in this manner they went out, the Egyptians weeping and repenting on account of their past ill treatment. But they made their journey through Latopolis (in Greek λητοῦς πόλιν, that is, the city of Latona), then deserted: for Babylon was afterwards founded in that place, when Cambyses (king of the Persians) was laying Egypt waste. That route is not only uncertain, but not even likely, since Rameses, situated in the land of Goshen, seems to have been nearer to Arabia and the Red Sea than was Egyptian Babylon: for this was situated almost in that place where now is Cairo, which grew together from the joining of it and of other places. Josephus continues thus: And as they went on and vigorously continued their journey, on the third day they reached Beelsephon, situated by the Red Sea; and since they found nothing along the way because of the solitude, they sustained themselves with meal moistened and hardened by a little heat into the likeness of bread: which food they used for thirty days, for they had brought no more provision out of Egypt, and they dispensed even that sparingly, for necessity rather than for satiety. Wherefore in memory of that want we celebrate a feast for eight days, which we call the feast of Unleavened Bread. For the rest, the multitude of those removing, together with their children and wives, was scarcely to be numbered: but those who were of military age filled up the number of six hundred thousand. They left Egypt in the month Xanthicus, on the fifteenth of the moon, in the four hundred and thirtieth year after Abraham our father came into Canaan: and in the two hundred and fifteenth year after the migration of Jacob into Egypt. But Moses was then in his eightieth year, and his brother Aaron was three years older; they carried with them also the bones of Joseph, as he had charged his sons. What the writer says, that the feast of unleavened bread was instituted on account of the want of food endured on the way, is assuredly unworthy of a Hebrew man, since it is agreed that the days of unleavened bread were instituted in Egypt together with the Paschal lamb.

[218] [as also Philo, who wrongly attributes to Moses the reasons for the route not being chosen.] Philo writes more rightly about the journey of the Hebrews, yet in such a way that he ought to have spoken more positively about the pillar leading them, and to have attributed the reason for the direct route not being chosen to God rather than to Moses. Therefore, he says, after he (Moses) had received the command by common consent, not without the Deity, he determined to lead a colony into Phoenicia, Coelesyria, and Palestine, then by a common name Canaan, whose borders were parted from Egypt by a three days' journey. But he led them by a route by no means the shortest: both because he feared lest the inhabitants of those regions, for fear of losing their seats together with their liberty, should come armed to meet them; and lest they themselves, being thrust back by enemies, should be compelled to return to enemies, from new to old, and, besides mockery, to suffer worse things than before; and because he wished, by leading them through vast solitudes, to test their obedience, since they were furnished not with ample provisions but with such as were gradually failing. Wherefore, turning aside from the direct way, he found a crooked path: he entered upon it, judging that it led to the Red Sea. It is reported that at that time there befell a huge miracle of nature, such as had never been heard of within the memory of men. There went before the people a cloud in the likeness of a great pillar, shining with a solar splendor by day, but by night with a flaming one, so that under its guidance they might march without the danger of straying. Yet it may be believed that some angel of the prefects of the most high King, wrapped in the cloud, led them, whom it is not lawful to be beheld by mortal eyes.

[219] The account of Josephus about the purpose of Pharaoh pursuing, Josephus sets forth the purpose of Pharaoh in pursuing the Hebrews, the reasons why Moses did not set out by the direct route, and the march and the preparation of Pharaoh, thus: But the Egyptians repented that they had let the Hebrews go: and since the king before the rest bore this matter ill, laying it all to the tricks of Moses, it was determined that they should rush upon them, and, having seized their arms and the rest of their equipment, they pursued them, meaning to bring them back if they could overtake them. For there was no need to fear that God should be offended, since the departure had now once been granted them: they hoped too that they would easily reduce into their power men unarmed and weary from the road. And so, asking of everyone they met whither they were going, they pursued in haste, although by a difficult route, not only for armies but for unencumbered travellers as well. But Moses led the Hebrews this way for this reason, that if the Egyptians, having changed their mind,

should wish to pursue them, they might pay the penalties of their malice and of the broken compact: and lest the Palestinians, whom he held hostile on account of an old quarrel, should be able to learn of this departure, for their region borders upon Egypt; wherefore, leaving aside the way which leads into Palestine, he willed to enter Canaan through the desert by a roundabout and difficult way: and on the way, according to God's commands, to bring the people to Mount Sinai to sacrifice.

[220] But when they had come to the Red Sea, behold the multitude of the Egyptians poured about them drives them into a narrow place: and the reasons for the roundabout route corrected: for there were present seven hundred chariots with fifty thousand horsemen, and two hundred thousand shield-bearing foot. These had beset all the ways by which an escape could lie open to the Hebrews, shut in between the crags and the sea, in which place a mountain, impassable for its roughness, runs forward to the very shore; and thus, no hope even of flight being left, they pressed the Hebrews with a siege between the sea and the mountain, setting armed men across where an exit into the plains lay open. In these things it seems, first, frivolous that he says that Pharaoh thought God would not be offended if he pursued the Israelites, because he had once granted them the departure. For the mere inconstancy of Pharaoh seems to have caused him to repent of the leave to depart he had given, and the hope of easily bringing them back drove him to follow, as can easily be gathered from the sacred words of Exodus 14, verses 3 and 5. Secondly, what he writes about the reasons which drove Moses to undertake the journey through the wilderness is also not accurate: for we have seen at numbers 202 and 203 that all this was done by God's will for the reasons given before.

[221] Philo wrote these things about the counsel, the preparation, and the expedition of Pharaoh to bring back the Israelites: Philo's narrative about Pharaoh pursuing the Israelites. But the king of Egypt, after he perceived that these were being carried through byways, having entered, as he thought, a desert trodden by no travellers, rejoiced that they had strayed from the right road, judging forsooth that they would not find a way out: and now repenting of their dismissal, he determined to pursue them, meaning either to draw them back by fear into servitude or to destroy the fugitive nation by slaughter. Then, having taken all his cavalry, javelin-men, slingers, archers, skirmishers, and all the soldiers of light armor, and six hundred scythed chariots, and having set courtiers over this expedition, that the rest might follow the more eagerly without shirking service; he rushed forth with the utmost speed, hastening to crush the fugitives unawares. For sudden assaults are wont to terrify the more grievously, and men off their guard are more easily cut off than the anxious: hoping this then too, he followed, as though he would come off victor at the first shout. And now the people had pitched camp on the shore: and as they were preparing their midday meal, first a noise was heard, as of so great a multitude of men and horses drawing near and hastening in rivalry: presently, having gone forth beyond their tents, they looked about with ears pricked up: a little after, the enemy's army was seen on the hills drawn up for battle with its line deployed. Philo attributes six hundred chariots to Pharaoh, Josephus seven hundred; which is the more right I could not easily say: for Scripture in Exodus 14, verse 7, enumerates six hundred chosen chariots, and all the chariots that were in Egypt. No more can it be determined which of them has more rightly recounted the number of horse and foot and the rest of the equipment, but each of them, I think, used a conjecture drawn from the strength of Egypt.

[222] The aforesaid Josephus presently subjoins with what feelings the Hebrews, driven into straits, beheld the army of Pharaoh. Shut in by this unfavorableness of place, he says, [Josephus, in relating the murmuring of the people, exaggerates too much the danger of Moses;] since they could neither endure a siege for want of supplies, nor find a way out for flight, nor were arms at hand even if they most desired to fight, they saw that nothing remained but that they should consult their safety by a shameful surrender: whence it came about that they accused Moses, forgetful of the prodigies by which God had signified their liberty: and it was but very little that they did not stone the Prophet, and, despising his promises through unbelief, return by surrender into their former servitude; for they were exasperated also by the lamentations of the women and children, who expected nothing but destruction, since they were girt about on every side by crags and sea and armed men, and no hope of escape was left. Thus far Josephus about these matters rightly enough, if he had spoken more cautiously about the danger of Moses: for Scripture does not have that it was but little that he was not stoned.

[223] but Philo in these things cleaves to Scripture: But Philo, cleaving more closely to Scripture and adding only a few things from probable conjecture, relates the same in this manner: Terrified by this so unlooked-for chance, since neither had they arms to hand for their defense (for they had gone out not for war but to seek dwelling-places) nor could they themselves make ready flight, the sea shutting them in from behind, the enemy threatening in front, on either side vast and pathless solitudes lying open, they were in dismay, despairing, as happens in such great calamities, and accused their Prince, crying out: Were there no graveyards in Egypt, that thou shouldst bring us hither and, having killed us, bury us in the wilderness? Is not any servitude lighter than death? Thou hast baited the poor folk with the hope of liberty, that they might run the risk of their life; thou hast abused our simplicity, as though thou knewest not the malice and wrath of the Egyptians. Dost thou not see that no escape from so many impending evils lies open to us? What shall we do? Shall we, unarmed, meet armed men? But shall we flee? How, since we are girt, as with hunting-nets, by the bitterest enemies, by pathless places, and by a sea without ships, if indeed it be navigable?

[224] [again Josephus on that occasion attributes to Moses a speech little conformable to Scripture;] Then Josephus brings in Moses addressing the Hebrews with such a speech indeed as the Leader of the people could use, trusting in God's help; but again the too timid writer has passed over in silence the prediction of Moses about the death of all the Egyptians, as also his prayers and the promise of God, writing thus of these matters: But Moses, although the crowd was maddened against him, yielding to no difficulty, did not cease to look to their good, trusting in God, whom after so many presages of liberty it was not probable would permit that they should either be destroyed or fall back into the power of their enemies. And when he had stood in the midst of the assembly, he spoke to them thus: If some man had hitherto administered your affairs well and prudently, you ought to expect the like care and diligence from him for the future: now, after God himself has undertaken to govern you, of how great madness would it be not to hope for the aid of him who through me has of his own accord afforded you whatever seemed to conduce to your safety and liberty: nay, this very difficulty and strait ought the more to have kindled you to hope: for he himself willed that you should be shut into this narrow place, that from so great a necessity he might save you beyond your own expectation as much as beyond your enemies', and in this manner declare not only his power but also the favor with which he perpetually attends you; for God is not wont to bring propitious aid in small matters, but then chiefly when least of hope remains. Therefore, trusting in the help of him who can both make great things out of small and render the power of these men weak, be not terrified by the equipment of the Egyptians, nor lose heart because flight is hindered by sea and mountains; for God can turn both these into a plain, and the sea into land.

[225] But Philo departs less from the narrative of Moses, but Philo departs less from Scripture. of whom he subjoins: Having heard these things (the murmurings of the people) he pardoned them, mindful of the divine oracle: and, having divided the offices of mind and of speech, at one and the same time with the one he silently entreated God to snatch them from their desperate state: with the other he strengthened and consoled the tumultuous crowd: Do not sink in mind; human aid is one thing, divine another. Why do you accommodate your faith only to credible words? Our helper has need of no equipments; to find a way out in doubtful matters is proper to God; he alone can do more than all creation. With these words he exhorted them, being then still master of himself; but a little after, now inspired by the familiar Deity, he prophesied thus: That army, most fully furnished, as you see, with arms and men, shall not terrify you hereafter, it shall be wholly destroyed by slaughter and sunk, so that not even its remnants shall remain upon the land, and that not after a long time, but on the very next night. This was the answer he then uttered.

[226] Josephus, when he proceeds to the division of the Red Sea and the crossing of the Israelites, Josephus makes light of the wonders wrought in the crossing of the Red Sea chose, after his wonted manner, so to relate the whole matter that it might appear in some sort likely to the heathen, rather than to narrate those wonders as they were done; and for this cause he mingles into his narrative various errors presently to be corrected. Take the words: Having said these things (Moses) led them to the sea, the Egyptians looking on. For having them under their eyes, since they were wearied with pursuing, they thought it more advisable to defer the battle to the following day. But when they had come to the very edge of the shore, then Moses, taking his rod, as a suppliant calls God to his aid, saying: Thou, Lord, knowest thyself that neither by human strength nor by human arts does any escape hence lie open to us: it remains that thou thyself provide safety for this people, which, having left Egypt, has been brought hither, following thy will and thy pledge. To thee alone, destitute of every other hope and of every counsel, we flee: to thy providence only we look, which alone can snatch us from the angry Egyptians. Succor us therefore speedily, and put forth thy power, and rouse to confidence and hope a people whose safety is already despaired of: we are set in difficulties, but ours, not thine. Thine, O Lord, is this sea, thine too the mountain which shuts us in: and this can, at thy bidding, be opened, and that be turned into land; we can also escape aloft through the air, if it so please thee that we be saved.

[227] Having prayed thus, he strikes the sea with his rod: and mingles in various errors; by which blow it was suddenly cleft, and, drawing back, left the bare ground to the Hebrews for taking their flight. But Moses, seeing that God was present and that the sea had withdrawn from its own ground, goes forward first; he exhorts the Hebrews to follow eagerly by the way divinely given, and, glad at the danger past, to give thanks for so incredible a means of safety, arisen so suddenly. But as they were following energetically, relying forsooth on divine help, the Egyptians at first thought them mad, rushing into manifest destruction. In these things correct the following. First, it is false that the Hebrews were led to the sea by Moses with the Egyptians looking on: for the dark cloud interposed took away from the Egyptians the sight of the Israelites, at least until they had gone further through the sea than that the Egyptians could harm them. For this reason too it is absurd that he says the Egyptians at first thought the Hebrews mad. Secondly, that speech which is attributed to Moses does not befit the Prophet, who had already learned from God the whole outcome of the matter and had received his commands. It would nevertheless be more tolerable if it had been ascribed to Moses earlier; namely as soon as the Hebrews had heard of the coming of the Egyptian host. Besides, he makes light of that miracle, omitting not a few things by which it is rendered more illustrious, as may be seen at numbers 211 and 212.

[228] but he narrates the destruction of the Egyptians more rightly: The same writer, of the Egyptians following through the sea,

continues thus: But after they saw that these had gone far forward and were making their journey unharmed and without any hindrance, they made a rush and began to pursue them, as though they too would have a safe passage through the sea: and, having sent the horsemen ahead, they went down from the shore. And now the Hebrews had come out upon the opposite shore, their enemies being left behind, whom, heavy with arms, the very novelty of the miracle also somewhat delayed: but when they saw those unharmed and holding the land, they promised themselves too the same outcome. But this opinion deceived them, since they knew not that such a way was not for anyone whomsoever, but for the Hebrews only; and that it lay open unto safety only for those fleeing, not for enemies who pursued them with intent to destroy. Therefore when the whole army had now entered, the sea is poured back again and wraps the Egyptians in its waves, the winds too driving it the same way: there came also rains from heaven, and harsh thunders with lightnings flashing between: thunderbolts too were borne down, and there was altogether nothing lacking of those things which are wont to be sent upon men for their destruction by an angry God: for a night exceedingly murky and dark took hold of them: and thus that whole army was destroyed, so that not even a messenger of the disaster returned home. In these things I find nothing greatly to be blamed: for the rains, thunders, lightnings, and thunderbolts I have confirmed in their place from the Psalmist.

[229] Philo, in relating the crossing of the Hebrews, Philo's account of these things is likewise not without blemishes, although otherwise this author cleaves more closely to the sacred Writings, narrating the foregoing thus: But after sunset there arose a most violent south wind, which drove still further out the sea, then wont to withdraw with the tide, the shores being laid bare, as happens in the outflow of torrents: the night too, dark with thick clouds, was lighted by no stars, so that the gloom might be the more dreadful to the pursuers. Then Moses, being bidden, strikes the sea with his rod: which done, the waters are cleft, and one part is lifted on high, standing solid after the manner of a wall, the other is drawn back as by a bridle set upon it by a hidden force, the middle cleft, being dried, affording an open and broad way for the crossing of the people. Moses, rejoicing at the sight of this so prodigious miracle, gave courage to his own people, and bade them move camp as swiftly as they could. But amid their delaying a new prodigy offered itself. The cloud which hitherto had been wont to go before as guide of the way, was then seen turned back at the rear of the column, as though for its guard, dividing by its interposition the fugitives from the pursuers, fortifying for the one a safer journey, retarding the others and breaking their swift onset. Terrified by which portent, the Egyptians filled all places with tumult and dismay, running upon one another with ranks disordered by fear, and too late and vainly attempting flight.

[230] For the Hebrews at earliest dawn were crossing by the dry way together with their wives and children. But the enemy, and the destruction of the Egyptians, likewise often slips: the waves of the sea again coming together into one, were drowned with their horses and chariots, the blasts of the north wind also rolling back the ebbing tide, so that not even a torchbearer was left surviving to announce to the Egyptians the disaster received. But the Hebrews, amazed that they had obtained a prodigious and unhoped-for victory without blood, and seeing the enemy destroyed in a moment of time, set up two choirs on the shore, one of men, the other of women, and sang to God hymns of thanksgiving, Moses leading the song for the men and his sister for the women, for these led the dances. Thus far Philo, who first changes the order of the event, when he puts the wind before the division of the sea and the striking by Moses. Secondly, he somewhat makes light of the miracle, when he says that the shores were laid bare by the tide helped by the wind. Thirdly, he wrongly brings in a night dark to all, whereas he ought to have ascribed the darkness produced by the murky cloud to the Egyptians alone. Fourthly, he affirms with Josephus and many others that the sea was struck by Moses with the rod: but Scripture has only that Moses stretched forth his hand and lifted his rod over the sea, so that that striking is, at the least, uncertain. Fifthly and finally, he does not sufficiently express those prodigies by which the Lord began to destroy the army of the Egyptians in the sea; and he wrongly records the ebbing course of the sea, by which the miracle is diminished.

[231] The joy and the songs of the Hebrews, rightly related by Philo, the rest written by Josephus about these matters is corrected. Josephus too expresses thus: But the Hebrews were scarcely masters of themselves for the joy conceived from so unlooked-for a deliverance, there being added to this the destruction of their enemies too, whereby their security of liberty was the greater, since no one survived who might desire to claim them into servitude, and God avowedly sent them aid. Wherefore, glad both at their own safety and at the punishment of their enemies, more than any men before them, they spent the whole night in hymns and gladness: and Moses composed in hexameter verse a song containing the praises of God and thanksgivings for the present favor. These things I have written down one by one as I found them in the sacred books. The Hebrews rather spent the day, or at least the morning time, in gladness and songs: for the destruction of the Egyptians happened in the morning watch, or at first dawn. But the same writer sins more gravely when he says that he wrote everything just as he found it in the sacred books, both because he seems from time to time knowingly and deliberately to depart from the sacred Writings, and because he afterwards disputes too timidly about the crossing of the sea, as though the matter had been open to doubt. Josephus presently adds: But on the following day, when the tide and the wind had cast the arms of the Egyptians upon the shore, on which the Hebrews had then pitched camp, Moses, interpreting that this too had been done by divine providence, lest they should be unarmed hereafter, gathered them and distributed them man by man: and thus, being now well furnished, he led them to Mount Sinai, to sacrifice there to God and to offer gifts for the safety of the people. What is here said about the arms of the Egyptians being gathered, although it is not clearly expressed in Scripture, is nevertheless commonly believed, because in Exodus 14, verse 31, the Israelites saw the Egyptians dead upon the sea shore: but that the Hebrews encamped there Josephus wrongly affirms, since sacred Scripture in Numbers 33, enumerating all the stations, is repugnant to it.

[232] Artapanus, in Eusebius, acknowledged the crossing of the Red Sea and the destruction of the Egyptians, but asserts that the matter was related in two ways. For the Memphites say that, since Moses had a great knowledge of the places, he observed the ebbing of the sea, and thus crossed with the people. Thus, forsooth, the Memphite Egyptians strove to ascribe the miraculous crossing, Artapanus acknowledged the crossing, but mingles false with true. which they could not deny, to the skill of Moses, as though it had happened in a natural way. But the flow or ebb of the sea cannot bring it about that the waters rise up on either side after the manner of walls and leave the middle space empty and dry, as it is agreed from the sacred Writings was done here. Wherefore the other account of Artapanus is better, which Eusebius subjoins in this manner: That the king of the Heliopolitans (it was a chief city of Egypt), on account of the treasure which the Jews carried off on loan, being moved, set out against the Jews with a great force: but that Moses struck the sea with his staff, as he was warned by a heavenly voice, and thus crossed the divided sea: and that when the Egyptians pursued after the Jews, they perished both by thunderbolts and by the returning waters, and that the Jews, being delivered, lived thirty years (nay, forty) in the desert, God raining down upon them daily as it were snow (manna, namely) by which they were nourished. Other heathen writers, who have lied much about the departure of the Israelites from Egypt, I do not transfer hither, lest I be too lengthy; and the same reason persuades me to abstain from the fables of the Rabbis.

§ XXIII. The fifth station at Marah, where the people murmurs for want of sweet water, which Moses obtains from the bitter: the sixth station at Elim: the seventh by the Red Sea: the eighth in the desert of Sin, where to the murmuring people quails are first given, and then manna also.

[ ] [The fifth station at Marah, in the desert of Etham, which therefore ought not to be set down as twofold:] The aforesaid Jerome indicates the fifth station of the Hebrews in these words: The fifth station is at Marah, which is interpreted Bitterness. How they came thither is indicated in Numbers 33, verse 8: And departing from Phihahiroth, they passed through the midst of the sea into the wilderness: and having marched three days through the desert of Etham, they camped in Marah. Now the third station had been at Etham; but now they come to the fifth through the desert of Etham. Some have wished to infer from these passages that the Israelites did not cross the breadth of the Red Sea from the Egyptian shore to the Arabian shore; but that they crossed the sea in its length, entering namely by the Arabian shore and going out by the same shore. But that opinion appears to me altogether improbable, because thus they would not have been shut in between the army of Pharaoh and the sea, nor would they truly have crossed through the midst of the sea. Nor does Etham occurring at the third station and the desert of Etham on the journey to the fifth present any difficulty: for Etham seems to have been on the border of Egypt and Arabia to the North of the Red Sea; but the desert of Etham to have extended itself widely into Arabia, or along the Arabian shore of the sea. But the Israelites, while they were at Etham, turned back, as is said in Exodus 14, verse 1, that is, returned southward from the border of Arabia, and then pitched camp on the Egyptian shore of the Red Sea. And so, after they had crossed the sea, they came to the desert of Etham, which is also called the desert of Sur, as we shall presently see.

[234] In Exodus 15, verse 22, the journey to the fifth station and the things done there are related thus: [they murmur there because of the bitterness of the waters, which Moses makes sweet by casting in a piece of wood:] And Moses brought Israel from the Red Sea, and they went forth into the wilderness of Sur: and they marched three days through the wilderness, and found no water. And they came into Marah, and they could not drink the waters of Marah, because they were bitter: whereupon he gave a name also agreeable to the place, calling it Marah, that is, bitterness. And the people murmured against Moses, saying: What shall we drink? But he cried to the Lord, who showed him a piece of wood: which when he had cast into the waters, they were turned into sweetness. How dreadful were the deserts through which the journey had to be undertaken is said in Judith 5, verse 14: But going out from the Red Sea, they took possession of the deserts of Mount Sinai, in which man never could dwell, or son of man rested. There bitter fountains were made sweet for them to drink. Ecclesiasticus, chapter 38, verse 5, compares the wood which the Lord showed Moses with natural medicines, and therefore seems to suggest that the waters were made sweet and drinkable by the natural power of that wood: The Most High, he says, hath created medicines out of the earth, and a wise man will not abhor them. Was not bitter water made sweet with wood? That argument indeed would not conclude in favor of natural medicines, unless the natural power of the wood had made the water sweet. Yet some interpreters dissent, and hold that it was not the wood which gave the sweetness to the water, but that God by a miracle made the waters drinkable at the mere presence of the wood. St. Augustine, doubting of these things in question 57 on Exodus, and there inclining to the former opinion,

which appears to me too the more probable, rightly subjoins: But even in such a nature of the wood, who but the Creator and the Shower of it is to be praised?

[235] Before the Israelites withdrew from that place, God gave them certain precepts, certain precepts given to the people. The sixth station at Elim, in all likelihood ceremonial and judicial, by which he might try how obedient they were to his laws. It is not expressed what those precepts were, nor am I pleased to recount the conjectures of certain men about them. But of the laws given Moses speaks thus in Exodus 15, verse 25 and following: There he appointed him ordinances and judgments, and there he proved him (by giving, namely, the aforesaid precepts as a test of obedience or disobedience), saying: If thou wilt hear the voice of the Lord thy God, and do what is right before him, and obey his commandments, and keep all his precepts, none of the evils that I laid upon Egypt will I bring upon thee: for I am the Lord thy healer. From the fifth station they set out for the sixth, which is called Elim, and which was more commodious than the preceding, nor is it notable for any event. In Numbers 33, verse 9, it is described thus: And departing from Marah, they came into Elim, where there were twelve fountains of water and seventy palm trees: and there they camped. Nor is more said in Exodus 15, verse 27, than this: And the children of Israel came into Elim, where there were twelve fountains of water and seventy palm trees: and they encamped by the waters.

[236] The seventh station of the children of Israel is not recorded in Exodus, because nothing memorable happened there. But in Numbers 33, verse 10, it is briefly described in these words: And departing from thence also (from Elim), they pitched their tents by the Red Sea. St. Jerome raises some difficulty for himself here. [the seventh by the Red Sea, from which they never withdrew far until Mount Sinai.] And it is asked, he says, how, after the crossing of the Red Sea and the fountain of Marah and Elim, they came again to the Red Sea, unless perchance some gulf of the sea met them as they went upon their journey, beside which they encamped. For it is one thing to cross the sea; another to pitch tents near it… Now the word Suph among the Hebrews is compounded of "sea" and "red." But Suph is called both "red" and "rush." Whence we may suspect that they came to a certain marsh which was full both of sedge and of rushes. But that holy Scripture calls all gatherings of waters "sea" there is no doubt. But no difficulty appears to me in that encamping by the Red Sea; nor is it even necessary to imagine some gulf running further inland, much less to substitute some lake for the Red Sea, since the Israelites never had to withdraw far from the Red Sea in order to come to Mount Sinai, which is near the Red Sea. And so it is not to be wondered at that the Israelites at some time encamped by the Red Sea, namely on the Arabian shore, since they never ought to have withdrawn far from it. Many interpreters and geographers have erred in removing Mount Sinai further than is right from the Red Sea, and in believing that the Israelites, before they came to Mount Sinai, penetrated further into Arabia from the Red Sea than was in fact done.

[237] [The eighth station in the desert of Sin, where after a month's journey the provisions fail:] The eighth station of the Israelites was in the wilderness of Sin, of which St. Jerome observes the following: It is to be known that the whole desert as far as Mount Sinai is called Sin, and that from the whole province the place of one station also received its name; as Moab too is the name both of a city and of a province. In this wilderness there are five stations: Jam Suph (otherwise, by the Red Sea), of which we spoke above, and the Desert of Sin, and Dophkah, and Alush, and Rephidim, of which we shall speak in what follows. In Numbers 33, verse 10, the arrival at this station is thus indicated: And departing from the Red Sea, they camped in the desert of Sin. In Exodus 16, the seventh station being omitted, as I have already noted, the following is read of these matters: And they set forward from Elim, and all the multitude of the children of Israel came into the desert of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai; on the fifteenth day of the second month, after they came out of the land of Egypt. The Israelites therefore spent a lunar month upon the journey from Rameses to the desert of Sin: for they had begun their journey on the fifteenth day of the first month. From these things it is gathered that they halted for some days at some of the stations, yet not for many: and that the provisions which they had brought with them out of Egypt lasted thus far, unless in certain less desert places they were able from time to time to obtain some food. But the provisions were at last consumed, and thence arose there a murmuring for this cause.

[238] [a murmuring having arisen thence, God promises food to Moses, and Moses to the people:] Moses relates this in this manner: And all the congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. And the children of Israel said to them: Would to God we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat over the fleshpots and ate bread to the full. Why have you brought us into this desert, that you might destroy all the multitude with famine? And the Lord said to Moses (praying, I suppose, for the need of the people): Behold I will rain bread from heaven for you: let the people go forth and gather what is sufficient for every day: that I may prove them whether they will walk in my law or not. But the sixth day let them provide for to bring in: and let it be double to that they were wont to gather every day. What is said about gathering double on the sixth day, that is, on Friday, the Lord ordained so that the Sabbath day might be holily observed and no work be done on it. I proceed again with the sacred text: And Moses and Aaron said to all the children of Israel: In the evening you shall know that the Lord hath brought you forth out of the land of Egypt: and in the morning you shall see the glory of the Lord: for he hath heard your murmuring against the Lord: but as for us, what are we, that you mutter against us? And Moses said: In the evening the Lord will give you flesh to eat, and in the morning bread to the full; for he hath heard your murmurings with which you have murmured against him: for what are we? Your murmuring is not against us, but against the Lord.

[239] Moses also said to Aaron: Say to the whole congregation of the children of Israel: [God again promises the same to Moses in the hearing of the people, to whom a multitude of quails is given,] Come before the Lord: for he hath heard your murmuring. These things Moses had been taught by the Lord, who had determined to establish anew in another manner his authority with the people, already vindicated by many prodigies, as he presently did: for it is subjoined: And when Aaron spoke to all the assembly of the children of Israel, they looked toward the wilderness: and behold the glory of the Lord appeared in a cloud. And the Lord spoke to Moses (in the hearing of the people), saying: I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel, say to them: In the evening you shall eat flesh, and in the morning you shall have your fill of bread: and you shall know that I am the Lord your God. Both came to pass at the appointed time. So it came to pass in the evening, and quails coming up covered the camp: in the morning also a dew lay (that is, manna) round about the camp. The first benefit was not lasting, but was given to the people only once. The Lord did indeed again give a huge multitude of quails at the Graves of Lust (so the place was named from the deed), but then the quails were given rather for a punishment of the murmurers than for a benefit: but this time the people ate the quails without punishment. Of the former the Psalmist speaks in Psalm 104, verse 40: They asked, and the quail came: and he filled them with the bread of heaven. But of the latter there is treatment in various places.

[240] The other benefit, which God continued for forty years, Moses explains more at large, then manna continued for forty years, relating at the same time how often the people had to be warned to use it in the manner in which God willed — namely, that no one should gather more than the prescribed measure, which was one gomor; that they should not go to gather on the Sabbath day; that they should not keep for the next day, which would be in vain; and other like things, which the rude people did not at once observe, either because it had not sufficiently grasped the mind of the holy Lawgiver, or because it was not sufficiently zealous to keep what was prescribed. Let us hear Moses: And when it (the manna, before called dew) had covered the face of the earth, it appeared in the wilderness small, and as it were beaten with a pestle, like unto the hoarfrost on the ground. And when the children of Israel saw it, they said one to another: Manhu, which signifieth, What is this? For they knew not what it was. And Moses said to them: This is the bread which the Lord hath given you to eat. This is the word that the Lord hath commanded: Let every one gather of it as much as is enough to eat: a gomor for every man, according to the number of your souls that dwell in a tent, so shall you take of it. And the children of Israel did so: and they gathered, one more, another less. And they measured by the measure of a gomor: neither had he more that had gathered more: nor did he find less that had provided less: but every one had gathered according to what they were able to eat.

[241] And Moses said to them: Let no man leave thereof till the morning. [about which various things are observed, especially for the observance of the Sabbath;] And they hearkened not to him, but some of them left until the morning, and it began to be full of worms, and it putrefied: and Moses was angry with them. Now every one gathered in the morning as much as might suffice to eat: and after the sun grew hot, it melted. But on the sixth day they gathered twice as much, that is, two gomors every man: and all the rulers of the multitude came, and told Moses. And he said to them: This is what the Lord hath spoken: Tomorrow is the rest of the Sabbath sanctified to the Lord: whatsoever work is to be done, do it: and the meats that are to be dressed, dress them: and whatsoever shall remain, lay it up until the morning. And they did so as Moses had commanded, and it did not putrefy, neither was there worm found in it. And Moses said: Eat it today, because it is the Sabbath of the Lord: today it shall not be found in the field. Gather it six days: but on the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord, therefore it shall not be found. And the seventh day came: and some of the people going forth to gather, found none. And the Lord said to Moses: How long will you refuse to keep my commandments and my law? See that the Lord hath given you the Sabbath, and for this hath allowed you on the sixth day double provisions: let every man stay at home, let none go forth out of his place on the seventh day. This rebuke does not fall upon Moses, but upon certain Israelites, who against the command

of the Lord had gone out of the camp on the Sabbath day to gather manna. But the command of the Lord and of Moses at last began to be observed by all, as follows: And the people kept the sabbath on the seventh day.

[242] the shape, taste, use, and excellence of the manna: The name of the food given to the Israelites, and its shape and taste, are presently explained in this manner: And the house of Israel called the name thereof (of the food) MAN: which was like coriander seed, white, and the taste thereof like to flour with honey. Of the same it is read thus in Numbers XI, verse 7: Now the manna was like coriander seed, of the color of bdellium (that is, of a white and shining color, or inclining somewhat to yellow). And the people went about and gathering it, ground it in a mill, or beat it in a mortar, and boiled it in a pot, and made cakes thereof of the taste of bread tempered with oil. And when the dew fell in the night upon the camp, the manna also fell together with it. The more excellent effects of this food the Wise Man describes in chapter 16, verse 20, celebrating it thus: Instead of which things thou didst feed thy people with the food of angels: and gavest them bread from heaven prepared without labor, having in it all that is delicious and the sweetness of every taste. For thy sustenance showed thy sweetness to thy children: and serving every man's will, it was turned to what every man liked. These words clearly prove that the taste of the manna was not one only, but that by a singular benefit of God the giver it was changed according to the will and desire of those who ate it, provided that they did not render themselves unworthy of this bounty of God: for most interpreters think that this same benefit of various tastes was not granted to the impious, whom this food soon began to weary, because they perceived only the natural taste, first indicated by Moses. St. Augustine embraces this exposition in book 2 of the Retractations, chapter 20, there restricting what he had asserted without any restriction about the variety of the manna's taste in book 1 to the Questions of Januarius, chapter 3.

[243] The benefit of manna given to the Hebrews in the desert is celebrated in various passages of Scripture. one gomor of it laid up in the tabernacle. Psalm 77, verse 23: And he (God) commanded the clouds from above, and opened the doors of heaven. And he rained down manna upon them to eat, and gave them the bread of heaven. Man ate the bread of angels: he sent them provisions in abundance. I pass over other passages both of the Old and of the New Testament, because they hand down nothing more about the manna than has been said hitherto, and only subjoin with Moses the following from Exodus 16, verse 32: And Moses said: This is the word which the Lord hath commanded: Fill a gomor of it, and let it be kept unto generations to come hereafter; that they may know the bread wherewith I fed you in the wilderness, when you were brought forth out of the land of Egypt. And Moses said to Aaron: Take a vessel and put manna into it, as much as a gomor can hold: and lay it up before the Lord, to keep unto your generations, as the Lord commanded Moses. And Aaron put it in the tabernacle (namely in that which then stood, and afterwards in the tabernacle of the covenant) to be kept. And the children of Israel ate manna forty years, till they came to a habitable land: with this meat were they fed, until they reached the borders of the land of Canaan. Now a gomor is the tenth part of an ephi. These last words are added for the explanation of the measure of a gomor, which was given to each: but about its quantity authors do not agree.

§ XXIV. The things done in the desert after the crossing of the Red Sea up to the obtaining of manna, from Josephus and Philo.

[ ] Josephus relates the journey from the Red Sea rightly enough, Josephus described the journey from the Red Sea to the place Marah compendiously and rightly enough; but the things done there he has corrupted with his wonted rashness, as I shall presently show. This fresh gladness, he says, at the safety unexpectedly received was somewhat darkened by the trouble of the journey by which they were being led through the deserts to Mount Sinai: because a region had to be traversed difficult on account of the extreme want of food and of waters, and not fit even for the feeding of brutes, much less of men: for it was wholly parched, and having no moisture at all, whence fruits are wont to come forth. But they necessarily entered upon such a way, since they could take no other, and they carried with them water drawn before they entered the desert, their Leader having so forewarned them: which being consumed, they got water by digging wells with great labor on account of the hardness of the earth: and not even so did they find it either good enough or in sufficient quantity. Journeying in this manner, they come at the first evening to a certain place, to which on account of the corrupt waters they gave the name Mar, the word signifying bitterness: and there, being weary from the road, and their provision too being now consumed, and beginning to feel want, it pleased them to turn aside.

[245] A well found by chance invited them to stay, which, although it could not suffice for so great a host, yet on account of the nature of the region afforded some comfort: for they heard that they would find no water as they went on; but he corrupts the things done, and especially the changing of the bitter water this very water too was bitter, and drinkable by no one, not by man only, but not even by a beast of burden. But Moses, seeing that their spirit had fallen, and having nothing to say (for the matter was not with an enemy whom he could repel by valor, but both men, and the unwarlike multitude of women and children, were in equal peril), hardly disentangled a counsel, referring the misery of the people to his own misfortune: for to this one man there ran together the poor women, imploring help for their infants, and the men for the women; that he should not despise them, and should seek some remedy of safety. Turning therefore to prayers, he begs that God, changing the water, would render it from corrupt to drinkable.

[246] And when he had granted this favor, into sweet. he seizes a piece of wood lying there by chance, and, splitting it in the middle along its length, casts it into the water, and teaches the Hebrews that God, having heard his prayers, had promised that he would give water to those who desired it, if they diligently performed his commands. And when they asked what needed to be done that the water might be changed, he bids all the strongest of them vie in emptying out the well, saying that when the greater part was drained the rest would be drinkable. Which being done, the water, made purer by continual stirring, offered a drink now not to be despised to the multitude. This writer has obscured the divine benefit by which through the wood assigned by God the bitterness was taken from the waters, when he attributes the effect to continual stirring, which ought to have been ascribed to the wood or, as others hold, to the miracle alone. He sins in these matters, first, when he writes that a piece of wood found by chance — which Scripture likewise does not record to have been split — was cast into the waters: for that wood was not found by a chance accident, but was shown to Moses by an angel. He sins, secondly, more gravely, when he attributes the healing of the water to the industry of Moses alone, as though it had been made sweet by stirring, thinking that this would be more credible to the heathen. Thirdly, the Hebrew writer dissembles the murmuring of his own people, and changes it into a modest imploring of help wrung out by necessity, thus consulting the honor of his nation. But true things ought to have been written, not more credible things or things honorable to the Hebrews; especially since he said that he would narrate all that he found in the sacred Writings.

[247] Philo, the murmuring of the people, Philo relates all these things more sincerely, writing thus: Then, having left the sea, they made their journey for some while in safety, being snatched from their enemies: but when for three days they found no water, again, sorrowful for thirst, they returned to complaints, as though they had received no benefit: for present trouble is always wont to take away the memory of past pleasure. Then, having caught sight of springs, they run up joyfully, deceived by a vain hope, as though they would drink: for the waters were bitter, and, offended by the taste of them, they failed both in soul and in body, grieving not so much for their own case as for their children's, whom, asking for drink, they could not look upon with dry eyes. But some, more inconstant and of less sure piety, blamed even what was past, as things which brought not safety but a heavier destruction, because it were much better to fall by the enemy's hand than to be tormented besides with thirst: for there was a swift death, or rather a passage to immortality; but this was true death, at once long-lasting and full of torment, since the feeling of it is more feared than itself.

[248] and the changing of the bitter water, sets forth more rightly. In this lamentation of the people Moses again as a suppliant prays God; that, knowing the weakness of living creatures, and especially of men, who through the necessities of the body depend upon food and serve only a hard belly, he would grant pardon to those in despair; and would fill up the want of all, and that without delay, since the natural heedlessness of mortals requires swift help. He, easily entreated, opens the eye of the suppliant soul, and shows a piece of wood, which, being taken up, he bade be cast into the springs. Whether that power was native, hitherto unknown; or was then first put into it for the present use. And when this was done, the springs received sweetness, so that they were drinkable, as though they had never before had anything bitter, so wholly was no trace of the former fault left. In this manner, their thirst being quenched, a doubled pleasure befell them, since whenever it comes beyond hope it brings the greater gladness. Then, their water-jars being filled, they departed as men who had feasted at a most festive banquet, drunk with a drunkenness not besotted, but with that sober one which they had drawn unmixed from the pledgings of their Prince most devoted to piety. Thus far Philo, rightly doubting whether the natural power of the wood, or a power put into it by God for this use, made the waters sweet: for both are probable.

[249] But Josephus adds other errors to those already spoken of, [The errors of Josephus, who refers the murmuring of the people to a place not its own:] continuing thus: Thence, having moved camp, they came to the field of Ilym (Elim), not a bad one, as it seemed at first sight from afar, for it bore palms. But when they came nearer, it disappointed the expectation of all. For the palms were not more than seventy, and those not very tall on account of the dryness of the place, for they were not even watered by the springs, which were twelve in that place, but not so abundant that by sending forth rivulets they supplied moisture to the earth. Wherefore, turning to dig out the sand, they could light upon no veins, and if any little trickled, it was made useless for drinking, being disturbed by the digging. The trees too bore not much fruit for the same want of waters. Wherefore there arose a murmuring of the multitude against their Leader, laying the whole cause of their misery upon him alone: for the journey of thirty days being accomplished, they now missed the whole provision which they had brought out with them, already consumed; and since they found nothing of food in the desert land, they were very little short of despair: and thus, present want shaking out the memory of past benefits both of God and of Moses, being roused to anger, they seemed on the very point of seizing stones and rushing upon their Commander, crying out that he was the author of their destruction. In these things Josephus errs, first, in that he accuses the place Elim, as though the Hebrews there labored under a scarcity of waters: for the place is praised in Exodus 15, verse 27, for its twelve fountains, and they encamped by the waters, nor is any scarcity of water there suggested. He errs again when the murmuring, which arose later, he refers to that place, and partly

attributes it to a scarcity of waters.

[250] More rightly Philo disputes of that place thus: And thus they came to the second station (from the crossing of the Red Sea, Philo's discourse about the station Elim: but otherwise the sixth), having waters and trees, whose name was Elim, watered by twelve fountains, near which were seventy palms, branching and most verdant, bringing a good omen to the nation, if one observe with the keen eyes of the mind: for it is divided into twelve tribes, each like to a fountain, as gushing with the streams of piety, from which illustrious deeds unceasingly proceed. But the heads of the families of the whole nation were seventy, deservedly likened to the palm, the most excellent of trees: which, most beautiful to look upon, bears also the best fruit, and has its vital force not buried in the roots, as the rest have, but at the top, as it were a heart, set in the midst of the branches, by which it is thronged on every side, as a prince by his guards. Of which sort is also the nature of any mind that has tasted holiness, for it is wont to look upward and to dwell among lofty things, taken up with the contemplation of divine beauties, counting earthly things as worthless, and reckoning these to be play and those to be earnest. What is said of the seventy princes of the nation we shall afterwards see appointed.

[251] other errors of Josephus in the murmuring of the people quieted Philo then proceeds to the murmuring of the people which arose in the desert of Sin for want of food, which Josephus anticipated, as we have already seen. Let us hear first, then, in what manner the same Josephus relates the quiet restored to the people. But he, he says, perceiving the multitude irritated and so bitterly roused against him, trusting in God and in the consciousness of a matter administered in good faith, comes forth into the midst of them as they cried out and threatened with stones; and since he showed a certain singular grace in his countenance, and excelled above all in popular eloquence, he began to soften their anger, beseeching them not, being intent upon the present necessity, to cast away the memory of all past benefits: and to turn their mind from the difficulty then pressing them to the grace and gifts of God, with which they had so often beyond expectation been heaped. Now too they should expect that he would procure a good issue, who, it was likely, had sent this strait of affairs to prove their fortitude, patience, and gratitude, and that it might appear whether the past or the present had more weight with them. They must beware, therefore, lest through impatience and ingratitude they be found unworthy of the divine favor, who both despise his will, in following which they had left Egypt, and pursue his Minister with unjust hatreds, especially since hitherto they could not complain of having been disappointed in any of those things which he had undertaken to accomplish at God's bidding.

[252] attributing to Moses a speech longer than is right, He then enumerates one by one how the Egyptians were afflicted while they tried to hold them back against the will of God: how the same river was to them indeed bloody and useless for drinking, but to these sweet and drinkable; how, when the sea, ebbing back, yielded them a place and a way for escape, they, escaping by it, obtained safety, but beheld their enemies destroyed by slaughter: and how, being unarmed up to that day, God supplying, they had provided themselves an abundance of arms too: then how often God had snatched them safe, beyond the expectation of all, from the very jaws of destruction, who, since he is always almighty, one must not even then despair of his providence. Wherefore all things must be borne with an even mind, and it must be considered that help is not late, however it be deferred, which is received while things are still whole; and so it must be judged that their perils are not despised by God, but their fortitude and love of liberty are being tried, that he may see whether out of desire of it they can endure the want of both food and waters, or would rather choose, after the manner of cattle, to serve masters who feed them for their own use.

[253] and exaggerating his danger too much, That he himself indeed feared not so much for himself privately, to whom, if unjustly slain, no evil could befall, as for their safety, if by this stoning they should seem to condemn the deeds and counsels of God. By these words he brought the raging men back to a saner mind, and struck the stones out of the hands of men now armed for the deed. Thus far Josephus, to be corrected first in that he ascribes to Moses the danger of stoning, and asserts that stones had already been seized by the people, although in the Scriptures no mention is made of a danger of stoning at that time, but only afterwards at another murmuring, and then at Rephidim. Secondly, he does not rightly attribute popular eloquence to the Lawgiver, and therefore has woven a longer speech as though spoken by him: for Moses was not wont to restrain a murmuring people with many words; but to have recourse to prayers to God, and to stop the mouths of the complainers with miracles and prodigies.

[254] Philo has expressed this murmuring of the people in these words: but Philo, that murmuring, Then not much time flowed by, when, their provisions failing, they were assailed by hunger, as though necessities pressed them by turns. For those grievous mistresses, thirst and hunger, each urged them in its own season, so that when the one ceased the other succeeded: and this to the afflicted was most troublesome and intolerable: who, after they seemed to themselves to have escaped the peril of thirst, had fallen into the snares of hunger. Nor did present want alone weigh upon them, but also the despair of provision for the future: for, seeing the vast solitude, barren of crops, they lost heart. Nothing appeared but rough crags, or salty plains or rocky hillocks, or the highest heaps of sands: nowhere a river or torrent or perennial stream, nowhere a spring, no crops, no trees, neither cultivated nor wild, no winged nor earthly animal, save venomous reptiles destructive to man, serpents and scorpions. Besides, there came into their minds the plenty and richness of the Egyptian region, which comparing with the want that pressed them, they were the more indignant; casting such words as these to one another: We removed in hope of liberty, now we cannot even live. Happy in our Leader's promises, in fact we are the most wretched of all mortals. What end will there be of so long and so useless a journey? Both voyages and journeys by land have some appointed term, either a harbor thronged with commerce, or a city or some region.

[255] We alone wander through pathless solitudes, destitute of the hope of all things: and the mind of Moses in it, sets forth more rightly. for we go forward through deserts like a most open sea, and day by day a greater waste offers itself. After he has puffed us up with vain words and filled our ears with hope, now he vexes our bellies with hunger, not providing the necessary food. Under the pretext of leading out a colony he has deceived so great a multitude, drawing it away from cultivated places into uncultivated: it remains for him to lead it down to the shades, which is the last way of life. Assailed by these reproaches, it was not so troublesome to him to hear ill as to bear the inconstancy of men: for having experienced very many miracles beyond the wonted order of things, they ought no longer to follow their own conjectures however probable, but rather to embrace the faith of which they had so often seen proofs. Yet since he reckoned that no calamity is heavier than want, he readily pardoned the unskilled common folk, of its own nature changeable, intent only upon present things, which both take away the memory of the past and remove hope for the future. Thus Philo, so amplifying from conjecture the words of the murmuring people and the vastness of the desert as nevertheless not to depart from probability.

[256] Josephus then writes these things about the food obtained through Moses, namely the quails and the manna: Josephus's account of the quails given to the people, But since he (Moses) understood that they had not been stirred up for nothing, he had recourse to prayers and supplications: and, having climbed a certain watch-height, he besought the help of God for their affairs afflicted by want, in whose hands alone the safety of the people was laid up: and that he would propitiously grant pardon to the people, exasperated by hard circumstances and for this cause departing from their duty after the manner of men. But God promises that the people shall be his care, and that the help which they asked would be at hand forthwith. These things having been obtained, Moses goes down to the multitude: and they, perceiving him glad at the divine promises, themselves too, laying aside their sorrow, took on cheerful faces. Then he, standing in the midst of the assembly, says that he brings from God a remedy for the present necessity. And not long after, a great force of quails — which kind of birds the Arabian gulf breeds above the rest — having crossed the sea that lay between, weary with the long flight, which anyhow is not lofty, is carried down among the Hebrews. And they, seizing eagerly the food divinely offered, sought a remedy for their want: and Moses turns again to supplications, on account of the aid promised by God and at the same time displayed: who to those thus fed presently sent down other food.

[257] as also about the manna raining down, For meanwhile, as Moses raised his palms in prayer, a dew glides down from heaven: which, when it had clung to his hands and thickened, he, suspecting that this food too was sent down by God, tastes it: and, glad at what he had discovered, he warns the crowd, ignorant and thinking that it was snowing in a wintry storm, that they were deceived in their opinion, and that no common dew was coming down from heaven, but food which should take away from those destitute of other help the peril of famine: and presently he offers them what he had tasted first, that they might believe upon trial. And they, after his example, gladly enjoyed the new food, which in sweetness came near to the sweetness of honey, but in appearance to the likeness of that spice which is called bdellium, in size like coriander seed: and each for himself gathered it eagerly, but presently they are warned by an edict to gather each day an equal measure of an assaron: for this kind of food would not be wanting. Which was done lest it should be lacking to the weaker, while the stronger through greed gathered more than enough: and if anyone, despising the edict, had gathered beyond the prescribed measure, he, being more wearied, had nothing more than the rest. For whatever remained above the assaron on the following day was rendered useless, being spoiled with bitterness and worms: so divine and incredible was this food: whose nature is such that he who has it desires no other.

[258] in which various errors are pointed out: Nay, even in our times that whole region is rained upon with this kind, just as of old God sent down that food for Moses's sake; this the Hebrews call Manna: for this word man in our vernacular is interrogative, asking "What is this?" and thus they obtained by this food a perpetual gladness and security, by which for forty years thereafter they were sustained. Some things are again to be observed here. First, he brings in Moses praying on a certain watch-height, or on a certain hill, about which watch-height there is nothing in the Scriptures. On the contrary, he keeps silence about God having spoken to Moses in the hearing of the people. Secondly, of another prayer of Moses after the quails were received there is likewise nothing in the sacred books. Thirdly, it is an open fiction that the manna clung to the hands of the praying Lawgiver and was tasted by him; and that the people thought it was snowing, and were taught out of their error by Moses: for the people did not see the manna coming down, since it fell by night or at first dawn, and not within the camp, but round about the camp, where it was found in the morning, as is said in Exodus 16, verse 13. Fourthly, by bdellium, to which the manna is said to be like in color, Josephus understands a spice, so interpreting the Hebrew word

bedolach, which the Seventy explained as crystal: Pagninus interpreted it a pearl, others onyx, others with Pliny hold that bdellium is a transparent gum. From these things it sufficiently appears that the signification of the Hebrew word is uncertain. But it is certain that the manna was white, since Scripture has this, with which Philo too rightly agrees.

[259] Fifthly and finally, the learned dispute whether the common manna, various differences between the common manna and the manna of the Israelites. which Josephus says was in Arabia in his own time, and which is even now found, is of the same nature with the manna on which the Israelites were fed. To settle that quarrel is not easy: but it can be affirmed for certain that the manna was given to the Israelites by a singular benefit of God, and had many qualities which the manna of today lacks. For first, it fell constantly for forty years, the Sabbaths alone excepted, and in so great quantity that it sufficed as food for an innumerable multitude. But the manna of today is not found constantly through the whole time of the year, but only in certain months; nor is so great an abundance of it found; nor does it exclude the Sabbath days. Then, the common manna is not at once corrupted, but is kept and sold; and it lacks all those effects surpassing nature which we have narrated in their place of the manna of the Israelites. Wherefore it seems frivolous to wish to compare the common manna outright with the Israelite manna, and to assert that the Israelites were sustained for forty years by that food, such as is now found in Arabia, without any miracle.

[260] Philo, in a reversed order, treated first of the manna and then of the quails; Philo, in describing the manna given to the people, relating the later benefit first in this manner: And so, when all were sorrowful and expected nothing but the utmost calamity, hanging, as they thought, over their heads: God, moved partly by his own clemency, partly in honor of the Leader chosen at his own bidding, that he might the more commend his piety and holiness, equal in prosperous and in doubtful affairs, displayed a remedy for their misery, new and before unheard of: that by such manifest signs of his favor he might instil into them a reverence for his presence: lest, if at any time all things should not fall out as they wished, they should cast away hope and patience together. What then happened? On the next day at dawn much dew fell round about the camp, little by little after the manner of snow, unlike this common and almost daily dew, since indeed it was neither water, nor hail, nor snow, nor ice, of which kind the clouds bring in wintry storms: but small in the likeness of millet, most white, so that it lay in heaps outside the tents in a wondrous spectacle, at which, being astonished, they asked of their Leader what this rain was, never before seen, or for what use it had been sent down. Then he divinely uttered this oracle: To mortals have been given the level fields to be cleft with furrows, that they may render to the husbandmen their seed with the increase of the yearly produce, as much as suffices for an abundance of the things necessary for life: but to God not one part, but the whole world is subject, whose portions he turns by his power to whatever uses he wills. Now it has so seemed good to him, that the air, not the water, should serve for food, since the earth too is wont to produce rain. The Egyptian river, yearly flooding and watering the fields, what else is it than an earthly rain?

[261] A marvellous thing indeed, even if nothing new had been added besides: omits many things, yet there was added what you would wonder at more. Vessels were eagerly brought on the beasts and on men's shoulders, that provision might suffice for the future also: but there was no need to lay it up, since God determined always to supply fresh gifts. The pressing necessity was abundantly satisfied, all feeding sweetly: whatever was kept for the morrow perished wholly, so corrupted that it stank and swarmed with little worms. Casting away therefore these remnants, they found other food, both raining down daily with the morning dew, and also then an exceptional honor was paid to the seventh day. For since no work is permitted on that day, a rest being enjoined upon small and great, lest the holy days should be violated on account of necessary use, God rained down double on the day before the Sabbath, the people being bidden to gather what should last for the next two days, the food meanwhile remaining uncorrupted contrary to custom. There followed another miracle also by no means to be passed over in silence: for forty continuous years, throughout all that so long journey, the necessary sustenance was not lacking according to the once appointed order of times, no otherwise than if it were measured out and distributed to each from granaries: and at the same time they learned the observance of that most sacred and most longed-for day. For whereas they had long since asked what was the birthday of the world, on which this universe was completed; a matter unknown to their forefathers they learned at last, not only by an oracle but also by a most manifest proof. For they saw that whatever was left over on the other days was corrupted (as I have said), but that what rained down on the day before the Sabbath came double and lasted for two days. But its use was of this kind: at first light, when gathered, they ground or beat it, then, when it was boiled, they fed most sweetly as though upon cakes, without the labor of a baker.

[262] and wrongly places the quails after it. These things about the manna given to the Israelites Philo says, whom the reader will easily see to have omitted not a few circumstances, provided he compare the account given from the Scriptures. The same writer has also added his own conjectures, when he brings in Moses speaking with the people. But his chief lapse is that he suggests that the quails were given after the manna, since he subjoins these things about them: Nay, they did not long lack even more delicate foods, such as are had in inhabited and happy regions, God bringing forth his riches in the solitude. For at the evening hours a cloud of quails flew up from the sea, overshadowing the whole camp, so near to the earth that it easily afforded a fowling. By catching and cooking these, as it pleased each, they enjoyed the best flesh, so that they did not miss dainties. The quails were given at evening time, and before the manna; but not on each evening, as Philo may be understood in the obvious sense — a further lapse here, if he meant that.

§ XXV. The ninth station at Dophkah, the tenth at Alush, the eleventh at Rephidim, where water is given to the murmurers from the struck rock: the victory over the Amalekites: the coming of Jethro.

[ ] The ninth and tenth station: the eleventh at Rephidim, where the people murmurs, After the Israelites had obtained the quails and the manna at the eighth station, they again gave themselves to the journey. The ninth and tenth stations Moses did not record in Exodus, because nothing of great moment occurred at them; but in Numbers 33, verse 12 and following, he has this of them: And departing thence, they came into Dophkah. The first letter being changed, the Seventy read Raphca, and St. Jerome in his Letter to Fabiola writes Dephca. The tenth station at Alush is presently thus subjoined: And departing from Dophkah, they camped in Alush. Immediately too there is added the eleventh station at Rephidim in these words: And going out from Alush they pitched their tents in Rephidim, where the people wanted water to drink. In Exodus 17 these things are read about this journey and the arrival at Rephidim: Therefore all the multitude of the children of Israel setting forward from the desert of Sin by their stations, according to the word of the Lord, encamped in Rephidim, where there was no water for the people to drink. And they chode with Moses and said: Give us water, that we may drink. And Moses answered them: Why chide you with me? Wherefore do you tempt the Lord? So the people was thirsty there for want of water, and murmured against Moses, saying: Why didst thou make us go forth out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our beasts with thirst?

[264] Moses, being again assailed by this murmuring, had recourse to the Lord, to whom Moses gives water from the struck rock. to seek a remedy for the evil: nor did his hope deceive him. Hear the sacred text: And Moses cried to the Lord, saying: What shall I do to this people? Yet a little more and they will stone me. And the Lord said to Moses: Go before the people, and take with thee of the ancients of Israel; and take in thy hand the rod wherewith thou didst strike the river, and go. Behold I will stand there before thee, upon the rock Horeb: and thou shalt strike the rock, and water shall come out of it, that the people may drink. Moses did so before the ancients of Israel: and he called the name of that place TEMPTATION, because of the chiding of the children of Israel, and because they tempted the Lord, saying: Is the Lord among us or not? In Psalm 77, verse 13, it is said of this benefit of God: He struck the rock in the wilderness: and he gave them to drink, as out of the great deep. And he brought forth water out of the rock: and made streams run down as rivers. And Psalm 104, verse 41: He opened the rock, and waters flowed: rivers ran down in the dry land. The Apostle makes mention of the same deed in 1 Corinthians 10, verse 4. But this murmuring is not to be confounded with another, which happened toward the end of Moses's life at the Water of Contradiction, where he struck the rock twice to draw waters from it.

[265] Another peril came upon the Israelites in the same place from the Amalekites, The victory over the Amalekites who dwelt in Arabia Petraea between Egypt and Canaan, and who attacked the people of Israel unawares. Moses narrates the deed in Exodus 17, verse 8 and following, in this manner: And Amalec came, and fought against Israel in Rephidim. And Moses said to Joshua: Choose out men, and go out and fight against Amalec: tomorrow I will stand on the top of the hill, having the rod of God in my hand. Joshua did as Moses had spoken, and fought against Amalec: but Moses and Aaron and Hur went up upon the top of the hill. And when Moses lifted up his hands, Israel overcame: but if he let them down a little, Amalec overcame. And Moses's hands were heavy: namely on account of the long stretching upward, which God willed in order to give the victory to the Israelites. So they took a stone and put under him, and he sat on it: and Aaron and Hur stayed up his hands on both sides. And it came to pass that (in this manner) his hands were not weary until sunset. And Joshua put Amalec and his people to flight by the edge of the sword.

[266] Of this victory Eliachim the priest speaks thus in Judith 4, verse 13: obtained by the prayers of Moses: Remember Moses the servant of the Lord, who overcame Amalec that trusted in his own strength, and in his power, and in his army, and in his shields, and in his chariots, and in his horsemen, not by fighting with the sword, but by praying with holy prayers. To this victory too, and to the water given from the rock, the Wise Man looked in chapter XI, writing thus of the Israelites: He guided their works by the hands of the holy Prophet (Moses). They went through wildernesses that were not inhabited: and in desert places they pitched their tents. They stood against their enemies, and revenged themselves of their adversaries. They were thirsty, and they called upon thee, and water was given them out of the high rock, and a refreshment of their thirst out of the hard stone. For by what things their enemies (the Egyptians) were punished, in the failing of their drink, and in those things when the children of Israel abounded, they rejoiced

; by these things, when they (the Egyptians) lacked them, it went well with those others.

[267] God afterwards bids punishment be exacted of the Amalekites. Besides, God willed that at some time punishment should be exacted of the Amalekites for this inhuman deed, by which they attacked the Israelites, who meditated no evil, on their journey. Hear Moses in Exodus 17, verse 14: And the Lord said to Moses: Write this for a memorial in a book, and deliver it to the ears of Joshua: for I will destroy the memory of Amalec from under heaven. And Moses built an altar: and called the name thereof, The Lord is my exaltation, saying: Because the hand of the throne of the Lord, and the war of the Lord, shall be against Amalec, from generation to generation. His precept about punishing the Amalekites the Lord repeated in Deuteronomy 25, verse 17: Remember what Amalec did to thee in the way, when thou camest out of Egypt: how he met thee, and slew the hindmost of thy army, who sat down being weary, when thou wast spent with hunger and labor, and he feared not God. Therefore when the Lord thy God shall give thee rest, and shall have subdued all the nations round about in the land which he hath promised thee; thou shalt blot out his name from under heaven. See thou forget it not. The charge of utterly destroying the Amalekites was committed by God to Saul; who nevertheless executed the Lord's command less exactly, and was therefore himself deprived of the kingdom. See 1 Kings, chapter 15.

[268] Jethro comes to the camp with Zipporah and the sons of Moses, At the same station Jethro came to the Prophet with Zipporah and the sons of Moses, and suggested to him a useful counsel about setting up inferior magistrates, as the often-praised St. Jerome notes, saying: The adversary (the Amalekite) being overcome, Jethro came upon them, brought Zipporah and both her sons; he gives the counsel of seventy Elders. Let us hear Moses, Exodus 18: And when Jethro, the priest of Midian, the kinsman of Moses, had heard all the things that God had done to Moses and to Israel his people, and that the Lord had brought forth Israel out of Egypt: he took Zipporah the wife of Moses, whom he had sent back, and her two sons, of whom one was called Gershom, his Father saying: I have been a stranger in a foreign land: and the other Eliezer: For the God of my father, said he, is my helper, and hath delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh. And Jethro the kinsman of Moses came with his sons and his wife to Moses into the desert, where he was camped by the mountain of God (Horeb, namely). And he sent word to Moses (before his coming, by a messenger), saying: I Jethro thy kinsman come to thee, and thy wife, and thy two sons with her. And he went out to meet his kinsman, and worshipped and kissed him: and they saluted one another with words of peace. It is doubted in this place whether this Jethro is the same as Raguel the father-in-law of Moses; because here in Latin he is called not father-in-law but kinsman. But it is the same Hebrew word chothen, which is elsewhere rendered father-in-law, elsewhere kinsman, and which properly signifies a connection by marriage, as various interpreters observe. For this cause the Hebrew word has in this place too been rendered father-in-law by various men, as it is rendered in the Vulgate of the same Jethro in Exodus 3, verse 1. Wherefore I hold it more probable that this Jethro was the very father-in-law of Moses, who brought his daughter Zipporah to him; as I have said more at large at number 65.

[269] But what was done between Moses and Jethro, Moses presently goes on to narrate in this manner: and is honorably received by Moses, And when he (Jethro) was come into the tent, Moses told his kinsman all that the Lord had done to Pharaoh and the Egyptians in favor of Israel; and all the labor which had befallen them in the journey, and that the Lord had delivered them. And Jethro rejoiced for all the good things that the Lord had done to Israel, because he had delivered them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and he said: Blessed is the Lord, who hath delivered you out of the hand of the Egyptians and out of the hand of Pharaoh; who hath delivered his people out of the hand of Egypt. Now I know that the Lord is great above all gods: because they dealt proudly against them. So Jethro the kinsman of Moses offered holocausts and sacrifices to God: and Aaron and all the ancients of Israel came to eat bread with him before God. That Jethro was a priest of the true God I have already noted before; and this is abundantly gathered from the sacrifice offered by him. Nor do these words, Now I know, etc., prove anything to the contrary: for it cannot be inferred from them that the power of God was not before known to Jethro, since the angel bearing the person of God in Genesis 22, verse 12, says in the same manner to Abraham as he prepared to sacrifice his son: Now I know that thou fearest God, etc. By the words spoken, therefore, Jethro only suggests that the prodigies wrought in Egypt, which Moses had narrated to him, are an illustrious argument of the divine power.

[270] These things being observed, let us proceed with Moses: And the next day Moses sat to judge the people, to whom he suggests a counsel about creating inferior judges: who stood by Moses from morning until night. And when his kinsman had seen all things, to wit, that he did among the people, he said: What is it that thou dost among the people? Why sittest thou alone, and all the people wait from morning till night? To whom Moses answered: The people come to me to seek the judgment of God. And when any controversy falleth out among them, they come to me to judge between them, and to show the precepts of God and his laws. But he said: The thing thou dost is not good: thou art spent with foolish labor, both thou and this people that is with thee: the business is above thy strength, thou alone canst not bear it. But hear my words and counsels, and God shall be with thee. Be thou to the people in those things that pertain to God, to bring their words to him: and to show the people the ceremonies, and the manner of worshipping, and the way wherein they ought to walk, and the work that they ought to do. And provide out of all the people able men, and such as fear God, in whom there is truth, and that hate avarice; and appoint of them rulers of thousands, and of hundreds, and of fifties, and of tens, who may judge the people at all times: and when any great matter soever shall fall out, let them refer it to thee, and let them judge the lesser matters only: that so it may be lighter for thee, the burden being shared out unto others. If thou dost this, thou shalt fulfil the commandment of God, and shalt be able to bear his precepts: and all this people shall return to their places with peace. Thus Jethro, freely as by a father-in-law's authority, and prudently.

[271] But Moses, as he was a man no less docile and humble than prudent, neither took the freedom of the admonition ill, nor neglected the counsel given, as presently follows: And when he had heard him, he did all things that he suggested unto him. And choosing able men out of all Israel, but Moses, having followed it with great praise of humility, he appointed them rulers of the people, rulers over thousands, and over hundreds, and over fifties, and over tens. And they judged the people at all times: and whatsoever was of greater difficulty they referred to him, and they judged the easier cases only. And he let his kinsman depart: and he returned and went into his own country. The holy Fathers attend the docility and humility of Moses with wonderful elogia, because he so readily followed the counsel of his father-in-law. But a brief observation of St. Augustine will suffice, who speaks thus of these matters in question 68 on Exodus: Here too an example of humility is suggested, in that Moses, with whom God spoke, did not disdain nor despise the counsel of his foreign father-in-law. Although Jothor himself too, since he was not an Israelite, whether he is to be reckoned among the men who worshipped the true God and were religiously wise, just as Job also, since he was not of that people, is deservedly asked: nay, it is held more credible.

[272] he institutes various magistracies: Further, Moses in Deuteronomy 1, verse 9, narrates somewhat more at large how he appointed judges and instructed them, addressing the people thus: And I said to you at that time: I alone am not able to bear you: for the Lord your God hath multiplied you, and you are this day as the stars of heaven, for multitude … I alone am not able to bear your business, and the charge and your quarrels. Let me have from among you wise and understanding men, and such whose conversation is approved among your tribes, that I may appoint them your rulers. Then you answered me: A good thing it is that thou meanest to do. And I took out of your tribes men wise and honorable, and appointed them rulers, tribunes, and centurions, and officers over fifties and over tens, who might teach you all things. And I commanded them, saying: Hear them, and judge that which is just; whether he be one of your country or a stranger. There shall be no difference of persons, you shall hear the little as well as the great: neither shall you respect any man's person, because it is the judgment of God. And if anything seem hard to you, refer it to me, and I will hear it. And I commanded all things that you were to do. Thus Moses.

[273] For the rest, some doubt here comes to be weighed about the time and place some believe that Jethro came to Moses later: their reasons at which Jethro came to Moses, namely whether at Rephidim, and at the time at which I have narrated the matter with Moses, or rather at the following station in the wilderness of Sinai, as the Abulensian, Torniellus, Salian, and others hold, whom Calmet has followed on Exodus chapter 18, briefly alleging the reasons for this opinion in the following order. The first reason is drawn from the words given in Exodus 18, verse 5: And Jethro came … to Moses …, where he was camped by the mountain of God: for they explain the mountain of God of Mount Sinai. But the station at Rephidim was near Mount Horeb, which is frequently called the mountain of God, and is a part of Mount Sinai. That reason therefore proves nothing at all against the station at Rephidim, where the camp was when the angel said to Moses in Exodus 17, verse 6: Behold I will stand there before thee, upon the rock Horeb: and thou shalt strike the rock, and water shall come out of it. The second argument he takes from the words just given from Deuteronomy 1, verse 9, And I said to you at that time, etc., because at verse 6 there is set before them: The Lord our God spoke to us in Horeb: You have stayed long enough in this mountain: turn you and come to the mountain of the Amorrhites. The latter words were doubtless spoken toward the end of the station at Mount Sinai. Wherefore, if the words at that time designate plainly the same time, Moses did not institute inferior judges at Rephidim, where he had encamped almost a whole year earlier. This seems the chief argument for that opinion, to which nevertheless answer can be made in two ways. First, Moses, speaking to the people in the fortieth year of the journey and briefly recounting many past matters, did not mean by those words, at that time, plainly the same

time in which the Lord had commanded that they should set out from the neighborhood of Mount Sinai, but only some neighboring time, as Salian himself has noted at the year of the world 2544, number 723. The other answer is that the word I said can signify the same as I had said, as often happens among the Hebrews. Both answers are Bonfrère's on Deuteronomy chapter 1, verse 9.

[274] Thirdly Calmet argues from Numbers chapter 10, are set forth and refuted; where Moses at the departure from Mount Sinai asks his kinsman Hobab to set out with him. But Calmet believes Hobab to be the same as Jethro, and accordingly that his coming happened about that time. But I answer that it is more probable that Hobab was the son of Jethro, as I shall show in its own place. Fourthly he argues from the murmuring against Moses which arose in Numbers 12 on account of his wife Zipporah: for Calmet conjectures that Zipporah had not yet been long in the camp when that murmuring arose on her account. But that conjecture is of small weight, and plainly uncertain, since a woman can equally afford occasion of murmuring after a long stay as after a short one. Fifthly and finally Calmet brings forward a reason from Exodus 18, verse 16, where Moses says to his father-in-law, And to show the precepts of God and his laws: which words he understands of the laws given on Mount Sinai. But that inference fails. St. Augustine, agreeing with us, answers thus in question 67 on Exodus: It may be asked how Moses said these things, when as yet no law of God had been written: unless because the law of God is everlasting, which all pious minds consult, so that what they find in it they either do, or command, or forbid, according as it has prescribed by that unchangeable truth. Indeed the Hebrews were not without the law of nature, and many doubts about it could occur. Besides, they had the law of circumcision, of the Sabbath, and many others proper to themselves, which had been made and promulgated partly in Egypt, partly on the journey, as has been said in their places; so that this reason is altogether empty. No more do certain other petty reasons neglected by Calmet press, such as this, that Jethro in Exodus 18, verse 12, offered holocausts and sacrifices to God. For long before this holocausts were offered to God, and other sacrifices; and Jethro doubtless offered them by the rite customary to himself, not by the rite prescribed by the Mosaic law. Our adversaries also object without warrant the shortness of the time during which they believe the Israelites stayed at Rephidim: for the Israelites could easily have halted for eight days at Rephidim, as I show in a few words. They came into the wilderness of Sin, or the eighth station, on the fifteenth day of the second month, as is said in Exodus 16, verse 1. Let them have halted there for five or six days, and to these let us add the three days' journey by which they afterwards came through Dophkah and Alush into Rephidim. They could therefore have arrived there on the twenty-fourth or twenty-fifth day of the second month. Now they came to the station of Sinai on the third day of the third month, and on the same day had set out from Rephidim, as I shall show in its own place. Easily therefore could they have halted for eight days at Rephidim. But from all that is narrated of Jethro it is not gathered that he stayed with Moses more than three days. And so the shortness of the time does not stand in the way of our opinion.

[275] and our opinion is established by various reasons. Wherefore I do not see why, with Jerome, Augustine, and the other Fathers and most interpreters, I ought not to follow the order which Moses kept in relating the events in Exodus. Indeed this order alone is of greater moment than all the arguments brought forward to the contrary, since it cannot be proved that the order of events was disturbed by Moses. To this reason, which otherwise ought to suffice even by itself, there is added a very likely conjecture from place and time. No station of the Israelites was nearer to the city of Midian, in which Jethro dwelt, than the station at Rephidim near Mount Horeb: for it is agreed that Moses formerly led Jethro's sheep to the neighborhood of Mount Horeb. Certainly the following station near Mount Sinai is further from the Red Sea, and accordingly from the city of Midian, which lies by the sea. The place therefore, as being nearer to the city of Midian, favors our opinion. But the time confirms it more strongly. The coming of Jethro is thus related in Exodus 18, verse 1: And when Jethro had heard … all the things that God had done to Moses and to Israel his people, and that the Lord had brought forth Israel out of Egypt, he took, etc. Who would believe that Jethro first heard these things after they had been done a whole year before; or, if he be said to have heard them earlier, that he put off his coming for a whole year? This is the more incredible, the less Jethro could know that an occasion of visiting Moses would not afterwards be wanting to him, even if he deferred the journey. Could not Jethro think, and prudently ought he not to have thought, that Moses with the Israelites would pursue his journey without a long stay, as they did up to Mount Sinai? And indeed that Jethro did not defer his journey, but at once seized the occasion of visiting Moses when he was nearest to him, other things also prove. For Jethro is said to have heard what had happened in Egypt and at the going out of the Israelites; not what had been done at Mount Sinai, although these were nearer. Moses narrated to his father-in-law the things done in Egypt and on the journey; but not the wonders wrought near Mount Sinai and on the mountain itself: for no other cause, surely, than that these latter had not yet been done, since the Israelites had not yet come to Mount Sinai. These things I wished to discuss, that we might preserve whole the order of the events, which some have undertaken to disturb without fit reasons; although otherwise I have judged that chronological controversies should be omitted for brevity's sake.

[276] A doubt about the time of the creating of the seventy elders. Another doubt occurs about the judges appointed by Moses at this time, namely whether among them we ought with St. Jerome to number the seventy Elders: for I see most moderns to be of that opinion, that they believe the seventy Elders were appointed later at the bidding of God himself in Numbers XI, verse 16. Nevertheless I do not see that the opinion of St. Jerome is improbable, if it be rightly understood and set forth: for seventy Elders are already recorded in Exodus 24, when the Israelites were dwelling near Mount Sinai, so that it is not altogether improbable that they had already been created at this time and are designated in the first place by rulers; and that these same were afterwards endowed by God with greater authority and with a prophetic spirit, so that they might be able to relieve Moses not only in civil matters but also in spiritual. But I choose rather briefly to indicate these things than to determine anything for certain.

§ XXVI. The same things from Josephus and Philo, whose account is discussed.

[ ] [The arrival at Rephidim, and the water given from the rock to those suffering thirst] Of the arrival at Rephidim and the things done there, Josephus thus begins: But the camp being moved from the place in which these things first happened, after they had come to Rephidim, they were now laboring under extreme thirst, both because on the preceding days it had been granted them to find only rare springs, and because they had then fallen upon a region altogether lacking waters. Again therefore they were angry with Moses. But he, having somewhat turned aside the fury of the crowd, betakes himself to entreaty, asking that he who had given food in want would now bestow drink also in the utmost necessity upon men all but failing for thirst, since food alone in this state of affairs profited nothing. But God, delaying nothing, promises Moses that he would give a spring and an abundance of waters whence they would least hope; and bids him, striking with his rod the rock set in view, to seek thence what they desired, saying that he willed them to obtain drink at ease and without labor. Having received these things from God, Moses returns to the people waiting and gazing upon him with intent eyes: for they already saw him coming down from the watch-height. And when he had returned, he says that God would free them from this necessity also, and would bestow safety in an unhoped-for manner, a river bursting forth from that rock.

[278] At which, when they had heard it, they were terrified, if, worn out with weariness and thirst, the rock had to be hewn out; from the rock, from Josephus: Moses strikes it with his rod, and it, gaping at once, poured forth water most abundant and at the same time most clear. But they, astonished at the unlooked-for spectacle, were refreshed by the very sight: and presently drank with great pleasure, because it was sweet, and such as befitted water divinely given. Wherefore they made much of Moses, whom they saw so dear to God, and rendered to God for the benefit received such thanks as they could by sacrifices. And the sacred Writings deposited in the temple testify that God foretold to Moses that the rock would send forth water flowing from itself. Thus Josephus, who ought to have omitted the fictitious terror of the Israelites, as though they had believed that the rock had to be hewn out by them: for it cannot even be proved from Scripture that it was foretold by Moses in what manner the Israelites should receive water, before they beheld it flowing from the rock.

[279] Philo, omitting the murmuring of the people and the movings of the camp, and from Philo. narrates the water given from the rock thus: In this abundance of food there came a great want of drink: and now the safety of all was despaired of, when Moses, taking that sacred rod through which he had wrought prodigies in Egypt, seized by the Deity, strikes the rock, which, whether a vein was opened by the well-timed blow, or the waters were then first drawn together thither through hidden channels and burst forth by their own force, poured out after the manner of a spring as much as sufficed both as a remedy for thirst and for a long watering for so many thousands. For they filled all their water-jars, as before at the bitter springs turned into a sweet nature by the providence of God. But if anyone does not believe this narrative, he does not know God, nor seeks to know him; otherwise he would know more surely than surely that these miracles are God's playthings, compared with his serious works: such as is the creation of heaven with the fixed and the wandering stars, of the light of day, and the production of the sun, etc. Many like miracles of nature the author heaps together, and rightly subjoins: But these things, though they are worthy of the greatest admiration, are despised on account of custom: whereas those things which are unusual, though lesser, we wonder at, indulging new imaginings. Rightly does he note these things; but what he says doubtfully about a vein opened by the well-timed blow, which perhaps gave the waters, is little probable: for the matter is to be attributed to the miracle alone.

[280] The attempt of the Amalekites to attack the Israelites, The war of the Amalekites Josephus narrates at length, whose account I subjoin: But the fame of the Hebrews being spread far and wide, and reports about them being scattered on every side among all nations, no small fear seized the dwellers of that region, and, sending embassies to and fro, they exhorted one another either to keep off, or even to destroy, if only they could, the approaching multitude. But the chief instigators of this expedition were those who inhabit the region of Gobolitis and the city Petra, and are called Amalekites, the most warlike among those nations. Their kings

stirred up both one another and their neighbors to a Hebrew war, saying repeatedly that a foreign army, fugitives of the Egyptians, was contriving destruction for them: that these ought not to be despised, but before their strength should increase, when they had obtained some rich region, and, having conceived confidence from their own inaction, should be the first to begin the war, they could be crushed in safety; and that it was more advisable to punish their attempts in the desert than to wait until they should get possession of good and wealthy cities. For it was the part of prudent men to withstand as soon as possible the beginnings of an adversary's power, and not to wait until by daily successes it should be increased to something greater, and rather to take care that they should not come into danger, than that they should be delivered from peril. After embassies of this kind it was decreed by common counsel that they should attack the Hebrews and attempt to repel them in battle. This preparation of the Amalekites is omitted in Scripture; but it is probably set forth by Josephus. That several kings of the Amalekites conspired is very likely, since it cannot be doubted that that nation, as well as the neighboring ones, had several princes who were called kings. Less certain is it whether certain princes of other nations also were present, since sacred Scripture speaks of the Amalekites alone. But what is said of the inhabitants of the city Petra, if it be understood of the metropolis of Arabia Petraea, is less probable, since this seems to have belonged either to the Midianites or to the Idumaeans.

[281] and their preparation to resist; What Moses did when he heard of the enemy's approach he presently sets forth thus: Moses then expected nothing less than some movement of the natives: therefore when he saw the people trembling and in tumult, who had to fight unexpectedly and unprepared with a fully equipped enemy, he exhorts them, relying on the judgment of God, under whose auspices they had preferred liberty to servitude, to think of nothing but victory: nor to reckon that they were inferior in arms, money, provisions, and other helps of this kind: but since they had God standing on their side against their enemies, they should conceive such courage as if in human resources also they were far superior; nor were they ignorant how great a Helper he was, having so often proved him in graver evils; that he was both hostile to their enemies and propitious to the Hebrews: and that this favor had been sufficiently declared, when he drove away hunger and thirst from them prodigiously, when to men shut in by sea and mountain he provided an unhoped-for escape: besides, that they must aspire the more to victory, because after this they would lack nothing of those things which seem to pertain to a more civilized living. The people being encouraged by such words, and the tribunes and nobles being called together, he exhorts them all and each — the younger, indeed, to be obedient to the word of their elders; and these, to observe all the nods of their commander. But they, despising the peril and desirous of the encounter, hoped that this battle would bring an end to their misery, and of their own accord asked Moses that he would lead them at once against the enemy, and would not blunt the eagerness of the soldiers by an untimely delay.

[282] Then he, having selected from the rest of the multitude those fit for battle, Moses's care, the beginning of the battle, sets over them Jesus the son of Nave, of the tribe of Ephraim, a man alike prompt in hand and in counsel, and distinguished in piety, and not degenerate in this respect from Moses his teacher: some cohorts also he so disposes that he could not be cut off from the water supply, and leaves several more for the guard of the camp and of the unwarlike multitude. Then through the night they make themselves ready for battle, and, their arms and their bodies alike being cared for, they wait intently for the signal to be given by the trumpet through Moses: who himself too was awake all night consulting with Jesus, and admonishing him about drawing up the ranks. And when day was now coming on, he exhorts the leader to study to answer the hope conceived of him, and, the matter being happily accomplished, to win himself esteem among the soldiers: likewise he kindles to fortitude with words each of the best of the Hebrews privately, and presently all the armed men, and thus, drawn up and encouraged, commits them to Jesus and to God. He himself climbs the mountain. And now they had come to blows, and were fighting vigorously, nor were mutual exhortations lacking: and so long as Moses stretched forth his hands upraised, the Amalekites fought at a worse advantage.

[283] But Moses, wearied by the stretching out of his hands, when he had observed that as often as he let his hands down, so often his own men, not bearing the enemy's onset, gave way; by which the Israelites obtain a signal victory: bids his brother Aaron and Uron, the husband of his sister Mariame, standing on either side, to hold up his hands unceasingly, and not to permit them to be let down through weariness. Which being done, the Hebrews conquered excellently, and the Amalekites would have been destroyed by slaughter, had not night intervening allowed some of them to seek safety by flight and hiding. Than which victory none either more magnificent or more opportune befell our forefathers: for they both routed and put to flight the army that met them, and struck a great terror into all who dwelt round about, and carried off as the reward of their labor a rich booty: for, the enemy's camp too being stormed, they were enriched both publicly and privately, who to that day could scarcely provide themselves daily food. Nor did that victory profit for the present only, but for the future also: for not only the bodies but the spirits also of their adversaries were broken in that battle: and from that time they became formidable to all the nations round about. And to themselves there was made no small addition of wealth: for much gold and silver was found in the camp, many vessels of bronze both for eating and for cooking, a great sum too of coined money: besides these, woven stuffs and ornaments of arms, and other camp furniture and various booty of beasts of burden and of baggage, which are wont to follow an army. Nay, this success made the Hebrews much bolder and more zealous of fortitude and industry, promising themselves everything if they should strenuously cultivate valor: and this battle indeed obtained such an outcome.

[284] the fruits of this victory: But on the following day Moses spoiled the corpses of the slain; gathered the arms which the fugitives had cast away; and distributed rewards to those whose service had been more distinguished; and praised Jesus the leader before the assembly, the soldiery approving the man's praise with acclamations: and so bloodless was this victory that not even one of the Hebrews was missed, while the number of the enemy's corpses remained undiscovered for their multitude. Then, victims being slain for thanksgiving, he set up an altar to God the victor: and foretold that the Amalekites would be destroyed by slaughter, so that not even one of that race should be left, because they had of their own accord attacked the Hebrews with arms, and that while they were laboring in the desert and in want. Lastly he received the leader of the army at a victory banquet. This was the first battle after the going out from Egypt, in which they bravely repelled a provoking enemy and afflicted him with a great disaster: after which, festal triumph-songs being celebrated for some days, and their strength repaired by rest, they continued their journey with the column drawn up. For the number of armed men had now grown, and, proceeding in this manner little by little, in the third month after they had removed from Egypt they came to Mount Sinai, on which Moses had seen the vision of the burning bush, as we have already recorded. Thus far Josephus on this battle, augmenting what was related by Moses with probable conjectures, yet in such a way that some correction is needed.

[285] some things in the account given are corrected. First, that hope of obtaining a more civilized living through that battle is to be disapproved; for it was sufficiently agreed to Moses that the dominion of the Amalekites was not granted by God to his people for a dwelling; but that they must go on through the solitudes to Canaan. Secondly, the things pertaining to the battle seem rather to have been ordered by Joshua at the bidding of Moses than by Moses himself, to whom Josephus wrongly attributes most of them: for in Exodus 17, verse 9, Moses says to Joshua: Choose out men: and go out and fight against the Amalekites. Thirdly, Josephus makes the victory greater than Scripture seems to make it, which testifies only that the Amalekites were put to flight. But he too liberally adds both that the enemy's camp was stormed and that most rich spoils were obtained: for these things are, at the least, uncertain. No more certain is it that none of the Israelites fell in the battle, Scripture again being silent. Fourthly, the conjectures are likewise uncertain which are given about the rewards distributed after the battle and about the praising of Joshua. Fifthly and finally, the journey toward Mount Sinai did indeed happen a little after, but not before the coming of Raguel, as Josephus holds: nor is that the mountain on which Moses had seen the vision of the burning bush; at least so far as the hill Horeb, to which the Israelites were near at Rephidim, can be distinguished from Mount Sinai as a part from the whole.

[286] Philo, in describing the battle against the Amalekites, Philo slips more gravely in relating the battle and victory over the Amalekites, as I shall show after his own words have been given. At last, he says, after long wandering through pathless solitudes, there appeared certain borders of habitable land, as it were the outskirts of that region which they had destined for themselves. But it was inhabited by Phoenicians. Here, hoping for a quiet and tranquil life, they were much deceived in their opinion: for the king of that region, fearing the plundering of his fields, having roused the youth town by town, set himself against them to keep them from passing. And if they should attempt to open a way for themselves by arms, he would attack with unimpaired forces and fresh soldiery men worn out with journeys and with want of provisions and scarcity of waters, with which necessities they labored by turns. But Moses, the matter being known through scouts, pitched camp not far from the enemy. A levy of the younger men being held, and setting over them as commander Jesus, one of the lesser leaders, he himself hastened to seek greater aid. For, being purified by solemn lustrations, he climbed a neighboring hillock, suppliantly invoking God that he would give victory to the Hebrews, whom he had freed from graver perils, having driven away not only the violence of men but also the plague which, the elements being corrupted, had assailed the Egyptians, and also, throughout the whole journey, a hunger otherwise unavoidable.

[287] But when the lines stood drawn up on both sides, falls into various errors. a new prodigy occurred in the hands of the Prophet himself, now the lightest, now wonderfully heavy, which, as often as they received lightness, being lifted toward heaven, strengthened his allies to carry on the matter bravely: but as often as they were weighed down, the enemy's line prevailed, God signifying that the proper inheritance of the one party is the earth, the lowest part of the world, and of the other the most sacred upper air; and that as in the universe of things the heaven is better than the earth, so also his people would overcome in war the opposing line. When therefore for some while the hands, after the manner of a balance, were now lifted up and now inclined downward, and the fight was waged with doubtful issue, at last suddenly, as though having wings instead of fingers, being lifted they flew through the air, remaining on high until a sure victory befell the Hebrews, the enemy being destroyed by slaughter and tamed by a just disaster from those whom they were provoking with unjust arms. Then Moses dedicated an altar, which from the fact he named the Refuge of God, on which he paid his vows, victims being slain. Thus far Philo.

[288] But he at once slips most gravely in the description of the place and of the nation, he falls into various errors. when he affirms that this battle happened about the borders of that region which the Israelites had destined for themselves, and that they were Phoenicians who dwelt there where the fight took place. For first, the solitude in which the fight took place is not far distant from the Red Sea, and was much further from Canaan or Palestine, which the Israelites were seeking, than the land of Goshen itself was distant from it, out of which

they had gone out about a month and a half before. Secondly, the Amalekites and Midianites then inhabited those tracts, and near them were the Idumaeans and Moabites, who by the common name of the region could be called Arabs, not Phoenicians, who already then dwelt by the Mediterranean sea. Thirdly, Philo trifles wonderfully about the hands of the praying Moses, now attributing to them a sudden heaviness, now so great a lightness as though they had been lifted by wings. But in the heaviness of the hands of Moses no miracle appears, since by the continual raising they were wearied and seemed heavier, because the strength of him who raised them was failing. For this cause he was compelled from time to time to let his hands down, that he might thus recover his strength, until, being set upon a stone, and with Aaron and Hur holding up his hands on either side, he was able to continue the labor of raising his hands, whether in a natural manner, or because God supplied sufficient strength: for it is only said that his hands were in that manner not wearied.

[289] Josephus, having related the aforesaid victory, and having wrongly interposed a moving of the camp, The coming of Raguel, in which various things are amended: begins to narrate the coming of Raguel or Jethro, passed over by Philo, not without errors presently to be corrected. But when, he says, the fame of the matter happily accomplished had reached Raguel also, he came to meet them with congratulations, to greet Moses and Sepphora and their children. He, glad at his father-in-law's coming, renews the sacrifice, and provides a banquet for the people near the bush which had come off unharmed from the burning. And while the multitude feasted, each by their own kindreds, Aaron with his own people, Raguel too being taken along, sang the divine praises, celebrating the Author of their safety and liberty: their Leader too they attended with auspicious songs, by whose valor all things had succeeded for them according to their wish. Raguel too privately sang much in praise of the people, much in praise of Moses their preserver, under whose auspices so many good and brave men were ruled. The writer errs in these things, first, in that he intimates that Zipporah and the sons of Moses, whom Raguel brought with him, had already been with Moses before. Secondly, in that he says that Moses offered the sacrifice: for that was done by Raguel. Thirdly, what is added about the songs spoken in praise of Moses, and about the banquet of the multitude by kindreds, are mere conjectures.

[290] the counsel given by Raguel, and the judges created Josephus then continues thus: But on the following day Raguel, seeing Moses overwhelmed with a multitude of businesses (for he was settling the suits of those who had need, since all brought them to him, and did not think they could hold their right under any other arbiter, and since even those who lost their cause under such a judge bore the sentence with an even mind), then indeed kept silence, wishing to hinder no one from enjoying the justice of the Man. But when at last he saw him freed from the tumult of business, he took him aside and taught him what needed to be done: and advised that he should yield the lesser causes to others to be examined; but that he himself should handle only the affairs of the commonwealth: for there were not lacking among the Hebrews others fit for deciding suits: but that no one could bear the care of the safety of so many thousands, save one like to Moses. And so, since thou art not ignorant, he said, of thy own gifts, which have so often been of use to the people in peril, spare thyself, and permit others to settle suits among themselves according to right: but be thou given only to the divine worship, that thou mayest the more easily deliver the people from their present necessity. Nay, I would also advise, so far as in me lies, that, the forces being reviewed and numbered, thou shouldst distribute them into ten thousands, setting over each such legion its own leaders: and again shouldst divide them into cohorts of a thousand, of five hundred, of a hundred and of fifty: and likewise into companies of thirty and twenty and ten fellow-soldiers. Then over these so divided thou shouldst set prefects, an appellation being given to each from the number of the soldiers under him. But thou shalt create by the votes of the people as judges men excelling in virtue and justice, who may decide their controversies: and if perchance anything graver should occur, they shall refer the examination of it to thee: and in this manner neither shall any of the Hebrews be defrauded of his right, and thou, worshipping God without interruption, shalt win his favor the more inclined toward the army.

[291] Josephus sets forth less exactly. This counsel of Raguel Moses gladly admitted, and did whatever he had advised, not usurping this device to himself, nor concealing its author, but declaring before the assembly to the people whose invention this had been. Nay, in his own books he ascribes to Raguel the invention of the military orders and of the courts, choosing rather not to defraud the deserving of their praise than to usurp another's honor for himself, so that from this too his virtue may be conjectured: of which we must often speak in its own places. A few things are to be observed about the counsel given to Moses, which he here executed. The orders are enumerated in Scripture thus in Exodus 18, verse 25: rulers of the people; and to these Josephus assigns ten thousand subjects apiece for military service. But most moderns think that the word rulers was put generally, and that by this word no magistracy distinct from those that follow, which are enumerated, is designated. Their reason is that Jethro, in Exodus 18, verse 21, suggesting that counsel to Moses, did not name rulers, and that they are everywhere omitted in the Seventy interpreters. Nevertheless I have already noted that it does not seem to me improbable that by rulers the seventy Elders are understood. But the companies of thirty and twenty Josephus wrongly added to Scripture, in which after the rulers there are recounted only tribunes, centurions, officers over fifties, and over tens: and these are said to have been chosen for the courts, not for military service.

§ XXVII. The twelfth station at Mount Sinai: the Law given to the people, and the covenant ratified with a solemn rite between God and the Israelites.

[ ] The Israelites come to Mount Sinai on the third day of the third month: Of the arrival at the twelfth station, ennobled by very many things, these things are read in Numbers 33, verse 15: And departing from Rephidim, they camped in the desert of Sinai. The time is added in Exodus 19 in this manner: In the third month of the going out of Israel from the land of Egypt, on this day they came into the wilderness of Sinai. For departing from Rephidim, and coming as far as the desert of Sinai, they camped in the same place, and there Israel pitched their tents over against the mountain. About the year and the month there is no difficulty: for in the same year in which they went out of Egypt, and in the third month of that year, they came to Mount Sinai. But these words, on this day, are very variously explained by interpreters, of whom some understand the first day of the month, others the last; but these with little probability. But more, with greater probability, hold that the third day of the month is designated, and that the words on this day signify the same, by a Hebrew idiom, as on the same day. This explanation too pleases me more, because there precedes in the third month, and to that the words on this day seem to be referred. Yet some suspect that the words on this day are referred to the departure from Rephidim, and that nothing is signified except that on the same day on which they departed from Rephidim they came to Mount Sinai. But this opinion would please more, if the departure from Rephidim had been recorded before the words on this day. But since the whole epoch of time is set before them, those words cannot conveniently be referred to it. Besides, Moses would thus not have assigned the day, but the month without the day: and this is repugnant to his custom, since he is wont to record the day of the month also wherever he assigns the month. Finally, since the Law is believed to have been given at Pentecost, that is, on the fiftieth day from the going out, and the sixth of the third month, and it was given on the third day after the day of arrival, not counted, as we shall presently see, it seems scarcely to be doubted that the Israelites came to this station on the third day of the third month, which is called Sivan.

[293] St. Jerome, in Station 12, says: They come to this place on the forty-seventh day. this station ennobled by very many deeds, And having brought forward a proof from the words of Scripture to be alleged below, he subjoins: Let us reckon the number, and we shall find that on the fiftieth day of the going out of Israel from Egypt the Law was given on the top of Mount Sinai. Whence the solemnity of Pentecost is celebrated, and afterwards the mystery of the Gospel is completed by the descent of the Holy Spirit. How many things were done in this place he presently touches briefly thus: It would be long, if I should wish to unfold what was commanded in the Law: how the tabernacle was fashioned, what variety of victims, what diversity of vessels, what garments of the high priest, what ceremonies of the priests and Levites, what they did: how the people was numbered. This only will I say, that the middle part of Exodus, and the whole book of Leviticus, and no small part of the precepts of Numbers, and the distribution among the several tribes of the people, and the offerings of the princes, are described at this station; and the disputation of many volumes could scarcely suffice for this place. These words of Jerome admonish me too that, mindful of the brevity I have proposed, I should treat only of those things which more nearly concern Moses; but should touch only lightly upon the laws, ceremonies, priestly garments, the tabernacle, and all that pertains to it, and assign them to their own places in Scripture. For the rest, there here occurs a lapse of Calmet's briefly to be observed, lest it draw the less attentive reader into error. On Exodus chapter 1, verse 1, he says that they did not come from Rephidim as far as Mount Sinai in one day, because they had before encamped at Mount Horeb. But Moses in Numbers 33 exactly enumerates all the encampings; yet he places none at Horeb, to which the station at Rephidim was so near that there the Israelites received waters from the rock Horeb.

[294] Moses, at God's bidding, sees to it Moses begins to narrate the things done at Mount Sinai in Exodus 19, verse 3, in this manner: And Moses went up to God (to pray, I suppose, in some part of the mountain), and the Lord called to him from the mountain, and said: Thus shalt thou say to the house of Jacob, and tell the children of Israel: You have seen what I have done to the Egyptians, how I have carried you upon the wings of eagles, and have taken you to myself. If therefore you will hear my voice, and keep my covenant, you shall be my peculiar possession above all people: for all the earth is mine. And you shall be to me a priestly kingdom, and a holy nation. These are the words thou shalt speak to the children of Israel. It may be doubted whether the angel said these things to Moses in God's name on the same day on which they had come to Mount Sinai, or rather on the following day. Whatever be the case about this difference of day; Moses came: and calling together the elders of the people, he declared all the words which the Lord had commanded. And all the people answered together: All that the Lord hath spoken, we will do. And when Moses had related the words of the people to the Lord, the Lord said to him: Lo, now will I come to thee in the darkness of a cloud, that the people may hear me speaking to thee, and may believe thee for ever. This is the second admonition of God at Mount Sinai. But what follows seems to have been enjoined in that second conversation, although the following words at first glance suggest a new meeting: Moses therefore told the words of the people to the Lord. And he said to him (that is, so far as I judge, When Moses was telling the aforesaid things, the Lord said further to him) Go

to the people, and sanctify them today and tomorrow

(that is, on the fourth day of the third month, on which these things

were said, and on the fifth day of the same month), and let them wash

their garments.

[295] that the people may be purified for the hearing of the divine commandments: And let them be ready against the third day (the sixth,

namely, of the month:) for on the third day the

Lord will come down in the sight of all the people upon Mount Sinai.

And thou shalt appoint certain limits to the people round about,

and thou shalt say to them: Take heed ye go not up into

the mount, and that ye touch not the borders thereof: every one

that toucheth the mount, dying he shall die. No hand

shall touch him, but he shall be stoned to death, or shall be shot through

with arrows: whether it be beast, or man,

he shall not live. The prohibition is against crossing

the limits. When the trumpet shall begin to sound, then

let them go up into the mount, namely as far as the appointed

limits. These commandments of the Lord were given

one day after the arrival of the Israelites at Mount

Sinai, that is, on the fourth day of the month; which perhaps is also

true of Moses' first colloquy with the

Lord, though of that it is less certain: for it could indeed

have happened that Moses, after the journey from Raphidim

on the third day of the month, went up the mountain once,

and conversed with the angel; but it does not seem to have been

possible that that journey, the ascent of the mountain,

the summoning of the elders, and a repeated ascent of the same mountain,

should have fallen upon the same day; especially

since there is nothing that compels us to heap all those things into one

day, but reasons rather persuade us

to separate these last commandments from the day of the arrival.

I return to the sacred text: And Moses came down

from the mount to the people, and sanctified them.

And when they had washed their garments, he said to them:

Be ready against the third day, and come not near

your wives.

[296] With what array the Law, or the decalogue, was thereafter promulgated, the terrible array preceding the promulgation of the decalogue: Moses goes on to set forth thus: And now the third day

was come, and the morning had appeared:

and behold thunders began to be heard, and lightning to flash,

and a very thick cloud to cover the mount, and the noise of

the trumpet sounded exceeding loud: and

the people that was in the camp feared. And when Moses had brought

them forth to meet God from the place

of the camp, they stood at the bottom of the mount. And all

Mount Sinai was on a smoke, because the Lord was come down

upon it in fire, and the smoke arose

from it as out of a furnace: and all the

mount was terrible. And the sound of the trumpet grew by degrees

louder and louder, and was drawn out to greater length: Moses

spoke, and God answered him. And the Lord came down

upon Mount Sinai, in the very top of the

mount, and he called Moses unto the top

thereof. And when he was gone up thither, he said unto him: Go down,

and charge the people: lest they should have a mind

to pass the limits to see the Lord,

and a very great multitude of them should perish. The priests

also that come to the Lord, let them be sanctified,

lest he strike them. And Moses said to the

Lord: The common people cannot come up into

Mount Sinai: for thou didst charge, and command,

saying: Set limits about the mount, and

sanctify it. And the Lord said to him: Go, get thee down:

and thou shalt come up, and Aaron with thee: but let not the priests

and the people pass the limits,

nor come up to the Lord, lest he kill

them. And Moses went down to the people,

and told them all.

[297] After these things the angel who represented God,

and who is therefore called the Lord, the decalogue promulgated by the angel in the presence of all the people, as was shown at nn.

82 and 83, promulgated the precepts of the decalogue before

all the people, who heard his voice, but saw no

form. Concerning these things we read thus in Exodus 20:

And the Lord spoke all these words:

I am the Lord thy God, etc. The ten

precepts may be read in that place. And to the precepts

there are subjoined these words at v. 18: And all the people

saw (that is, perceived by the senses) the voices

and the flames, and the sound of the trumpet, and the mount

smoking: and being terrified and struck with fear,

they stood afar off, saying to Moses: Speak thou

to us, and we will hear: let not the Lord speak to us,

lest we die. And Moses said to the people:

Fear not: for God is come to prove you,

and that his dread might be in you,

and you should not sin. In Deuteronomy 4 Moses relates to the people

the things done at this time, setting forth the promulgation of the Decalogue

thus from v. 9: Forget not the words

that thy eyes have seen, … from the day in which thou didst stand

before the Lord thy God in Horeb, when

the Lord spoke to me, saying: Gather the

people together unto me, that they may hear my words,

and may learn to fear me all the time that they live

on the earth, and may teach their children. And you came to

the foot of the mount, which burned even unto heaven:

and there was darkness in it, and a cloud, and obscurity. And the Lord

spoke to you from the midst of the fire.

You heard the voice of his words, and you saw no

form at all. And he shewed you his

covenant, which he commanded you to do, and the ten

words (that is, precepts) which he wrote in two

tables of stone. And he commanded me at that

time that I should teach you the ceremonies and judgments

which you should do in the land that you shall

possess.

[298] [who, seized with excessive terror, ask Moses that they may be allowed to hear the rest from him:] Again in Deuteronomy 5 Moses treated of these matters

with the people at v. 2, reporting his own words thus: The Lord

our God made a covenant with us in Horeb.

He made not the covenant with our fathers (such a covenant, that is,

by giving his Law), but with us

who are present and living.

He spoke to us face to face in the mount out of

the midst of the fire. I was the mediator and stood between

the Lord and you at that time, to shew

you his words. For you feared the fire, and

went not up into the mountain. Here someone will ask

how Moses, in the fortieth year, when most of those were dead

who had been present at the promulgation

of the Law, could say to the people that the covenant was made

With us, who are present and living.

I answer that he so spoke because the covenant had been entered upon

with the people, which even at that time was reckoned the same.

Then Moses repeats the ten

precepts, and concerning them subjoins in the same place at v. 22:

These words the Lord spoke to all your

multitude in the mount out of the midst of the fire, and

the cloud, and the darkness, with a loud voice, adding nothing more:

and he wrote them in two tables of stone, which

he delivered unto me. But you, after you heard the voice

out of the midst of the darkness, and saw the mountain

burning, came to me, all you princes of the tribes,

and the elders, and you said: Behold,

the Lord our God hath shewn us his majesty

and his greatness: we have heard his voice

out of the midst of the fire, and have proved this day that

God speaking with man, man hath lived. Why

shall we die therefore, and shall this exceeding great fire consume us?

For if we hear the voice of the Lord

our God any more, we shall die.

What is all flesh, that it should hear the voice of the living God,

who speaketh out of the midst of the

fire, as we have heard, and be able to

live? Go thou rather near: and hear all things that

the Lord our God shall say to thee: and thou shalt speak

to us, and we will hear and do them. With so great

a terror did the Lord will to strike the inconstant people,

that he might render them the more obedient to his commandments.

[299] and for this cause the people are bidden return to their tents, But when the Lord approved this reverence and fear,

the angel set forth the remaining precepts to Moses

alone, that he might communicate them to the people,

just as he afterwards gave Moses on the mount the two tables

containing the precepts of the decalogue already promulgated.

Hear the sacred text, thus

proceeding: And when the Lord had heard this,

he said to me: I have heard the voice of the words of this people,

which they spoke to thee: they have spoken all things well…

Go and say to them: Return into your tents.

But stand thou here with me, and I will speak

to thee all my commandments, and ceremonies, and

judgments: which thou shalt teach them, that they may do them in the land

which I will give them for a possession. To this

time also seems to belong the promise of the Messiah

made by the Lord to Moses, although Moses is read to have

communicated it to the people only towards the end

of his life. Certainly in Deuteronomy 18, v. 15, Moses

addresses the people in these words: The Lord thy God will raise up to thee

me: him thou shalt hear, as thou desiredst

of the Lord thy God in Horeb, when the assembly

was gathered together, and saidst: Let me not hear any more

the voice of the Lord my God, neither let me see any more

this exceeding great fire, lest I die. And the Lord said

to me: They have spoken all things well. I will raise them up a Prophet

out of the midst of their brethren, like to

thee: and I will put my words in his mouth, and he shall speak

to them all that I shall command him:

and he that will not hear his words, which he shall speak in my

name, I will be the revenger. Of

the Messiah, or of Christ, St. Peter explains these words

in Acts 3, v. 22, speaking thus to the Jews: For Moses

said: A Prophet shall the Lord your God raise up

unto you of your brethren,

as myself: him you shall hear according to all things,

whatsoever he shall speak to you. And it shall be:

that every soul which will not hear that Prophet,

shall be destroyed from among the people. Now the very words

of Moses abundantly indicate that that promise

was made upon the occasion of the people's begging not to hear

the voice of the Lord himself. But it is not added that Moses

was commanded to communicate that promise to the people

at once.

[300] Further, Moses, being bidden to go up the mountain

to the Lord, but Moses to go up the mount, where he receives various commandments, relates that he did so in Exodus 20, v.

21, in these words: And Moses went to the dark cloud

wherein God was. And the Lord said moreover

to Moses: Thus shalt thou say to the children of Israel: You

have seen that I have spoken to you from heaven. You shall not

make gods of silver, nor shall you make to yourselves gods of gold.

Then the Lord, or the angel

representing him, goes on to prescribe to Moses very many precepts, for the greater

part judicial, as the studious

reader will find in the said chapter 20, chapter 21,

chapter 22, and chapter 23, where at v. 20 this promise is inserted:

Behold I will send my angel, who

shall go before thee, and keep thee in thy journey, and bring thee

into the place that I have prepared. Take notice of him, and hear

his voice, and do not think him one to be contemned: for

he will not forgive when thou hast sinned, and

my name is in him (that is, I think, he acts in my name).

But if thou wilt hear his voice, and do all

that I speak, I will be an enemy to thy enemies, and will

afflict them that afflict thee, etc. This promise is not without

threats, and indeed after the Law had been given

the Israelites did not sin or murmur with impunity,

but severe punishment presently followed the guilty,

as the studious reader will easily see, provided he considers

everything attentively. Several promises,

but all under this condition, if they kept the commandments of God,

the angel heaped up in the same place, especially

concerning the leading of the people into the promised land, and the crushing

of its inhabitants. But, before

Moses departed, he received the command to return,

as is set forth in chapter 24, v. 1, in these words: And to Moses

he said: Come up to the Lord, thou, and

Aaron, Nadab and Abiu (the sons of Aaron), and seventy

of the ancients of Israel, and you shall adore afar off.

And Moses alone shall come up to the Lord, and they

shall not come nigh: neither shall the people come up

with him.

[301] [which, written down, he reads out to the people, and binds them to God by a solemn covenant.] Having received these commandments, Moses came down

from the mount, that he might communicate them to the Israelites, whom for this end

he had to gather together — summarily

first, and afterwards reading out each thing exactly and solemnly.

He narrates the matter thus in chapter 24, v. 3:

So Moses came and told the people all the words

of the Lord, and the judgments: and all the people

answered with one voice: We will do all the words of the Lord,

which he hath spoken. And Moses wrote

(after the people had been dismissed, in the evening

or at night) all the words of the Lord: and

rising in the morning he built an altar at the foot of

the mount, and twelve titles according to the twelve tribes

of Israel. And he sent young men of the children of Israel (probably

from each of the tribes, because the priesthood

was not yet proper to any one tribe), and they offered

holocausts, and sacrificed pacific victims

of calves to the Lord. Then Moses took

(of the victims immolated) half of the blood,

and put it into bowls: and the rest

he poured upon the altar. And taking the book

of the covenant, he read it in the hearing of the people: and they said:

All things that the Lord hath spoken we will do,

and we will be obedient. And he took the blood

(out of the bowls) and sprinkled it upon the people, and

said: This is the blood of the covenant, which the Lord hath made

with you concerning all these words.

That the whole people, and the book of the Law also, were sprinkled

with that blood, with which water had been mingled,

the Apostle teaches in Hebrews 9, v. 19, where also

he says that this was done with scarlet wool and hyssop, namely

by an aspergillum composed of both.

Take the Apostle's words: Whereupon neither was the first

(Testament) dedicated without blood.

For when every commandment of the Law had been read by Moses

to all the people, he took the blood of calves

and goats, with water, and scarlet wool,

and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book itself and all the

people, saying: This is the blood of the Testament

which God hath enjoined unto you. With this solemnity

the old Testament was founded, and the covenant

entered upon between God and the Israelite people,

by which the latter bound itself to the observance of the laws given by

God; while God promised that the Israelites

should be a people dedicated to himself in a singular manner and his own,

whom he would always protect, so long as they observed the said

laws.

§ XXVIII. Moses abides forty days with God

on the mount, where he receives the precepts concerning the tabernacle and other things pertaining to the tabernacle, and likewise concerning the vestments and consecration of the priests: having received the tables also, he comes down, and, the people having fallen into idolatry, he breaks the tables and appeases God.

[Moses goes up the mount with the elders, where an august appearance is offered to them:] After the solemnity of the covenant had been performed, Moses,

mindful of the Lord's command, by which he had been bidden

to return to the mount, goes thither with the appointed companions,

as is related in Exodus 24 in these words: Then

Moses and Aaron, Nadab and Abiu, and

seventy of the ancients of Israel went up: and they saw

the God of Israel: and under his feet as it were a work of sapphire

stone, and as the heaven, when clear.

Neither did he lay his hand upon those of the children of Israel

that had retired afar off (and had therefore been made nearer)

(by slaying them; but contrary to their

common persuasion), and they saw

God, and (continuing to live) they did eat and drink.

The place is indeed somewhat obscure; but the exposition given,

as it is that of many, so it also greatly pleases,

and seems sufficiently genuine. These princes saw

some august form, either of a King

or of a Lawgiver, so far as appears, since mention

is made of feet. But against this opinion Calmet

objects on this place, first, the words of Moses

to the people in Deuteronomy 4, v. 15: You saw not

any similitude in the day that the Lord spoke to you

in Horeb from the midst of the fire. I answer

that this concerns the day on which the Lord promulgated the precepts

of the decalogue to the people. But there is no such

consequence as this: The whole people on that day did not see

any similitude: therefore certain chosen elders

could never at any time see a similitude, or

some human form, by which God was represented.

No better does his second reason conclude, namely that Moses

afterwards still desired to see God. For the Lawgiver

could, since he knew well enough that he had not

seen the very nature of God, wish for a more perfect vision

of God. I return to the sacred text.

[303] And the Lord said to Moses: Come up

to me into the mount, then Moses remains forty days on the mount without food or drink, and be there: and I will give

thee tables of stone, and the Law, and the commandments

that I have written, that thou mayest teach them. Moses rose up,

and his minister Josue: and Moses going up into

the mount of God, said to the ancients: Wait ye here,

till we return to you. You have Aaron and Hur

with you: if any question shall arise, you shall refer it

to them. And when Moses was gone up, a cloud

covered the mount, and the glory of the Lord dwelt

upon Sinai, covering it with a cloud six days:

and on the seventh day he called him out of the midst of the darkness.

And the sight of the glory of the Lord was like

a burning fire upon the top of the mount, in the eyes

of the children of Israel. And Moses entering into the midst

of the cloud, went up into the mountain: and he was there forty

days and forty nights. That Moses remained

on the mount forty days and as many

nights without any food or drink, is read in Deuteronomy 9,

v. 9; and from the same place it is gathered that the six

earlier days, in which he was with Josue in the cloud, are to be reckoned

within the forty days, and not to be added on to them,

as some would have it: for Moses says

in the same place: I continued in the mount forty

days and nights, neither eating bread,

nor drinking water. He does not say, forty-six

days, as nevertheless he ought to have said, if the contrary

opinion were true.

[304] where he receives many commandments, and at last the two tables. Further, Moses again received many precepts

at that time, and they are narrated in Exodus 25

and the following chapters. In chapter 25 it is related what

offerings he was to receive from the people for the construction

of the tabernacle, the ark, the propitiatory,

the table, the candlestick, and other things pertaining hereto,

whose form is prescribed partly in the same place, partly

in chapters 26 and 27. Then in chapter 28 he is bidden to consecrate

Aaron and his four sons as priests

in these words: Take also unto thee Aaron thy brother

with his sons from among the children of Israel,

that they may minister to me in the priest's office: Aaron, Nadab,

and Abiu, Eleazar, and Ithamar. And thou shalt make

a holy vesture for Aaron thy brother for glory and

for beauty. Presently also it is described what manner of

vestments God would have for Aaron, that is, the high priest,

and what for his sons, that is, the other priests.

Then in chapter 29 it is related by what rite

he was to consecrate Aaron and his sons. Again

in chapter 30 precepts are given concerning the altar of incense, and various things

pertaining to the anointing of the tabernacle and of the priests.

In chapter 31 the Lord designates

two men, Beseleel and Ooliab, whom he had furnished with fit

wisdom, that they might put together all the aforesaid things.

The rest of the Sabbath also is prescribed under pain

of death. At length Moses receives the tables, as is read

in the same place at v. 18: And the Lord, when he had ended

these words in Mount Sinai, gave to Moses

two stone tables of testimony,

written with the finger of God.

[305] meanwhile the Israelites fall into the most grievous While Moses on Mount Sinai rejoices in these heavenly

favours, the inconstant people, weary of the long

delay, fell into the most grievous crime of idolatry.

Moses himself in Exodus 32

explains the matter in this manner: And the people seeing

that Moses delayed to come down from the mount,

gathering together against Aaron, said:

Arise, make us gods, that may go before us:

for as to this Moses, the man that brought us out of the land

of Egypt, we know not what has befallen him. Wonderful indeed

is this inconsiderate levity of a people that had seen so many signs

and prodigies, that had obtained so many and so great favours of God,

that had lately bound itself by so solemn a covenant

to the divine service — whether they believed Moses dead

or taken away, or themselves abandoned by him.

But not less wonderful appears the pusillanimity

of Aaron, that he did not more strongly set himself against so great

a crime, but only tried indirectly

to hinder the wickedness by bidding them bring their more precious things,

hoping probably that they would not do it,

and that thus the matter would come to nothing. Let us hear Moses

thus proceeding: And Aaron said to them:

Take the golden earrings from the ears of your wives, and your sons,

and daughters, and bring them to me.

And the people did what he had commanded, bringing the earrings

to Aaron. And when he had received them, he fashioned them

by founders' work, and made of them a molten calf.

And they said: These are thy gods, O Israel,

that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt. And when

Aaron had seen this, he built an altar before it, and

made proclamation by a crier's voice, saying: Tomorrow is the solemnity

of the Lord. And rising in the morning, they offered

holocausts, and peace victims, and the

people sat down to eat and drink, and they rose up

to play. By to play I here more probably understand to sing,

to lead dances, and to do the like in honour

of the idol: for that in these things there was the crime of idolatry the Apostle

clearly declares in 1 Corinthians 10, v. 7, adducing these very

words. There have been some who have tried

to excuse Aaron in all these things, on the ground that he wished

to refer everything to the worship of the true God. But

it is not worth while to inquire too curiously into his intention,

since at least it is certain that he sinned by excessive indulgence,

and is accused both by Moses and by God himself,

as we shall see below.

[306] St. Stephen in Acts 7, v. 36, speaks thus of Moses and

of this idolatry of the Israelites: the crime of idolatry, He

brought them out, doing wonders and signs in the land

of Egypt, and in the Red Sea, and in the desert forty

years. This is that Moses who said to the children of Israel:

A prophet shall God raise up to you of your own brethren,

as myself: him shall you hear. This

is he that was in the church in the wilderness with the angel

who spoke to him on Mount Sina, and with

our fathers: who received the words of life to give unto us.

Whom our fathers would not obey: but thrust him away,

and in their hearts turned back into Egypt,

saying to Aaron: Make us gods, that

may go before us: for as to this Moses, who brought

us out of the land of Egypt, we know not what has become of

him. And they made a calf in those days, and offered

sacrifice to the idol, and rejoiced in the works

of their own hands. In Psalm 105, v. 19, the same

sin of the Israelites is gravely censured in these

words: They made also a calf in Horeb: and they adored

the graven thing. And they changed their Glory

(that is, God) into the likeness of a calf that eateth

grass. They forgot God, who saved

them, who had done great things in Egypt, wondrous works in

the land of Cham, terrible things in the Red Sea. And he

(God) said that he would destroy them: had not Moses

his chosen one stood before him in the breach, to turn away

his wrath, lest he should destroy

them. It is clear that Moses by his prayers hindered

the Israelites from being utterly destroyed by God for this crime.

But those words in the breach

can be fittingly expounded in various ways. For

first they may be understood of the breaking of the covenant entered upon

with God, and thus they only designate the time in which

Moses saved his people from ruin. They may

also be taken of the breaking of the tables,

or rather of the grinding down of the calf, and thus they indicate

the means Moses used to appease the divine

wrath, although he added prayers also

and the punishment of many.

[307] Moses learned the crime of his people from the angel

on the mount, which the angel indicates to Moses: and he prays for the people, as he narrates in Exodus 32, v. 7, writing thus:

And the Lord spoke to Moses,

saying: Go, get thee down: thy people,

which thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt, hath sinned. They have quickly

strayed from the way which thou didst shew them: and they have made to

themselves a molten calf, and have adored it,

and sacrificing victims to it, have said: These are

thy gods, O Israel, that have brought thee out of the land of Egypt.

And again the Lord said to Moses (now

probably praying for the people): I see that

this people is stiff-necked: let me alone, that

my wrath may be kindled against them, and that I may destroy them,

and I will make of thee a great nation. But Moses

besought the Lord his God, saying: Why,

O Lord, is thy indignation kindled against thy

people, whom thou hast brought out of the land of Egypt, with great

strength and with a mighty hand? Let not the Egyptians say,

I beseech thee: He craftily brought them out, that he might kill them

in the mountains, and destroy them from the earth: let

thy anger cease, and be appeased upon the wickedness of thy

people. Remember Abraham, Isaac, and Israel,

thy servants, to whom thou sworest by thy own self,

saying: I will multiply your seed as

the stars of heaven: and all this land

that I have spoken of, I will give to your seed, and you shall possess

it for ever. And the Lord was appeased

from doing the evil which he had spoken against

his people. Nevertheless the Lord was not yet altogether appeased,

as is gathered from what follows.

[308] he comes down from the mount, breaks the tables, gravely rebukes Aaron, And Moses returned from the mount, carrying

the two tables of the testimony in his hand, written

on both sides, and made by the work of God: the writing

also of God was graven in the tables. And Josue

(whom Moses had revisited as he tarried in the lower part of the mount)

hearing the tumult of the people shouting,

said to Moses: There is a noise of battle heard

in the camp. But he (better instructed) answered:

It is not the cry of men encouraging to fight, nor

the shout of men compelling to flight: but

I hear the voice of singers. And when he came nigh

to the camp, he saw the calf, and the dances:

and being very angry, he threw the tables out of his hand, and broke

them at the foot of the mount: and laying hold of the calf,

which they had made, he burnt it, and beat it to

powder, which he strowed into water, and

gave thereof to the children of Israel to drink. And he said to Aaron:

What has this people done to thee, that thou shouldst bring

upon them a most heinous sin? And he answered him:

Let not my lord be offended: for thou

knowest this people, that they are prone to evil:

they said to me: Make us gods, that may go

before us: for as to this Moses, who brought

us out of the land of Egypt, we know not what has befallen him.

And I said to them: Which of you hath any gold? And they took

and brought it to me: and I cast it into the

fire, and this calf came out. Frivolous indeed

was this excuse. But Moses, though otherwise most

meek, strove to repair the honour of God, wounded by so enormous a crime,

by a more signal display of severity than he had

hitherto employed, that in this way also

he might afterwards more easily render God propitious.

[309] and orders twenty-three thousand men to be slain by the Levites: Moses therefore, seeing the people that they were

naked (of their gold, and still more of the honour of the divine

friendship) — for Aaron had stripped them by reason of

the shame of the filth (that is, of the idol, which is called by that name,

as often elsewhere, or by reason of the shameful

idol), and had set them naked (of the divine

protection, or unarmed, as others will have it) among their enemies —

and standing in the gate of the camp, said: If

any man be on the Lord's side, let him join with me. And all the sons

of Levi gathered themselves together unto him: and he said to them: Thus

saith the Lord God of Israel: Put every man (each one)

his sword upon his thigh: go, and return

from gate to gate through the midst of the camp,

and let every man kill his brother, and friend,

and neighbour (that is, whomsoever he met,

without any distinction). And the sons of Levi did

according to the words of Moses, and there fell that

day about twenty-three thousand men. And Moses said:

You have consecrated your hands this day to the Lord,

every man in his son and in his brother, that a blessing may be given

to you. This punishment being accomplished, in which

the wonderful authority of Moses appears, he then rebuked

the people more mildly, and appeased God,

as we shall see.

[310] But it is worth while first to hear what Moses himself set forth

to the people concerning these matters in Deuteronomy 9, v. 8, where

he thus addresses the people: For in Horeb also thou didst provoke

him (God), and being angry he would have destroyed thee, when for this sin the Lord would have destroyed the whole nation,

when I went up into the mount to receive the tables

of stone, the tables of the covenant which the Lord

made with you: and I continued in the mount forty

days and nights… And the Lord gave me

two tables of stone, written with the finger of God,

and containing all the words that he spoke to you

in the mount from the midst of the fire, when the assembly of the people

was gathered together. And when forty days

were passed, and as many nights, the Lord gave me

the two tables of stone, the tables of the covenant,

and he said to me: Arise, and go down from hence quickly,

for thy people, which thou hast brought out of Egypt,

have quickly forsaken the way that thou hast shewn

them, and they have made to themselves a molten thing. And again

the Lord said to me: I see that this people is stiff-

necked: let me alone that I may destroy him,

and blot out his name from under heaven, and set thee

over a nation, that is greater and stronger than

this. And when I came down from the burning mount, and

held the two tables of the covenant with both hands, and had seen

that you had sinned against the Lord your God, and

had made to yourselves a molten calf, and had quickly forsaken

his way, which he had shewn you:

I cast the tables out of my hands, and broke

them in your sight.

[311] And I fell down before the Lord, as before,

forty days and nights neither eating bread, Moses interceded with prayers,

nor drinking water, for all

your sins, which you had committed against the Lord,

and had provoked him to wrath: for I feared

his indignation and anger, wherewith being moved against you,

he would have destroyed you. And the Lord heard me

this time also. And he was exceeding angry against Aaron

also, and would have destroyed him,

and I prayed for him in like manner. And your sin

that you had committed, that is, the calf,

I took, and burned it with fire, and breaking it into pieces,

and utterly bringing it to dust, I cast it

into the torrent which cometh down from the mountain. These

last words hint how Moses gave

the Israelites to drink of the water into which he had cast

the dust of the calf; namely because it was from the said torrent

that they drew drink for themselves. But what is narrated

concerning the second forty days' fast and the receiving

of the second tables, is said out of order on occasion

of the breaking of the first: for it happened some

days later. The rest, however, befell

on the same day on which Moses came down from Mount

Sinai.

[312] What the Lawgiver did on the following day is told

in Exodus 32, v. 30: who, since he could hardly obtain God's pardon, showed the highest And the next day being come,

Moses spoke to the people: You have sinned a very great

sin: I will go up to the Lord, if by any means

I may be able to entreat him for your crime.

And returning to the Lord, he said: I beseech thee,

this people hath sinned a heinous sin, and they have made to

themselves gods of gold: either forgive them this

trespass, or if thou do not, strike me out of the book

that thou hast written. And the Lord answered him: He that

hath sinned against me, him will I strike out of my book: but

go thou, and lead this people whither I have told

thee: my angel shall go before thee. And I,

in the day of revenge, will visit this sin also

of theirs. The Lord therefore struck the people for

the guilt of the calf, which Aaron had made. Some believe

that the Israelites were punished in the same place and time

by some plague nowhere named, as by pestilence or

the like: others will have it that in punishment of that sin were inflicted

all the hardships of the journey which they suffered

in the desert. But perhaps that striking is to be understood

of the slaughter of the twenty-three thousand, which had been carried out

by Moses' command, and doubtless by the Lord's

inspiration. But what goes before, in the day of revenge

I will visit, can conveniently be understood of the day of judgment,

or of the eternal punishment to be inflicted upon those who had not

blotted out, or should not blot out, their sin by due

penance. But here interpreters chiefly dispute

concerning the words of Moses, Strike me out of thy book,

etc., and ask whether he asked to be deprived of eternal

beatitude, if the Lord did not pardon the people's

sin, or only of the present life, or of some

other prerogative by which he was inscribed in the book of God.

[313] herein showing his charity in prayer. St. Augustine, in question 147 on Exodus,

expresses his mind thus: He said this indeed with confidence,

so that the reasoning might be concluded from the consequences,

that is, that because God would not blot Moses

out of his book, he would remit that sin to the people.

Nevertheless it is to be noted how great

an evil Moses perceived in that sin, since he believed it must be expiated

by so great a slaughter, he who so loved them

that he poured out those words to God for them. St.

Paulinus of Nola expounds Moses' purpose in the same way

in his Epistle to Amandus, which was the 21st,

but in the most recent edition is the 12th: for having recited

the Prophet's words, he speaks of them thus: That he,

partaker of the divine colloquy, not neglectful of his own salvation,

nor insolent towards the Lord, by the art of a deep

counsel dared to speak so, that against the Lord in his justice,

threatening the destruction due to a sinful people,

he might set the offering rather of his own blotting-out,

being assured, that is, of the divine mercy and justice, that

the Lord's mercy should spare even the unjust, since Justice cannot blot out

the just man. Again Augustine, in Sermon 88,

elsewhere 18, on the Words of the Lord,

reasons thus concerning this prayer of Moses: God

discloses to his Servant the deed of the people, and says that he will

destroy them from before his face. Moses intercedes, being about to return

to that same people… And lest perchance he should seem to have done this

out of necessity rather than out of charity,

God offered him another people: I will make thee, he says,

a great nation, that he might destroy those others. But

he did not accept: he cleaves to sinners, he asks

for sinners. And how does he ask? A great

proof of love, brethren. How does he ask?

See that charity, of which we have often spoken, which is

in a certain manner motherly. When God threatened

the sacrilegious people, the tender bowels of Moses trembled,

and he set himself for them against the wrath of God.

Lord, he says, if thou forgive them this sin: but if

not, blot me out of thy book, which thou hast written.

With what fatherly and motherly bowels, with what assurance

he said this, considering the justice and mercy

of God; that, because he is just, he should not destroy

the just; because he is merciful, he should pardon sinners.

This extraordinary charity of Moses is certain,

and the intention of the petitioner seems rightly expounded: but of

what book he speaks appears to me too uncertain

for anything certain to be established.

§ XXIX. Moses again treats with the Lord, whose

threats he at length allays, and desires to see his face: in what manner he saw God: remaining again forty days on the mount, he receives the second tables, and comes down with shining countenance.

[ ] The Lord continues to show himself angry with the people, Although Moses at once strove by the most urgent prayers

to appease the Lord, yet he obtained full

reconciliation only by degrees. Already before his descent from the mount he had obtained

that God should not destroy the whole people. But on the

following day he had pressed most earnestly for reconciliation;

yet he had received an answer not altogether favourable,

as may be seen at n. 312. The Lord, or the angel of a higher order

representing the Lord, persisted in the same answer

in Exodus 33, where the following is read: And the Lord spoke to

Moses, saying: Go up from this place,

thou and thy people, which thou hast brought out of the land

of Egypt, into the land which I swore to Abraham, Isaac,

and Jacob, saying: To thy seed I will give it:

and I will send an angel before thee, that I may cast out

the Chanaanite, and the Amorrhite, and the Hethite, and

the Pherezite, and the Hevite, and the Jebusite, and that thou mayst enter

into the land that floweth with milk and honey. For I will not

go up with thee, because thou art a stiff-necked people:

lest I destroy thee in the way. And the people hearing

these very bad tidings (that the Lord was unwilling

to accompany them), mourned: and no man put on

his ornaments according to custom. And the Lord said to Moses:

Say to the children of Israel: Thou art a stiff-necked

people, once I shall come up in the midst of thee, and shall destroy

thee. Now presently lay aside thy ornaments, that I may know

what to do to thee. So the children of Israel laid aside

their ornaments by Mount Horeb. After these threats

of the Lord, Moses too, in order to increase the people's

fear, and perhaps also at the Lord's command,

pitched the tabernacle outside the camp. But it is not

a question here of the tabernacle which the Lord commanded

to be put together; for that was not yet built,

but only of the earlier tabernacle, whether it was Moses'

own, or common to all.

[315] Take the words of the sacred text at v. 7: Moses

also, taking the tabernacle, and Moses pitches the tabernacle outside the camp; pitched it far off without the camp,

and called the name thereof, The tabernacle

of the covenant (as another was afterwards also called).

And all the people that had any

question, went forth to the tabernacle of the covenant,

without the camp. And when Moses went forth

to the tabernacle, all the people rose up,

and every one stood in the door of his pavilion, and they beheld

the back of Moses, till he went into the

tent. And when he was gone into the tabernacle of the covenant,

the pillar of the cloud came down, and stood at

the door, and he (the angel out of the cloud) spoke with Moses,

all seeing that the pillar of the cloud

stood at the door of the tabernacle. And they

stood, and worshipped at the doors of their tents.

And the Lord spoke to Moses face to

face, as a man is wont to speak to his friend.

And when he returned into the camp, his servant

Josue the son of Nun, a young man, departed not from the tabernacle.

What is said above, that Moses spoke

with the Lord face to face, does not mean

that he saw the Lord's face: for a little

after he desires to see it, but that he spoke with him

familiarly, and with one present before him,

yet in such a way that he did not see the angel with whom

he spoke. And Josue is called a young man not from

childish age, but because he was Moses' disciple,

and much younger than he: in the Greek it reads νέος, a youth.

[316] but at length he obtains from God, But in what way Moses again besought the Lord

with new prayers, and at length

obtained what he asked, is subjoined at v. 12. And

Moses said to the Lord: Thou biddest me lead forth

this people: and thou dost not let me know whom

thou wilt send with me, especially whereas thou hast said: I know

thee by name, and, Thou hast found grace before

me. If therefore I have found favour in thy sight,

shew me thy face, that I may know thee, and may find

grace before thy eyes: look upon thy people,

this nation. Moses' prayer has some

obscurity, and is variously expounded. But

Bonfrerius' exposition much pleases me. It is

as follows: Because God had asserted above that he was unwilling

to go up with them, but would only send his angel

as forerunner — a thing which by no means pleased

Moses — Moses complains amicably with God

that his desire has not been satisfied, nor has the leader

he wishes for been assigned him. He asks therefore whether

he persists in his sentence, whether he will send an angel with him,

or whether God himself, the tabernacle having been built for him in

the camp, will accompany them and be their guide

into the promised land. This is the explanation of the first words.

The middle words signify the highest

favour of Moses with God, which he uses

as an argument for his petition: Shew me thy face,

where the Hebrew has, Shew, or, Make

me know thy way. And hence Bonfrerius gathers with others

that Moses here does not yet ask the vision

of God, as he asked afterwards; but only

that God should show himself companion and guide of the way. The reason

of this exposition is that Moses seems to be wholly bent

on obtaining this from God. The following words

also favour it, in which God assents to Moses:

And the Lord said: My face shall go before

thee (that is, I myself will go before), and I will give thee

rest.

[317] that he will accompany the Israelites on the way: asking also to see God's face, And Moses said: If thou thyself dost not go before us,

bring us not out of this place. For wherein

shall we be able to know, I and thy people, that we have found

grace in thy sight, unless thou walk

with us, that we may be glorified by all the peoples

that dwell upon the earth? And the Lord said

to Moses: This word also, which thou hast spoken,

will I do: for thou hast found grace before

me, and thee I know by name; that is, By name

I know thee, and hold thee dear above the rest,

says Bonfrerius again, who also thinks

that nothing was here asked by Moses, or granted

by God, that had not been granted in the preceding

words; but that that concession was approved

and confirmed. It might perhaps be said that the first promise

belongs to Moses alone, but the second

to the whole people. Certainly Moses at the beginning had spoken

only of himself, and the angel had said, shall go before

thee; but afterwards he treats of the whole people, and the Lord

likewise assents. And these things being obtained, Moses leaps forward

to another petition, as follows: And he

(Moses) said: Shew me thy glory. He answered:

I will shew thee all good, and

I will call in the name of the Lord before thee: and I will have mercy

on whom I will; and I will be clement to whom

it shall please me. And again he said: Thou canst not see

my face: for man shall not see me,

and live. And again: Behold, he says, there is a place

with me, and thou shalt stand upon the rock. And when

my glory shall pass, I will set thee in a hole of the rock,

and protect thee with my right hand, till I pass: and I will take away

my hand, and thou shalt see my back parts:

but my face thou canst not see. These

words again have many difficulties.

[318] First, these words I will shew thee all good

seem here only to signify, he is in part heard: I will shew

thee some most excellent good, that is, my

glory, yet in part, as is added below. Secondly,

the words, I will call in the name of God before thee, and

I will have mercy on whom I will, and I will be clement

to whom it shall please me, are to be attributed to the angel,

who was about to pass before Moses, and thus

to indicate his presence, namely by saying

the name of God, and certain epithets of God, especially

these, I will have mercy, etc.; which will at the same time indicate that I

bestow this favour on thee freely. Thirdly, all that comes

after seems sufficiently to hint that nothing else

is here promised to Moses, save that he should see that glorious body

which the angel representing God assumed,

with whom Moses frequently and familiarly

spoke, yet in such a way that he heard the voice

from near at hand, but did not see the body assumed by

the angel. That nothing further was here promised to Moses

is also gathered from the outcome presently

to be related. But whether Moses ever in this life saw

the very essence of God, I shall inquire more at large

towards the end of the Commentary.

[319] Further, the Lord by his angel at the same time

bids Moses to prepare two tables, [then he is bidden to prepare two tables, and to go up the mount with them, where he enjoys the vision,]

such as the first had been, setting forth his command

thus in chapter 34: And thereafter (the Lord to Moses):

Hew thee, he said, two tables of stone

like unto the former, and I will write upon them the words

which the tables had that thou brokest. Be

ready in the morning, that thou mayst forthwith go up into Mount Sinai,

and thou shalt stand with me upon the top of the mount.

Let no man go up with thee, and let not any man be seen

throughout all the mount: neither let the oxen nor the sheep

feed over against it. Then he cut out two tables of stone,

such as had been before: and rising very early

he went up into Mount Sinai. Presently follows

the fulfilment of the promise made to Moses on the preceding day,

that he should see the Lord's back parts, and it is narrated thus:

And when the Lord had come down in a cloud,

Moses stood with him, calling upon the name

of the Lord. And as he passed before him, he said: O Ruler,

Lord God, merciful and gracious,

patient and of much compassion, and true, who keepest

mercy unto thousands: who takest away iniquity,

and wickedness, and sins, and no man of himself is

innocent before thee. Who renderest the iniquity of

the fathers to the children and to the grandchildren, unto the third and

fourth generation. Here the interpreters dispute

whether those words, spoken at the time of the vision, O Ruler,

Lord, etc., are to be attributed to Moses, as

the text of the Vulgate hints; or to the passing angel,

as some will have the Hebrew text and

the Seventy interpreters to have it. But the Hebrew text

is ambiguous, and can be fitted to either sense,

as can the text of the Septuagint. Wherefore I do not see

that these words must necessarily be adjudged away from Moses.

The same is to be said of the words calling upon the name

of the Lord, which again in the Hebrew are ambiguous,

And he called upon the name of the Lord, as also in the Greek,

And he called.

[320] Cornelius a Lapide on this place, with

many others, thinks which is variously expounded: that the reported words are rather to be attributed to the Lord or

the angel than to Moses, because

in chapter 33, v. 19, the Lord had promised that he would say similar words

in passing, and because in Numbers 14, v.

17, Moses attributes almost the same words to the Lord, as spoken before;

and he shows that the words of the Vulgate can be adapted

to this exposition, and would have it that the Lord

said those words in order to give Moses a formula

of prayer. This interpretation is indeed probable;

but since he confesses that the Hebrew and

Greek text can be fitted to either sense, and this

can be done more easily than the words of the Vulgate can be

so expounded that the words often mentioned should be attributed

to the angel or to the Lord, another exposition of his own pleases me more.

He gives it in this manner: If you would take our interpreter's words

of Moses, as uttered by

him, say that God as he passed before

Moses first uttered these words, and that then Moses, following

God, pronounced them a second time,

so that these words of God were repeated by him. Further,

as I consider the particulars, another explanation also

occurs to me; and I gladly share it with the reader.

Moses recited in chapter 33, v. 19, the words which

the Lord in passing was to say, as also the other things

that he was then to do, which he presently subjoins there. But

in chapter 34, v. 5 and following, Moses is silent about these things,

because they had already been related; and he narrates only what

he himself said upon the occasion of that vision. This conjecture

appears to me probable, because the words that are

attributed to the Lord as to be said are much shorter,

and not exactly the same as those which Moses

said according to this opinion. But the words

in Numbers 14, v. 17, make little to the purpose, since

they are not the same, and seem rather gathered from

things said at different times. St. Augustine, in question 154

on Exodus, believed that the vision promised to Moses

was to be explained mystically, and was not offered to Moses,

because nowhere is Moses said to have seen the back parts

of the Lord. But all others commonly think

that that vision is here related, although not everything

that had been promised is again asserted in express words

to have been done.

[321] praying again for the people, and remaining forty days on the mount, After the vision, which was doubtless brief,

and during which Moses stood motionless,

had vanished from his eyes, he returns to his accustomed prayers:

for so I would think the following words are to be understood:

And Moses making haste, bowed down prostrate

to the earth, and adoring, said: If I have found grace

in thy sight, O Lord, I beseech thee that thou wilt

go with us (for it is a stiff-necked people),

and take away our iniquities and sins,

and possess us. The Lord answered:

I will make a covenant in the sight of all, I will do signs

such as were never seen upon the earth,

nor in any nations: that this people, in the midst of whom

thou art, may see the terrible work of the Lord which

I will do. Observe all things that I command thee

this day: I myself will drive out before thy face the Amorrhite,

etc. Then various precepts are delivered,

the observance of which the Lord inculcates:

and it is subjoined at v. 27: Write thee these words,

by which I have made a covenant both with thee and with Israel. So he was

there with the Lord forty days and forty

nights: he ate no bread and drank no water,

and he wrote upon the tables the ten words

of the covenant. Of these Moses speaks to the people

in Deuteronomy 10, v. 10, in this manner: And I stood in

the mount, as before, forty days and nights:

and the Lord heard me this

time also, and would not destroy thee. And he said to me: Go,

and go before the people, that they may enter, and

possess the land which I swore to their fathers

that I would deliver to them.

[322] And in the same place at v. 1, concerning the tables: At that

time the Lord said to me: Hew thee two tables

of stone, like the former, and come up

to me into the mount: [he receives the tables with the ten precepts written on them, which he afterwards enclosed in the ark:] and thou shalt make an ark of wood, and

I will write upon the tables the words that were in those

which thou brokest before, and thou shalt put them in the ark.

So I made an ark of setim wood. And when I had hewn

two tables of stone like the former, I went up

into the mount, having them in my hands. And he wrote

in the tables, according to that which he had written before,

the ten words * which the Lord spoke to

you in the mount from the midst of the fire, when the people

was assembled: and he gave them to me. And returning

from the mount, I came down, and put the tables into the ark

that I had made, and they are there until this present, as

the Lord commanded me. What is said of the tables

placed in the ark was done a little later, namely

after the ark had been put together. But Moses

in Deuteronomy is wont to narrate things done without order

of time, according as each conduced more to his

purpose. That the tables afterwards remained

in the ark we have in 3 Kings 8, v. 9, where these words are read:

Now in the ark there was nothing else but the two

tables of stone, which Moses put there in

Horeb, when the Lord made a covenant with

the children of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt.

The same is said in 2 Paralipomenon 5, v. 10; and the Apostle

mentions the same as placed in the ark in Hebrews 9,

v. 5.

[323] But when Moses came down from the mount with the tables,

the splendour of Moses' countenance. he offered a new and glorious spectacle with his shining countenance,

which sent forth rays like

horns. Hear his own words in Exodus 34,

v. 29: And when Moses came down from Mount

Sinai, he held the two tables of the testimony, and he knew not

that his face was horned from the conversation

of the Lord's discourse. And Aaron and

the children of Israel, seeing the face of Moses horned, were afraid

to come near. And being called by him, they returned,

both Aaron and the princes of the synagogue. And after

he had spoken to them, all the children of Israel also came

to him: and he commanded them all things

that he had heard of the Lord in Mount Sinai. And having ended

his discourse, he put a veil upon his

face. Which when he went in to the Lord, and spoke

with him, he took off, till he came forth, and then he spoke

to the children of Israel all things that had been

commanded him. And they saw that the face of Moses when he came forth

was horned, but he covered his face

again, if at any time he spoke to them. Thus far

the sacred text. And it cannot be doubted

that God conferred that splendour upon Moses — so great that,

as the Apostle witnesses in 2 Corinthians 3, v. 7, the children of Israel

could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses, for the glory

of his countenance — in order to gain him greater

authority and reverence among

the people, and to declare his own intimate familiarity

with him. Of the veil with which Moses

covered the splendour of his face, that the Israelites might more freely

speak with him, the Apostle makes mention

in 2 Corinthians 3, v. 13, expounding its allegorical

signification.

* i.e., precepts

§ XXX. The construction, erection and consecration

of the tabernacle and of other things: Aaron and his sons consecrated priests: and two of these punished with death by divine visitation.

[ ] [Moses sets forth the Lord's commandments concerning the tabernacle and the other things to be constructed:] After the covenant of the Israelites with the Lord

had been restored by Moses, and the full

reconciliation of the people had been confirmed by the second receiving of the tables,

the holy Lawgiver used all

diligence that the people might perfectly fulfil the Lord's

commandments. For this cause he called the people together and

taught them what the Lord had commanded to be done,

as is read in Exodus 35: Therefore, all the multitude

of the children of Israel being gathered together, he said to them: These are

the things which the Lord hath commanded to be done. And having repeated the precept

concerning the religious observance of the Sabbath, he proceeds to the offering

of all things that were necessary for building

the tabernacle, and the other things pertaining to the worship

of God and to the ceremonies. And Moses said:

(v. 4) to all the assembly of the children of Israel:

This is the word that the Lord hath commanded, saying:

Set aside with you first-fruits to the Lord. Let every one

that is willing and hath a ready heart offer them to the Lord:

gold, and silver, and brass, violet,

and purple, and scarlet twice dyed, and fine linen,

goats' hair, and rams' skins dyed red,

and violet-coloured skins, setim wood, and oil to

maintain the lights, and to make ointment,

and most sweet incense, onyx stones,

and precious stones for the adorning of the ephod

and the rational. These were the gifts to be offered. Besides,

as follows, Whosoever of you is wise

(that is, a skilled craftsman), let him come and make

(namely under the direction of Beseleel and Ooliab) that which the Lord

hath commanded: to wit, the tabernacle, and its roof;

and the rest pertaining to the divine worship, and to the ceremonies

and priestly vestments, which are there enumerated.

[325] and the people offer for this end more gifts than were needed The Israelites most readily obeyed Moses in these commands,

as is said at v. 20: And all the multitude

of the children of Israel going out from the presence

of Moses, offered first-fruits to the Lord with a most ready and

devout mind, to make the work of

the tabernacle of the testimony. Whatsoever was necessary for the service

and for the holy vestments, the men with

the women furnished, bracelets, and earrings,

rings, and armlets: every vessel of gold was set aside for the offerings

of the Lord. If any man had violet

and purple, and scarlet twice dyed,

fine linen and goats' hair, rams' skins dyed red,

and violet-coloured skins, metal of silver and brass, they offered them

to the Lord, and setim wood for various uses.

But the skilled women also, who had spun, gave

violet, purple, and vermilion, and fine linen,

and goats' hair, bestowing all of their own

accord. And the princes offered onyx stones,

and precious stones for the ephod and the rational

(they are vestments of the high Priest), and spices

and oil to maintain the lights, and

to prepare ointment, and to compound incense of most sweet

odour. All the men and women

offered their gifts with a devout mind, that the works

might be made which the Lord had commanded by the hand

of Moses. All the children of Israel dedicated voluntary offerings to the Lord.

Nay, so great was the ardour of the Israelites

that they did not cease offering until they were bidden by a new

command. Hear what Moses says of the matter in chapter 36,

v. 3: And they (the craftsmen), while they pressed on with the work,

the people offered their vows (that is, gifts) every morning.

Whereupon the craftsmen were forced to come, and they said

to Moses: The people offereth more than is necessary.

Moses therefore commanded proclamation to be made by the crier's voice:

Let neither man nor woman offer any more

in the work of the sanctuary. And so they ceased from

offering gifts, because the things offered sufficed and more than abounded.

[326] Further, as all the most precious things were most readily

offered by the Israelites, and the craftsmen set about the work with a ready mind, so very many craftsmen

offered themselves of their own accord, that under Beseleel and Ooliab, appointed by

the Lord, they might complete all the works

which the Lord had commanded to be made. And Beseleel and

Ooliab, whom the Lord had furnished for this end with singular wisdom and

understanding, Moses presented

to the people, as is had in chapter 35 towards the end.

And these, with the others who offered themselves of their own accord, set about the work

briskly, as is set forth in chapter 36

in these words: So Beseleel and Ooliab wrought, and

every wise man, to whom the Lord gave understanding

and intelligence, that they might know how to work skilfully

the things that are necessary for the uses of the sanctuary, and which

the Lord commanded. And when Moses had called them,

and every skilled man to whom the Lord had given

wisdom, and who of their own accord had offered

themselves to do the work, he delivered to them all

the offerings of the children of Israel. In this manner, therefore, there were built by the said

craftsmen the tabernacle, the ark,

the priestly vestments, and all the rest belonging to the tabernacle

and to the divine worship and the ceremonies,

in which the workmanship doubtless surpassed even the most precious

material, since the Lord himself suggested the plan of them all

to Moses, and Moses communicated it

to the craftsmen; and these were endowed by the Lord with singular

knowledge and skill to carry out everything

expertly.

[327] About six months seem to have been spent on the construction

of them all, so that in six or seven months all was completed: or at most nearly

seven months: for at the beginning of the third month the Israelites came

to Mount Sinai, and were there at least

three months before the construction of the aforesaid things

was begun, as may easily be gathered from

Moses' twofold stay of forty days on

the mount, and the things done before and between, so

that those works seem to have been begun in the sixth month. And so,

since all was completed before the end

of the year, as we shall presently see, the construction of everything

lasted six months, and

perhaps part of a seventh.

Further, very many things, and those exceedingly precious,

that pertained to the tabernacle alone, Exodus explains

in chapter 36, where the parts of the tabernacle are described.

In chapter 37 is narrated the construction of the ark,

the propitiatory, the table, the candlestick, the lamps,

the altar of incense, and of the incense itself, and

of the ointment; as also in chapter 38 that of the altar of holocaust, the brazen

laver, and the whole court of the tabernacle with its

parts. Lastly in chapter 39 are recounted all the pontifical

and priestly vestments made by the same men,

and it is affirmed that all things were built

which the Lord had commanded to be made, so that nothing of

them all was wanting. Finally in the same place at v. 43 it is subjoined:

And when Moses saw all things finished,

he blessed them.

[328] And all things being finished, Moses received a command

from the Lord, Moses is bidden to erect the tabernacle and consecrate the priests; which is related in chapter 40

in these words: And the Lord spoke to Moses,

saying: In the first month, on the first day of the month,

thou shalt set up the tabernacle of the testimony, and shalt put

the ark in it, and shalt let down the veil before it (for the separation

of the holy place from the holy of holies): and when thou hast brought in

the table, thou shalt set upon it the things that are duly commanded.

The candlestick shall stand with its lamps, and

the golden altar, whereon the incense is burnt, before

the ark of the testimony. Thou shalt put the hanging in the entry

of the tabernacle, and before it the altar of holocaust:

the laver between the altar and the tabernacle, which thou shalt fill

with water. And thou shalt encompass the court with hangings,

and the entry thereof. And taking the oil of unction

thou shalt anoint the tabernacle with its vessels, that they may be sanctified:

the altar of holocaust and all its vessels:

the laver with its foot: thou shalt consecrate all with the oil of unction,

that they may be most holy. And thou shalt bring

Aaron and his sons to the door of the tabernacle of the testimony,

and having washed them with water, thou shalt clothe them with the holy vestments,

that they may minister to me, and that their unction may profit them for an everlasting

priesthood. And Moses did all things

that the Lord had commanded. But not all

was completed in one day, or with slight labour.

[329] the erection of the tabernacle, and the placing of all things pertaining to it: Therefore, as follows at v. 15, in the first month

of the second year (from the going out), on the first day of the month,

the tabernacle was set up. And Moses reared it up,

and placed the boards and the sockets and the bars, and set up

the pillars, and spread the roof over the tabernacle,

putting the covering above, as

the Lord had commanded. This is the whole construction of the tabernacle,

named part by part, but without the court.

There follows the ark with the oracle or propitiatory,

which was to be placed in that part of the tabernacle which

is called the holy of Holies, and was separated by a veil

from the other part, which is called the holy place. V. 18: And he put

also the testimony (that is, the tables) in the ark,

setting the bars underneath, and the oracle above.

And when he had brought the ark into the tabernacle, he hung up

the veil before it… He set the table also in

the tabernacle of the testimony, at the north side

without the veil… He set also the candlestick in

the tabernacle of the testimony over against the table on the south

side, placing the lamps in order… He set also

the golden altar under the roof of the testimony over against the veil,

and burnt upon it the incense of spices…

He put also the hanging in the entry of the tabernacle of the testimony,

and the altar of holocaust in the entry of the testimony,

offering upon it the holocaust and the sacrifices…

He set also the laver between the tabernacle of the testimony

and the altar, filling it with water. And Moses

and Aaron and his sons washed their hands and

feet, when they went into the tabernacle of the covenant, and

drew near to the altar… He set up also the court round about

the tabernacle and the altar, drawing the hanging in the entry thereof.

This is the setting up of the whole tabernacle with the court,

and all things belonging to it. And all things

were done as the Lord had commanded,

which is frequently repeated.

[330] the glory of the Lord overshadows it: After all things were finished, the cloud covered

the tabernacle of the testimony, and the glory of the Lord

filled it. Neither could Moses go into

the tabernacle of the covenant, the cloud covering all things, and the majesty

of the Lord shining forth, because the cloud had covered

all. That Moses could not enter because of

the too great brightness and density of the cloud happened only

at the beginning, at the dedication. For at other times Moses

often entered, to consult the Lord,

as is had in Numbers 7, v. 89: And when Moses entered

into the tabernacle of the covenant, to consult

the oracle, he heard the voice of one speaking to him

from the propitiatory that was over the ark of the testimony

between the two cherubims, and from thence he spoke

to him. And after the erection of the tabernacle, from the cloud

resting upon it the Israelites learned when they should set forward,

or remain in a place, as

is set forth in Exodus 40, v. 34, in these words: If

at any time the cloud left the tabernacle, the children of Israel

went forward by their troops: if it hung over,

they remained in the same place. For the cloud

of the Lord hung over the tabernacle by day, and

a fire by night, in the sight of all the peoples of Israel

throughout all their mansions. These things concerning the cloud of the tabernacle

are related on occasion of its erection. But let us return

to the things that Moses did on the day on which he erected the tabernacle,

not alone, but with the help of the craftsmen

who had built it.

[331] The Lord had commanded not only that the tabernacle be erected,

but also that it, with all the rest,

be consecrated, the consecration of the tabernacle, and moreover that Aaron

and his four sons be anointed and initiated into the priesthood. These ceremonies

are believed to have been begun on the same day, and

they were continued for seven days, as is related

in Leviticus 8, where also are related the sacrifices which

on each of those days were offered for this cause by Moses.

The rite of consecration may be read in that place.

But in Exodus 29 the Lord prescribes to Moses in what

manner all things were to be done; and there at v. 37 the consecration

of the altar is prescribed to be continued for seven days,

no less than the consecration of the high priest and of the priests.

And in Leviticus 8, v. 10, before the anointing of Aaron,

the anointing of the tabernacle and of the rest is thus related: He (Moses) took

also the oil of unction, wherewith he anointed the tabernacle

with all its furniture. And when he had

sanctified and sprinkled the altar seven times, he anointed

it and all its vessels, and sanctified the laver with its foot

with the oil. During all those seven days those to be consecrated

remained in the tabernacle, as is said

at v. 33, where it is added: For in seven days is the consecration

finished. This Moses performed alone, and he also

offered all the sacrifices on those days.

[332] Further, for the sake of this consecration the princes

of the Israelites offered vast gifts. on account of which the princes offer gifts:

In Numbers 7 the following is read concerning this offering:

And it came to pass on the day when Moses had finished

the tabernacle, and set it up: and had anointed and

sanctified it with all its vessels, the altar likewise

and all its vessels: the princes of Israel

and the heads of the families, who were in each

tribe, and the chiefs of them that had been numbered

(already before the tabernacle was finished, Exodus

28, v. 25), offered gifts before the Lord, six covered

wagons with twelve oxen. These wagons served

for carrying the parts of the tabernacle, when they had

to set forward. This offering could have been made on the first

day of the month, on which the tabernacle was set up.

But the second offering of the princes, related at v. 10,

which was continued for twelve days, seems only

to have been begun after the dedication was completed, that is,

on the eighth day of the month, and it is thus related: Therefore

the leaders offered for the dedication of the altar on the day

when it was anointed, their offering before the altar. And the Lord

said to Moses: Let each of the leaders offer their gifts

on each of the days for the dedication of the altar.

And each offered the same gifts on twelve

days, as may be seen in that place. That this

offering was probably only begun on the

eighth day of the month, I asserted for this reason, that the offerings

were made for the offering of sacrifices, and that

no other sacrifices appear to have been offered on the seven days

during which the consecration lasted than those which

are related as offered for this end in Leviticus 8. But as to

what is said, on the day when it, namely the altar, was anointed,

it may be expounded of the first day after the anointing

was completed; and perhaps more rightly of an indeterminate time,

so that it signifies only about that time.

Certainly so must be understood the offering of all the twelve

princes, of which it is said at v. 84: These things were offered at the dedication

of the altar by the princes of Israel,

on the day whereon it was consecrated, twelve silver

dishes, etc.: for on the twelve following days

each offered one dish with the other

gifts by turns.

[333] the consecration of the priests made famous by a prodigy; On the eighth day of the first month Aaron began

to offer sacrifices with his four priestly sons;

but the two elder of these were on the same day taken off

by a sudden death. The whole matter is narrated in Leviticus 9 and

10 in this manner: And when the eighth day was come,

Moses called Aaron and his sons, and the ancients

of Israel, and said to Aaron: Take of the herd

a calf for sin, and a ram for a holocaust,

both without blemish, and offer them before

the Lord. And to the children of Israel thou shalt say: Take

a he-goat for sin, etc… For this day the Lord

will appear to you (by some prodigy, namely).

They brought therefore all things that Moses had commanded to

the door of the tabernacle: where when all the multitude

stood, Moses said: This is the word that the Lord

hath commanded: do it, and his glory will appear

to you. Then are related the various sacrifices which

Aaron offered, with the help of his sons. And it is subjoined

at v. 22: And (Aaron) stretching forth his hands to

the people, blessed them. And so, the victims for sin

and the holocausts and the peace offerings being completed, he came down.

And Moses and Aaron went into the tabernacle

of the testimony, and afterwards came forth and blessed

the people. And the glory of the Lord appeared to all

the multitude: and behold a fire, coming forth from the Lord,

devoured the holocaust, and the fat that was upon

the altar. And when the multitude saw this, they praised

the Lord, falling on their faces. Thus far

all was joyful for the new priests, whom the Lord

honoured by this prodigy.

[334] [two of the priests, because they had taken fire that was not sacred for sacrificing, are punished with death] But sadder things followed on the same day, as it seems,

when the Lord willed to punish a certain negligence of two of them

with a severe penalty, to show

with how great care one ought to approach the altar.

In chapter 10 Moses sets forth the deed and the punishment thus:

And Nadab and Abiu, the sons of Aaron (the elder-born),

taking their censers, put fire therein and incense

on it, offering before the Lord strange

fire: which was not commanded them (that

is, was forbidden). And fire coming out from the Lord

devoured them, and they died before the Lord,

namely in the tabernacle. In Numbers 3, v. 4, this is read of that

death: For Nadab and

Abiu died, when they offered strange fire before

the Lord in the desert of Sinai, without children. Likewise

Numbers 26, v. 61: Of Aaron were born Nadab

and Abiu, and Eleazar and Ithamar: of whom

Nadab and Abiu died, when they had offered

strange fire before the Lord. The reason of the death is everywhere

set down as the same, namely that they had offered

strange fire before the Lord, that is, that they had put upon the altar of

incense fire that was not sacred, brought to the tabernacle

in their censers, whereas they ought

to have taken fire from the altar of holocausts,

as is gathered from this place. Certainly most interpreters so explain

the place, and rightly, as I think.

This negligence the Lord punished with death.

But from the gravity of that temporal punishment we shall not

rightly gather the gravity of their sin, since

the Lord, the arbiter of life and death, can punish even a light

sin with death.

[335] and they are buried, but the others are forbidden to leave the tabernacle: What Moses did upon seeing this

death of his brother's two sons, whom by the Lord's

command he had consecrated priests, Leviticus

10, v. [ ], narrates, proceeding thus: And Moses said to Aaron:

This is what the Lord hath spoken: I will be sanctified

in them that approach to me, and in

the sight of all the people I will be glorified. The sense is,

I will show myself just by punishing the sins of those

who approach me, that is, of the priests; and

I will bring it about that the people see and proclaim this justice

of mine; and so be deterred from sins.

And when Aaron heard this, he held his peace. And Moses, having called

Misael and Elisaphan, the sons of Oziel, the uncle of Aaron,

said to them: Go and take away your brethren from

before the sanctuary, and carry them without the camp.

And they went forthwith and took them as they lay,

vested with linen tunics, and cast them forth,

as had been commanded them. They were carried without the camp

to burial, because the Jews did not bury the dead in cities

or in camps. Moreover Moses

forbade Aaron and his sons to give any outward

signs of grief, as he relates at v.

6 in these words: And Moses said to Aaron,

and to Eleazar and Ithamar his sons: Uncover not

your heads, and rend not your garments,

lest perhaps you die, and indignation come upon all

the congregation. Let your brethren, and all the

house of Israel, bewail the burning which the Lord

hath kindled: but you shall not go out of the doors

of the tabernacle, otherwise you shall perish: for

the oil of the holy unction is on you. And they did all things

according to the precept of Moses. Others might bewail

and mourn those who perished by the burning, and did so in fact;

but not Aaron and his sons, because they were

in the sacred ministry.

[336] Further, some error crept upon the other priests also,

some error had also crept upon the other priests. but they did not incur punishment. For the priests

used to eat certain portions of the sacrifices, save the holocaust,

and Moses had bidden them do so

at v. 12. But at v. 16, meanwhile, when Moses sought the he-goat

that had been offered for sin,

he found it burnt: and being angry with Eleazar

and Ithamar, the sons of Aaron who remained, he said:

Why did you not eat in the holy place the sin offering,

which is most holy, and given to you,

that you may bear the iniquity of the multitude, and may pray

for them in the sight of the Lord, especially

since none of the blood thereof hath been brought within the holy places,

and you ought to have eaten it in the sanctuary,

as was commanded me? Aaron answered:

This day hath been offered the victim for sin, and the holocaust

before the Lord: and to me hath happened

what thou seest. He hints at the death of his two sons,

and so goes on: How could I eat it,

or please the Lord in the ceremonies, having a sorrowful heart?

And when Moses heard this, he was satisfied.

Such things show how attentive

to everything, how skilled in the ceremonies, and how

exact even in the smallest matters the holy

Lawgiver was.

§ XXXI. The numbering of the people: the Levites

taken and numbered for the service of the tabernacle: the trumpets made, and other things for keeping order in the march of the host.

[ ] Many laws received from God and written down, The erection of the tabernacle, and the other things done on that occasion,

which we have narrated, took up a great part

of the first month of the second year from the going out.

The remaining part of that month seems to have been spent

on various laws pertaining to rites and ceremonies,

which Moses received from the Lord, whether on Mount Sinai or in the tabernacle,

and which he doubtless wrote down and promulgated

piecemeal, since they could not all be written down and promulgated

at once by reason of their multitude;

and since many of them concern the priests alone, or the Levites.

Concerning them one may see the whole book of Leviticus, which

contains almost nothing but laws chiefly ceremonial,

though some also moral and judicial.

And at the end the whole book is closed with these words:

These are the precepts which the Lord commanded

Moses for the children of Israel in Mount Sinai. And the last chapter

but one ends in this way also: These are

the judgments and precepts, and laws, which the Lord

gave between himself and the children of Israel in Mount Sinai

by the hand of Moses. Nevertheless from these words

I would not conclude that all the precepts were given to Moses

on Mount Sinai: for the words given may be understood

of the three last chapters, since chapter

25 thus begins: And the Lord spoke to

Moses in Mount Sinai, etc. On the contrary, from many

other places it may easily be gathered that many precepts were still

given to Moses after the tabernacle was erected:

and at that time the Lord was wont to speak to his Servant

in the tabernacle itself. At that time also could have arisen

that doubt concerning the punishment to be inflicted on the blasphemer:

concerning which the Lord, being consulted,

in Leviticus 24, v. 13, commanded the man to be stoned,

as it is related to have been done at v. 23 in these words: And Moses spoke

to the children of Israel: and they brought forth

him that had blasphemed without the camp, and stoned him

to death. And the children of Israel did as

the Lord had commanded Moses.

[338] the people are numbered, Many things were afterwards ordained by Moses,

at the Lord's command, that both in encampments

and on marches a comely disposition might be preserved.

For this end the numbering of the whole people

by their several tribes was first conducive, concerning which

in Numbers 1 these things are read: And the Lord spoke

to Moses in the desert of Sinai in the tabernacle

of the covenant, the first day of the second month, the second year

of their going out of Egypt, saying: Take

the sum of all the congregation of the children of Israel

by their families and houses, and the names of every one,

all that are of the male sex from twenty

years old and upwards, of all the men of Israel fit

for war, and you shall number them by their troops, thou and

Aaron. And there shall be with you the princes of the tribes and

of the houses in their kindreds. And having named

the princes of the twelve tribes, as may be seen

in the same place, he proceeds thus: These are the most noble princes

of the multitude by their tribes and kindreds,

and the chiefs of the army of Israel: whom Moses and Aaron took

with all the multitude of the common people: and they assembled them

on the first day of the second month, reckoning

them by their kindreds, and houses, and families,

and heads, and names of every one, from twenty

years old and upwards, as the Lord had commanded.

And they were numbered in the desert of Sinai. The number

of each tribe Moses presently relates in the same place, and of them all

reckoned together he thus subjoins at v. 45:

And the whole number of the children of Israel by their houses

and families, from twenty years old

and upwards, that were able to go forth to war,

was six hundred and three thousand five hundred and fifty men.

The Levites were not comprised in this number:

nevertheless there were twelve tribes, because the descendants

of Joseph made up two tribes, namely Ephraim

and Manasses, so that the tribe of Levi was

the thirteenth. But the Levites, as follows, were

not numbered with them in the tribe of their families,

the Lord so commanding, who had chosen this tribe

for the service of the tabernacle, as we shall say.

[339] The Israelites being numbered, the Lord commanded

the whole army to be divided into four camps, each of which

should consist of three tribes, the whole army divided into four camps, and of which

the first should encamp toward the East, the second toward the South,

the third toward the West, and the fourth lastly toward

the North; and that on the march they should set forward in the same

order. This most beautiful disposition,

by which confusion in a most numerous army was avoided,

is related in Numbers 2 in this manner: And the Lord

spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying:

All the children of Israel shall camp by their troops, ensigns, and standards, and the houses

of their kindreds, round about

the tabernacle of the covenant: that is, the tabernacle being left in the midst.

Presently the first camp is thus described: On the east side Juda (the head

of this camp) shall pitch his tents by the troops of his

army: and the prince of his sons shall be Nahasson

the son of Aminadab: and the whole sum of the fighting men

of his stock, seventy-four thousand six hundred.

Next unto him they of the tribe of Issachar encamped,

whose prince was Nathanael the son of Suar: and

the whole number of his fighting men, fifty-four

thousand four hundred. In the tribe of Zabulon

the prince was Eliab the son of Helon. All the army

of fighting men of his stock, fifty-seven

thousand four hundred. All that were numbered in the camp of Juda

were a hundred and eighty-

six thousand four hundred: and they by their troops shall

march first. This first camp was more numerous

than the rest. The head of the second camp, which encamped toward the South,

was the tribe of Ruben, and to it were joined

the tribes of Simeon and Gad. In this camp

there were a hundred and fifty thousand and one thousand four hundred

and fifty. The head of the third camp, placed toward the West,

was the tribe of Ephraim, which

had with it the tribes of Manasses and Benjamin.

The sum was a hundred and eight thousand and one hundred. Over the fourth

camp, set toward the North, presided

the tribe of Dan, and to it were joined the tribes of Aser and

Nephthali. And in this camp there were

a hundred and fifty-seven thousand six hundred fighting men,

who made up the last camp.

[340] Just as Moses most beautifully disposed the order of the twelve

tribes, [the Levites taken for the service of the tabernacle, and twice numbered in different ways] at the Lord's command,

so no less exactly did he divide the ministries

of the Levites, who for this cause also were numbered

apart. In Numbers 1, v. 48, the Lord indicates

to what ministry he had destined the Levites.

Let us hear Moses: And the Lord spoke

to Moses, saying: Number not the tribe of Levi

(with the others), neither shalt thou put down their sum

with the children of Israel: but appoint them over the tabernacle

of the testimony, and all its vessels, and whatsoever

pertaineth to the ceremonies. They shall carry the tabernacle

and all the furniture thereof: and they shall be in

the ministry, and shall camp round about the tabernacle

(namely between the tabernacle and the four

camps of the Israelites already mentioned). When you are to go forward,

the Levites shall take down the tabernacle:

when you are to camp, they shall set it up: whosoever of the strangers

shall come near, shall be slain. And the children of Israel

shall camp every man by his troops and bands

and his own army. But the Levites shall pitch their tents

round about the tabernacle, lest there come indignation

upon the multitude of the children of Israel, and they shall keep

watch in the guards of the tabernacle of the testimony. In chapter

3, v. 5, these things are said to our purpose: And the Lord

spoke to Moses, saying: Bring

the tribe of Levi, and make them stand in the sight of Aaron

the priest, to minister to him, and let them watch,

and observe whatsoever appertaineth to the service of the multitude

before the tabernacle of the testimony, and let them keep

the vessels of the tabernacle, serving in the ministry

thereof. And thou shalt give the Levites for a gift to Aaron and to his sons,

to whom they are delivered by the children of Israel. But thou shalt set Aaron and

his sons over the service of the priesthood.

Presently the Lord also adds that he claims the Levites to himself

in place of the firstborn, whom he had already sanctified

to himself in Egypt. Then a census of the Levites was taken,

but not altogether in the same way in which the other

Israelites had been numbered; for boys even of one

month were reckoned. Of these it is said at v. 14: And the Lord

spoke to Moses in the desert of Sinai,

saying: Number the sons of Levi by the houses of their fathers

and their families, every male

from one month and upward. Moses numbered them, as

the Lord had commanded, and there were found the sons of Levi

by their names, Gerson and Caath and Merari. These

three were the sons of Levi, and the fathers of all the Levites,

who from them were divided into Gersonites,

or sons of Gerson; Caathites, or sons of Caath;

and Merarites, or sons of Merari: the ministries of these three

families we shall see distinguished by Moses.

The Gersonites, reckoned from one month and upward,

were seven thousand five hundred: the Caathites

eight thousand six hundred: the Merarites six thousand two hundred.

Small indeed was their number, if it be compared

with the number of the other tribes. But all the Levites

God gave to Aaron in place of the firstborn

for the ministry of the tabernacle. Then God commanded another numbering

of the Levites to be made, from thirty years

to fifty, that their several ministries might be assigned

them. And all, as

is had in Numbers 4, v. 46, who were reckoned of the Levites,

and whom Moses and Aaron and the princes of Israel caused to be reckoned

by name, by their kindreds

and the houses of their fathers, from thirty years and upward,

unto the fiftieth year, that entered

to the ministry of the tabernacle, and to bear the burdens,

were together eight thousand five hundred and eighty.

[341] then they receive their ministries, And the ministries of the Levites are read to have been divided thus

in Numbers 4. After Aaron with his sons

had taken down all the things that were in the tabernacle, namely

the ark, the table, the candlestick, the golden altar,

that is of incense, and the rest of the lesser furniture,

and had duly wrapped them in many coverings,

they gave all these things to the Caathites,

over whom presided Eleazar the priest, and they had to carry

all those things on their shoulders, the priests

dividing the burdens. This was the ministry of the Caathites,

of whose family were Moses himself

and Aaron. But the Gersonites, over whom Ithamar the priest

was set, carried all the curtains, and

the brazen altar, that is of holocausts, and all things

pertaining to that altar. But these had wagons

wherein they could convey their burdens. The Merarites,

who likewise had wagons, conveyed all the boards,

bars, pillars, and sockets both of the tabernacle

and of the court, and other things pertaining thereto. Over these likewise

Ithamar presided. These things may be seen more at large in Numbers

4. But concerning the wagons given by Moses to the Gersonites and Merarites, and

not to the Caathites, it is thus read

in Numbers 7, v. 6: And so Moses, having received

the wagons and the oxen, delivered them to the Levites. Two

wagons and four oxen he gave to the sons of Gerson,

according to what they had need of. The other four

wagons and eight oxen he gave to the sons of Merari,

according to their offices and service, under the hand of Ithamar

the son of Aaron the priest. But to the sons of Caath

he gave no wagons or oxen: because they serve in the sanctuary,

and carry their burdens upon their own shoulders.

[342] and therefore they are consecrated by Aaron: Further, that the Levites might discharge the ministries appointed them,

the Lord willed them first to be consecrated.

For this cause he taught Moses the rite of the consecration

of the Levites, and commanded the consecration itself to be performed

by Aaron, as is read in Numbers 8, where

also the ceremonies of the consecration are recounted. Of

the matter accomplished, the following is had at v. 20: And Moses

and Aaron and all the multitude of the children

of Israel did with the Levites all that the Lord had commanded

Moses: and they were purified, and washed their garments.

And Aaron lifted them up in the sight

of the Lord, and prayed for them, that being purified they might go in

to their offices in the tabernacle of the covenant

before Aaron and his sons. As the Lord had commanded

Moses touching the Levites, so was it done.

But for how long a time the Levites were to serve the tabernacle

is presently thus subjoined: And the Lord

spoke to Moses, saying: This is the law

of the Levites: From twenty-five years old and upwards they shall go in

to minister in the tabernacle of the covenant.

And when they shall have accomplished the fiftieth year of their age,

they shall cease to serve: and they shall be the ministers of their brethren

in the tabernacle of the covenant, to keep

the things that are committed to their charge, but not to do

the works themselves. Thus shalt thou order the Levites in their charges.

Thus far concerning the Levites, to each of whose families

its own place of encamping was also assigned,

as may be seen in Numbers 3. Moreover

certain ceremonial laws, enacted at the same times,

may be read in Numbers 5, 6 and 9.

[343] Before the Israelites departed from Mount Sinai,

the Lord at length commanded two silver

trumpets to be made, two trumpets made: by what signal the Israelites should set forward or rest. whereby so great a multitude might more easily know

the command of Moses, as is related

in Numbers 10. The priests sounded these trumpets,

and their use was manifold. For according to the variety

of the sound, various things were signified; and by those trumpets

now the whole people was called together, now

the princes alone: at other times by the same trumpets the signal was given

for moving the camp, and they were used

both in war and on festivals. All these things

being disposed, the holy Lawgiver awaited the signal

for setting forward and leaving the place

in which for a whole year, save for some

days, he had encamped neither idly nor unprofitably.

That signal is thus described in Numbers 9, v. 15 and following:

Therefore on the day that the tabernacle was reared up,

a cloud covered it. But from the evening

there was over the tent as it were the appearance of fire until

the morning. So it was continually: by day the cloud covered it,

and by night as it were the appearance of fire.

And when the cloud that covered the tabernacle was taken up,

then the children of Israel marched forward: and

(when they were on the way) in the place where the cloud stood,

there they camped. (And in that manner)

at the commandment of the Lord they marched, and at his commandment

they pitched the tabernacle. All the days

that the cloud abode over the tabernacle,

they remained in the same place: and if it happened

that it continued over it a long time, the children of Israel

kept the watches of the Lord, and marched not,

for as many days as the cloud abode over the tabernacle.

At the commandment of the Lord they pitched their tents, and at

his commandment they took them down. If the cloud tarried from

evening until morning, and immediately at daybreak left

the tabernacle, they marched forward: and, if it departed after

a day and a night, (likewise for the journey)

they took down their tents. But if it remained over the tabernacle

two days, or a month, or a longer time,

the children of Israel remained in the same place, and

marched not: but immediately as it departed,

they moved the camp. By the word of the Lord they pitched

their tents, and by his word they marched forward:

and they kept the watches of the Lord (that is,

diligently observing the movement of the cloud) according to his commandment

by the hand of Moses. Thus far concerning the things done

in the desert of Sinai, whence we shall see Moses departing with the whole

host, after we have discussed Josephus

and Philo on the things done in that place.

§ XXXII. The assertions of Josephus and Philo concerning

the things done at Mount Sinai are weighed and corrected, though many things are omitted for brevity's sake.

[ ] Josephus relates the earlier events at Mount Sinai Josephus in book 3 so treats of the things done at Mount Sinai

that he preferred to consult the honour of his own nation,

and to win credit for his history even among the gentiles,

rather than to narrate exactly all that he found in the sacred

Codices. For the former reason the casting

of the golden calf is entirely omitted, and its adoration,

as also the punishment that followed so great a crime, and the breaking

of the tables: for the same reason too he mentions only

one stay on the mount continued for forty

days. The second reason doubtless impelled Josephus

either to omit the prodigious deeds altogether,

or to narrate them in a less marvellous manner;

nay, even imprudently to attribute to his readers the liberty

of thinking what they pleased about the things related in Scripture.

But that I may discuss the particulars more aptly,

I subjoin his own words. Meanwhile (he says in chapter 3),

while the people tarried in these places, Moses said before the assembly

that he was going into Mount Sina, to converse

with God, and would bring back thence something useful to them:

and he bids them meanwhile encamp nearby,

as being about to be nearer to God. Having said this,

he went up Mount Sina, the highest of all that region,

and one which, by reason of its excessive height and its

sheer crags, wearied not only the ascent of men, but even

their gaze, so that not undeservedly it was held

religious on account of the Deity dwelling there. But the Hebrews, according to the Prophet's command

moved their camp and occupied the roots of the mountain, in suspense

of mind as to what good, according as he had promised,

he was about to bring back from God: and meanwhile,

while they awaited their Leader, they kept festal days,

observing chastity both in other respects and by abstaining

from the company of women for three days, as

they had been bidden, and importuning God with assiduous prayers

that, receiving Moses graciously, he would send

them through him some gift which might be conducive

to living a good and happy life.

[345] he corrupts with various errors: Meanwhile they used a more sumptuous diet,

and adorned themselves with more splendid attire, together with their wives

and children: and when in this manner

two days had been spent among banquets, the third now drawing on,

first a cloud, contrary to custom, hung on high over

the whole camp of the Hebrews, covering the tents,

wide as they spread, while the rest of

the heaven all around kept a clear serenity:

then storms with violent rain rushed down,

and lightnings flashing frequently terrified them at once, and thunderbolts

hurled forth signified that Moses had met

with God propitious according to his wish. Let those who read these things take them

as each shall please: for me at least it has not been lawful

to depart from those things which are written

in the sacred history. Thus far Josephus, imprudently

allowing that those who read may take the things related

as each shall please, though he says that they are had

in the sacred Letters. But not a few other things here need correcting. First,

that Deity dwelling on Mount Sinai, as if

that mount had already before been religious, has been refuted

at n. 90. Secondly, the Hebrews had not pitched camp

at the very roots of the mountain, as is here said,

since it was forbidden them in Exodus 19, v. 12, to touch its

borders. Thirdly, Moses, when he went up the mountain

the first time, did not remain there three days, as the hallucinating

Josephus says, but after repeated goings and returnings

prepared the people for three days to receive the commandments of God.

Fourthly, in those three days they did not feast,

nor keep festal days; but were intent upon purity, both outward

and inward. Fifthly, that cloud hanging over the whole camp on the third

day of the three days is altogether fictitious.

[346] These things observed, let us hear Josephus again:

But, and the following things he says, the Hebrews, seeing the unwonted

tempest, and its dreadful noise striking their ears,

were troubled beyond measure, for both the novelty of the thing

terrified them, and the rumour spread abroad about the mountain,

that God frequently visited it. Wherefore

they kept themselves sorrowful within their tents, thinking

that it was all over with Moses' safety, and that, he being taken off

by the wrath of God, a like destruction awaited them also. In

such a state of things, behold Moses, exulting with gladness,

and by his very countenance displaying a mind leaping with joy:

at the sight of whom, suddenly all fear

departed, and in its place succeeded the hope of some great good:

for the air too at his coming recovered its former

serenity. Presently therefore he calls an assembly, to hear

what commandments he brought back from God.

And when he perceived that it had come together, from

a higher place, that he might be heard by all, he spoke

in this manner: Men of the Hebrews, God

most good and great, as he has never before

spurned our prayers, so at this

time also has most kindly received me as your Legate,

and now is present and propitious in your camp,

about to prescribe to you a manner of living

than which none happier can even be conceived.

[347] Wherefore by him and by his magnificent

works I beseech you, nor any more exactly that you despise not what I

am about to say to you, looking upon my own mediocrity,

and that you are about to hear a human tongue: but

weighing the goodness and usefulness of the commandments,

acknowledge the majesty of him who, in order to advance your

advantages, has not disdained to use me

as go-between to you. For it is not Moses the son of Amaram

and Jochabel, but he who for your

salvation corrupted the Nile with bloody streams, and broke

the obstinacy of the Egyptians with so many different calamities,

who made a way for you through the sea, who

devised food from heaven for you all in your need, who

bade water gush from the rock for those who desired drink, from whom

Adam received the usufruct of earth and sea,

through whom Noe escaped the deluge, through whom Abraham,

the author of our race, from a wanderer was made a possessor

of the land of Chanaan, through whom Isaac

was born of parents worn out with age, through

whom Jacob was adorned with twelve most honourable sons,

through whom Joseph rose to be governor of the Egyptians:

he, I say, bestows these precepts upon you: I am nothing else than

the interpreter of so great a Deity. These shall be sacrosanct to you,

and more ancient than your wives and children: for by obeying

them you shall lead a happy life, enjoying a fertile land,

a tranquil sea, offspring happy according to the laws

of nature, and you shall be always formidable to your enemies.

For I, having conversed with God face to face,

have heard his immortal voice: so much

are you and the safety of your race dear to him.

[348] Having said this, he brings the people with their children

and wives, that they may hear God speaking to them,

and teaching what is to be done, he describes: lest the words should have less authority,

if they slipped into their minds by

a human tongue: and so all heard

a voice coming down from on high, so that no one

failed to understand it. But the precepts which Moses

left inscribed on two tables, it is not lawful to publish

word for word; we will only indicate their

sense. Thus Josephus, thereafter reciting the ten precepts

in summary in such a way that he divides the first into two,

but has the ninth and tenth as one.

Correct moreover in the words given, first,

these words, they kept themselves sorrowful within their tents: for,

as is said in Exodus 19, v. 17, Moses

brought forth the people, after the thunders began to be heard,

and the lightnings to flash, and especially after

the sound of the trumpet sounded loud, which Josephus

wrongly omitted. Secondly, that fear of the Hebrews

for the safety of Moses is fictitious, since he was present with them

until at the last moment he was called by God into

the mount. Thirdly, fictitious likewise is that serenity of the air,

which was said to have been restored at the coming of Moses, before

the precepts had been promulgated by the angel.

Fourthly, that lengthier declamation of Moses to the people

had no place at that time. Sixthly, lastly,

the tables were not given to Moses at that time,

but afterwards. Further, having recited the ten precepts in the manner

I have said, the author subjoins: When

the multitude had joyfully heard these things from God himself, as Moses had foretold,

the assembly was dismissed. But on the following

days, coming often to the Leader's tent,

they asked that he would bring them laws also from God.

He, gratifying them in this too, gave laws,

and prescribed what and in what manner was to be done, at the same

time. Some things are here omitted, which may be seen in their

place as related out of the sacred Letters.

[349] he narrates Moses' twofold stay on the mount Now let us hear Josephus concerning Moses'

ascent into the mount, and concerning the doings of the people during the forty

days in which he was absent: At about the same time

Moses went up again into Mount Sina,

having forewarned the people: for he wished them also

to behold his ascent. And when he tarried longer,

for he was absent forty days, they began to be anxious

lest something graver had befallen him, nor

in all their hardships did anything else so grieve them

as the belief that Moses had perished. For the rumours

varied, some giving out that he had been devoured by beasts,

especially those who loved him less; others preferring that he seemed to have been

caught up by God: while those who were more prudent,

wavering between the two opinions, since they saw the one

not alien to human accidents, and the other

more befitting the virtue of such a Man,

bore his lot with a mind equal enough: but they grieved for

their own case, that they were bereft of such a Governor

and patron, the like of whom they believed it

impossible to find: and neither did their anxiety allow them to hope,

nor, hope being taken away, could they but grieve;

nor did they even dare to move the camp, having been bidden

to await his return.

[350] as one, omitting various things shameful to his nation: At length, forty days and as many nights

having passed, he returns, no human food having in the meanwhile

been tasted: and by his coming he filled the whole camp with

vast joy, signifying that the divine providence was with them,

and that he had learned during those days a way of living well and happily:

and that God demanded

that they should make him a tabernacle, into which he might come down

as often as it pleased him, and which they might even carry about

with them as they journeyed, so that it should no longer be necessary

to ascend Mount Sina, but that he, visiting often

and all but dwelling with them, should be at hand for their prayers

and supplications: and that the measure and

form of the tabernacle had been shown him beforehand, and nothing

remained but that they should gird themselves as soon as possible

for building it. Having said this, he brings forth the two tables

containing the ten precepts inscribed, five

on each; and the writing was the hand of God.

Thus far Josephus, confounding the two stays

on the mount, both of forty days,

and studiously passing over the idolatry of the people,

and the breaking of the first tables, as reproaches to his own

nation. But the conjectures of the fearful

people on account of Moses' long absence

may be held not improbable conjectures;

but they fit only Moses' first stay

on the mount; the rest concern his

descent after the second stay. But

again many things are passed over, which I have recounted in their places.

[351] The bounty of the people towards the construction of the tabernacle and of the

other things, and the structure itself, yet the gifts contributed towards the construction of the tabernacle,

he explains more correctly than the rest, thus: But they,

glad at the presence and discourse of Moses, each for himself

vied in contributing towards the structure of the tabernacle

gold, silver, copper, timber

elegant and firm against decay, goats' hair,

and sheepskins, some of a violet, some of

a scarlet dye, some also white in

colour, and others tinged with the bloom of purple. Besides these,

wools dyed with the same colours, and fine linen of byssus,

precious stones also, which are wont to be set in gold

for adornment, and moreover a great quantity

of spices: for such was the material of

the tabernacle, which differed nothing from a movable

and portable temple. Therefore after those

kinds of things had been ambitiously contributed, each man contributing,

some even more than their domestic means allowed,

the Prophet sets architects over the work

by God's command, but such that no others

could have been chosen, even if the matter had been committed

to the votes of the people.

[352] Their names are even now extant in the sacred codices:

he recounts more correctly, Beselel of the tribe of Juda, son of Uri

and of Mariamme, who was the leader's sister: and

Eliab son of Isamach, of the tribe of David. But the common people

offered labour and expense with such alacrity

that they had to be restrained by edict, and warned

by the crier's voice that there was no need of more:

for so it seemed good to the builders. And thus they set about the structure

of the tabernacle, Moses designating both the measure and

the size, as he had learned in the mount from God's

colloquy, and prescribing duly and orderly how great an instrument *

it should hold for the use of the sacrifices and

the ministry of holy things.

Nor was the bounty of the women less as regards

the priestly vestments, and the other things which seemed to pertain either to the adornment

of the tabernacle or to the divine

worship. The same author then narrates

the erection of the tabernacle, and describes it with

all things pertaining to it, as also the pontifical vestments

and the priestly ones, and finally the laws given to the people.

But the examination of all these things, as too lengthy,

I have thought fit to pass over.

[353] But concerning the dedication of the tabernacle, the consecration

of the priests, as also the dedication of the tabernacle, and the consecration of the priests; and concerning the death of two of

them, let us hear what he relates: But at the beginning of the following

year, he says in chapter 9, in the month Xanthicus

of the Macedonians, Nisan of the Hebrews, at the new moon the tabernacle

was dedicated, and whatsoever vessels

had been in it. And immediately God showed that the labour of the Hebrews

was pleasing to him and not superfluous,

declaring himself present in his shrine in this manner:

when the heaven was otherwise serene, over

the tabernacle alone a mist came down, not

indeed so thick as winter fogs are wont to be,

nor yet so thin as to let human sight

pass through it: and a pleasant dew dripped

from it, confirming to the people the faith of God's presence.

And Moses, having first distributed rewards among the builders

of so great a work according to each man's desert,

slew victims in the court of the tabernacle according to what was prescribed…

Then he sprinkled the vesture of Aaron and of his sons

with the blood of the victims, purifying them

with spring waters and with ointment, that they might become priests of God:

and in this manner for seven days he tended them

and their garments: the tabernacle likewise and

its vessels with ointment, made as I have already said,

and with the blood of bulls and rams, slain

on alternate days according to their kind. But on the eighth

day he proclaimed a feast, and commanded every man to sacrifice

according to his means. And they, obedient to the word,

vied ambitiously in offering victims, and when these had been

laid upon the altar, suddenly of its own accord a fire flashed forth

from them after the manner of lightning, and in the sight

of the people the flame consumed all.

[354] but in relating the death of two of them he errs in various ways: At about the same time a certain calamity

befell Aaron, grievous to a father's heart: which nevertheless

he bore nobly: for he was a brave man, and understood

that this was not done without God's will. Of

the four sons whom I mentioned, the two elder, Nabadus

and Abius, when they had brought victims to the altar, not

according to Moses' prescription, but such as they had been accustomed to before,

were burned, the flame turning upon them

and feeding on their faces and breasts: nor could help

be given them, but that they so perished. And Moses

bade their father and brothers take up the corpses and carry them

outside the camp, and there bury them honourably:

and the whole people mourned this unlooked-for

death of theirs: only the brothers and the father Moses

willed to abstain from grief, and to hold God's

honour of more account than their own sadness, for Aaron already

wore the sacred robe. Thus Josephus of these matters,

who again needs some correction.

For first, when he says that Nadab and Abiu

brought victims such as they had been accustomed to before, he wrongly

supposes that they had been used to sacrifice already before their consecration,

which is by no means probable.

He also wrongly asserts that their fault lay in

the quality of the victims; whereas they sinned only

in that they employed fire that was not sacred. Secondly, it is not

probable that Nadab and Abiu were burned,

and their faces and breasts fed upon by the fire,

since in Leviticus 10, v. 5, their corpses are said to have been carried out,

as they lay, vested with linen tunics. It is indeed

said in the same place at v. 2, Fire… devoured them,

but the word devour often signifies the same in the Scriptures

as to kill: for the sword too is said to devour,

that is, to kill. And so it is more probable

that they were only slain by a fire divinely sent, their bodies

not being burnt, which were presently carried out with their linen

garments. Thirdly, Josephus contradicts the sacred Letters more plainly,

when he asserts that the bodies of the slain

were carried out by Aaron and the other priests:

for to these Moses severely forbade not only outward

mourning, but also the carrying out of the bodies.

[355] lastly, some things about Moses and the people exact enough. Further, better are the things that the same writer subjoins

concerning the doings of Moses: But Moses,

having refused all the honours offered him by the people,

was wholly devoted to the divine worship: and

into Sina indeed he went up no more, but coming often to the tabernacle

he brought back oracles from God as often as there was need,

continuing to use the dress and habit of a private

man; nor claiming for himself anything above others

save the care of the commonwealth. Moreover

he wrote laws and a manner of living,

by keeping which they might both please God, and themselves

live sociably and peaceably among one another: and all

this he did at God's admonition. And after certain other things,

concerning the people likewise rightly: The tabernacle having been dedicated,

and all things whatsoever pertaining to the priestly

order duly performed, the people,

having received God into the fellowship of their camp, turned joyfully

to hymns and sacrifices, as though all evils were now averted,

and hoping for all prosperity in time to come: and they offered

gifts to God, both privately and publicly, by their several tribes.

For the princes of the tribes, two by two contributing

of their own, furnished a wagon with two oxen,

so that six wagons served for conveying the tabernacle

on the way: and besides this each

of them offered a bowl, etc… Moreover

a calf, etc… and thus for twelve continuous

days they sacrificed, one on each day;

namely by Aaron and the priests, who did the sacrificing:

while the princes gave the victims

to be sacrificed. Let it suffice to have brought forward these things from Josephus concerning what was done at

Mount Sinai.

[356] Philo has delivered nothing of these matters in book 1 of the Life

of Moses, Philo's account of the idolatry of the people, where otherwise he is wont to narrate each thing historically.

But in book 3, where he warns that he will speak of Moses'

priesthood, he has recorded many things about the tabernacle, about

the sacred vessels, about the priests and their vestments,

about the Levites, and other like matters, which I have not thought

fit to sift. He also relates a few things here and there, by way of

examples, concerning those deeds of Moses which I have mentioned

before. Let us therefore hear these. At page 524, of

the idolatry of the Hebrews, when they made and adored the golden

calf, he speaks thus: When

Moses had gone up the neighbouring mount, and there

for some days conversed with God without witnesses,

certain inconstant men, as though bereft of

their Prince, turned his absence into an occasion of impiety:

and forgetting the true God, they began to emulate

the figments of Egypt, making a golden bullock

in imitation of the most sacred animal of that region:

to which they performed profane rites, and led disorderly

dances, singing hymns like laments,

and filled with strong drink they redoubled their drunkenness,

raving alike with wine and with madness, passing the night in

revels, and delighting themselves with the worst deeds,

ignorant of the impending vengeance which they were provoking

by their wickedness, and blinded by their own passions.

But when the shouts of the camp, as in a crowd and festivity,

were heard far and wide, so that

they reached the summit of the mount, Moses, struck in his ears,

hesitated, as a lover of God and at once of men,

neither enduring to depart from the divine colloquy

with which he had been privately honoured, nor to despise

the people wretchedly rioting through their prince's absence.

For he perceived the tumult, the confused

and inarticulate cries indicating disorders

of mind, especially to a shrewd and prudent Man,

who easily understood that this was a public debauch,

by wine-madness of men not abstaining from

wrongs.

[357] And so for a long while he was drawn this way and that in uncertainty:

but an oracle took away his doubt in these

words: which Moses understanding on the mount, and calling the upright to himself, Go, go down quickly: the people has fallen

into impiety, adoring a bullock made by hand

for a deity, and sacrificing victims to it,

forgetful of all that it has hitherto either seen or heard,

and of all the piety and religion received

from their forefathers. He, astounded, since he could not

but believe the oracle, as mediator and arbiter,

did not at once leap back, but first prayed

for the people, suppliantly begging pardon for their sin:

then, the almighty King being appeased, he returned

with sadness mingled with joy. For he rejoiced

that God had not rejected his supplication, but he was

saddened because he took it most ill

that the laws of the fathers had been forsaken by the people. But when

he had entered the camp, he saw the rites suddenly changed,

and figments received for truth, yet not all

infected with the contagion of that evil, but that there remained

some sound men, to whom such things were displeasing; and wishing

to distinguish the uncorrupted from the incurable, and to see

whether any would return to penitence, by

a crier he admonished the people with an edict, by whose token

he might plainly know both the pious and the impious.

The words of the edict were these: If any man is on the Lord's side,

let him come to me: brief indeed, but containing great

force. Just as if he had said: If any man holds nothing

made by hand, nothing created, for God,

but one Lord of all things, let him come to me.

[358] he punishes severely: And so some, who had preferred the Egyptian vainglory,

despised the edict: others perhaps

for fear of punishment did not dare to come nearer,

whether fearing Moses or the sedition of the people.

For the common crowd is wont to rage against those who dissent from

their madness. Of them all the tribe of Levi alone,

hearing the crier, ran up in haste as though by agreement,

showing by the swiftness of their feet the alacrity

of their mind, and with how great affection they cherished piety.

When Moses saw them running to him in emulation:

It will presently appear, he said, whether the same alacrity

is in your minds as in your bodies. Take your swords,

slay those who have deserved a thousand punishments, who, the true

God being forsaken, have made themselves false ones, giving to corruptible

and created essences the name of that incorruptible

and uncreated One: spare not kindred, spare not friends,

esteeming friendship and kinship by

the holiness of upright men. Scarcely had he said these things

when they, exasperated, and hostile to the crime from

the beginning, rushing to the slaughter, slew about

three thousand men who before had been most closely joined to them.

Whose corpses lying in the midst of the market-place the common people seeing,

grieved, and at the same time fearing the avenging wrath

still hot, came at once to their senses.

[359] certain errors observed in these things: When Philo had narrated these things, he subjoins concerning the reward

of the Levites: Then Moses, having publicly praised

their fortitude, decreed them a perpetual

honour, befitting a most illustrious deed.

By that honour he understands the sacred ministry.

And indeed I would not deny that the Levites were advanced to the sacred ministry

in reward of that deed: nevertheless

it was not done at once, as Philo hints,

but after eight or nine months. Several things also

in the preceding account are to be corrected. First,

it is wrongly said that Moses heard the shouts of the Israelites

before he was warned by the angel of their

idolatry: for he heard those shouts afterwards,

when he came down from the mount with Josue.

Secondly, Moses did indeed pray for the people before

he came down, and averted the destruction of the Hebrews;

but he did not so thoroughly appease God

as Philo intimates. Thirdly, a graver, or at least a more open,

slip is that he numbers only three thousand

slain by the Levites, whereas those slain were about

twenty-three thousand. This error is repeated by the same man

at page 536, where he mentions the deed again.

Fourthly, the author passes over many circumstances of this history:

but that is here less to be blamed,

since it is brought forward only for an example, than

that he suppressed the whole history in its own place.

[360] [his account of Moses' stay on the mount, his abstinence from food, and the splendour of his countenance.] Of Moses' stay on the mount for forty

days without food or drink he has this at page 514:

First, as the soul, so also the body had to be purified

from every contagion of mortal things, from food,

drink, and intercourse with women. But

by this affection he had long since not been touched, almost

from the time when he began to be breathed upon by the divine spirit,

so that he might always be ready to receive oracles. For

for forty continuous days he abstained from food and drink,

being refreshed, that is, by better nourishments

breathing from heaven, and bringing profit first to the mind, then

through the soul to the body also,

so that he increased both in strength and in condition, insomuch that

those who looked upon him scarcely believed their own eyes. For

when he had gone up the sacred mount, the highest in that tract,

at God's command — which otherwise no one

might do with impunity — he is said to have remained there as many days

as I have said, although he had brought nothing with him

wherewith to satisfy natural desire: nevertheless, having spent

so long a time there, on returning to his people who awaited him

at the foot of the mount, he seemed fairer

than when he went up, so that, astounded at the miracle,

they could not even gaze upon his face shining with a splendour

like the sun's. And while he stayed on the mount,

he was learning all the mysteries of the priesthood, and

before all things concerning the furnishing of the temple and of the sacred vessels.

Thus far Philo, from whom I bring forward no more

concerning the things done at the mount, because he himself chose to omit

most things dishonourable to his own nation.

* In Greek, how many vessels

§ XXXIII. The departure of the Hebrews from Mount Sinai:

[ ] Hobab, invited by Moses, accompanies them: the murmuring of the people: the thirteenth station at the Sepulchres of lust: seventy elders appointed: flesh given to the people, and the punishment that followed.

The departure from Mount Sinai to the wilderness of Pharan, After Moses had ordered the commonwealth of the Hebrews

at Mount Sinai, and had established it by the laws

given by God, he departed with the whole

host out of the desert of Sinai to the wilderness of Pharan,

and went forward as far as the place which from the event was afterwards

called The sepulchres of lust: for

in Numbers 33, v. 16, it is thus read of this journey: And

going out from the wilderness of Sinai, they came to the Sepulchres

of lust. The time when this journey was undertaken

is expressed in Numbers 10, v. 11, in these words: In

the second year, in the second month, on the twentieth day of the month,

the cloud was taken up from the tabernacle of the covenant: and

the children of Israel set forward by their troops from the desert

of Sinai, and the cloud rested in the wilderness of Pharan.

This epoch shows that the Israelites did not remain a whole year

in the aforesaid camp at Mount Sinai,

since they came thither on the third day of the third month

of the preceding year. Wherefore I do not sufficiently grasp

what St. Jerome meant, when at the thirteenth Station

he wrote, After he had tarried by Mount Sinai

one year and four days,

with a wonderful ordering of the camp he went forth into the wilderness

of Pharan, unless perhaps he wished to include

the whole time during which they were at Raphidim, that is,

in the eleventh station, because that was not far

from Mount Sinai.

[362] Further, the taking up of the cloud was the signal of departure.

And so, the cloud being now taken up, Moses inviting his kinsman Hobab to accompany them, after

Moses had given orders for signifying the march by the sound of trumpets,

and while the priests took down the tabernacle

and duly wrapped the sacred vessels, that they might assign

the Levites their burdens,

Moses invited Hobab his kinsman to accompany him;

unless perhaps he had been forewarned by the angel

of the impending journey, and so had done this a little before.

Certainly to this belongs the place in Numbers 10, v. 29, where

the matter is thus narrated: And Moses said to Hobab, the son

of Raguel the Madianite, his kinsman: We are going

to the place which the Lord will give us:

come with us, that we may do thee good: for the Lord

hath promised good things to Israel. And he answered him:

I will not go with thee, but I will return to my own country

wherein I was born. And he said: Do not, he said,

leave us: for thou knowest in what places

throughout the desert we ought to camp, and thou shalt be our

guide. And when thou shalt come with us, whatsoever

shall be best of the riches which the Lord shall deliver

to us, we will give thee. Various things may here be asked.

First, what need was there of a guide, when the angel

led the host by the cloud, and the cloud

always rested in the places where camp was to be pitched?

But, notwithstanding the angel's guidance, the service

of such a guide could be useful to Moses and the Hebrews,

because the cloud rested in one place only,

namely where the tabernacle was to be pitched; while the camp,

by reason of the immense multitude of the people, had to be extended

to a vast distance on every side: and to this end

a guide skilled in the places could be useful, who moreover could point out

the springs and other conveniences of the places,

and could tell what sort of peoples they were whose territories

or borders they were about to pass through, and many other

things of that kind.

[363] [who probably accompanied them, and is a different man from Raguel, Moses' father-in-law.] Secondly, it may be asked whether Hobab really

acquiesced in Moses' request: for that is neither clearly affirmed

nor denied. But it is more probable that he went with them,

both because he is not said to have made any reply

to Moses' repeated invitation, but it is presently

subjoined, So they set forward, etc.; and because the descendants

of Hobab seem to have dwelt in the promised land

with the Israelites, as is gathered from Judges 4, v. 11,

where the sons or descendants of Hobab, the kinsman of Moses, are mentioned,

and are called Cinites. Likewise in Judges 1, v. 16,

it is said: And the sons of the Cinite, the kinsman of Moses, went up

from the city of Palms, with the children of Juda,

into the wilderness of his lot, which is at the south of

Arad, and they dwelt with him. It may indeed

here be doubted whether Hobab himself, or his father

Raguel, is called the Cinite: but it seems certain

that it was the sons of Hobab, or his descendants, who fixed their seats

in the tribe of Juda. More of these things I do not bring forward.

Further, the third question, and that a more controverted one,

is whether Hobab is the father-in-law of Moses, and the same

as Raguel and Jethro, or a different man.

Some will have those three names to be of the same man,

who would also have been called the Cinite, because all

are called in Hebrew chothen, by which word they contend that

a father-in-law is signified. But this opinion

does not appear probable to me: for Hobab is clearly said to be the son

of Raguel; nor have we any ground

for calling him the son of some elder

Raguel. Secondly, Hobab remained with Moses,

as we have seen. But Jethro had already returned home from Raphidim,

as was said at n. 271: nor is it

probable that Raguel, who must have been very

old, afterwards returned, and leaving

his family, attached himself to Moses. And so, whether

Raguel and Jethro be the same, as seems to me more probable,

or Jethro be the son of Raguel, as some

will have it, I cannot doubt that Hobab is

the son of Raguel, Moses' father-in-law, and either the son of Jethro

or his younger brother. For what is objected concerning

the word chothen is of small moment, and

I have already said before that the word is taken of any kinsman by marriage,

whether he be a father-in-law, or a father-in-law's son, or even a grandson.

From this digression let us return to the departing Israelites.

[364] The order of their march was this. The whole

host was preceded by the ark of the covenant, carried by the Caathites. The order of the march, continued for three days:

There followed the whole tribe of Juda with the tribe of Issachar

and the tribe of Zabulon. After these the tabernacle,

which was partly conveyed, partly carried

by the Gersonites and Merarites. Then the tribe of Ruben

with the tribes of Simeon and Gad joined to it. These

tribes were followed by the Caathites, carrying all the vessels

of the tabernacle, except the ark. Then the tribe of Ephraim

with the tribes of Manasses and Benjamin. Lastly

the tribes of Dan, Aser, and

Nephthali closed the column, as is narrated more fully in Numbers 10, where

at v. 33 these things are added: So they marched from the mount

of the Lord three days' journey, and the ark of the covenant

of the Lord went before them, for three days providing

a place for the camp. The cloud also of the Lord was over

them by day when they marched. And when the ark

was lifted up, Moses said: Arise, O Lord,

and let thy enemies be scattered, and let them that hate

thee flee from before thy face. And when it was set down,

he said: Return, O Lord, to the multitude

of the host of Israel. In the aforesaid order the Israelites

went forward for three days, allowing nevertheless the necessary

time for tending their bodies and taking

rest; but those places where they thus rested

were not numbered among the stations,

because no tents were pitched.

[365] But those continued journeys of three days

gave occasion of a new murmuring to certain

slothful men, a murmuring arisen on the march, and many consumed by heavenly fire: who on the very march began to complain

bitterly, and communicated the evil to many.

For in Numbers 11 Moses writes these things:

In the meantime there arose a murmuring of the people, as it were of men grieving

at their labour, against the Lord. And when

the Lord heard it, he was angry. And the fire of the Lord being kindled

against them, devoured the uttermost part of the camp.

It is probable that the authors of the murmuring,

who were either weary, or feigned themselves the more weary,

sat down on the way, as though they could not follow,

and that therefore this was the uttermost part of the camp

which was struck with this heavenly fire. In Psalm 77, v. 21,

it is said of this punishment: And a fire was kindled in

Jacob, and wrath came up against Israel: because they believed not

in God, nor trusted in his salvation.

But this punishment being begun, they presently in terror

ran back to Moses, who allayed the wrath of the Almighty,

as is read in Numbers 11, v. 2: And when

the people cried to Moses, Moses prayed

to the Lord, and the fire was swallowed up. And he called

the name of that place THE BURNING; because

the fire of the Lord had been kindled against them. I would believe

that this place was not far from the thirteenth station,

and that in the same place the murmuring was continued

about the lack of flesh and of the other foods

which they had had in Egypt.

[366] Certainly that murmuring about the lack of foods

is so related [the murmuring on account of the lack of flesh, upon occasion of which Moses asks for helpers in the government,] that it seems to have begun along with the other,

and then to have been continued in the camp, yet with weeping

rather than with insolent shouts. Hear v. 4:

For a mixed multitude of people, that had come up

with them, burned with desire, sitting and weeping,

the children of Israel also being joined with them, and said: Who shall give

us flesh to eat? We remember the fish

that we ate in Egypt free of cost:

there come into our mind the cucumbers, and the melons,

and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic. Our soul is dry,

our eyes behold nothing else but

manna *… Moses therefore heard the people weeping

by their families, every one at the door of his tent. And the fury

of the Lord was exceedingly kindled: and to Moses also the thing

seemed intolerable. These things were done after

the Israelites had already pitched their tents, as appears from

the words brought forward; and it is indeed to be wondered at that the punishment

inflicted on the murmurers on the march did not check the progress

of the evil. Moses himself felt so heavily

the great levity, indocility, and rashness of the inconstant

people, that he judged death preferable to so great

a burden. Let us hear what follows

his words: And he (Moses) said to the Lord:

Why hast thou afflicted thy Servant? wherefore do I not find

favour before thee? and why hast thou laid the weight of all

this people upon me? Have I conceived

all this multitude, or begotten it,

that thou shouldst say to me: Carry them in thy bosom, as the nurse

is wont to carry the little infant, and bear them into the land

for which thou hast sworn to their fathers? Whence should I have flesh

to give to so great a multitude? They weep against

me, saying: Give us flesh that we may eat.

I am not able alone to bear all this

people, because it is too heavy for me. But if it seem unto thee otherwise,

I beseech thee to kill me, and let me find

grace in thy eyes, that I be not afflicted with so great evils.

Thus far Moses, doubtless submitting himself reverently

to the divine will; for we ought not to reprehend

his words, since the Lord did not reprehend them,

but assented to his prayers.

[367] and the Lord endows seventy elders with the prophetic spirit: these probably Take the sacred text: And the Lord said

to Moses: Gather unto me seventy men

of the ancients of Israel, whom thou knowest to be ancients

of the people and masters: and thou shalt lead them to the door

of the tabernacle of the covenant, and shalt make them stand there with thee, that

I may come down and speak to thee: and I will take of thy spirit,

and will give to them, that they may bear with thee the burden

of the people, and thou be not burdened alone. This had been the chief

petition of Moses: for flesh, of which

we shall see below, he had not directly asked for the people.

Moses obeyed the Lord's command, as is related

at v. 24 in these words: Moses therefore came, and

told the people the words of the Lord, gathering seventy

men of the ancients of Israel, whom he made to stand

about the tabernacle. And the Lord came down

in a cloud, and spoke to him, taking away of

the spirit that was in Moses, and giving to the seventy

men. And when the Spirit had rested on them, they prophesied,

and ceased not afterwards. Some things here

are rather obscure, and some need elucidation.

First, those ancients are so called not from their age, but from the gravity

of their manners and their wisdom, as is easily gathered from

those words, Whom thou knowest to be ancients of the people

and masters. These same words hint that

those ancients had already before had some office, since

they are called masters; and therefore it seems to me probable

that these seventy were of the number of those

whom Moses had appointed at Jethro's counsel in Exodus 18.

[368] [were among those appointed before at Jethro's counsel, but were now endowed with greater grace and authority,] But, someone will say, how then does

Moses complain above that he alone bears the burden

of the people? I answer that he complained of this

because those lower judges only settled certain suits

of lesser moment; nor did they enjoy such

authority with the people that it deigned to hear them in matters of greater

weight, or to acquiesce in their counsels, because they lacked the prophetic Spirit:

for that indocile people could not be kept

to its duty save by prodigies and grave punishments

divinely inflicted, as is abundantly clear from many

examples. And so, since none among the Israelites but

Moses alone appears down to that time to have been endowed

with the gift of prophecy, and none to have sufficiently understood

how great goods God promised to obedient

Israelites, and how great evils he threatened

to the disobedient; none dared or was able

to terrify with threats those who departed from their duty, and by terrifying

to restrain them; but that whole burden lay upon

Moses alone, to whom recourse was always had,

whether the wrath of God was to be appeased with humble prayers,

or the people complained for some cause.

Moreover Moses alone taught the people the divine laws,

and alone set forth God's commandments to them.

Certainly no other is read down to this point either

to have taught the people, or to have expounded God's commandments,

or to have terrified or restrained those who murmured and departed

from their duty. For not even Aaron,

when the Lawgiver was absent on the mount, although with Hur

he had been appointed by Moses to govern the people

in the meantime, was able to hinder the most grievous crime of idolatry.

In this sense, then, I think Moses said

that he bore the weight of all the people.

[369] It is obscure also how God took away

of the Spirit of Moses, Moses nevertheless losing nothing thereby, or that was in Moses,

to give to the elders. For St. Augustine has already observed,

in question 18 on Numbers, that the Latin interpreters

have made this sense laborious to understand.

For the words sound as if something

had been taken from Moses and given to others. But that

sense is deservedly rejected, since Moses lost nothing of

the grace or gift of prophesying. And the praised

Augustine observes that in the Greek of the Septuagint

it is not read, I will take away of thy Spirit, but,

of the Spirit which is upon thee; and he thus

resolves the question: But now, since it is so written…

the resolution of the question is easier: because we understand

that God meant nothing else but

that they too should have help from the same Spirit of grace

from which Moses had it; that they too

should have as much as God willed, not that Moses

should therefore have less. I do not see why the Latin

words cannot be expounded in this same sense: for

of thy Spirit can be so understood, of that same Spirit

which is thine, or given to thee. Nor does it seem

to be doubted that God promises that he will communicate

his gifts more abundantly to the seventy elders without any loss to Moses;

and that so it really was done: for otherwise Moses would have lost more

by the subtraction of his own gifts than

he would have gained by the accession of another's help.

[370] Further, how far Moses was from envy,

who desired his gifts to be communicated to many. and how unwilling he was to be alone in the eyes of so great

a people, not only the aforesaid petition for help shows,

but the same is further declared by what

was done on that occasion concerning two of the Elders

called to the tabernacle, who out of humility,

as most think, had not come thither, and yet

were not deprived of the gift of prophecy. The matter is thus narrated

at v. 26: And there remained in the camp two

men, of whom one was called Eldad, and the other

Medad, upon whom the Spirit rested: for

they also had been enrolled, and had not gone out to the tabernacle.

And when they prophesied in the camp,

a young man ran and told Moses, saying: Eldad

and Medad prophesy in the camp. Forthwith Josue the son

of Nun, the minister of Moses, and chosen out of many,

said: My lord Moses, forbid them. But he,

Why, said he, hast thou emulation for me? Would that

all the people might prophesy, and that the Lord

would give them his Spirit. And Moses returned, and the ancients

of Israel, into the camp; that is, each

to his own tents: for otherwise the tabernacle, to which

they had come together, was in the midst of the camp. Now let us come

to the flesh to be given to the people: for it

was promised to Moses at the same time, when the Lord commanded the seventy

elders to be gathered; but I wished to narrate each

thing done in its order.

[371] Of the flesh to be given the Lord, or the angel

acting in his stead, thus speaks to Moses at v. 18:

To the people also thou shalt say: Be sanctified: tomorrow you shall eat

flesh. Flesh promised for a whole month, For I have heard you say:

Who will give us flesh to eat? It was well with us

in Egypt; that the Lord may give you flesh,

and that you may eat, not one day, nor two, nor

five, nor ten, no nor twenty, but

even for a month of days, till it come out at your nostrils,

and become loathsome to you, because

you have cast off the Lord, who is in the midst of you,

and have wept before him, saying: Why

came we out of Egypt? This promise of the Lord was

of one punishing rather than pitying, as appears from

the very words and from the event. The Israelites had cast off

the Lord, because they were not content with the manna. But

as this contempt of the food given by the Lord

was not the fault of all, so the punishment was not for all; but the obedient

usefully ate the flesh given on this occasion

for the punishment of the murmurers. Further,

Moses does not seem at once to have perceived God's mind or purpose,

perhaps because he was still somewhat troubled

by the people's absurd murmuring. Hence the following words

are those neither of one disbelieving nor doubting the Lord's power,

but rather of one wondering: And

Moses said: There are six hundred thousand footmen of this people

(besides the women, children, Levites, Egyptians

and servants), and thou sayest: I will give them flesh to eat

a whole month? Shall then a multitude of sheep and oxen

be killed, that it may suffice for their food?

or shall all the fishes of the sea be gathered together

to fill them? And the Lord answered him:

Is the hand of the Lord unable? Thou shalt presently

see whether my word shall come to pass in deed.

[372] and an immense multitude of quails is given; Certainly on the following day not only Moses,

but all the people saw the angel's promise fulfilled:

for at v. 31 the matter is thus related: And a wind

going out from the Lord, taking quails up beyond the sea

brought them, and cast them into the camp for the space

of one day's journey, on every side

of the camp round about, and they flew in the air

two cubits high above the ground. The people

therefore rising up all that day and night, and the next day,

gathered together of quails, he that did least,

ten cores (others therefore more): and they dried

them round about the camp. They ate therefore,

at least some of them, quails for a whole month, as is understood

from the aforesaid; but not without the punishment of the rebellious,

as follows: As yet the flesh was between their teeth,

neither had that kind of meat failed: and behold

the wrath of the Lord being provoked against the people, struck

them with an exceeding great plague. And that place was called,

The sepulchres of lust: for there they buried

the people that had lusted. Of these things

also the following is said in Psalm 77, v. 26: He removed

the south wind from heaven: and by his power brought in

the southwest wind. And he rained upon them flesh as dust:

and feathered fowls like as the sand of the sea. And

they fell in the midst of their camp, round about

their pavilions. And they did eat and were filled

exceedingly, and he gave them their desire: they were

not defrauded of that which they craved. As yet their meat

was in their mouth: and the wrath of God came upon

them. And he slew the fat ones amongst them, and brought down

the chosen men of Israel.

[373] but in punishment of the murmuring many were slain. The sacred Scripture does not express by what kind

of death they perished. But it seems credible to me

that the evil arose from the food itself, and that very many perished

of a disease contracted by excessive gluttony, so that they might be punished

by the use of the flesh which with rash desire

they had demanded. This suspicion is suggested to me by

the words of the Lord promising flesh, until that food

come out at their nostrils… and become loathsome.

There is added the naming of the place, The sepulchres of lust,

which seems to hint that lust

and gluttony brought them death, especially because

no other kind of death is expressed. I confess

nevertheless that the matter is uncertain. But I dislike the opinion of those

who think they were slain by the burning related above,

since that burning arose on the way and in the uttermost

part of the camp or column, because some

murmured about excessive labour, and gave its name to the place

as The burning; whereas this place was called The sepulchres

of lust.

* manna

§ XXXIV. Josephus' account of the aforesaid is weighed: Philo is arraigned.

[ ] Josephus stains the murmuring of the people at the Sepulchres of lust Josephus treats briefly of the aforesaid, passing over many things,

and disfiguring others with various errors.

His words in chapter 12 are these: Not

long after, the camp is moved from Mount Sina: and

after some stations, of which we shall speak, they came

to the place which is called Iseremoth: where

the people began anew to be stirred by seditions, and to lay the blame

of their toilsome pilgrimage upon Moses.

At his persuasion they had left a most fertile region,

and now not only lacked its abundance,

but even, instead of the hoped-for happiness, wandered here and there

in the utmost miseries, labouring under lack of water:

and if the manna too should by some chance fail,

they would doubtless perish of hunger. To these they added

many reproaches, which were cast about on all sides against a Man

who had deserved most well. Meanwhile there arose one

of the people who, admonishing them of Moses' past

benefits, exhorted them to have good hope,

that not even now would they seek divine help in vain.

But the common crowd, more vehemently stirred by these words,

tumulted more and more against the Prophet.

He, seeing them so desperate, bids them be of good cheer,

promising that, however undeservedly he had been assailed with grievous

insults, he would nevertheless furnish them with abundance

of flesh, not for one

day only, but for many. But when they refused

to believe, and one even asked whence

he could provide for so many thousands of men? God,

he said, and I, however ill we may be spoken of among you,

shall nevertheless never cease to have care

of you: and that you shall shortly see. Scarcely had he

said this when the whole camp is filled with quails,

which they hunted in heaps. God nevertheless

not long after took notice of the Hebrews' insolence and

curses, not a few of the people being lost.

For even today that place retains the name given it from that

event, and is called Cabrothaba,

as one might say, the monuments of lust.

[375] In these things correct first what is said about

the lack of water: with many errors: for the Israelites did not labour under that want in that place,

nor did they complain of it.

Nor did he rightly set forth the cause of the murmuring,

being silent that the desire of flesh and the weariness of the manna

gave occasion to it. Secondly, for the weeping

of the people he wrongly substitutes reproaches against Moses:

for of reproaches the Scripture is here silent. Thirdly, he wrongly

brings in some one of the people speaking on Moses' behalf,

the Scripture being again silent. Fourthly,

he makes Moses too speak, not as the Scripture has it,

but as Josephus himself invented, who

wrongly adds that the people did not believe his words.

Fifthly, that the quails flew up immediately after Moses'

promise the writer wrongly asserts, careless of truth,

since there intervened the choosing of the seventy

elders, which with many other things he passes over.

Sixthly, lastly, he did not even express the places rightly: for the matter

did not happen after some stations from Mount

Sinai, nor in Iseremoth, by which he understands Haseroth,

that is, the fourteenth station, but

in the thirteenth station, that is, the first after the station of the desert of Sinai.

These and like errors of Josephus

show that the writer had no great care

of writing true things; but was content

if only he could put together a history somehow probable to the gentiles

and honourable to the Jews: and this

appears still more from his innumerable truncations

and from his deliberate corruptions of what was done.

[376] nor did Philo write sincerely. Philo too wrote the Life of Moses

not sincerely enough, but studied too much the honour

of his own nation. For I find no other cause

why he passed over many things which pertained most of all to the Life

of Moses, but were shameful to the Hebrew nation;

and why he tore not a few other things from their own place,

and preferred to relate them in book 3 of the Life of Moses

without order of time, and with such brevity that

the levity and inconstancy of the Hebrews scarcely appears in them.

But he is chiefly to be blamed because for that

cause he neglected even the truth. Take an evident

proof of the thing. In book 1 of the Life, page 493,

after he had narrated the victory over the Amalecites,

which fell in the second month of the first year

from the going out of Egypt, he at once proceeds thus:

After the battle he decides to send spies to

inspect the seats destined for his nation,

in the second year after they had entered upon the journey, etc.

Philo was not ignorant, nor could he be ignorant, that the sending

of the spies was later by a whole year and a month

or two. Why then does he place it

immediately after the victory over the Amalecites related? I find no

other reason than that the readers might not notice

that a great gap was left in the Life

of Moses. For all the deeds at Mount

Sinai are omitted, or rather torn from their place, so that

in book 3 some of them might be narrated, those which could shine

the more; while those that were shameful to the Hebrews

might be briefly touched: everything is omitted

that happened at the Sepulchres of lust and in Haseroth,

for these were too great a dishonour

to the Hebrews, especially because so short a time after

receiving the Law at Mount Sinai they were found so

indocile and light. These things I wished to note,

that the studious reader may have the trustworthiness of both Hebrew writers

better perceived.

§ XXXV. The murmuring of Mary and Aaron against

[ ] Moses: Mary's punishment: several stations: the sending of the spies, the murmuring of the Israelites, and the punishment of the rebels.

The station in Haseroth, where Mary and Aaron speak against Moses, After the dead were buried in the Sepulchres of lust,

the Israelites came to the fourteenth station

in Haseroth, as is said in Numbers

33, v. 17, in these words: And departing from the Sepulchres

of lust, they camped in Haseroth.

And in Numbers 11, v. 34: And going out from the Sepulchres

of lust, they came to Haseroth, and abode

there. This place again exercised the virtue of the holy Lawgiver,

and his grief must have been the more bitter

as the persons were the nearer to him

who raised themselves against a most meek Man.

Moses himself narrates the deed in Numbers 12 in this manner:

And Mary and Aaron spoke against Moses

because of his wife the Ethiopian, and they said:

Hath the Lord spoken by Moses only?

hath he not also spoken to us in like manner? A few things are here

to be observed. Moses' Ethiopian wife was Sephora

the Madianite, who is called an Ethiopian because

the region of the Madianites was of old inhabited by Chusites or Ethiopians,

as we said before at n.

69. This seems certain enough, although some of old

dissented. But not so clear or certain is

the occasion or cause of this quarrel, since the interpreters

disagree more among themselves about it. I much like

the conjecture of those who think that Sephora

was too well pleased with herself on account of Moses' familiarity with

God, and the authority that followed from it among men,

and that she so extolled those favours of Moses before

Mary and Aaron that she arrogated somewhat more to herself also,

and perhaps preferred herself to Mary,

because she was the wife of so great a Prophet and Lawgiver.

The words of Aaron and Mary favour this conjecture:

and it is probable that that quarrel arose while

Moses was absent.

[378] Of this imprudence of his brother and sister the most meek Prophet

does not seem to have complained,

who perhaps had not even heard the words of the murmurers,

or at any rate would easily have pardoned them. But the Lord

vindicated the authority of his Friend so much the more readily.

Hear what follows: And when the Lord heard this

(for Moses was a man exceeding meek above

all men that dwelt upon earth,

and therefore would easily have overlooked the injury done him),

immediately he spoke to him, and to Aaron and Mary:

Come out you three only to the tabernacle

of the covenant. And when they were come out, the Lord came down

in a pillar of the cloud, and stood in the entry

of the tabernacle, calling to Aaron and Mary. And when they

were come, he said to them: Hear my words: if

there be among you a prophet of the Lord, I will appear to him in a vision,

or I will speak to him in a dream.

But it is not so with my servant Moses, who is

most faithful in all my house: for I speak to him mouth to mouth:

and plainly, and not by riddles and figures

doth he see the Lord. Why then were you not afraid

to speak ill of my servant Moses? And being angry with

them, he went away: the cloud also departed that was

over the tabernacle: and behold Mary appeared white

with leprosy as snow. The words stood and went away almost hint

that the angel here appeared in human form,

and some have believed this. But to me it appears far

more probable that Aaron and Mary saw nothing

but the cloud, out of which they heard the voice. This

voice first came down with the cloud, then stood; and

at last went away. For it does not appear probable to me

that an angel in human form was seen from near at hand

by Aaron and Mary, since Moses had before

desired to see his face, and saw only his back

parts. Further, from Mary's punishment it is gathered

that she was more culpable than Aaron, who yet was not

free from all fault, since he was rebuked,

and in his sister after a fashion chastised.

[379] Let us return to the narration of the history:

And when Aaron had looked on her, and she was freed only after seven days by Moses' prayers. and saw her covered

with leprosy, he said to Moses: I beseech thee, my lord,

lay not upon us this sin, which

we have foolishly committed, let her not be as one dead,

and as an abortive that is cast forth from the mother's

womb: behold now half of her flesh is devoured

with leprosy. And Moses cried to the Lord,

saying: O God, I beseech thee, heal her. And the Lord

answered him: If her father had spitten upon her face,

ought she not to have been ashamed for at least seven

days? Let her be separated seven days

without the camp, and afterwards she shall be called again. So Mary

was shut out of the camp (according to the Law concerning

the segregation of lepers given in Numbers 5, v. 2), and

the people was not moved from that place until

Mary was called again. Thus the Lord partly heard the prayers

of Moses by shortly restoring health,

partly consulted his authority by so protracting the punishment inflicted

to seven days that it must become known

to the people. For little probable is the opinion of some,

who would have it that Mary was healed at once;

but was only sent away outside the camp at the Lord's command;

because the segregation followed the leprosy with which the Lord

had struck her, and he would not have her exempted from the common law,

so that she might be confounded not only by the leprosy but also by the segregation,

and thus be more effectually corrected.

[380] Various stations in the desert of Pharan, But Mary being healed after seven days and called back,

the people pursued its journey.

The station to which they went forward was the fifteenth,

and it is called Rethma in Numbers 33, v.

18, where it thus stands: And from Haseroth they came

to Rethma. In Numbers 13, v. 1, it is said of the same journey:

And the people marched from Haseroth, and pitched

their tents in the desert of Pharan. St. Jerome at

Station 15 notes the following to our purpose:

And it is to be noted that the remaining eighteen

stations, of which a catalogue is now briefly

set down, from Rethma as far as Asiongaber, that

is, as far as the thirty-second station,

are contained under the name of the wilderness of Pharan, in

which we understand that all the things that are written

were done at various times: and since these are not distributed

among the several stations, by us also they shall be spoken of

in common… From this station, therefore,

as far as the thirty-second, histories of this kind are contained.

Twelve spies are sent

to the holy Land: a cluster is brought back on a pole,

and the passion of Christ is briefly shown forth.

The people of the Jews murmurs, dreading

the onset of the giants. It fights against Amalec and the Chanaanite

against God's will, and being conquered, it learns what

sacrifices it ought to perform in the holy Land. Dathan

and Abiron and the sons of Core (nay, Core himself without

his sons) rise up against Moses and Aaron, and

are swallowed by a chasm of the earth. Between the dead and the living

the high priest goes in armed with a censer,

and the running wrath of God is stayed by the priest's voice.

The rod of Aaron brings forth both flower and leaves;

and to everlasting memory a green dryness is consecrated,

etc. That all these things were done in uncertain places,

because Moses did not express the names of the places

when he narrated the deeds, the holy Doctor rightly observed.

[381] but it is uncertain what was done in each; nor is it settled from which Wherefore I cannot embrace as certain

the opinion of many moderns, who assign the sending

of the spies to the fifteenth station,

since I find no ground in the Scriptures

by which this assertion might be supported. For this cause

take all the stations, with which the deeds briefly touched by St. Jerome

so agree that nothing can be certainly attributed

to any determinate one. The sixteenth

is Remmomphares, after which follow in order

the others as far as the thirty-second,

thus recorded in Numbers 33 from v. 19: And departing from

Rethma they camped in Remmomphares.

And going out from thence they came to Lebna. From Lebna

they camped in Ressa. And departing from Ressa,

they came to Ceelatha. From whence going forth, they camped

in Mount Sepher. Going out from Mount Sepher,

they came to Arada. Setting out from thence they camped

in Maceloth. And departing from Maceloth,

they came to Thahath. From Thahath they camped

in Thare. From whence going out, they pitched

their tents in Methca. And from Methca they camped

in Hesmona. And departing from Hesmona, they came

to Moseroth. And from Moseroth they camped

in Beneiaacan. And departing from Beneiaacan,

they came to Mount Gadgad. From whence

setting out, they camped in Jetebatha. And from

Jetebatha they came to Hebrona. And going out from

Hebrona, they camped in Asiongaber. This

is the thirty-second station, if none have been passed over.

[382] Further, I cannot suppose that any stations

were passed over, [the spies were sent, since it cannot be said which station Cadesbarne is, from which they were sent.] since here Moses is bent solely

on enumerating the stations, and reckons many

in which nothing memorable happened.

Now that the spies were sent to the promised Land

from Cadesbarne is clear from the testimony

of Moses to be given below; and therefore some will have it

that there was a station in Cadesbarne distinct from all

the aforesaid. But it seems to me far more probable

that Cadesbarne was a place neighbouring on one of

the said stations, and that the station is named by

Moses in Deuteronomy Cadesbarne rather than

by the other name by which it is reckoned in Numbers 33, because

Cadesbarne was a more famous place and better known to the Israelites.

But since it is uncertain to which station Cadesbarne

was neighbouring, or which station was designated by that name,

it is equally uncertain whether

the spies were sent from the fifteenth station, or from one of those

next following. But

it is clear that they were sent in the second year from the going out, and thence

it may be gathered that they were sent from the fifteenth station or

from another not too far following.

[383] Of the sending of the spies itself Moses

in Numbers 13, v. 2, has this: the people asking and God assenting, And there (in the desert of Pharan)

the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:

Send men that may view the land of Chanaan,

which I will give to the children of Israel, one of every tribe,

of the princes; that is, of the chief men,

yet not the princes of the tribes themselves, as is known

from their names. Further, that the people also asked

of Moses that spies should be sent, we have

in Deuteronomy 1, v. 19, where Moses on this matter

thus addresses the people: And departing from Horeb, we passed

through the terrible and vast wilderness

which you saw, by the way of the mountain of the Amorrhite, as

the Lord our God had commanded us. And when

we were come to Cadesbarne, I said to you: You are come

to the mountain of the Amorrhite, which the Lord

our God will give us. See the land,

which the Lord thy God giveth thee: go up and

possess it, as the Lord our God hath spoken

to thy fathers: fear not, nor be anything

dismayed. And you came all to me, and said:

Let us send men who may view the land;

and may bring us word what way we ought to go up,

and to what cities we should go. And when the saying

pleased me, I sent of you twelve men,

one of every tribe. The whole matter seems thus to be ordered.

Moses exhorted the people to gird itself for

the possession of the promised Land. But it

asked that first spies should be sent.

And the Lord, being consulted on the matter, commanded that

twelve spies should be sent.

[384] Let us again hear Moses in Numbers 13, v.

4: Moses did what the Lord had commanded,

sending from the desert of Pharan principal men, whose

names are these. Of the tribe of Ruben (he sent)

Sammua the son of Zechur. Moses sends spies into the promised Land, Of the tribe of Simeon, Saphat

the son of Huri. Of the tribe of Juda, Caleb the son

of Jephone. Of the tribe of Issachar, Igal the son of Joseph.

Of the tribe of Ephraim, Osee the son of Nun. Of the tribe

of Benjamin, Phalti the son of Raphu. Of the tribe of Zabulon,

Geddiel the son of Sodi. Of the tribe of Joseph, of the sceptre

of Manasses, Gaddi the son of Susi. Of the tribe of Dan,

Ammiel the son of Gemalli. Of the tribe of Aser, Sthur

the son of Michael. Of the tribe of Nephthali, Nahabi the son

of Vapsi. Of the tribe of Gad, Guel the son of Machi.

These are the names of the men whom Moses sent

to view the Land: and he called Osee the son

of Nun, Josue. Moses therefore sent them to

view the land of Chanaan, and said to them:

Go up by the south side. And when you shall come

to the mountains, view the Land, of what sort it is:

and the people that are the inhabitants thereof, whether they be strong

or weak: few in number or many:

the land itself, good or bad: what manner of cities, walled

or without walls: the soil, fat or barren,

woody or without trees. Be of good courage,

and bring us of the fruits of the Land. Now it was

the time when the first ripe grapes are fit to be eaten.

[385] [who survey it: and returning they praise its richness, and exaggerate the strength of its inhabitants,] And when they were gone up, they viewed

the Land from the desert of Sin unto Rohob as you enter into

Emath (that is, as far as the borders of Emath, a city

of Syria, that is, the northern part of the promised Land).

And they went up to the south, and

came to Hebron, where were Achiman and Sisai

and Tholmai, the sons of Enac: for Hebron was built seven

years before Tanis, the city of Egypt.

And going forward as far as the Torrent of the cluster, they cut off

a branch with its cluster of grapes, which two men carried

upon a bar. They took also of the pomegranates

and of the figs of that place: which was called

Nehelescol, that is, The torrent of the cluster, because

the children of Israel had carried a cluster from thence. And the spies

of the Land returning after forty days, having gone round

all the region, came to Moses and Aaron

and to all the assembly of the children of Israel in the desert

of Pharan, which is in Cades. And speaking to them and

to all the multitude, they showed them the fruits of the Land:

and they related, saying: We came into the Land

to which thou sentest us, which in very deed floweth with milk

and honey, as may be known by these fruits: but

it hath most strong inhabitants and cities great

and walled. We saw there the race of Enac. Amalec dwelleth

in the south (but outside the promised Land),

the Hethite and the Jebusite and the Amorrhite in the mountains:

but the Chanaanite abideth by the sea and near

the streams of the Jordan. Not all the nations are reckoned

which dwelt in the Land promised and afterwards

occupied; but the spies report only so much

as they had learned on the way, and therefore they also

mention the Amalecites, because they were the enemies of the Hebrews,

although otherwise they did not dwell in the land to be occupied by the Israelites.

Now this account had stirred up in the minds

of the hearers excessive fear and murmuring.

[386] [Caleb striving to allay the murmuring of the people; the ten spies go on to feed it,] And so Caleb wished to meet it, as follows:

Meanwhile Caleb, stilling the murmur of the people

that rose against Moses, said: Let us go up

and possess the Land, for we shall be able to

obtain it. But the others (ten, for Josue

was of another mind), who had been with him, said:

We are not able to go up to this people, because

they are stronger than we. And they spoke ill

of the Land which they had viewed, before the children of Israel,

saying: The Land which we have viewed devoureth

its inhabitants: the people that we beheld

are of tall stature. There we saw certain monsters

of the sons of Enac, of the giant kind: in comparison

with whom we seemed like locusts. Of these things

in Deuteronomy 1, v. 24, Moses discourses thus to the people:

And when they (the spies) had gone forward and gone up

into the mountains, they came as far as the Valley

of the cluster *: and having viewed the Land, taking of its fruits,

to show its richness, they brought them

to us, and said: The Land is good, which

the Lord our God will give us. And you would not

go up, but being incredulous at the word of the Lord

our God, you murmured in your tents,

and said: The Lord hateth us, and therefore

he hath brought us out of the land of Egypt, that he might deliver

us into the hand of the Amorrhite, and destroy us. Whither shall we go up?

The messengers have terrified our heart, saying:

The multitude is very great, and taller than we:

the cities are great, and walled up to the sky,

we have seen the sons of Enacim there. These things had been begun

in the very report of the spies, and were afterwards

increased in the tents, where the ten treacherous spies

so drove their calumnies into the people

that Caleb, Josue, and Moses himself were not able to allay the tumult.

[387] What Moses himself did, he goes on to narrate

in the same place in this manner: so that Moses himself could not recall the hope of the despairing, And I said to you: Fear not,

neither be ye afraid of them: the Lord God, who

is your leader, will himself fight for you, as

he did in Egypt in the sight of all. And in

the wilderness (thou hast seen it thyself) the Lord

thy God hath carried thee, as a man is wont to carry his little

son, in all the way by which you have walked,

until you came to this place. And yet not even so

did you believe the Lord your God, who went before

you in the way, and marked out the place in which

you should pitch your tents, showing you by night

the way by fire, and by day by the pillar of the cloud. The same,

with other sins, Moses gravely reproaches the Israelites with

in Deuteronomy 9, v. 22, saying to them: At the Burning

also, and at the temptation, and at the Sepulchres

of lust you provoked the Lord: and when

he sent you from Cadesbarne, saying: Go up,

and possess the Land which I have given you: and

you despised the commandment of the Lord your God, and

did not believe him, neither would you hearken to his voice:

but were always rebellious from the day that I began

to know you. It is indeed to be wondered at that the people, amid

continual tokens of divine protection, and miracles

and prodigies, was so pusillanimous

and so incredulous that it attributed more to its own inconsiderate

and rash fear than to the most efficacious reasons

and promises of Moses, which had never

deceived them. Yet so it was done, and they did not even

refrain from blasphemies.

[388] Moses in Numbers 14 thus sets forth the rashness of the rebellious

people: [and to raise the spirits of the rebels, though Aaron, Josue and Caleb helped him;] Therefore the whole multitude, crying out,

wept that night, and all the children of Israel murmured against Moses

and Aaron, saying: Would that

we had died in Egypt: and would that we might perish in this vast

wilderness, and that the Lord may not bring

us into this Land, lest we fall by the sword,

and our wives and children be led away captives.

Is it not better to return into Egypt? And they said

one to another: Let us appoint us

a captain, and let us return into Egypt. Which when

Moses and Aaron heard, they fell down flat upon the ground

before all the multitude of the children of Israel.

But Josue the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephone,

who themselves also had viewed the Land, rent

their garments, and said to all the multitude of the children

of Israel: The Land which we have gone round

is very good. If the Lord be favourable,

he will bring us into it, and will give us a land flowing with milk

and honey. Be not rebellious against

the Lord: and fear ye not the people of this Land,

for we are able to eat them up as bread:

all aid is gone from them: the Lord

is with us, fear ye not. And when all the multitude cried out,

and would have stoned them,

the glory of the Lord appeared over the tabernacle

of the covenant to all the children of Israel. Here was the end of the rebellion;

but not of the punishment.

[389] until God threatened all with death: Moses then praying, And the Lord said to Moses: How

long will this people detract from me? How long will they not

believe me for all the signs that I have wrought before

them? I will strike them therefore with pestilence, and will consume them:

but thee I will make a ruler over a great nation,

and a mightier than this is. And

Moses said to the Lord: That the Egyptians may hear, out of

whose midst thou hast brought forth this people, and the inhabitants

of this Land, who have heard that thou,

O Lord, art among this people, and art seen face

to face, and thy cloud protecteth them, and thou goest before them in a pillar

of a cloud by day, and in a pillar

of fire by night: that thou hast killed so great

a multitude as one man, and they may say:

He could not bring the people into the Land

for which he had sworn: therefore did he kill them in the wilderness.

Let therefore the strength of the Lord be magnified, as

thou hast sworn, saying: The Lord is patient and of much mercy,

taking away iniquity and wickedness, and leaving

no man clear, who visitest the sins

of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation.

Forgive, I beseech thee, the sin of this

people, according to the greatness of thy mercy,

as thou hast been merciful to them that came out of Egypt

unto this place. Thus far Moses

praying for the rebellious people: but it is probable that his whole

prayer is not here set out, and that therefore

the beginning seems the more abrupt. The holy Lawgiver was heard:

but he did not so wholly obtain all

that a most grievous crime should lack its due punishment:

for in place of a hastened death a long exile was given

to the rebels, to be ended only by death.

[390] that punishment is changed into perpetual exile, Hear what follows: And the Lord said:

I have forgiven according to thy word. As I live: and the whole earth

shall be filled with the glory of the Lord. But yet all

the men that have seen my majesty,

and the signs that I have done in Egypt and in the wilderness,

and have tempted me now ten times (that is,

frequently), and have not obeyed my voice, shall not see

the Land for which I swore to their fathers,

neither shall any one of them that hath detracted from me behold

it. My servant Caleb, who being full of another

spirit hath followed me, I will bring into this

Land, which he hath gone round: and his seed shall possess

it. Since the Amalecite and the Chanaanite dwell

in the valleys (as you have said): Tomorrow move the camp,

and return into the wilderness by the way of the Red

Sea, that is, towards the Red Sea. That Tomorrow

return does not seem an absolute command of the Lord,

since the Israelites did not return on the following day.

It seems rather to be a concession of an indignant God,

that they should return the next day if they would: yet the return

was altogether commanded, but later, so far as appears.

[391] so that none of those numbered at Mount Sinai Of this punishment of the Israelites Moses speaks

to the people in Deuteronomy 1, v. 34, in this manner:

And when the Lord had heard the voice of your words,

being angry he swore and said: Not any one

of the men of this wicked generation shall see

the good Land, which I promised under oath

to your fathers, except Caleb the son of Jephone.

For he shall see it, and to him I will give the Land

that he hath trodden upon, and to his children, because he hath followed the Lord.

Nor is his indignation against the people to be wondered at,

since the Lord, being angry with me also for your sakes,

said (afterwards): Neither shalt thou go in thither: but

Josue the son of Nun thy minister, he shall go in for

thee… Your little ones, of whom you said that

they should be led away captives, and your children, who this day know not

the difference of good and evil, they shall go in: and

to them will I give the Land, and they shall possess it. But you,

turn back, and go by the way of the Red Sea.

In both the places cited Caleb alone is expressly excepted

from the condemnation: but that Josue too was exempted

is here hinted, as it is clearly affirmed in the words

presently to be given.

[392] Again in Numbers 14 from v. 26 Moses

sets forth this punishment a little more at large thus: should enter the promised Land, save Josue and Caleb: And the Lord

spoke to Moses and Aaron, saying: How

long doth this wicked multitude murmur against

me? I have heard the complaints of the children of Israel. Say therefore

to them: As I live, saith the Lord: as you have spoken

in my hearing, so will I do to you. In this wilderness

shall your carcasses lie. All you that were numbered

from twenty years old and upward, and have murmured against

me, shall not enter into the Land, over which I lifted up

my hand to make you dwell therein, except

Caleb the son of Jephone and Josue the son of Nun.

But your little ones, of whom you said that

they should be a prey to the enemies, I will bring in, that they may see

the Land which you have displeased. Your carcasses

shall lie in the wilderness. Your children shall wander in

the desert forty years, and shall bear your fornication *,

until the carcasses of their fathers be consumed

in the desert, according to the number of the forty

days, wherein you viewed the Land: a year

shall be counted for a day. And for forty years you shall receive

your iniquities, and shall know my revenge:

for as I have spoken, so will I do to all

this wicked multitude, that hath risen up together against

me: in this wilderness shall it faint away, and die.

[393] Therefore all the men whom Moses had sent

to view the Land, the ten spies taken off by a sudden death. and who at their return made

all the multitude to murmur against him,

speaking ill of the Land that it was bad, died

and were struck in the sight of the Lord. But Josue

the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephone,

lived of all them that had gone to view

the Land. And Moses spoke all these

words to all the children of Israel, and the people

mourned exceedingly. From what has been said it is easily gathered that the ten

spies perished at once by a sudden death, because

they themselves had given occasion of the murmuring; while the rest

perished by degrees in the space of thirty-eight

years and some months, during which they wandered

in the wilderness: for what is said, Your children

shall wander in the desert forty years, must be so understood

that there is reckoned together with it the time during which

they had already been in the desert, where they were now spending

the second year.

* al. The torrent of the cluster

* that is, the punishment of the crime

§ XXXVI. The sending of the spies, the murmuring, and its punishment out of Josephus and Philo, whose accounts are examined.

[ ] Josephus' account of the spies sent, Josephus and Philo passed over entirely the murmuring of Mary and

Aaron against Moses, as being

less honourable to their nation.

Nevertheless they committed to writing the sending of the spies

and the cowardly rebellion of the Israelites. Of

it Josephus in chapter 13 writes the following: But Moses,

after he had led them away thence into

a place little fit for human habitation, situated not

far from the borders of the Chanaanites, which is called

The Gorges, calls the people to an assembly.

And when he had stood in their midst, Two goods, he said,

God has decreed to give us, liberty and the possession of a happy

land: of which the one you already have from his

munificence, the other also you shall shortly have.

For we are on the borders of the Chanaanites,

from whom so far is it that any city or king shall keep us out,

that not even the whole nation with its forces gathered

into one could avail to do this. Therefore let us be

ready to bear ourselves bravely. For they will not

yield us their region without a battle, but after

great struggles the prize of victory will be ours. Before

all things spies must be sent, who may explore both the richness

of the land and the power of its inhabitants.

But we must above all strive after concord,

and follow God our helper and aider with due

worship. When he had spoken thus, the people,

having praised Moses' counsel, chooses twelve

most noble spies, one from each

tribe.

[395] the murmuring that then arose, Who, beginning from the parts that verge towards Egypt,

had surveyed the whole region of the Chanaanites,

until they came to the city Amathe * and Mount

Libanus: and having explored the nature both of the land

and of the inhabitants, they returned to their own,

forty days having been spent on this business.

And indeed the beauty of the fruits, of which a specimen

had been brought, and the richness of the region of which

they heard, raised the minds of the multitude to undertake

the war. On the other hand they were deterred by their telling

that its acquisition would be difficult, because

great and deep rivers had to be crossed, and

steep mountains climbed, and the cities were girt with

most strong walls. And at Hebron they said that they had even found

a progeny of giants,

and so the spies, since they had found everything greater among

the Chanaanites than what hitherto after

the going out of Egypt they had seen, deliberately filled

the rest of the multitude also with their own fear.

And they, thinking from their account that it was impossible

to acquire such a land, when the assembly was dissolved, returned home

and lamented with their wives and children,

saying that God promised many things in words only,

but in fact furnished no help at all. And again

accusing Moses, they cried out against him and at once against his brother

Aaron the high priest:

and thus they spent the whole night restless, casting

reproaches upon both. But in the morning they run together

to the assembly with this mind, that having stoned

Moses and his brother, they might return back into Egypt whence they had come.

[396] Fearing which outcome, two of the spies,

Jesus the son of Naveches of the tribe of Ephraim, by the effort of Josue and Caleb to allay the multitude,

and Chaleb of the tribe of Juda, come forward into

the midst and restrain the people, praying them to be of good

hope, and not to charge God with lying,

rashly giving credence to certain men who with vain reports

published about the affairs of the Chanaanites terrified the credulous

multitude: but rather to follow those

who offered themselves as authors and leaders in acquiring so happy a region for them.

For neither the greatness of the mountains, nor the depth of the rivers

would stand in the way of men prepared to bear themselves bravely,

especially under God's auspices, and with him

fighting in the line for them. Go, they say, laying aside all

fear, briskly, and relying upon God, follow whither we shall lead

you. With such words they strove to allay

the tumultuous people. Meanwhile Moses and

Aaron, falling on their faces, besought God,

not for their own safety, but that he would bring back the raving multitude

to a sound mind, troubled as it was by so many present

and pressing necessities: when

suddenly a cloud arising over the tabernacle signifies

that God is present.

[397] At which sight Moses, taking heart, thrusts himself into

the crowd, by Moses' prayers, and the sentence of God passed on the rebels, and of his own accord threatens them with punishment from God,

provoked by such insolence, yet not so great

as the enormity of the sin deserved, but such as fatherly

chastisement is wont to be. For when he had entered the tabernacle,

and with tears deprecated the destruction of the people,

God had reminded him with how many and how great

benefits they had been endowed, and yet went on being ungrateful, and

that now, seduced by the cowardice of the spies, they thought

there was more truth in their words than in his own

promises. Wherefore he would not indeed destroy

that whole people, which he had preferred before all other mortals:

nevertheless he would not grant them the land of Chanaan and its

richness, but they should wander forty years in the desert without

home and without city, so that they might pay the penalty of their sin.

Yet he would give that land to their children,

and would make them lords of the goods of which their fathers

had rendered themselves unworthy by their intemperance.

The common people, astounded by these denunciations, gave itself wholly

to sadness, and they besought Moses

to entreat God, that being reconciled and their sins pardoned

he would deliver the hostile cities to them.

But he denied that God would suffer himself to be tempted by such

prayers. For it was not rashly or after the manner of men

that he had been moved to this indignation, but he had pronounced

this sentence as a just one.

[398] In this account the Hebrew writer departs less

openly from the sacred Letters in certain things he is corrected. than he frequently does

elsewhere: yet there are things to be corrected.

First, I do not see why he named the place from

which the spies were sent, in Greek φάραγγα, in Latin

The Gorges, unless perhaps he wished by that word to explain the nature

of the places, or inflected it from Pharan.

Secondly, Moses' speech to the people

is indeed suitable enough to the place and time; but it is not

exactly conformable to the sacred Scripture, especially

since he attributes to Moses the counsel of sending spies,

whereas Moses seems rather to have sent the spies

at the people's request and with God's permission,

than to have first suggested that counsel, as

was said at n. 383. Thirdly, there were indeed mountains

and rivers to be crossed by the Hebrews, that they might acquire

the promised Land: but we do not read in the sacred Letters

that the spies exaggerated this difficulty,

or that the people was terrified by it, as Josephus

narrates. Fourthly, the blasphemous words of the Israelites,

that God promised many things in words only, etc.,

the Hebrew writer did not find in the Scriptures, but

he made the blasphemy in Deuteronomy 1, v. 27, harsher.

Fifthly, lastly, he passed over many things, or at least touched them

very lightly, as the studious reader will easily see, if only

he compares with this account the exposition given from the sacred Letters.

[399] Philo's not sufficiently faithful account Philo acts no less dissemblingly in narrating this

deed than Josephus, nay even more so:

for he entirely omits the murmuring against Moses, the design

of returning into Egypt, and the seditious

and blasphemous words of the Hebrews,

recording only the danger of Josue and Caleb; nay,

he did not even clearly set forth the punishment inflicted by God

for the rebellion. Then he fell into the same error

as Josephus, in making Moses the first author

of sending the spies. Nay, by a graver

slip he brings in the Lawgiver doubting of the fertility

of the promised Land, and saying to the spies:

Otherwise to undergo dangers of one's own accord for the possession of barren fields

would be the height of folly. Moses knew

well that that Land was exceedingly

fertile, and he had been bidden by God to lead the people to its

possession: when therefore he bade the spies

consider whether the land was good or bad,

he did not do so because he doubted of the goodness of the land,

but that all the people, hearing of the land's fertility,

might be the more stirred to undertake the possession of it.

These things being premised, I shall subjoin Philo's words:

for the error about the spies being sent

immediately after the victory over the Amalecites related

I have already corrected before.

[400] concerning the spies sent by Moses, After the battle (with the Amalecites, of which

he had treated), he (Moses) decided to send spies to inspect

the seats destined for his nation, in the second

year after they had entered upon the journey: lest

perhaps in their usual manner they should through ignorance dissent from

their Leader's counsel; and that, the matter being learned by hearing, they might

consider in common what was to be done. There were sent

from the twelve tribes as many princes chosen

from the nobles, that the authority of all might be equal;

and that all the tribes might learn equally of the state of the region

from men of higher honour, provided only

that they should be willing to report the truth. And he thus

addresses those chosen: The prize of the struggles and dangers which

we have endured and endure even today

will be the division of the fields, which hope may God

most good and great ratify, that we may lead a most numerous nation

into a colony. And it will be of the greatest profit

to know thoroughly the condition of the places, of the men, of things,

as to be ignorant of these is harmful.

Therefore we have chosen you, that with your eyes and minds

we may inspect those things. You shall therefore be to so many thousands

for ears and eyes, that you may learn what we

ought to know, namely these three things: the number

and power of the inhabitants; the site of the cities, whether they be walled

or without fortifications: lastly, what is the nature

of the soil, whether fruitful and fit for vineyards, orchards

and crops, or on the contrary barren: that against

the strength and forces of the inhabitants we may furnish ourselves with legions

which we may safely oppose to them, and against

the difficulties of the places with siege engines.

It is necessary also to know the nature of the region,

whether it be good or not. Otherwise to undergo dangers of one's own accord

for the possession of barren fields

would be the height of folly. But our arms and engines

and forces are placed in trust towards God

alone. Relying on this equipment we shall yield to no terrors:

by this we shall conquer, even if we be inferior

in strength, condition, boldness, skill, forces:

furnished with this, even in a vast wilderness we have lacked

nothing of what is had in cities.

The time too is now most fit for exploring,

namely the spring, when the crops

are tending to ripeness, and the fruits of the trees begin

to put themselves forth. Yet it is better to defer

your return to the summer, and to bring back some fruits, which

may be a specimen of the richness of that region.

[401] Having heard this, they set out to explore,

the whole multitude escorting them, concerning the Land inspected, anxious

lest they be taken and pay the penalty, and a double

harm be received, the destruction of men chosen from each tribe,

together with ignorance of the enemy's affairs,

the knowledge of which was sought. And they had

with them guides skilled in the places, whom they followed

on the way. And when they had drawn near to the borders,

having gone up a very high mountain, they beheld

a region for the most part level, fruitful

in barley, wheat and fodder. The mountainous parts also

were planted with vines and orchards, everywhere green,

and marked out with streams and springs for abundance of watering,

so that from the roots to the summits the whole sides of the mountains

were shady with continuous trees, especially

the ridges and the mid valleys. They saw also cities

excellently fortified both by nature and by art. Then, inquiring

further, they saw an immense number

of inhabitants, like giants in height and strength.

That they might survey these things the more diligently, they stayed

there the longer, lest they should be deceived at first sight, but might impress

surer marks upon the mind. And at the same time they took care

to show to their tribesmen the fruits plucked from the trees, now

half ripe, especially those

which are not easily spoiled. But at nothing did they wonder more

than at the fruit of the vine. For there hung

exceedingly great grapes from the branches, a sight

scarcely credible. One of these, taken off, they hung

from the middle of a pole, whose ends they laid

upon the shoulders of two young men, and thus carried it,

others succeeding one after another because of the weight.

[402] For the rest they were not agreed. On the journey

they could not agree concerning the discord of the spies, and the people stirred to sedition, what should be reported

by common consent, lest any sedition should arise

among the people. But this was the lighter matter. After their return

there arose a greater discord. Some, telling of the fortifications of the cities

and the numbers of the citizens, and magnifying

everything, terrified the assembly with their words:

others on the contrary made light of whatever they had seen,

exhorting them to be of brave heart, and to seek

the colony, since they would obtain victory at the first

shout. No city would bear the onset of so great

a multitude rushing on at once, nor would it be equal

to the weight bearing upon it. And so both parties

found among the common people those whom they imbued with their own

feelings, the timid with cowardice, the brave with hope and

boldness. But these last were a fifth part, the timid

outnumbering the rest fivefold, whereby it came about

that the fortitude of the few was obscured in so great

a number of cowards. Two authors of the best

counsel were overborne by ten dissuaders from their

opinion, who drew over to their side

the whole plebeian multitude. All with one mouth

praised the mountainous parts equally with the plains: but

at once there was an outcry from the assembly: What need

have we of others' fortunes guarded with so great a garrison,

that they cannot be taken from their former lords? Scarcely

did they keep their hands off from stoning the two who thought

otherwise, preferring to hear pleasant things rather than useful ones,

and setting false before true.

Which the Leader of the multitude bore most ill, suspecting

that it was driven by furies, since it so obstinately spurned the oracles:

nor was vengeance far off, as the event

showed. For those ten timid spies

were consumed by pestilence, together with the crowd

that followed their cowardice. Those alone who had urged them

to go undaunted were saved, bearing the reward of piety,

and of an oracle reverently received.

[403] [and concerning the long wandering of the Hebrews: various things herein corrected.] This was the cause of the later leading forth of the colony.

For whereas they might have divided the fields of Syria in the second

year after they had migrated out of Egypt, turning aside

from the short way, they wandered through

far-off and out-of-the-way retreats, seeking other

after others, wearying mind and body in vain,

that they might pay the deserved penalties of their impiety:

for they, besides the time already elapsed, for thirty-eight

years, the age of a man, wandering up and down

through pathless places, scarcely in the fortieth year came

to the same borders as before. Thus far

Philo, rightly reckoning the years during which the Israelites

wandered in the desert; but silent that all

those aged twenty years or more died in the meantime,

a few excepted. With the same silence he covers

the disaster of the rebels, who had refused battle

when the Lord commanded it; and presently against his

prohibition rashly went forward to battle, as

we shall presently see. Further, certain other things in the account given

are uncertain or less exact. First, whether

the ten spies perished by pestilence, as

Philo asserts, or by another kind of death, is not clear

from Scripture. Secondly, what is said of the fields

of Syria to be divided is to be understood of a part of Syria

taken more broadly, that is, of Palestine, which was included

in Syria broadly taken. Thirdly, less exactly

does he draw out the time during which the spies were absent from spring into

summer, as though they had been absent longer than

forty days, although I confess that this does not follow from his own words:

on the other hand he is silent about the diligence of the spies

in going round the whole of Palestine. Lastly,

he relates certain things from conjecture, probably rather than

certainly, such as for the greater part is the speech

of Moses to the people, the fear about the spies,

their discord on the journey, etc.

* Emath

§ XXXVII. A battle undertaken, Moses forbidding it,

and a disaster: a man gathering wood on the Sabbath day stoned: the conspiracy of Core, Dathan and Abiron, signally chastised by divine visitation: the punishment of the murmurers: the prodigy of Aaron's rod.

[ ] The Israelites, the Lord forbidding, go forward to battle, The sentence passed by God against the rebellious Israelites

and published by Moses, by which most of them

were condemned to meet death in the desert of Arabia,

not only brought great mourning upon the people,

but also poured such boldness, or rather

rashness, into the minds of the rebels, that of their own accord they demanded

battle, and even against Moses' will

hastened to the fight. And so they who had not dared

to attempt an entrance into the promised Land when

the Lord's favour breathed upon them, with unheard-of rashness

drew near to the enemy, God refusing, in part

carrying out by this their disobedience the sentence

of death passed against them. Moses in Numbers 14, v. 40,

has the following of these things: And behold, rising early in the morning,

they went up to the top of the mountain, and

said: We are ready to go up to the place

of which the Lord hath spoken: because we have sinned.

To whom Moses said, Why do you transgress

the word of the Lord, which shall not turn out to your prosperity?

Go not up, for the Lord is not

with you: lest you fall before your enemies.

The Amalecite and the Chanaanite are before you,

by whose sword you shall fall, because you would not consent

to the Lord, neither will the Lord be with you.

But they being blinded went up to the top

of the mountain. But the ark of the testament of the Lord and

Moses departed not from the camp. And

the Amalecite came down, and the Chanaanite that dwelt in

the mountain: and striking and slaying them,

pursued them as far as Horma. It is not expressed

how great was the number of the slain; but that it was not small

the very words sufficiently hint.

[405] In Deuteronomy 1, v. 41, of the same battle and disaster

Moses thus addresses the people: and are driven back with grave disaster: And you answered

me: We have sinned against the Lord: we will go up and fight,

as the Lord our God hath commanded.

And when you went forward armed into the mountain,

the Lord said to me: Say to them: Go not up,

nor fight, for I am not with you:

lest you fall before your enemies. I spoke,

and you heard not: but resisting the commandment of the Lord,

and swelling with pride, you went up into the mountain.

And so the Amorrhite that dwelt in the mountains

came out, and coming against you, chased

you, as bees are wont to chase: and slew you from

Seir as far as Horma. And when you returned and wept before

the Lord, he heard you not, neither would he yield

to your voice. So you abode in Cadesbarne

a long time. It may here be asked how they

remained long in Cadesbarne, since they had been bidden to set forward toward

the Red Sea on the first day after the rebellion.

I answer that the Israelites did not obey that command,

but on the same day went forward to that unhappy

battle. And since that disobedience was punished with a huge

slaughter, God probably permitted

them to stay longer in the same place, until

the wounded either died or were healed. But

the Lord would not permit them to go forward to battle a second

time, as they seem to have asked after the disaster

received. It may also be observed that here the Amorrhite

is named as the one by whom the Israelites were cut down; but

in Numbers 14 the Amalecite and the Chanaanite are named: it seems therefore

that those three peoples joined arms against the Israelites,

unless the Amorrhites in Numbers 14 are called

Chanaanites by reason of the common name of the peoples

of the promised Land.

[406] When the Israelites had long encamped about Cadesbarne,

[their journey toward the Red Sea: certain laws: a violator of the Sabbath stoned.] they set forward by a backward march

toward the Red Sea, until they came to

the thirty-second station, that is, to Asiongaber,

a place adjoining the Elanitic gulf of the Red Sea.

Of this very long journey Moses in Deuteronomy

2 speaks thus briefly: And departing from thence (from Cadesbarne) we came into the wilderness that leadeth

to the Red Sea, as the Lord had said to me:

and we compassed Mount Seir a long time. Various

and long meanwhile were the stations during

that journey, as may be seen at n. 381:

but we do not know what was done in each of them.

For this cause I shall relate the deeds of the intervening time in the order

in which they were related by Moses in the book

of Numbers, without any other note of place or time.

In Numbers 15 various ceremonial laws are reckoned,

which are prescribed to be observed after they should have entered

the promised Land. In the same place at v. 32 the punishment

of a man who had violated the Sabbath is thus

narrated: And it came to pass, when the children of Israel

were in the wilderness, and had found a man gathering

sticks on the Sabbath day, that they brought him

to Moses and Aaron and the whole multitude. And they shut

him up in prison, not knowing what they should

do with him. And the Lord said to

Moses: Let that man die, let all the multitude

stone him without the camp. And when

they had brought him out, they stoned him,

and he died, as the Lord had commanded. This

deed hints that the Israelites at that time observed the Sabbath

most religiously.

[407] The conspiracy of Core and those adhering to him Further, at that same time when the Israelites were borne

wandering through the deserts, a most grievous conspiracy broke out

against Moses and Aaron, and that

not begun by a popular movement of the inconstant crowd,

but studiously got up by chief men, who envied

Moses his command, and Aaron the pontificate.

It was Levites and Rubenites who strove to abrogate

Moses' command, and to make Aaron's priesthood

common to more. The leader of the whole faction, Core the Levite,

was Moses' cousin: for

the grandfather common to both was Caath:

for Moses was the son of Amram, who was the elder-born

son of Caath; while Core had for father

Isaar, the second son of Caath, as may be seen

in Exodus 6, v. 18 and 21. This nearness of blood being

observed, let us hear Moses, who

in Numbers 16 thus sets about narrating the deed: And behold

Core, the son of Isaar, the son of Caath, the son of Levi;

and Dathan and Abiron, the sons of Eliab; Hon

also, the son of Pheleth, of the children of Ruben, rose up

against Moses, and others of the children of Israel,

two hundred and fifty men, leaders of the synagogue,

and who in the time of the assembly were called by name.

In Ecclesiasticus 45, v. 22, it is said of them: Because

strangers stood up against him (Aaron), and through envy

the men that were with Dathan and Abiron compassed him about

in the wilderness, and the congregation

of Core in their wrath. The Lord saw, and

it pleased him not, and they were consumed in the heat of his anger.

He wrought monstrous things upon them, and consumed them

in a flame of fire. That punishment we shall see more at large,

when the attempt of the conspiracy has been set forth.

[408] against Moses and Aaron, Of it Moses at v. 3 thus proceeds: And when

they had stood up against Moses and Aaron, they said:

Let it be enough for you, that all the multitude consisteth of holy ones,

and the Lord is among them. Why lift you up yourselves

above the people of the Lord? When Moses had heard this,

he fell flat on his face: and speaking

to Core and to all the multitude, he said: In the morning

the Lord will make known who belong to him,

and he will join to himself the holy ones: and whom

he shall choose, they shall approach to him. Do this therefore:

let every man take his censer, thou Core, and

all thy council: and taking fire tomorrow, put

incense upon it before the Lord: and whomsoever

he shall choose, he shall be holy: you lift yourselves up too much,

ye sons of Levi. And he said again to Core:

Hear, ye sons of Levi: is it a small thing unto you, that

the God of Israel hath separated you from all the people, and

joined you to himself, that you should serve him in the service of the tabernacle,

and should stand before the congregation of the people, and minister

to him? Did he therefore make thee and all thy brethren

the sons of Levi to approach unto him, that you should challenge to yourselves

the priesthood also, and that all thy company should stand against

the Lord? For what is Aaron, that you should murmur

against him? With these words Moses strove in vain to bring back Core

and the Levites adhering to him to better counsels.

[409] whom they assail with grievous reproaches: but Moses praying, Equally obstinate were Dathan and Abiron

with the Rubenites adhering to them, as follows:

Moses therefore sent to call Dathan and

Abiron the sons of Eliab. But they answered: We will not come.

And adding grievous reproaches, they thus went on:

Is it a small matter to thee, that thou hast brought

us out of a land that flowed with milk and honey,

to kill us in the desert, except thou rule also

over us? Thou hast brought us in truth into a land

that floweth with rivers of milk and honey, and hast given us possessions

of fields and vineyards. Wilt thou also pull out our

eyes? We will not come. These reproaches must have grievously

stung the holy Lawgiver, because they falsely imputed to Moses

the whole cause of their long stay in the desert, which the Israelites

ought to have imputed to their own crimes; as though

he had promised great things, and meanwhile had been able to perform

nothing. And Moses being very angry, said to the Lord:

Respect not their sacrifices: thou knowest that

I have not taken of them so much as a young ass at any time,

nor have injured any of them. And he said to

Core: Thou and all thy congregation stand apart

before the Lord, and Aaron apart tomorrow.

Take every one of you your censers, and put

incense upon them, offering to the Lord two hundred

and fifty censers: let Aaron also hold

his censer. And when they had done this,

Moses and Aaron standing, and they had gathered together

against them all the multitude at the door of the tabernacle,

the glory of the Lord appeared to them all.

[410] And the Lord spoke to Moses and Aaron,

saying: [Dathan and Abiron are swallowed up by the earth opening, while the other two hundred and fifty are consumed by fire:] Separate yourselves from the midst of this

congregation, that I may presently destroy them. And they fell

flat on their face, and said: O most mighty

God of the spirits of all flesh, shall thy wrath rage against all,

for one man's sin? And

the Lord said to Moses: Command the whole people

to separate themselves from the tents of Core, and Dathan,

and Abiron. And Moses arose, and went

to Dathan and Abiron: and the ancients of Israel following him,

he said to the multitude: Depart from the tents

of these wicked men, and touch nothing

of theirs, lest you be involved in their sins.

And when they had departed from their tents

round about, Dathan and Abiron coming out stood

in the entry of their pavilions, with their wives

and children and all their company. And Moses said: By

this you shall know that the Lord hath sent me to do

all things that you see, and that I have not brought them forth

of my own heart. If these men die the common

death of men, and if they be visited with a plague, wherewith

others also are wont to be visited, the Lord did not send me:

but if the Lord do a new thing, and the earth

opening her mouth swallow them down, and all things

that belong to them, and they go down alive

into hell, you shall know that they have blasphemed

the Lord. Immediately therefore as he ceased to speak,

the earth broke asunder under their feet: and opening

her mouth, devoured them with their tents

and all their substance; and they went down alive

into hell, covered with the ground, and perished from

the midst of the multitude. But all Israel that

was standing round about fled at the cry of them that were perishing,

saying: Lest perhaps the earth swallow us up also.

And a fire coming out from the Lord destroyed the two

hundred and fifty men that offered the incense.

[411] It cannot be understood from this place whether Core

was swallowed up by the earth opening, Core too swallowed by the gaping of the earth, yet not his sons: or slain by fire

with his Levites. Nay, even in Deuteronomy 11, v. 6,

Dathan and Abiron alone are named, … whom

the earth, opening her mouth, swallowed up, with their households

and tents and all their substance which

they had in the midst of Israel. No more is

Core named in Psalm 105, v. 15, where the punishment of the rebels

is thus expressed: And they provoked Moses in the camp,

Aaron the holy one of the Lord. The earth was opened,

and swallowed up Dathan, and covered the congregation

of Abiron. And a fire was kindled in their synagogue:

the flame burned the sinners. But

from elsewhere it is clear that Core was swallowed up by the earth opening;

but that his sons, as innocent, were wonderfully

snatched from the danger. For in Numbers 26

Moses, weaving the genealogy of Dathan and Abiron,

writes of them at v. 9 as follows: These are Dathan and Abiron,

princes of the people, who rose up against

Moses and Aaron in the sedition of Core, when they

rebelled against the Lord: and the earth, opening

her mouth, devoured Core, many others dying,

when the fire burned two hundred and fifty

men. And a great miracle was wrought,

that when Core perished, his sons did not perish. Thus

the Lord separated the innocent from the guilty: for it does not seem

to be doubted that the sons of Core were plainly

guiltless, and that for that cause the Lord spared them.

Further, that Core also was in his own tent

when he perished is gathered from the command

of God, whereby he ordered the whole people to be separated

from the tents of Core and Dathan and Abiron.

And so probably, when Moses went off to the tents

of Dathan and Abiron, Core followed him,

and leaving the Levites who adhered to him, who were offering

incense, withdrew to his own tent,

and there perished in the aforesaid manner.

[412] plates from the censers of the slain fastened to the altar: After setting forth the death of the seditious,

Moses continues his narration in Numbers 16,

v. 36, in this manner: And the Lord spoke to

Moses, saying: Command Eleazar the son of Aaron

the priest to take up the censers that lie in the burning,

and to scatter the fire hither and thither: because

they are sanctified in the deaths of the sinners:

and let him beat them into plates, and fasten them to the altar,

because incense hath been offered in them to the Lord, and

they are sanctified, that the children of Israel may see them

for a sign and a memorial. Eleazar the priest therefore took

the brazen censers, wherein they had offered whom

the burning devoured, and beat them into plates,

fastening them to the altar: that the children of Israel might have afterwards

wherewith they might be admonished, lest any stranger,

and whosoever is not of the seed of Aaron, should come near

to offer incense to the Lord, lest he suffer as

Core suffered, and all his congregation (that is,

of those adhering to him), the Lord speaking to Moses.

[413] [a murmuring of the people arising on account of their death is punished with the death of another fourteen thousand seven hundred;] It is a marvel that the Israelites were not restrained by so signal

a punishment of the rebels from murmuring

against the Lawgiver. Yet it is clear that this very

punishment again gave occasion to another murmuring.

Of this Moses thus goes on at v.

41: But all the multitude of the children of Israel

murmured the next day against Moses and Aaron,

saying: You have killed the people of the Lord. And when

a sedition arose and the tumult increased,

Moses and Aaron fled to the tabernacle of the covenant.

And when they were gone into it, the cloud covered it,

and the glory of the Lord appeared. And the Lord said

to Moses: Get you out from the midst of this

multitude, this moment will I destroy them. And as

they were lying on the ground, Moses said to Aaron: Take

the censer, and taking fire from the altar, put incense

upon it, going quickly to the people, to pray

for them: for already wrath is gone out from the Lord,

and the plague rageth. When Aaron had done this,

and had run to the midst of the multitude which

the burning fire was now destroying, he offered the incense: and

standing between the dead and the living, he prayed

for the people, and the plague ceased. And the number

of those that were struck was fourteen thousand

seven hundred men, besides them that had perished in the sedition

of Core. And Aaron returned to Moses

at the door of the tabernacle of the covenant, after

the destruction had ceased. By this deed the Lord willed to show

how unjust was the accusation of the perverse,

who imputed to Moses and Aaron the death

of the seditious.

[414] The Wise Man praises Aaron's deed in chapter 18,

v. 20, in these words: to which plague an end was brought by Aaron's prayers: But then the just * also were touched

by an assault of death, and there was a disturbance of the multitude

in the wilderness: but thy wrath did not long continue. For

a blameless man * made haste to pray for

the people, bringing forth the shield of his ministry, prayer,

and by incense making supplication,

withstood the wrath, and put an end to the calamity, showing

that he was thy servant. And he overcame the disturbance

(that is, the plague which was troubling the people),

not by strength of body, nor with force of arms,

but with a word he subdued him that punished them (the destroying

angel), alleging the oaths of the fathers

(that is, the oaths made to the fathers, that is, to Abraham,

etc.), and the covenant.

For when they were now fallen down dead by heaps

one upon another, he stood between, and stayed the assault,

and cut off the way to the living.

For in the priestly robe which he wore was the whole

world: and the glorious names of the fathers were graven

in the four rows of the stones, and

thy majesty was written upon the diadem of his head.

And to these the destroyer gave place, and

feared these things: for the proof only of wrath was sufficient.

Thus far the Wise Man on these matters, whose more obscure

words I have tried briefly to explain by interposed parentheses:

but more may be seen in the interpreters.

[415] Although the authority of Moses and Aaron,

and the latter's election to the pontificate, had been sufficiently asserted

and vindicated by the punishment of so many thousands of seditious men, the priesthood of Aaron further confirmed

it nevertheless pleased the divine Providence to confirm the election

of the high priest still further by a new prodigy,

which Moses narrates in Numbers 17 in this manner:

And the Lord spoke to Moses, saying:

Speak to the children of Israel, and take of every one of them

a rod by their kindreds, of all the princes

of the tribes twelve rods, and write

every man's name upon his rod. And

the name of Aaron shall be for the tribe of Levi, and one rod

shall contain all their families apart: and thou shalt lay

them up in the tabernacle of the covenant before the testimony,

where I will speak to thee. Whomsoever of these I shall choose,

his rod shall blossom: and I will stay from me

the complaints of the children of Israel, wherewith they murmur against you.

And Moses spoke to the children of Israel: and all the princes

gave him rods, one for every tribe:

and there were twelve rods besides the rod

of Aaron (which was the thirteenth, as the tribe of Levi

was the thirteenth tribe).

[416] And when Moses had laid them up before the Lord

in the tabernacle of the testimony: by the prodigy of his rod blossoming. returning on the following day

he found that the rod of Aaron for the house

of Levi had budded: and that the buds swelling had bloomed

into blossoms, which, spreading their leaves,

were formed into almonds. Moses therefore brought out all the rods

from before the Lord to all the children of Israel: and they

saw, and every one received their rods. And

the Lord said to Moses: Carry back the rod of Aaron

into the tabernacle of the testimony, that it may be kept there for a token

of the rebellious children of Israel, and that their complaints

may cease from me, lest they die. And Moses

did as the Lord had commanded. The Apostle

in Hebrews 9, v. 4, among the things that were in the ark of the testimony,

reckons the rod of Aaron that had blossomed,

so that it was not only brought back to the holy of holies,

where before the ark it had received its flowers, but was also laid

in the ark itself. For the rest the Israelites, seeing so great

a prodigy, were long quiet, or at least nothing is read

of their murmurings before the death of Mary,

which fell in the last year of their long

exile. Yet they modestly bewailed the frequent

funerals of their own before Moses in Numbers 17, v.

12: And the children of Israel said to Moses: Behold

we are consumed, we all perish: whosoever

approacheth to the tabernacle of the Lord, dieth.

Are we to be utterly destroyed even to extermination?

That these things were said by men mourning and fearing new

disasters, but with due reverence,

the interpreters commonly hold; and indeed those words,

even though they may be variously understood, are not reprehended

by Moses, who down to the fortieth year of the going out

narrates nothing further of the doings of the Israelites,

but only reckons in Numbers 18 and 19

some ceremonial laws enacted in the meantime.

* i.e., the Israelites

* Aaron

§ XXXVIII. What Josephus wrote concerning the battle with the Chanaanites, and the sedition and punishment of Core and the others, and what Philo wrote.

[ ] [Josephus' account of the battle undertaken by the Israelites, against Moses' will,] Philo in book 1 of the Life of Moses would record neither the battle with

the Chanaanites nor the sedition of the princes that afterwards

followed; but of the latter deed he wrote certain things to be examined below.

Josephus however narrated both histories after his own manner.

First, of the battle with the Chanaanites, in book 4

of the Antiquities, chapter 1, he has this: But the Hebrews, leading a hard

life in the desert, and afflicted with many miseries,

had nothing worse than that God

did not suffer them to try arms with the Chanaanites:

nor would they any longer hear Moses

bidding them be quiet, thinking that even without his auspices they could obtain

victory over the enemy: and they accused

him as though he aimed at this only, that, set in great

want, they should always hang upon his counsels:

and they altogether resolved to fight, promising themselves

the help of God, not so much out of regard to Moses

as because from their forefathers they were in his protection:

and that those whom before he had judged worthy of liberty

for their piety, to these he would not now deny victory

if they bore themselves stoutly. That they had strength enough

against those nations, even though Moses should try

to alienate God from them: and that it was altogether expedient

for them to manage the matter at their own judgment,

rather than that, in exchange for the shaken-off servitude of the Egyptians,

they should take on the tyranny of Moses, and, seduced, obey his caprice,

as he boasted of divine colloquies in which, as one dear

to God above the rest, he was forewarned of what was to be done:

as if forsooth they were not all equally the posterity

of Abraham, that one man by a singular grace

should have foreknowledge of things to come from God.

That it was for prudent men, despising the arrogance of one Man,

rather to believe God the promiser, and to make ready

to acquire that region, and not to let themselves be

put off any longer under the pretext of God.

That they must think of their present want, which the desert

places made heavier day by day, and, God being their leader,

must join hands with the Chanaanites as soon as possible,

and no longer wait for the Lawgiver's assent.

[418] unhappily undertaken, is sifted: This opinion being then approved by the votes of all,

they go against the enemy in a popular fashion: who, terrified neither

by their fierce onset nor by their immense multitude,

bravely receive them as they rush on:

and a good part of the Hebrews being cut down, they force the rest

shamefully to turn their backs, and pursuing them drive them trembling

into their camp. That disaster, coming beyond

everyone's expectation, greatly cast down the spirits

of the multitude, which feared worse things, and thought

that it had been sent by an angry Deity, because,

without waiting for an oracle, they had rushed forth to battle.

But Moses, seeing both his own men dismayed by the disaster received,

and the enemy elated by the fresh victory,

fearing lest, not content with his present success,

he should attempt greater things, resolved to lead his forces back

into the desert. And when the people promised that hereafter

it would be in its Leader's power, being taught by misfortune

that nothing would prosper without his counsel,

the camp being moved, they went into the desert with this

mind, that they would not undertake battle against the Chanaanites

before they had received a signal from God. Thus

Josephus, adding his own conjectures to the words of the sacred Scripture.

For first, the things that he says were bandied about by

the Israelites against Moses are not read in the sacred

Letters; but they are not alien to the temper of the Hebrews

of that time, nor is it improbable that like things

were bandied about by at least some of them, when they went forward

to battle against Moses' will. Yet I would rather

think that very many of them persuaded themselves

that they would blot out the sin of disobedience contracted through cowardice

if they went bravely against the enemy, and that they clung

stubbornly to that persuasion, though Moses

dissuaded in vain. For this opinion agrees

with their words to Moses in Deuteronomy 1, v. 41: We have sinned

against the Lord: we will go up and fight, as

the Lord our God hath commanded. Josephus' second

conjecture is that Moses led them into the inner parts

of the desert for fear of the enemy's army. But

this conjecture is mistaken, since afterwards their camp remained

long in the same place.

[419] To the sedition of Core and of the others adhering to him

Josephus then proceeds in this manner: The same Josephus, narrating the conspiracy of Core,

But as it commonly happens in a great army,

especially in adverse circumstances, that men show themselves difficult

to their governors, so the same befell the Jews also.

For since they were six hundred thousand in number,

and even in good fortune seemed little tractable to their commanders,

so much the more in want and misfortune

were they exasperated both against one another and against their Commander.

Wherefore they laboured under so great a sedition

as we have not heard ever to have been either among the Greeks

or among the Barbarians.

Which thing would doubtless have destroyed them, already brought

into the utmost danger, had not Moses, forgetting the injury

received — for very little was wanting but that he should have been stoned —

brought help to their tottering fortunes. Nor

indeed did God altogether cast off the care of them, but although

they were contumelious not only towards the Lawgiver,

but also towards the divine commandments received through Moses,

he nevertheless freed them from a most destructive

sedition, of which, without his providence, nothing but

a most sorrowful issue could have been expected. This sedition,

and how, when it was allayed, Moses

administered affairs, we shall now tell, its cause being

first set forth. Thus far Josephus, probably enough.

[420] Presently he thus begins to set forth the sedition itself,

of which he rightly makes Core the chief

author: he enlarges it with various conjectures, Cores, a man illustrious among the Hebrews for birth and wealth,

and endowed with a certain popular eloquence, seeing

Moses set on the height of dignity,

bore it ill and enviously. For since he was

of the same tribe and kindred, he thought it unjust

that he should be put after him, being more powerful in riches

and in no way inferior in birth: and haranguing among

his fellow-tribesmen the Levites and among his kindred, he cried out

many things against him, saying it was an unworthy thing

and no longer to be borne, that Moses by ambitious

arts under the pretext of a certain divinity should study

only his own glory, to the injury of others: and

that lately, against right and religion, he had given the priesthood

to his brother Aaron without the people's vote, and

was distributing the other dignities at his pleasure, as though

he had seized a tyranny. That this was a grave injury,

that he should so secretly insinuate himself into dominion, that before

it could be perceived, the people's liberty should be crushed.

For whoever is conscious to himself of being worthy of the principate

aspires to such a height with the people willing and persuaded, without force.

But those who despair of coming thither by good arts

abstain indeed from force, lest they lose

the reputation of goodness and honesty, but strive by

malicious tricks to attain it. That the attempts of such men,

when dragged into the open, should be punished for the commonwealth's sake,

before out of secret plotters they become open

enemies. For what reason could Moses bring forward

why he had given the priesthood to Aaron above all,

and to his sons. For if such honour were due to anyone

of the tribe of Levi by the divine will,

he himself deserved to have been preferred, being equal

to Moses in birth, and superior in age and wealth.

But if account were taken of the most ancient tribe,

that dignity ought by best right to be conferred on the men

of the Rubelite tribe, on Dathamus, Abiron, and

Phalaus, who were pre-eminent among their fellow-tribesmen alike in riches

and in age. Thus Cores, wishing to seem

to have care of the commonwealth, but in reality aiming only at this,

that by stirring up the people he might seize the pontificate.

[421] partly probable, partly improbable and false: Most of these accusations of Core are probable,

since they agree well enough with his words to

Moses in Numbers 16, v. 3, and since he could not

have drawn so many chief men to his side

unless by secret accusations he had detracted from the fame of Moses

and Aaron. Some things nevertheless are less

probable. For first, it seems to be disallowed

that Core should prefer himself in age and riches to Moses and Aaron:

for both are uncertain, and not very

probable. Secondly, that he feigns that he himself

openly wished to transfer the priesthood to another:

for his words in Numbers 16, v. 3, only hint

that he wished the priesthood to be made common to all

the Levites; and that this only he attempted: yet I would not

deny that he could have done this, so that afterwards by the people's

favour he might draw the pontificate to his own

family. Thirdly, although Josephus speaks

chiefly of the priesthood, he nevertheless sufficiently indicates that the conspiracy

was also against the supreme dignity of Moses.

And indeed the intention of the seditious seems to have been

that not only should the pontificate be snatched from Aaron,

but also the supreme power from Moses.

Both are hinted by Core's words in Numbers 16, v.

3: Let it be enough for you, that all the multitude consisteth of holy ones,

and the Lord is among them. Why lift you up yourselves

above the people of God? To the same tend the words of Dathan

and Abiron, refusing to obey Moses, at v.

13: Is it a small matter to thee that thou hast brought us out,

… except thou rule also over us? And so it is not

to be doubted that the seditious wished to reduce both Moses

and Aaron to the common rank. But

the Lord defended the men chosen by himself to govern

the commonwealth of the Israelites; nor did he suffer either the priesthood

or the supreme principate to be transferred

to others. Fourthly, Josephus is to be corrected,

in that he joins to Dathamus and Abiron Phalaus,

of whom no mention is made in the sacred Letters when

their conspiracy is related. Hon could have been joined,

not Phalaus, by whom seems to be designated

Phallu, the son of Ruben in Numbers 26, v. 5, and in the same place

at v. 8 the grandfather of Dathan and Abiron, so that he must long

have been dead before this conspiracy.

[422] These things being observed, I return to Josephus' text.

Nor long, [he also confounds the conspiracy with the murmuring of the people that followed after:] he says, did these accusations keep themselves within one tribe:

but the rumour, spread abroad little by little,

while each added something of his own to what he heard,

now ranged through the whole camp: and shortly

the matter came to this, that two hundred and fifty

of the chief men followed the faction of Cores, all of whom

took pains that the priesthood, taken from Moses' brother,

should be transferred to him. The people moreover

was so stirred that there was a general cry for stones:

and the unruly multitude ran together into

an assembly, where standing before God's tabernacle

it shouted that the Tyrant must be removed, and the people

freed from a servitude in which under the pretext of religion

harsh commands were laid upon it. For God,

if he himself were the chooser of the priest, would have advanced

some worthy man to this honour,

not one who deservedly ought to be put after many:

or if he had decreed to give it to Aaron, he would have given it

by the people's vote rather than by his Brother's favour.

In these words of Josephus confusion reigns:

for, as I have said, it was not yet a question of transferring the Priesthood

to Core: nor yet was there so great

an exasperation of the people that they ran together for stones;

but that arose on the following day, when the people, stirred

to a graver sedition, began to impute the death of the seditious

to Moses and Aaron.

[423] Let us go on with Josephus: But Moses,

who was not ignorant of Cores' calumnies, and in the speech attributed to Moses to the people seeing the people

irritated, was in no wise afraid: but relying

on the consciousness of affairs well administered, and knowing

that his brother had come to the priesthood by God's choice,

not by his own favour, he came forth into the assembly: and since

he was not unskilled in the arts by which the crowd

is to be handled, turning to Cores he said with raised voice:

To me, Cores, either thou, or any one whatever

of these — stretching out his hand toward the two hundred and fifty men —

seem worthy of the honour: nay, I do not even despise

the rest of the assembly, although they are not to be compared with you

in riches and other endowments. For neither does Aaron obtain

the priesthood because he is richer.

For thou possessest ampler means than either

of us: nor because he is nobler;

for God willed our race to be common to all,

giving to all the same author of it:

nor did I, moved by brotherly affection, confer upon my brother

what was due to others; for unless I had had right and religion before my eyes,

by no means forgetting myself would I have given it

to another, since no one is nearer to me than I am myself,

and I wish myself no less well than him; and besides,

what prudence were it to make myself guilty of violated right,

and to let the reward of this crime pass to another?

But far be such wickedness from my honesty,

nor would God have endured either to be despised, or that you

should be ignorant of what would be most pleasing to him. He himself

chose the priest for himself, he himself has made me

free of this charge. Yet although he obtained this honour not by my

favour but by divine election,

he does not hesitate to commit the deposit into the midst for your

votes, demanding no prerogative

from the fact that he has hitherto lawfully discharged it,

as one who, laying aside all ambition, would rather see you

without sedition, even though he has already before been approved

by your votes too. For we have not injured God's

will in this, that we have wished your assent also to be added.

But what he of his own accord conferred, it was not lawful,

saving piety, to refuse: just as it is also

fair that he who once gave should make his gift ratified and perpetual.

[424] Wherefore he will judge anew whom he would have

perform the sacred rites for you, and be the president

of your piety. is not sufficiently conformable to the sacred Scripture: For it would be most unjust that Cores

by his ambition should stand in the way of God's having a free

election of his own priest. There is nothing therefore

for which you should be troubled with seditions, so far as this

cause is concerned. Tomorrow morning let each man be present with his own censer

and fire and spices. But thou,

Cores, yield to God, and await his vote,

nor arrogate to thyself greater authority than God has:

but be present thou also to be judged among the other

competitors for this honour: nor do I see why Aaron should be

excluded from the petition, born of the same race,

and one who has already in this function given an irreproachable

sample of himself. And when you shall have come together,

make your offering of incense before all the people, and whosesoever

sacrifice shall have been more acceptable to God,

him will I also confirm by my authority, and

shall free myself from this calumny of having conferred the highest dignity

on my brother through private favour. Hearing this,

the crowd both ceased to make tumult and to suspect ill

of Moses: and moreover praised his counsel

as one that would be for the commonwealth's good: and so

the assembly is dismissed. Thus far Josephus, who at the beginning

of the speech which he attributes to Moses departs far

from the mind of the sacred Letters, when he brings in Moses

craftily flattering Core and the other

Levites, whom he censured with a grave speech

in Numbers 16, v. 8 and following. And the middle part

of the speech is formed out of conjectures, the Scripture

neither contradicting nor favouring; but the last part

of the speech is more conformable to the text of Scripture.

[425] being about to narrate the punishment of the seditious, he confounds the deeds, Josephus narrates the punishment of the rebels in chapter

3, not without much confusion and some errors.

Let us hear his words: But on the following day they return to

the assembly, that by a sacrifice performed they might be present at the divine judgment

by which the contest of the competitors was to be

decided: and there was some tumult, the multitude being

in suspense awaiting the outcome, some desiring

Moses to be reduced to the common rank,

while those who were more prudent longed for an end of the seditions:

for they feared that it would be all over with

the commonwealth if the sedition went further. The multitude

too, by nature desirous of new things, and

prone to speak against magistrates, was carried about

by every rumour. But Moses, having sent officers

to Dathamus and Abiron, ordered them

to come to the appointed place to be present at the sacred rites.

But after they refused to obey, and said they would

not any longer suffer Moses' power, sought by evil arts,

to be increased among the people: these things being reported

and some of the more eminent men being taken along, he did not

disdain to come to the obstinate faction of Dathamus,

those whom he had ordered following him willingly.

Thus far Josephus, confounding the order and times

of what was done: for on the first day of the sedition Moses

had ordered Dathan and Abiron to be called to him,

and they had refused to obey. But Moses,

hearing their answer full of contumely, on the same

day had prayed the Lord not to hear the seditious,

and had bidden Core to come the following day to the tabernacle

with his Levites. On the second day therefore Moses

went to the tents of Dathan and Abiron, and there followed

the punishment both of them and of the Levites.

[426] and he attributes to Moses prayers conformable neither to Scripture Let us hear Josephus, who thus goes on:

Then Dathamus with his followers, hearing that Moses with

the chief men was approaching them, having come forward with their children

and wives before their tents, awaited

what he would do. There were present also guards

to keep him off if he should wish to do anything by force. But he,

now nearer, lifting up his hands to heaven,

and with raised voice, that he might be heard by the whole multitude,

said: Lord of heaven and earth and sea, as

thou art my most trustworthy witness that whatsoever

I have done hitherto I have done by thy sentence, who,

pitying the affairs of the Hebrews, hast been my perpetual helper,

hear this prayer. For thou knowest

all things, even the very thoughts of men. Wherefore

thou wilt not disdain to bring into the open the truth of the matter and

these men's ingratitude. Thou knowest

exactly even those things that went before my birth,

seen indeed, not heard: now in

those matters relieve me by thy testimony, of which these men,

though they are not ignorant, are not afraid

to suspect ill. I, when I was leading a quiet life,

which by my own virtue and thy will and by the kindness of Raguel

my father-in-law I had obtained, nevertheless, leaving

its pleasures and comforts, gave myself wholly

to enduring hardships for this people: and

first for their liberty, and now for their safety I have most readily

undertaken great labours. Now

therefore, since I have come into suspicion with men

who by my care and providence have come safe out of so many evils,

thou who in that fire at Mount Sina

didst appear to me, and didst deign to grant me thy voice and the sight

of those prodigies, who didst will that I should discharge

an embassy in thy name in Egypt, who,

when the resources of the Egyptians had been shattered, didst grant them to escape

their servitude, and didst make the power of Pharao

succumb to me, who to men ignorant of the way didst open a path

through the midst of the sea, in whose waves afterwards thou didst wrap the Egyptians,

who didst furnish the unarmed with arms,

who from tainted springs didst render them drinkable, and

didst bring forth drink from the rock for us labouring under want,

and didst bring food from the sea to those who found none on land,

and lastly didst bestow from heaven what was never before heard of,

who didst adorn our state with laws and institutions,

be present with me, Lord, judge

of all and most incorrupt witness, that I have neither admitted

gifts from any of the Hebrews seeking my favour

against justice, nor suffered a poor man having

a good cause to lose his suit because of a rich

adversary.

[427] And now, having administered the commonwealth most sincerely,

I come into suspicion of a fault nor to his own meekness, from which I am most far removed,

as though I had conferred thy priesthood on my brother

out of private affection, and not by thy will:

show that all things are dispensed by thy providence,

and that nothing comes to effect by chance accidents but by thy

will: and declare that the affairs of the Hebrews

are dear to thee by a just punishment upon Dathamus and

Abiron, who make thee stupid, boasting that thou art

circumvented by my impostures.

And thou wilt make thy vengeance against the mad detractors of thy glory

manifest if they perish not

in the common manner, lest anyone think that they suffered nothing beyond the human lot,

but that the earth which they unworthily

tread, gaping open, may swallow them with their families and goods:

in this way both thy power will appear to all,

and an example will be set for posterity,

that no one dare think of thy majesty otherwise

than is pious: and my ministry will be proved

to be according to thy sentence. But if the charges are true

which they heap upon me, then let the curses turn upon my own

head, those whom I have execrated remaining unharmed.

And so, punishment being exacted of the disturbers of thy people,

keep the rest of the multitude in peace,

concord, and the keeping of thy commandments, untouched

and free of the punishment due to wicked men:

since it is alien to thy justice

that the undeserving crowd of Israelites should pay their penalties.

Thus Josephus, after his own manner.

But various things are to be corrected. First, this long prayer

of Moses to God is incongruously put together.

The earlier part, however, in which God's benefits are reckoned,

is true; but it has Josephus rather than Moses

for author, certainly for the greater part. Secondly,

the Hebrew writer sins gravely when

he brings in Moses praying that his adversaries be swallowed up

by the earth opening: for Moses did indeed foretell this kind of destruction

for them, but he did not ask the Lord

that they should be so punished, nor are such prayers conformable

to the extraordinary meekness of the holy Lawgiver.

Thirdly, it is false also and incongruous

that Moses called down curses on himself if the things bandied about

by the seditious were true.

[428] he relates the punishment of Dathan and Abiron, omitting Core, The punishment of Dathan and Abiron, Core

being wrongly omitted, he presently narrates thus: When he had uttered these things

with tears, the earth suddenly trembled horribly,

and its surface heaving, no otherwise than a sea

billowing with the wind, terrified all the people:

presently, with a huge crash sent forth, the ground where the seditious

were stationed sank, and in the same moment

swallows them all to a man: and the profane being thus taken away,

that chasm is again so closed

that not even a trace of it remained. This

was the end of the seditious faction, an illustrious proof of divine

providence and power together, and this

mishap was the more pitiable in that so far was anyone, even of their neighbours

or kindred, from pitying them,

that the whole people, such as it was, forgetting what had gone before,

approved God's sentence with glad acclamations,

and judged them not even worthy of mourning,

as the plague and ruin of their countrymen.

It is false, what is asserted, that there was no

mourning at the death of the seditious, since on the following

day there arose another sedition of those who cried out

that Moses and Aaron had been the cause of their

destruction, as Josephus himself also narrates.

[429] whom he wrongly joins to the two hundred and fifty men consumed by fire: No less does the writer stray from the truth in what follows,

being little exact, who thus goes on: After

Dathamus with his followers was destroyed, Moses calls together

the rivals for the pontificate, meaning to commit the election

again to God, that the priesthood should be ratified to him

whose sacrifice should appear most pleasing to God.

And so there come together two hundred and fifty men held always

in the highest esteem among their countrymen, both

because they were sprung from ancestors illustrious in every virtue,

and because they themselves in no way degenerated:

and with these come forward both Aaron and Cores: then,

standing * before God's tabernacle, they burned in their censers

the spices which they had brought with them: when suddenly

so great a fire blazed out as neither men

themselves ever kindled, nor have they seen kindled in lands

burning of their own accord, nor in woods dashed and rubbed together

by the blast of the south wind in the heat, but such

as could be lit only by divine power, at once most brilliant

and most burning: by whose force and onset those two hundred

and fifty, together with Core, were so consumed

that not even the remains of their corpses appeared.

Aaron alone survived unharmed, that it might be manifest

that this burning had arisen from God.

These being thus consumed, Moses, wishing that a perpetual memory

of that punishment should be handed down to posterity, that it might not

be unknown to them either, ordered Eleazar the son of Aaron

to consecrate their censers fastened to the brazen altar,

that by this monument all might be terrified

who think that the heavenly Deity can be circumvented

by human wiles. In these things correct first the time:

for these Levites were not gathered together after the death

of the Rubenites; but had already come together before,

and probably were burnt at the same time

at which the others were swallowed by the gaping of the earth. Secondly, Core was not

burnt with these, as some with Josephus

would have it, but was likewise sunk in the gaping of the earth,

as I said before. Thirdly, Josephus wrongly says that these men

had not degenerated from illustrious parents, since

they were seditious against their Prince

and priest chosen by God. Fourthly, not only

Moses, but God himself commanded that their censers be beaten

into plates and fastened to the brazen altar for a sign of the rebellion,

and for a perpetual memory of the thing.

[430] Lastly Josephus in chapter 4, again with a confused

exposition of the matter, put an end to all these tumults,

he also narrates the end of the sedition confusedly, attributing it omitting the burning divinely kindled,

by which fourteen thousand men perished,

and which Aaron, sent by Moses, at length checked by his

deprecation. But the last tumult,

the most furious of all, in which Moses himself

and Aaron were forced to flee to the tabernacle,

he feigns to have been removed not by the death of so many thousands,

but by Moses' prudence alone, through Aaron's rod

blossoming. Take his words: After so evident a proof,

since it was now clear enough that it was not by canvassing

or by a Brother's favour, but by divine judgment, that the priesthood

had come to Aaron, he held it thereafter without any

controversy: yet not for this

did the sedition long cease, nay a graver one than the former

followed. For it took its rise from such causes

that it easily appeared it would last a long time.

For when once this persuasion had taken hold of men's minds,

that nothing was done without God's will,

they judged that God did these things for Moses' sake.

To him therefore they imputed everything, as though

God raged not out of hatred of sins, but

at Moses' solicitation: and they took it ill that he had

not only with impunity mulcted the people by the death of so many nobles,

but was also carrying off as his reward

his brother's pontificate now confirmed: since

no one hereafter would aspire to it, seeing

that it had gone ill with others. Besides, the kinsmen of those destroyed

worked upon the people, asking that it should set some bound

to Moses' proud and excessive power,

for that this was easy for it.

[431] Then he, perceiving in good time that disturbances were being stirred up,

fearing lest some should again attempt revolution, [to the prodigy of the blossoming rod, whereby the priesthood was confirmed to Aaron.] whence

some great evil might come about, orders an assembly

to be called. And answering nothing to their demands,

lest they be the more irritated, he only commanded

the princes of the tribes to bring rods

inscribed with the names of the tribes. For his

should the priesthood be, on whose rod God should show a sign.

And when this pleased them, they brought them inscribed,

both the others and Aaron, having his inscribed

with the tribe of Levi. Moses, receiving them, laid them up

in God's tabernacle. And on the following day he brought them all out,

which were easily recognized, because they had been marked

both by the princes who had brought them and by the rest of the people:

and they saw that the others remained in the same appearance

in which they had been the day before when Moses received them,

but that from Aaron's had sprung branches and buds, and,

what was more wonderful, ripe almonds,

because the rod was made of wood of this kind.

Astounded at the newness of this spectacle, the common people, laying aside

the hatreds with which they pursued both Moses

and Aaron, turned wholly to admiration of the divine judgment,

and ceased to resist God any further, and willed

the priesthood to be ratified to Aaron: and

so, confirmed by a third vote of God, he was pontiff thereafter

with none contradicting; and the people of the Hebrews,

agitated by long seditions, in this way at last

came to quiet. Thus far Josephus,

whose errors I have already assigned: for the tumult of the people

was checked by the punishment of the fourteen thousand,

before the prodigy in Aaron's rod

was wrought: and by that prodigy at last

the priesthood was confirmed to Aaron.

[432] Philo's brief account of the conspiracy Philo in book 3, page 536 and following, concerning the punishment

of Core and of the others adhering to him, yet naming

none of them, brings forward the following: There is also another

oracle of his joined with a greater prodigy, of which

I made mention above in treating of the Prophet's pontificate:

that too, uttered from the inspiration of the Deity,

was without delay followed by the event.

Of the ministers of the temple there are two orders,

that of the priests the higher, that of the temple-keepers the lower. At that time

there were three priests, and many thousands of temple-keepers.

These, relying on the multitude of their own, despised

the fewness of the priests, with no simple sin, since

they both took away from their superiors the honour due, and exalted

their inferiors beyond measure, as happens when subjects rise

against their governors, and the public order is disturbed.

Then, holding assemblies, they cried out

against the Prophet, that on account of domestic

kinship he had bestowed the priesthood on his brother and his sons

by a fabricated oracle, that he might seem to do it by God's

authority. Wherefore, being exasperated, though otherwise

an injury and malice at once, and asked of God

that he would turn away from their sacrifices: not that

there was danger that a most just Judge should accept the rites of the impious,

but because this is the peculiar effect

of a soul dear to God, openly to oppose wicked

attempts.

[433] and the punishment of the seditious Not yet had his just indignation and anger cooled,

when, inspired by the Deity, he further uttered

this prophecy: Unbelief is a grave evil,

but destructive to the unbelieving alone. These must be chastised by deeds,

not by words. Punishment will teach them that I

do not lie, since they will not know what they know.

Death shall decide this controversy. If they depart by a natural

death, my oracle is feigned.

But if they be consumed by a new and unwonted kind of destruction,

my truthfulness will be attested. I see the earth

gaping with a vast pit, numerous kindreds swallowed up

together with their tents, living men

descending to the lower world. Scarcely had he uttered these things

when the earth, shaken, is rent in that place chiefly

where the impious were encamped: and in a moment of time

it covers them all. For the chasm closed again,

as though having discharged its office. And not

long after, two hundred and fifty seditious men, who had been the chief

authors of the tumult, suddenly struck from heaven

were burned up together, not even the least member being

left that could be laid in a tomb. And

so, by dreadful punishments heaped one upon another,

the Prophet's piety was greatly illustrated, God

bearing witness to the truth of his oracles.

[434] is somewhat emended; Here it is worth while to consider how

heaven and earth exacted punishment from impious

men, as though the duties were divided between the chief

parts of the world, whence the rest took their origin.

Namely, because the wicked raised and stretched their malice,

rooted in the earth, to such a height

that it touched heaven,

therefore earth and ether together raged against them; the one drawing itself

apart, that it might swallow up useless weights; the other

burning them up with thunderbolts, thick as rain

and frequently flashing. And the end both of those swallowed up

and of those burned was the same. For both

disappeared, the one covered by the ground restored to its former

level, the others consumed by lightning fires.

Thus Philo, explaining after his own manner what is related

in the Scriptures, and enlarging some things with conjectures:

for it is only conjecture that he asserts the two hundred and fifty

Levites to have been so consumed by fire that

nothing of their bodies remained. Conjecture

likewise, and that little probable, is that

he explains the fire divinely sent, by which they were slain,

as frequent thunderbolts, since they seem to have perished

in a single moment by that fire. He sins moreover in that

he so sets forth the rebellion and the punishment as though all had been

accomplished on the same day, whereas it is clear that one night

intervened.

[435] The same writer in book 3, page 525, concerning the conspiracy

of the Levites, as also his exposition concerning Aaron's rod blossoming. whom he calls temple-keepers, had narrated

almost the same things, and passing over the punishment of the rebels in that place,

speaks thus of the prodigy wrought in Aaron's rod:

Moses perceived that this conspiracy tended

against himself, because he had designated his brother pontiff at

an oracle's command. That deed did not lack calumny,

as though under the pretext of an oracle domestic favour

had prevailed more than the public good. Which, as

it was, seemed most unworthy, that not only

should a trust approved by so many heavenly prodigies

be called into doubt, but that religion also should be questioned,

which is wont to wring a confession of the truth even from dissembling

men. For truth is not separated from God.

Accordingly, judging it superfluous to remind those

with a lengthy speech of the benefits received,

whom he perceived already preoccupied by the accusations of his adversaries,

he entreated God to declare by an evident sign

that the election of the pontiff had been sincere and uncorrupted. He

bade him inscribe twelve rods, equal to the number of the tribes,

with the names of eleven phylarchs,

and the twelfth with the name of the pontiff his brother, and then

to carry them into the sanctuary. The seer did as bidden, intent upon

the outcome. On the next day, admonished by an oracle, in the presence

of all the people, he brought forth the rods, the rest in nothing

changed, but that which he had inscribed with the pontiff's name

conspicuous by a new portent. For this, wonderfully,

the whole of it, such as it was, put forth leaves and fruits.

And they were nuts, of a nature different

from other fruits. Thus far Philo, who then disputes

at length about the nature of nuts. But some things here

are to be emended. First, he wrongly says that the rods

were only eleven besides Aaron's rod,

which was not the twelfth, but the thirteenth, as

is clearly said in Numbers 17, v. 6. Secondly, he sins

in hinting that Moses from the beginning of the conspiracy at once,

at God's command, used that sign to restrain the seditious,

no mention being there made of

the punishment of the seditious. Thirdly, by the nuts which

he asserts were produced by Aaron's rod, understand almonds,

which are a certain species of nuts. These things being

observed, let us go on to other matters.

* In Greek, all

§ XXXIX. The thirty-third station, the death of Mary,

the murmuring of the people, the sin of Moses and Aaron, to whom entrance into the promised Land is denied by God.

[ ] [The journey from Asiongaber to the desert of Sin, where the thirty-third station was in Cades:] The thirty-second station of the Israelites was

in Asiongaber by the Red Sea, whither they had been bidden

to return, as we saw before. Thence at length

they departed about the beginning of the fortieth year of their

pilgrimage, and came again toward

the promised Land, which they might quickly have entered

if passage through Idumaea had been granted. Of

their coming from Asiongaber to the thirty-third

station, Numbers 33, v. 36: Departing from thence, they came

into the desert of Sin, this is Cades. And in Numbers

20, v. 1: And the children of Israel and all the multitude

came into the desert of Sin, in the first month: and the people

abode in Cades. Some things are here to be observed

concerning the place and the time. First, it is clear enough

that this desert of Sin, in which the thirty-third station was,

is distinguished from the desert of Sin in which the eighth station was:

for the eighth station was in the desert

of Sin, which is situated not far from the Red Sea over

against Egypt, and between lower Egypt

and Mount Sinai. But the desert of Sin to

which the Israelites have now come is situated further

from the Red Sea, and more to the East and

about the borders of Idumaea. The distinction of the two

St. Jerome also notes, and proves it from the diversity

of the Hebrew name: for Sin, in which the eighth

station was, has for its first Hebrew letter

Samech, while the first letter of the other Sin is Sade,

so that there can be no doubt of the diversity.

[437] it is disputed whether this Cades is the same as Cadesbarne, But it is not equally clear whether the Cades

of the desert of Sin is distinguished from Cadesbarne, whence

the spies were sent in the second year of the pilgrimage:

for Cadesbarne is sometimes also called Cades,

and the Israelites could have returned to the same place.

Writers too disagree on this matter,

some of whom contend that it is the same city,

others that they are different places: and for that cause

I have judged that a more diligent examination should here be used. But

all the places of Scripture from which any light

can shine having been attentively considered, it appears to me far

more probable that the cities were different,

and indeed far apart. The site of the city of Cadesbarne

can be assigned without difficulty, since in Numbers

34 and Josue 15 it is so recorded on the Southern border

of the promised Land that it must necessarily be placed

on the very Southern border between the Dead Sea

and the Mediterranean Sea. About this site of that city

my opponents will readily agree, and they too will doubtless

acknowledge that the Israelites went forward thus far

in the second year of their journey, that they might invade Canaan

by that way; but that this design of Moses

was hindered by the rebellion of the people that arose there. Moreover I observe

that that place itself was near to the region of the Amalecites,

since these together with the Amorrhites and Chanaanites there

cut down the Israelites when they went forward to battle against

Moses' prohibition. But that Cadesbarne was near to Idumaea

is nowhere said in the Scriptures. And although

the situation of the places itself sufficiently hints that this city

could not have been very far from Idumaea,

I do not think that it was situated on the very border or confine of Idumaea.

I am not indeed ignorant that in most

geographical maps of the holy Land it is placed near

Idumaea, because the Western borders of Idumaea

have commonly been extended too far towards the Mediterranean

Sea, whereas the Southern borders ought rather

to have been extended as far as the Elanitic gulf

of the Red Sea, adjoining which was Asiongaber, a city of Idumaea,

as is said in 3 Kings 9, v. 26, in these words:

King Solomon also made a fleet in Asiongaber,

which is by Ailat on the shore of the Red Sea,

in the land of Idumaea. Idumaea therefore extended

between the Dead Sea and the Red Sea; but it cannot

be proved that it extended so far towards

the Mediterranean Sea that Cadesbarne was situated on its

confine. Thus far concerning the site of Cadesbarne and

of Idumaea.

[438] and various things being observed concerning the journeys of the Israelites, Now a few things must also be said about the journey

of the Israelites as far as Asiongaber, and thence

into Moabitis, that it may more clearly appear that they did not return

from Asiongaber to Cadesbarne, but went forward

by a wholly different way. From Egypt

as far as Mount Sinai they never withdrew further

from the Red Sea, but went almost from the West

into the East. From Mount Sinai they went straight

to the borders of the promised Land, leaving

Idumaea to the East, to which they are nowhere read to have come nearer

on that journey, and so they came

as far as Cadesbarne. Thence, being forced to go back

by many circuits, they often came near the borders

of Idumaea, and probably also passed through certain desert

places of that province: and therefore

Moses says in Deuteronomy 2, v. 2: And we compassed

Mount Seir (that is, the mountains of Idumaea) a long

time. These wanderings seem to have ended at Asiongaber,

or at the preceding station, when

the Lord commanded them to set forward through Idumaea towards the North,

as Moses says in Deuteronomy 2, v. 3, in these words:

And the Lord said to me: You have compassed this mountain

long enough: go toward the North: and

command thou the people, saying: You shall pass by the borders

of your brethren the children of Esau, who dwell

in Seir, and they will be afraid of you. Take ye then good heed

that you stir not against them: for I will not give

you of their land so much as the step of one foot

can tread upon, because I have given Mount Seir

to Esau for a possession. You shall buy meats of them

for money, and shall eat: you shall draw water bought,

and shall drink. That the Israelites really passed through

a certain part of Idumaea about Asiongaber

he presently subjoins at v. 8 in this manner: And when we had passed by

our brethren the children of Esau, who dwelt in

Seir, by the way of the plain from Elath and from Asiongaber,

we came to the way that leadeth to the desert

of Moab. It is here clearly asserted that the Israelites

passed through Idumaea towards the borders of the Moabites:

and on that journey the stations were at Asiongaber,

at Cades, at Mount Hor, at Salmona,

at Phunon, at Oboth, whence they came to Jieabarim,

which is in the borders of the Moabites, as is said

in Numbers 33, v. 44.

[439] These things being observed, it can easily be shown

that the Israelites did not return from Asiongaber to Cadesbarne, it is proved that the Cades of the desert

but came to another city, likewise called Cades,

and therefore that this must necessarily be distinguished from that one.

Calmet, though he defends the contrary opinion,

on Deuteronomy 2, v. 3, thinks with us that

that command was given to Moses by the angel at Asiongaber

or at neighbouring Elath: You have compassed

this mountain long enough: go toward the North, etc.

And indeed there can be no doubt that Moses received

that command before he came

to the following station at Cades, where by force of it

he was unwilling to fight with the Idumaeans; since he himself says

at v. 8 that, having received that command, he came by the way

of the plain from Elath and from Asiongaber towards

Moabitis. Now on that journey from Asiongaber

into Moabitis, to whose borders they came

at the sixth station, the first station that occurs is Cades,

which in Numbers 20, v. 16, is placed on the uttermost borders

of the Idumaeans. This therefore cannot be Cadesbarne,

placed on the Southern border of the promised Land,

and to the West of Idumaea near the region of the Amalecites.

For first, Cadesbarne was not

on the way that led from Asiongaber towards the Moabites,

but was as far, or even probably

farther, distant from Asiongaber, as the borders of the Moabites

themselves were distant. Secondly, between Cadesbarne

and Moabitis lay the whole of Idumaea,

where it is broadest toward the borders of the promised Land.

And so if Moses with the Israelites had gone from Asiongaber

to Cadesbarne, and thence into

Moabitis, he would greatly have begun to compass

the Idumaean mountains, when the Lord was commanding them to end

their long circuits. Moreover it is not credible that the Israelites

went forward in one stretch from Asiongaber

as far as Cadesbarne, because of the too great distance of the two places,

whereas only one change of camp

is noted from Asiongaber as far as Cades in Numbers

33, v. 36. These reasons altogether persuade that the Cades

of the desert of Sin must be distinguished from Cadesbarne, and

that Cades was a city on the Southern or Eastern borders

of Idumaea, whereas Cadesbarne was to the West

of Idumaea, and does not seem to have been so near

to the Idumaeans as to the Amalecites, Amorrhites

and Chanaanites.

[440] was distinct from Cadesbarne: Calmet's arguments, Further, there are not lacking other reasons also

by which the distinction may be shown. First, Cadesbarne

was in the desert of Pharan, but Cades in the desert

of Sin. The former also is commonly called Cadesbarne to indicate

the distinction, and where in Numbers 13, v.

27, it is called Cades, there is added the desert of Pharan,

whereby it was sufficiently marked off. The Cades of the desert of Sin too,

although elsewhere it is named simply Cades, in Numbers 27, v.

14, is expressly called Cades of the desert of Sin, and that

after mention had been made in the same place of the desert of Sin,

so that the words of the desert of Sin seem altogether to have been added

for distinction. To these arguments Calmet

tries to answer on chapter 13 of Numbers, v. 27, where

he handles this controversy. To the first he says

that the desert of Sin was neighbouring on the desert of Pharan; and

that therefore the city Cades or Cadesbarne is attributed now

to the one, now to the other desert. And to show

that the desert of Sin was not far from Cadesbarne,

he brings forward the journey of the spies, who were sent

from Cadesbarne, and of whom it is said in Numbers

13, v. 22: And when they were gone up, they viewed

the land from the desert of Sin as far as Rohob as you enter into

Emath. And from these words he concludes that the desert

of Sin was in the neighbourhood of Cadesbarne, or that Cadesbarne

was in the desert of Sin itself. I answer that from

the words brought forward nothing can be concluded but that the spies

began to view the promised Land from the desert

of Sin; and thence went forward as far as the Northern part

of the same Land: for it is not expressed

how much journeying they spent before

they came to the desert of Sin, or what circuits they made

that they might not be recognized. Certainly it is by no means

probable that they went straight from their camp

into the promised Land which they were to view, even though Calmet

supposes it: for so they would easily have been recognized and taken.

I say therefore that those spies went

through Idumaea to the desert of Sin, near the Dead Sea,

and thence began to explore the land.

[441] asserting the contrary opinion, That the desert of Sin was near the Dead Sea

we have from another place of Scripture, which

Calmet likewise alleges for his own opinion. The Southern

border of the holy Land from the East as far as

the West is described in Numbers 34 in this manner: The Southern

part shall begin from the wilderness of Sin, which is by

Edom: and shall have the most salt sea for its borders on the east:

which borders shall compass the south side by the Ascent

of the Scorpion, so as to pass into Senna,

and reach from the south as far as Cadesbarne,

whence the confines shall go out to the town called Adar,

and shall reach as far as Asemona:

and the border shall go round from Asemona as far as

the torrent of Egypt, and shall end at the shore of the great sea.

In almost the same manner the Southern border of the tribe

of Juda is described in Josue 15, and there also

the desert of Sin is placed first toward the East,

and last toward the West the great sea, that

is, the Mediterranean. Both places altogether hint

that the desert of Sin was in the Eastern and Southern

corner of the promised Land, and was situated partly

between the Dead Sea and Idumaea. Calmet

indeed strives to explain the place otherwise, but forcedly,

as will be plain to the studious reader who considers

his words. Further, it is not expressed in those places

whither, and how widely, that desert extended

from the Southern part of the Dead Sea. But, if

it be the same as the desert of Sin in which the city Cades was

situated, it extended far along the borders of Idumaea toward

the Red Sea, since Cades was not very

near the Dead Sea. From what has been said it is clear

that neither the way of the spies nor the desert of Sin favours

Calmet's opinion.

[442] To the second argument concerning the distinction

of the names Cades and Cadesbarne, are weighed, he says that Cadesbarne

is in other places also called Cades. But this is

rarely done, and without danger of confusion, as we have seen.

I gladly confess also that that argument from the distinction

of names is of no great moment. But

others have been brought forward, and those firmer. Then indeed

the same writer says that no second city is recorded

in the description of the Southern border of the holy

Land. But this is plainly frivolous, since Cades

of the desert of Sin was not near the holy Land, much less

situated within its borders. He says also, but does not prove,

that both Cades and Cadesbarne border

on Idumaea and on Canaan. But I have already said it is uncertain

whether Cadesbarne bordered on Idumaea;

whereas the contrary is certain of Cades. Yet if

both cities were on the border of Idumaea, Cades was

towards the South on the Eastern border, while Cadesbarne

was towards the North on the Western border.

But the neighbourhood of Canaan is true of Cadesbarne,

false of Cades, since it was only one day's

journey distant from the Red Sea.

[443] Then Calmet, going on, makes both

neighbouring on Mount Hor, and each point is answered, on the city Arad and on the place Horma.

But I answer that the city Cadesbarne was far

from Mount Hor, and that Idumaea lay between,

as appears from what was said at nn. 437 and 438. Moreover,

St. Jerome in his book on the Hebrew Places

places Mount Hor next to the city Petra, which

is everywhere noted by all as on the Eastern borders

of Idumaea. No truer is what is asserted about the nearness

of the city Arad: for this city, whether with

most geographers it be placed near the Dead Sea

within the borders of the tribe of Juda, or outside those

borders a little more to the East and South,

was not so near to the city Cadesbarne as to favour

Calmet's opinion. Lastly the place Horma, whether it was one,

which occurs in Numbers 14, v. 45, and

Numbers 21, v. 3, or whether it was twofold, plainly proves

nothing: for not even the site of that place can

be assigned, since we do not know in what place the Israelites

fought when they battled unsuccessfully in Numbers

14; nor do we precisely know the place in which they were

victors in Numbers 21. We know indeed that the multitude

at the time of the former battle was encamped near

Cadesbarne, and at the time of the other near

Mount Hor. But therefore we still do not know the determinate

place of the battle, since the column was sent off to the conflict

far from the camp.

[444] And so Calmet wrongly asserts that nothing

can be said about the city Cades and our opinion is confirmed by various reasons. that is not also true

of Cadesbarne; and almost all the arguments

which he alleges to prove this stand very much in need

of proof, since most of them seem false,

or at least prove nothing, if any of them are truly

asserted. Moreover, on Calmet's opinion it cannot be understood

why Moses, while he was in Cades, asked passage

through Idumaea, which did not lie between Canaan

and Cadesbarne: for Cadesbarne

was on the Southern border of the holy Land.

Secondly, when Moses with his host came from

Cades to Mount Hor, he either went straight towards

the North, as the Lord had commanded; or

he went back again towards the South. If anyone say the first,

he must necessarily say also

that that journey was through the promised Land: which

contradicts the Scripture, which testifies that Moses never

entered the promised Land. But if

with Calmet he say that the Israelites returned again from

Cadesbarne to Hor: why did the king of Arad

attack them rather when they were at

Mount Hor than when they were nearer at

Cadesbarne? How did the Chanaanite king Arad,

who dwelt in the south, hear in Numbers 33, v. 40,

that the children of Israel had come into the land of Chanaan,

when they were at Mount Hor, and why did he not hear it

rather when they were in Cades, if this was nearer?

Thirdly, why does Moses say in Deuteronomy 2, v. 14:

And the time that we journeyed from Cadesbarne

as far as the passing over of the torrent Zared

was thirty-eight years; if in the fortieth year of the pilgrimage

Mary his sister died in Cadesbarne,

as Calmet will have it, confounding Cades and

Cadesbarne, since in the same fortieth year they passed over

the torrent Zared? Fourthly, in Cadesbarne

the Israelites were a long time without lack of anything,

but in Cades they suffered scarcity of water.

All these things being considered, Calmet's opinion,

which I have examined the more diligently because it has already pleased others,

seems to me to be disallowed, because it cannot rightly

be reconciled with the journey of the Hebrews, and with

the sacred Scripture.

[445] The death of Mary: the murmuring of the people on account of the lack of water: Now let us see what befell the Israelites in that

thirty-third station, that is, in Cades.

First is related the death of Mary, sister of Moses

and Aaron, in Numbers 20, v. 1, in these words: And Mary

died there, and was buried in the same place. Moses and Aaron doubtless

mourned this death, and probably

the whole people; but of that mourning the Scripture makes no mention. But a graver

grief met the holy Lawgiver, when he saw

his people fallen back into their former murmurings

in the same place. Let us hear his words at v.

2: And the people wanting water, came together

against Moses and Aaron: and turning to sedition,

they said: Would God we had perished among

our brethren before the Lord. Why have you brought out the church

of the Lord into the wilderness, that both we and our

cattle should die? Why have you made us come up

out of Egypt, and have brought us into this most wretched place,

which cannot be sowed, nor bringeth forth figs,

nor vines, nor pomegranates, neither hath it

water to drink? And Moses and Aaron,

leaving the multitude, went into the tabernacle of the covenant,

and fell flat upon the ground,

and cried to the Lord, and said:

O Lord God, hear the cry of this people, and

open to them thy treasure, a fountain of living water, that being

satisfied, their murmuring may cease. And the glory of the Lord

appeared over them. And the Lord spoke

to Moses, saying: Take the rod, and assemble

the people together, thou and Aaron thy brother, and speak

to the rock before them, and it shall yield waters.

And when thou hast brought forth water out of the rock, all the multitude

and their cattle shall drink.

[446] Moses, at God's command, striking the rock, draws forth waters a second time, Moses therefore took the rod, which was

before the Lord, as he had commanded him,

and having gathered the multitude before the rock, he said to them:

Hear, ye rebellious and incredulous: can we bring you forth water

out of this rock? And when Moses had lifted up

his hand, and struck the rock twice with the rod,

there came forth water in great abundance, so that the people

and their cattle drank. And the Lord said to Moses

and Aaron: 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.

This is the Water of Contradiction (that is, that place

was called the Water of Contradiction), where

the children of Israel strove with words against the Lord, and he was

sanctified in them. That Moses and Aaron here sinned

by some diffidence, and were therefore excluded

from the promised Land, is certain and beyond doubt,

since the Lord himself asserts it. Yet

that sin cannot be gathered from the preceding words,

which otherwise might be explained in a kindly sense, as

St. Augustine notes in question 19 on Numbers; and

for the same cause it can hardly be determined

in what precisely the holy Brothers sinned.

[447] The interpreters have brought forward various opinions,

none of which seems to me sufficiently certain, sinning by some diffidence. although several

are probable. In Psalm 105, v. 32 and 33, the Psalmist

speaks thus of these things: They provoked him

at the Waters of Contradiction: and Moses was afflicted

for their sakes: because they exasperated his

spirit: and he distinguished with his lips. St. Augustine on

Psalm 105 explains this place thus: What is,

HE DISTINGUISHED? As though God, who had already done such great things,

could not do this, that water should flow from the rock.

For in doubt he struck the rock with the rod, and

therefore he distinguished this miracle from the other miracles,

in which he had not doubted. Herein he offended, herein he deserved

to hear that he should die, and not enter into the Land

of promise. For, disturbed by the murmuring of an unbelieving people,

he did not keep such confidence as he ought.

To whom nevertheless God, as to his Elect, even

after his death gives good testimony,

that we may understand that that faltering of his faith

was corrected by this punishment alone, that

into that Land, whither he himself was leading the people, he was not

permitted to enter. But far be it that we should believe

him estranged from the kingdom of God's grace, which that Land of promise

signified, whence milk and honey

were said to flow. He who desires more conjectures about the sin

of Moses may go to the interpreters.

That Moses afterwards asked that he might be allowed to enter

the promised Land, but that he could never obtain it,

we shall see in their places.

§ XL. Passage through Idumaea asked in vain: the thirty-fourth station at Mount Hor: the death of Aaron: victory over the Chanaanite king Arad.

[ ] Passage through Idumaea asked in vain, When the camp was in Cades, Moses, that

he might more directly go on to the promised Land,

asked passage through the midst of Idumaea, on whose

borders he was. The matter is narrated in Numbers 20, v. 14,

in this manner: In the meantime Moses sent messengers from Cades

to the king of Edom, to say: Thus saith

thy brother Israel: Thou knowest all the labour

that hath come upon us, how our fathers went down

into Egypt, and we dwelt there

a long time, and the Egyptians afflicted us and

our fathers: and how we cried to

the Lord, and he heard us, and sent an angel

who hath brought us out of Egypt. Lo, we are

in the city of Cades, which is in the uttermost of thy borders,

and we beseech thee that we may have leave to pass through thy

land. We will not go through the fields, nor through the vineyards:

we will not drink the waters of thy wells; but

we will go by the public way, turning neither to the right hand

nor to the left, until we pass thy borders.

And Edom answered him: Thou shalt not pass

by me, otherwise I will come out armed against thee.

And the children of Israel said: We will go by the beaten

way: and if we and our cattle drink of thy waters,

we will give what is just: there shall be no difficulty

in the price: only let us pass speedily.

But he answered: Thou shalt not pass.

[449] and therefore they went only along the borders of the Idumaeans: And immediately he came forth to meet them with an infinite

multitude and a strong hand, nor would he yield

to their entreaty that he should grant passage

through his borders. Wherefore Israel turned away from him.

For God had forbidden them to fight

with the Idumaeans, and therefore they turned aside from

their army, yet in such a way that they did not at once

depart from the borders of the Idumaeans: for the following station

was on the borders of Idumaea, as we shall presently see. At first sight

this answer of the Idumaean king seems

contrary to God's promise in Deuteronomy 2, v. 4: You shall pass

by the borders of your brethren the children of Esau,

… and they will be afraid of you. Nay, in the same place

at v. 29 Moses says that he asked king Sehon

to grant passage, as did the children of Esau, who dwell

in Seir. I answer that these things can be reconciled thus. The Idumaeans

did not set themselves against the Israelites passing along their uttermost

borders, nor did they attack them,

because they feared a battle no less than

their passage; and so they in some manner granted

passage, yet not through the middle of the region,

which they guarded with an armed hand. Some also

believe that their princes were different, some of whom

granted passage, others refused it.

[450] Aaron dead on Mount Hor: The coming to the thirty-fourth station,

and what was done there, are briefly related in Numbers 33, v. 37,

thus: And departing from Cades, they camped

in Mount Hor, in the uttermost borders of the land

of Edom. And Aaron the priest went up into Mount

Hor, at the Lord's command: and there he died

in the fortieth year of the coming out of the children of Israel

from Egypt, in the fifth month, on the first day of the month,

when he was a hundred and twenty-three years old. And

the Chanaanite king Arad, who dwelt in the south,

heard that the children of Israel were come into the land of Chanaan.

In Numbers 20, v. 22, the death of Aaron is narrated in this manner:

And when they had moved the camp from Cades, they came

to Mount Hor, which is in the borders of the land of Edom:

where the Lord spoke to Moses:

Let Aaron, he said, go to his people: for

he shall not enter the Land which I have given to the children of Israel,

because he was incredulous to my words at the Waters

of Contradiction. Take Aaron and his son with

him, and thou shalt lead them up into Mount Hor. And when

thou hast stripped the father of his vesture, thou shalt clothe with it Eleazar

his son: Aaron shall be gathered to his people, and shall die there.

Moses did as the Lord had commanded: and they went up

into Mount Hor before all the multitude.

And when he had stripped Aaron of his vestments, he clothed

Eleazar his son with them. And when Aaron was dead on

the top of the mountain, he came down with Eleazar. And all

the multitude, seeing that Aaron was dead,

mourned for him thirty days throughout all their

families. An ample elogium of Aaron was composed by

Ecclesiasticus in chapter 45, as may be seen in that place.

The death of his most dear brother was doubtless mournful to Moses,

especially since from it as in a mirror he beheld

what was hanging over himself. Nevertheless

with unconquered fortitude he went on diligently to further the affairs of his people,

and to administer the commonwealth in his accustomed way.

[451] In Deuteronomy 10, from v. 6, another place of Aaron's death,

and another time, is apparently hinted, [on account of the difficulty from the place of his death various certain things are observed from the Scriptures,]

when among the deeds at Mount Sinai these words are inserted as it were

abruptly: And the children of Israel moved their camp

from Beroth of the children of Jacan into Mosera, where

Aaron died and was buried, in whose stead his son Eleazar

discharged the priestly office. Thence they came

to Gadgad: from which place setting out, they camped

in Jetebatha, in a land of waters and

torrents. This place is most difficult, nor

do the interpreters so unravel its difficulties as to satisfy

the studious reader. I shall try therefore, as others have tried,

to bring forward something whereby the place may be elucidated,

and various things reconciled which seem contrary

to one another; but I would not dare to hope that my

thoughts will be approved by all: nor indeed

do I claim that. The learned reader, whom my thoughts do not

satisfy, will be able meanwhile not to condemn the attempt,

and to seek another way of setting forth each point. Those things which

appear certain I premise for clarity of explanation,

and things also probable, and productive of difficulty,

I shall presently recite for the same cause. First,

it is certain that Aaron died on Mount Hor in the fortieth year

of the going out of Egypt,

on the first day of the fifth month; and that the camp was then

at that same mountain. Secondly, it is certain that the camp

was then in Mosera. Thirdly, from these it is deduced

by a certain conclusion that Mount Hor and Mosera

were neighbouring places. Fourthly, from what has been said it is certainly concluded

that Moses sometimes gave different names to the same station.

And this is by no means to be wondered at, because by reason

of the huge multitude of the people the camp extended

over various places, and therefore could get various

names from them. Fifthly, it is certain

that the Israelites went to the stations in that order

in which Moses reckons them in Numbers 33.

Sixthly, it is certain that the Israelites made many circuits

about Mount Seir. And these turns and returns

happened from their return from Cadesbarne down to about

the fortieth year, and most probably

as far as Asiongaber, since there the Lord seems

to have said to Moses: You have compassed this mountain long enough:

go toward the North.

[452] After these things, which can in no way be denied,

I subjoin certain others so probable other things also probably that they ought not to be denied

without necessity. First, it is so probable

that Moses in Numbers 33 reckoned all

the stations of the Israelites, that it ought not to be denied,

provided all the other places of Scripture can be rightly expounded so.

Hence the station at Cadesbarne, which does not occur there

by that name, is believed to be designated there by another name,

just as the station at Mount Hor

is called Mosera in Deuteronomy 10, v. 6. Secondly, it is probable

that those four stations, set down above from Deuteronomy 10,

in the second of which Aaron died,

belong to the fortieth year, in which Aaron died:

for Moses seems only to have reckoned them there

that he might speak of Aaron's death, and the substitution of Eleazar,

and when they have been reckoned he presently returns to the deeds near Mount Sinai.

Certainly the place can be expounded in no sense so natural

and genuine, and the other explanations have only been sought out

that the occurring difficulties might more easily

be set forth. Thirdly, it is probable that the places Gadgad

and Jetebatha, that is, the twenty-ninth and thirtieth stations

in Numbers 33, v. 32, are the same as the places

Gadgad and Jetebatha of Deuteronomy 10, v. 7: for in both

places they are said to have come from Gadgad to Jetebatha,

which would be strange if it had been done in different

provinces; especially since Moseroth in Numbers 33

and Beneiaacan are not far distant from them; and in Deuteronomy

10 Mosera and Beroth of the children of Jacan, of which

I shall treat. Fourthly, it is probable that Mosera and Moseroth

are the same place, since Mosera is not distinguished

from Moseroth in Hebrew save as a singular

from a plural; and since Gadgad is near enough to both,

and afterwards follows Jetebatha. Fifthly,

it is probable also that Benejaacan is not distinguished

from Beroth of the children of Jacan, in Hebrew Berothbenejaacan,

since the first name in Latin is The sons

of Jaacan, and the second The wells of the children of Jacan; unless

perhaps the first name designated the whole field

or province of that people, which was a part of the Idumaeans;

and the second name signified some place

of that province. Certainly it cannot be doubted

that either it was the same place, or distinguished only

in that manner, or at least that they were places neighbouring

on one another; which is also clearly drawn out from their nearness

to the places before mentioned.

[453] deduced from the certain ones, Sixthly, it is probable that those words of Deuteronomy 2,

v. 1, We compassed Mount Seir, are so to be understood

that they went forward not only along one side

of the mountain, or of those mountains, but along various

sides, and wandered long through the desert places

of Idumaea, just as they passed through other solitudes of Arabia

Petraea: for this is to compass. From this

observation it follows that it is consonant with the sacred Scripture,

or at least not contrary to it, if we say

that the Israelites, on the journey from Cadesbarne to Asiongaber,

in which they thus compassed Mount Seir, penetrated into Idumaea,

and by various circuits came to its

Eastern borders, and thence went to Asiongaber

through Madianitis. All these

observations have such ground in the sacred Letters

that I think none of them would be denied

by any interpreter, if he considered each separately,

and did not imagine to himself that they were contrary to other places

of Scripture: for all are taken from texts

understood in the most natural sense. It can only be doubted

whether that last inference about establishing a passage

through Idumaea and Madianitis, which I have said is conformable to the Scriptures,

has so firm a ground. But

it will afterwards appear that that passage not only is not contrary

to the Scriptures, as I have hitherto asserted, but also

rests on a solid ground.

[454] and at last the difficulties arising from these, From all the aforesaid various difficulties arise,

on account of which most interpreters have denied

some of them. For first, if the same place Gadgad

has been twice related, how in Numbers 33, v. 32, are the Israelites

said to have come from Benejaacan to Gadgad,

and in Deuteronomy 10, v. 7, to have come to the same place Gadgad

from Mosera? Secondly, how in Numbers 33,

v. 31, are they said to have gone forward from Moseroth to Benejaacan;

but on the contrary in Deuteronomy 10, v. 6, from Beroth of the children

of Jacan into Mosera, since we do not distinguish Moseroth from Mosera,

and Benejaacan from Beroth of the children of Jacan?

I answer that these difficulties are easily explained from the foregoing

observations. For when

the Israelites were compassing Mount Seir, that is, wandering through

the desert places of Idumaea, they had their twenty-eighth station

in Moseroth, their twenty-ninth

in Benejaacan, not going by a direct road,

but wandering hither and thither, as the pillar going before

led them, condemned as they were to a long exile.

Hence they had their thirtieth station at

Gadgad, their thirty-first at Jetebatha, which

places were either on the Eastern border of Idumaea, or

outside Idumaea in the region of the Madianites; and thence

through Hebrona they came to Asiongaber.

[455] an elucidation of which is attempted: But when from Asiongaber, at the Lord's command,

they went forward along the borders of Idumaea toward

Moabitis, they passed through those four places again,

but the first two in inverted order. And so they had their thirty-third

station partly in

Beroth of the children of Jacan, partly in Cades, or in

the desert of Sin, which is called by those different names

from the different places which the most numerous host

occupied. But the thirty-fourth station was at

Mount Hor, that is, in Mosera or Moseroth. Thence,

when the king of the Idumaeans refused passage through the middle

of Idumaea, they turned aside to the right,

that is, toward the East and partly also toward the South,

so far as appears, by the way that leads

to the Red Sea, as is had in Numbers 21, v. 4,

yet not with the mind of going again to the Red

Sea, as before they had come thither by almost the same way,

but that they might go around the land of Edom.

By this turn they came from Mosera to Gadgad, whither

before they had been brought from Benejaacan; and having had

their thirty-fifth station partly in Gadgad, partly in Salmona

(as that station is called in Numbers 33, v. 41),

they went on to Jetebatha and Phunon,

and had there their thirty-sixth station. And from this station, from which before by

way of Hebrona they had gone to Asiongaber by the Red

Sea, this second time they went straight

northward toward Moabitis, on whose borders

they had their thirty-eighth station,

as we shall see.

[456] This whole exposition is such that the most difficult place

of Deuteronomy 10 is understood in its proper sense, the exposition given is confirmed by some reasons. and

is rightly reconciled with Numbers 33, and with all

other places of Scripture, so that I think nothing

is to be found in Scripture that cannot be reconciled with

it. But one might wonder that the same stations

were sometimes called by different names by Moses; and

ask for what cause this was done.

I answer that that change of name is clear from

the station of Mount Hor, which in another

place he called Mosera, as is certain, and in another place again

Moseroth, as I have shown by a most probable reason.

And since we know for certain that this was done

once, we ought the less to wonder that the same happened more often.

But why Moses could change the names of the stations

is easy to say, namely because

the immense multitude of the people so spread itself out that

it sometimes occupied various places, from which the camp

could get its name. But why he chose to use that diversity

of names cannot be said for certain. Perhaps

in Numbers 33 he reckoned the places nearer to his own tabernacle or

to the tabernacle of the covenant; but in Deuteronomy,

when he was addressing the people, the more famous and better known

places, to which the camp had extended itself

at the same time. Perhaps also in Numbers 33 he designated

by different names the stations which had been in the same places,

that the number and diversity of the stations

might be more clearly known. For whatever

cause at length Moses did this, it is enough that the fact

is clear. Further, if anyone should wish to object against the exposition

given the geographical maps which some have made

of the stations, I would briefly answer

that those maps, at least those I have seen,

swarm with many errors, as may easily be proved

from the sacred Letters.

[457] From this digression, which seemed necessary,

[The Chanaanite king Arad attacks the Israelites; but is slain, and his cities destroyed:] I return to Mount Hor, where I left Moses with

the Israelites in mourning for Aaron's death. The Israelites had to fight

while their camp was at Mount Hor, as Moses narrates in Numbers 21

in these words: And when the Chanaanite king

Arad, who dwelt in the south, had heard, namely,

that Israel was come by the way of the spies, he fought against

him, and being victorious, carried off spoil from him.

But Israel, binding himself by vow to the Lord, said:

If thou wilt deliver this people into my hand, I will destroy

their cities. And the Lord heard the prayers of Israel,

and delivered up the Chanaanite, whom he slew,

overthrowing his cities: and he called the name of that place

Horma, that is, Anathema. This place again

is not without great difficulties, which some have passed over

in silence, others have tried in various ways

to expound. The first difficulty arises from the situation

of the places, because king Arad is said to have dwelt

in the south, and it is not added whether he dwelt

in the promised Land itself or outside it, just as

in Numbers 13, v. 30, it is said, Amalec dwelleth in

the south, namely outside the promised Land. In Numbers

33, v. 40, of the same king it is read: And the Chanaanite

king Arad, who dwelt in the south, heard

that the children of Israel were come into the land of Chanaan. This

text seems to say that the Israelites had come into the land

of Chanaan: but this is not true in the sense

that, while they were at Mount Hor, they had entered

that region which they afterwards possessed, although that

is wont to go by the name of the land of Chanaan. Bonfrerius saw

the difficulty, and therefore noted on this place

the following: Further, as to its being said that this king heard

that the children of Israel were come into the land of Chanaan;

it is to be understood of a coming begun, not completed;

namely because they were on the way, nay close at hand,

that they might come thither, seeking every approach

by which they might penetrate into it.

[458] more probably that king dwelt in Palestine But that phrase into the land of Chanaan, which

in our text must be referred to the Israelites and to the verb WERE COME,

in the Hebrew, Chaldee and Septuagint must be referred

to king Arad and to his dwelling;

for thus the Hebrew has it: "And the Chanaanite king Arad heard,

and he dwelling in the south

in the land of Chanaan." And indeed perhaps in our

text the punctuation which precedes into the land of Chanaan

should be moved, and placed after those same words,

and perhaps it should be read in the ablative,

in the land of Chanaan, as the Hebrew and the other

texts have it. But as to some denying

that this king Arad dwelt in Canaan and in the promised Land,

I think it alien to the mind of Scripture:

for if he was a Chanaanite, if the city Arad

fell into the lot of the tribe of Juda, as is had

in Judges 1, v. 16; which same city with changed name is called Horma or Herma, and under that name was attributed

to the tribe of Juda, Josue 15, v. 3; if in Josue

15 among the other kings who fought with the Israelites in Canaan

and were cut down by Josue, the king of Arad,

or Hered (for it is the same word in Hebrew),

is named, by what reason can he be said not

to have dwelt in the land of Chanaan? So reasons

that interpreter, whose opinion I judge at least more probable

than the opposite, especially on account of the place in Judges

1, v. 16, where the desert of the lot of Juda is said to be

to the south of Arad. But what is asserted about Horma and Hered

is less certain, and at least both cannot be

true, because in Josue 12, v. 13,

the kings of these cities are distinguished in these words:

The king of Herma one, the king of Hered one.

[459] about the Dead Sea; But another difficulty again arises:

for if king Arad dwelt in the Southern part

of the promised Land about the Dead Sea, as the same

Bonfrerius rightly says on Numbers 21 with many others,

between his kingdom and Mount Hor, where

the Israelites were, a part of Idumaea lay between.

How then did the Chanaanite attack the Israelites,

and how did the Israelites, when he was conquered, overthrow his cities,

since from Mount Hor they did not go straight

into Canaan? The first part offers no

great difficulty: for the Chanaanite could come to meet

the Israelites with his army, and attack them,

as indeed happened. The second part

seemed to Bonfrerius so difficult that he departed from

the obvious and natural exposition of the place, and wished to prove

that the cities of that king were not overthrown in the time

of Moses, but afterwards, when the promised Land

was occupied. Others for the same cause preferred

to place the kingdom of Arad outside the borders of the promised Land,

which I should the less disallow, if the place

could not be otherwise expounded. But the difficulty does not seem to me

insuperable, if all things be attentively considered.

Wherefore I follow the obvious and natural

understanding of the place, according to which Moses affirms,

first, that king Arad came to attack

the Israelites while they were encamped

at Mount Hor; secondly, that that Chanaanite king

at the same time was conquered and slain, and

his cities overthrown. Thirdly, at least as more probable,

I admit that that king dwelt in the Southern part

of the promised Land about the Dead Sea,

and on the borders of Idumaea: and these things being presupposed,

I set about explaining how all these

things can stand with the other assertions of the sacred

Scripture, and be understood in a wholly probable way.

[460] Above we saw that passage through Idumaea was asked by Moses

[and through Idumaea he attacked the Israelites; and these by the same way could enter his kingdom:] while he was in Cades:

but that the king of Idumaea, having refused passage, came out

with a huge army. Moses, to whom battle

with the Idumaeans was forbidden, so went forward from Cades

to Mount Hor as to avoid a battle, and yet

not to withdraw from the borders of Idumaea, but to go forward along its

borders more towards Canaan, and

to come to Mount Hor, where on the borders of Idumaea

the Israelites long encamped. These things do not allow

us to doubt that the Idumaean king went on

with his army to watch the Israelites. And since

their immense multitude spread terror more widely,

king Arad seems to have hurried up, that together

with the Idumaeans he might keep the Israelites from passage,

and that thus the parts were divided between the Chanaanites and

the Idumaeans, so that the Chanaanites took their stand in that part of Idumaea

through which lay the entrance into the kingdom of Arad.

But that Chanaanite king, not content

to keep the Israelites from passage, began to harass them,

and indeed at first successfully enough, so that, having won

a victory, he also obtained spoils. Moses

with his men, being thus harassed, out of the huge multitude

of warriors which he had, sent forth a chosen column

to battle. Then, a vow being made about

destroying the cities of that Chanaanite, and the Chanaanites being cut down

with their king, the victorious Israelites followed the fugitives

through Idumaea, and together with them

penetrated into the kingdom of Arad, which they laid waste

with sword and flame. The vow being fulfilled, they also put an end

to the expedition, and by the same way

returned to the camp still fixed at Mount

Hor. In this or a like way the whole matter

could have been carried out, since there is nothing in the sacred Letters

that contradicts this exposition. Such was this expedition

as that which was undertaken against the Madianites in Numbers

31, which will be explained in its place.

[461] What Bonfrerius here objects can be set forth

without difficulty. the objected difficulties are answered. He says first that if the Israelites had then

penetrated into Canaan, it would have been better for them to pursue

their victory in Canaan than to go back and

undertake the long journey through the Moabites. But this was not

free to the Israelites, who did not move their camp

save with the pillar going before and leading them: for the time

had not yet come in which God had decreed

to bring them into possession of the promised Land. He says

secondly that the king and the city of Arad afterwards survived.

But we do not contend that the city of Arad was so utterly

destroyed that it could not be restored. That city

could indeed be raised again from its ruins, and

another king succeed the former, or be chosen in his place.

Further, that all the cities of the kingdom were destroyed the Scripture

does not clearly affirm. They certainly overthrew those

which they went to and took. But it is not necessary

that we should say that all were taken and destroyed. Hence

also it is uncertain whether they gave the name Horma

to the city Arad, or to the whole kingdom, or to the place

where they made the vow, or where they fought: which name

was afterwards given to other places too. For the rest, I would not

contend that all the circumstances of the deed were exactly

such as I have given from conjectures, with this intention only,

that I might show that the obvious sense of Scripture

can be retained. And so if anyone can combine everything equally well

in another way, he will readily have me consenting.

§ XLI. What Josephus and Philo narrated concerning the death of Mary and Aaron and the other things that followed are given and examined.

[Josephus treats briefly of the passage asked through Idumaea, of the death of Mary,] Of the things done in the fortieth year of the pilgrimage,

thus far recited from Scripture, the Hebrew writers,

Josephus and Philo, narrated but few things,

and passed over many, especially

the murmurings of the people, as being little

honourable to their nation. Josephus in book 4, chapter 4, after relating

the sedition of Core and the other things then done, speaks thus of the journeys

and of the passage asked through Idumaea, and of the death

of Mary: These things being thus ordered after the sedition,

he moved the camp, and with all his forces

came to the borders of Idumaea. Having first sent legates ahead

to the king, he asked of him only free

passage, ready at his judgment to give assurance

that he would make his journey without injury to anyone: moreover

he demanded that a market of things for sale be provided for his men,

meaning even to pay the price of water, if the king so ordered.

But he, having dismissed the legates without effect,

and refused passage, went out armed with his army

to meet them, meaning to hinder Moses if he should try

to open a way by force. But the Prophet, having first consulted

the oracle, and God not permitting that he himself should make

the beginning of a battle, led back his army,

meaning to make his journey through the desert. At the same time

for his sister Mariamme the last day of life came,

in the fortieth year since she had left Egypt,

on the first moon of the month Xanthicus, and she was buried

magnificently at public expense, upon a certain

mountain which is called Sein. Thus Josephus, presently

adding that the mourning for Mary's death was for a month,

and that after the mourning the people was purified by

Moses. This purification is taken from the laws

given in Numbers 19; but it does not seem to have had place

for the whole people. Secondly, the mountain Sein doubtless

is taken from the desert of Sin, but a mountain of that

name I do not find. Thirdly, the leading back of the army

is fittingly to be understood, namely

that Moses turned aside more toward the borders of Idumaea,

and not that he retreated.

[463] of the advance of the Israelites, and the death of Aaron: Of the advance of the army and the death of Aaron

the same writer then narrates these things: But when the mourning army had

been purified as I have said, going on with it through the desert,

he made for Arabia. And when

he had come into the territory of the chief city of the Arabians, which

was once called Arce, and now Petra, in this place

Aaron climbed a lofty mountain by which the territory is enclosed,

having been forewarned by Moses that he was

to die: and in the sight of the whole army, standing

on a sloping place, he took off the pontifical robe and handed it to Eleazar

his son, to whom by right of age the succession

belonged. And thus, with the people looking on, he dies,

in the very same year in which he lost his sister, in the hundred

and twenty-third year of his age. The day of his death

fell on the first moon of the month which among the Athenians

is called Hecatombaeon, among the Macedonians Lous,

among the Hebrews Sabba. The people mourned him thirty days,

and, the mourning ended, under Moses' leading came to

the river which is called Arnon. Thus Josephus,

leaping over many things: for to the river or torrent

Arnon the Israelites came after several intervening stations.

Other things also are here to be observed. The city

Petra, which he says was once called Arce,

he rightly places in Arabia, since it was the metropolis

of Arabia Petraea; rightly too he assigns near it

Mount Hor, on which Aaron died:

but he does not rightly distinguish Idumaea from Arabia,

since it was a part of it, and since the city Petra

was of Idumaea, as Jerome will have it in his book on

the Hebrew Places, or at least on its borders in neighbouring

Madianitis, as some think.

[464] Philo, all the rest of which we here

treat being passed over, Philo's account, passing over many things narrated only what was done with

the Idumaeans and with the Chanaanite king Arad. Of the former

he writes this: At the entrance of the (promised) region

there dwelt a kindred nation (as being sprung from Esau),

whom they (the Israelites) hoped would be allies in the war

to be waged against their neighbours, and helpers

in preparing new seats: or if they should be reluctant in this,

at least that they would join neither party. For the first

founders of both nations, both of the Hebrew

and of that which dwelt on their hostile borders, had been born

of one mother and one birth, whose families, increased with a happy

offspring, had then grown into two populous nations.

Of these one remained in its own seats: the other

(as we said before) removed into Egypt because of famine,

after some ages returned back whence

it had come. This one, not forgetful of kinship,

though long parted in dwelling: and even then,

recognizing nothing of the rite of their forefathers in the degenerate

posterity, judged it seemly for gentle spirits

to grant something to the ancient tie.

In the other no trace of friendship remained,

which, accustomed to far different manners,

reasonings, counsels and pursuits, renewed the ancestral hatreds.

For the first author of this nation had sold the right of primogeniture

to his brother, which a little after, repenting of the deed,

he demanded back, and even wished to extort it

by threatening death. These private feuds of the forefathers

were renewed among whole nations of their posterity

at that time.

[465] For the rest the Leader of the Hebrews, Moses,

although at the first onset he could have crushed them, of the passage asked through Idumaea,

judging that unjust by reason of the right of the aforesaid kinship,

preferred to ask passage through their fields,

promising that they would make their journey without injury to the inhabitants,

their fields and cattle untouched: that they would not even take the necessary

drink of water without price, that provisions should be

in the inhabitants' power, and that they would use the market

at their own judgment. But they, despising the heralds

offering the conditions of a treaty, went out armed

to meet them, threatening them with war

if they dared to cross their borders, nay even to touch them.

The people taking that answer ill, and

being now stirred to arms, the Prophet from a higher place,

that he might be heard, thus addressed them:

Your indignation, most valiant men, is not unjust,

who by offering good conditions have suffered a repulse

from depraved and perverse men. They indeed

deserve to pay the penalties of inhumanity, yet it becomes us

to act more mildly, and to reverence the ties of kindred.

Otherwise what will be the difference between good men and bad,

if we shall think more of what they

deserve than of what becomes us? Having said this,

he turned the people elsewhere, when he saw all the approaches

beset with garrisons by these men, to whom no danger

was threatening: only out of envy had they blocked the short

way: which was a most certain token

of the ill-will of men who took it ill that a nation

was restored to liberty, which before they had gladly heard

was oppressed with grievous servitude in Egypt. For it must needs be

that he who grieves at another's happiness rejoices

at his calamity, however much he dissemble. For

so far had they associated their affairs with the impious that,

fallen into the utmost malice, they were hostile to all good men,

took their successes ill, and rejoiced in their calamities.

[466] he is too bitter against the Idumaeans, and some things need correction: This could not then be hidden: yet the people

was restrained by its Prince, who by the same act gave a twofold

example both of goodness and of prudence.

For prudently he acted in that they departed

without mutual injuries: but that out of respect for kinship

he restrained vengeance was the duty of humanity.

So philosophizes Philo, more unjust than is just towards

the Idumaeans, who seem to have refused passage from a fear not wholly

groundless. But let it suffice to have said this in general

about the cause of the refused passage, since

we cannot know the true cause for certain. But certain other things

are to be emended in particular. First,

Moses, by whom Philo too boastfully affirms the Idumaeans could have been crushed

at the first onset, abstained from making war

upon them because of the command received from God.

Secondly, the Idumaeans are too much accused when

they are said to have threatened war if Moses dared even to touch

their borders: for it is clear that the Israelites

passed through their borders, and yet did not fight with the Idumaeans.

Thirdly, from mere conjecture, yet a bearable

and probable one, the Israelites are said to have been stirred

to arms when they heard that passage was refused by the Idumaeans.

But more unjust are the conjectures

by which Philo wonderfully exaggerates the hatred and envy of the Idumaeans:

for although in truth no danger

threatened them from the Israelites because of the divine command,

they probably were ignorant of it, and therefore neither

gave credence to their best promises,

nor were free from fear of a danger which, as they might

believe, was imminent.

[467] the same, concerning the Chanaanite king invading the Israelites, The war of the Chanaanite king Philo then

recounts thus: Their (the Idumaeans') towns being passed by,

as they went on to the further parts, a certain neighbouring

king, Chananes by name, when he learned from

scouts that the army was making its journey through places not far distant,

thinking that they, marching without order,

could easily be crushed, invaded them with the armed youth of his own,

and at the first assault forced some, as being unprepared,

to turn their backs: and having intercepted

some captives, puffed up with unhoped-for success, he went

further, as though he would reduce all into his own power.

But they, in nothing terrified by the setback received,

nay with kindled boldness, that they might wipe out

the disgrace, exhorted one another: Let us be

men, let us do the business briskly at the first entrance

of the promised region. Let us fight undaunted, having

boldness for a bulwark. Often the outcome is decided by

beginnings. While we are on the threshold let us strike terror

into the inhabitants, that we may exchange the want under which

we have laboured in desert places for the abundance of fertile

and well-tilled fields. Thus animated they vowed

to God the first-fruits of the fields, the towns of that king

with their borders.

[468] Nor were their vows in vain, the favourable Deity

adding strength to the Hebrews and conquered, he is in certain things corrected. to wrest the victory from the enemy.

And so they fought excellently, and after the victory made supplication:

the whole spoil was consecrated

to the Author of so great happiness. It was resolved that the towns with their men

and gold and silver should be dedicated to God, whence

that whole kingdom was named an anathema. For just

as every pious man consecrates

the first-fruits of the crops gathered from his fields:

in the same manner the whole nation dedicated to God a portion

of the great region into whose possession it was passing, and

that not a small one, a whole kingdom,

which was first won by war, as the first-fruits of the new

colony. For they thought it unlawful

either to divide the fields or to move into the cities before

the first-fruits of these had been consecrated. In this account

correct first the place, because the thing was done on the very

borders of the Idumaeans. Secondly, the Chanaanite king

did not invade them as they were journeying, but as they were encamped at

Mount Hor. Thirdly, the speech of the Israelites exhorting one another

is only conjectural; nor does the kingdom

of that Chanaanite king seem to have been so great

as Philo hints it was.

§ XLII. Several stations: the murmuring of the people,

upon whom God sends fiery serpents, the brazen serpent set up: the subdued kingdoms of Sehon and Og, kings of the Amorrhites.

[ ] [Two stations, in one of which the murmuring of the people was punished with fiery serpents;] From Mount Hor the Israelites, going forward almost along the borders

of the Idumaeans, through Madianitis and

Moabitis, in a short time came to the borders

of the land first to be occupied. In Numbers 33 the following stations

are thus reckoned from v. 41: And departing

from Mount Hor, they camped in Salmona

(which station was the thirty-fifth, elsewhere getting its name from

Mount Gadgad, as also the following is read in another

place to be called Jetebatha). And going out from thence they came

to Phunon. In one or the other of these stations,

or perhaps on the journey itself, there arose again a grave

murmuring, of which Moses treats in Numbers 21,

v. 4, writing thus: And they set forward from Mount

Hor by the way that leadeth to the Red Sea,

to compass the land of Edom. And the people

began to be weary of their journey and labour: and speaking against

God and Moses, they said: Why didst thou bring us out of Egypt,

to die in the wilderness? There is no bread,

nor have we any waters: our soul now loatheth

this very light food. Wherefore the Lord sent

among the people fiery serpents, at whose

wounds and the deaths of very many, they came to Moses,

and said: We have sinned, because we have spoken

against the Lord and thee: pray that he may take away

these serpents from us. And Moses prayed for

the people, and the Lord said to him: Make

a brazen serpent, and set it up for a sign: whosoever

being struck shall look on it, shall live. Moses therefore made

a brazen serpent, and set it up for a sign:

which when they that were struck looked upon, they were healed.

[470] With the lifting up of this brazen serpent Christ himself

compared his own lifting up upon the cross in John 3, v. 14;

and faith in Christ with the looking upon this serpent, saying:

As Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert; and for the healing of those struck the brazen serpent set up: so must the Son of man

be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in him

may not perish, but may have life everlasting.

And that murmuring the Apostle in 1 Corinthians 9

calls a tempting of God, thus warning his own by the example of the Hebrews:

Neither let us tempt Christ, as

some of them tempted, and perished by the serpents.

The Wise Man in chapter 16, v. 5, writes thus of these things:

For when the fierce rage of beasts came upon them (the Hebrews),

they were destroyed with the bitings of crooked serpents.

But thy wrath did not endure for ever;

but they were troubled for a short time for their correction,

having a sign of salvation to put them in remembrance

of the commandment of thy law. For he that turned to it

(that is, was healed) was not healed by that which he saw,

but by thee, the Saviour of all: and in this

thou didst show to our enemies that thou art he

who deliverest from all evil. And presently at v. 10:

But not even the teeth of venomous serpents overcame

thy children: for thy mercy came and healed them.

For they were examined for the remembrance of thy words,

and were quickly healed, lest falling into deep

forgetfulness they might not be able to use thy help.

For neither herb nor mollifying plaster healed them,

but thy word, O Lord, which healeth all things.

To the former of the two stations perhaps this murmuring will more probably

be attributed. But to the latter agrees better what Moses

says in Deuteronomy 2, v. 8: We came to the way that leadeth

to the desert of Moab.

[471] the Lord's command about not attacking the Moabites: various stations: In this place therefore is to be fixed the Lord's precept,

thus related there by Moses: And the Lord said

to me: Fight not against the Moabites, neither

go to battle against them: for I will not give thee

anything of their land, because I have given Ar (the metropolis of the region)

to the children of Lot (from whom the Moabites, as also the Ammonites)

for a possession. In Numbers 33, from

v. 43, the stations that followed are thus enumerated, and first

the thirty-seventh is Oboth: And departing from

Phunon, they camped in Oboth. And from Oboth

they came to Jieabarim, which is in the borders

of the Moabites. And departing from Jieabarim, they pitched

their tents in Dibongad. This thirty-ninth station

at Dibongad is elsewhere called at the torrent Zared,

as St. Jerome observes, and as will appear from

the words to be given. In Numbers 21, v. 10, of this journey it is thus

read: And the children of Israel setting forward camped

in Oboth. And going out from thence they pitched their tents in Jieabarim,

in the wilderness that faceth Moab toward

the east side. And removing from thence they came

to the Torrent Zared. In Deuteronomy 2, v. 13, the Lawgiver narrates

these things to our purpose: Rising up therefore

to pass over the torrent Zared, we came to it.

And the time that we journeyed from

Cadesbarne until we passed over the torrent Zared

was thirty-eight years: until all the generation of the men

that were fit for war was consumed out of

the camp, as the Lord had sworn: whose hand

was against them, that they should perish from the midst of the camp.

He speaks of all who had been condemned to meet death in the

desert near Cadesbarne on account of the rebellion arisen on occasion of the spies.

All these therefore perished not only before the passing over

of the Jordan, but even before the war waged against

the two kings of the Amorrhites beyond the Jordan.

[472] [the precept about not assailing the Ammonites: the advance of the host to the torrent Arnon,] Before they went forward, when they were drawing near

to the borders of the Ammonites, the Lord forbade them to wage war

against them, as he had done concerning

the Idumaeans and Moabites. Let us hear Moses in Deuteronomy

2, v. 16, thus proceeding: And after all the fighting men

were fallen, the Lord spoke

to me, saying: Thou shalt pass this day the borders

of Moab, the city named Ar: and drawing nigh

to the confines of the children of Ammon, take heed thou fight not against

them, nor be moved to battle: for I will not give

thee of the land of the children of Ammon, because I have given it

to the children of Lot for a possession. The following station,

that is, the fortieth, is thus expressed in Numbers 33, v. 46:

And going out from thence (from Dibongad), they camped

in Helmondeblathaim. This place was near the torrent

Arnon, which had to be crossed for entering

the land of the Amorrhites. Hence in Numbers

21, v. 13, it is said: And leaving it (the torrent Zared),

they camped over against Arnon,

which is in the desert, and standeth out on the borders of the Amorrhite.

For Arnon is the border of Moab, dividing

the Moabites and the Amorrhites. Whence it is said in

the book of the Wars of the Lord: As he did in the Red Sea,

so will he do in the torrents of Arnon. The rocks of the torrents

were bowed down that they might rest in Ar,

and lie down in the borders of the Moabites.

From that place appeared a well, whereof the Lord

said to Moses: Gather the people together, and I will give

them water. Then Israel sang this song:

Let the well spring up. They sang together: The well, which

the princes dug, and the chiefs of the multitude prepared

by the Giver of the law, and with their staves. From

the wilderness, to Matthana. From Matthana to Nahaliel:

from Nahaliel to Bamoth. From Bamoth, there is a valley in

the country of Moab, on the top of Phasga, which looketh

toward the desert.

[473] Many things here are exceedingly obscure. The book

of the Wars of the Lord will be examined afterwards. where certain prodigies wrought are obscurely hinted: From

the verses adduced in this place it seems to have been written

in metre, and prophetically, as some will have it:

which nevertheless is less certain. The obvious sense is this.

As many prodigies were wrought in the Red Sea,