11:6. Our soul is dry, our eyes behold nothing else but manna.
11:7. Now the manna was like coriander seed, of the colour of bdellium.
Bdellium.... Bdellium, according to Pliny, 1.21, c. 9. was of the
colour of a man’s nail, white and bright.
11:8. 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.
11:9. And when the dew fell in the night upon the camp, the manna also
fell with it.
11:10. Now Moses heard the people weeping by their families, every one
at the door of his tent. And the wrath of the Lord was exceedingly
enkindled: to Moses also the thing seemed insupportable.
11:11. And he 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?
11:12. Have I conceived all this multitude, or begotten them, 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?
11:13. Whence should I have flesh to give to so great a multitude? They
weep against me, saying: Give us flesh that we may eat.
11:14. I am not able alone to bear all this people, because it is too
heavy for me.
11:15. 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.
11:16. And the Lord said to Moses: Gather unto me seventy men of the
ancients of Israel, whom thou knowest to be ancients and masters of the
people: and thou shalt bring them to the door of the tabernacle of the
covenant, and shalt make them stand there with thee,
Seventy men.... This was the first institution of the council or
senate, called the Sanhedrin, consisting of seventy or seventy-two
senators or counsellors.
11:17. That I may come down and speak with 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 mayest not be burthened alone.
11:18. And thou shalt say to the people: Be ye sanctified: to morrow
you shall eat flesh: 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 you may eat:
11:19. Not for one day, nor two, nor five, nor ten, no nor for twenty.
11:20. 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?
11:21. And Moses said: There are six hundred thousand footmen of this
people, and sayest thou: I will give them flesh to eat a whole month?
11:22. Shall then a multitude of sheep and oxen be killed, that it may
suffice for their food? or shall the fishes of the sea be gathered
together to fill them?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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