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Numbers 12
The substance of it is a misunderstanding between Moses on the one hand, and his brother and sister on the other, clearly indicative of low and very unexpected jealousy on their part, at the authority exercised, and the powers assumed, by Moses. One may fancy that Aaron, who had seen, not long ago, his two eldest and most favorite sons perish before his eyes, would still be too broken-hearted, too much bowed down by the weight of grief, to find room in his mind for such matters. But it is not so. This way is the way of man’s life. It is with him even as with the cedar, whose great branches bend down in winter, as it would seem almost to breaking, beneath their load of snow; but, day by day, a morsel drops off, or melts insensibly away, and so they slowly rise, until at last, by one vigorous bound, each branch throws off its hoary trouble, and grows and looks green again.
Hitherto Moses seems to have had the cordial support of his own family. But one cannot help thinking that Aaron’s mind had become somewhat too exalted by the very distinguished position to which he and his had been raised. Self-esteem keeps a man’s mind so much awake to his own real or supposed claims, that any consideration which we can suppose likely to have arisen from that influence in any man’s mind, is almost certain to have been presented to it. As it occurs to us, therefore, it can scarcely have escaped the notice of Aaron himself, that the position assigned to him in the commonwealth was, in some respects, superior to that of Moses himself. The function of Moses was temporary, and would pass away with his life; whereas his own was permanent in himself and his heirs, and would leave him and them the foremost and most important persons in the state. He might not, therefore, always regard with patience the degree in which the full development of his own high office was superseded by the existing authority of Moses. No doubt he remembered he was the elder brother; and we know that men seldom consider any advancement beyond their merits and their claims; it is more than probable that he overlooked the fact, that the place be had attained was, as far as we can see, given to him entirely on account of his brother, and from consideration of the part he had been allowed, for that brother’s sake, to bear in the deliverance of Israel. That he was discontented is certain—that he made no secret of that discontent is clear—and that it had its principal source in the jealousy entertained of the powers exercised by Moses, is plainly stated. “It is a hard thing,” says Bishop Hall, “for a man willingly and gladly to see his equals lifted over his head. Nothing will more try a man’s temper than questions of emulation.” And he adds well: “That man hath no true light, who cannot be content to be a candle before the sun of others.”
We are sorry to see Miriam also engaged in this murmuring. For her a somewhat different ground of discontent may be expected; and it is to her that we are disposed to ascribe that part of the dissatisfaction which rests upon the marriage of Moses with “an Ethiopian woman.” There is a difficulty in understanding this. Some suppose that it refers to that Ethiopian princess whom Moses had espoused, according to the Jewish traditions to which we formerly referred, Note: Fourteenth Week, Wednesday. before he originally left Egypt, and who now rejoins him in the wilderness. Others, chiefly old commentators, fancy that Moses actually married a new wife at this time, and that she was an Ethiopian, which some suppose to mean actually a black woman, who in their hands becomes a type of the gentile church. But it is safest to adhere to known facts. The facts we do know, are that Moses had a wife called Zipporah, the daughter of Jethro; that during the encampment in Sinai, she had been brought by her father and brother to Moses; and that the brother, Hobab, had been prevailed upon to accompany the Israelites, to whom his knowledge of the country might be useful. Now, if we can show that this woman might, with propriety, be called an Ethiopian, a perfectly satisfactory explanation grows out of this circumstance. And we can show this. The name translated “Ethiopian” is “Cushite,” from Cush the son of Ham. This name is applied in Scripture not only to Africa but to Arabia, which is explained by the descendants of Cush having left their name in certain regions in which, on their migration from the common center, they tarried some time prior to their final passage into Africa. Or a body of them may have remained a long time in Arabia before they eventually passed over to join the main stock of their people—if ever they did, for the descent of many of the more ancient Arabian tribes has been by no means very clearly deduced, and some of them may have been of Cushite origin. The land in which Jethro dwelt may indeed have been, at this very time, occupied mainly by such tribes, to whom belonged the hostile shepherds who wronged Jethro’s daughters at the well. But it suffices that they were once in this region, and left their name in it, to understand that Zipporah may have been called a Cushite, not as being herself of the children of Cush, but as belonging to a country which had received from them its name. This explanation is not new. In fact it is the one that is now current—and we object not to receive it, although there is a difficulty which has escaped all those by whom it has been urged; and that is, that the Israelites, whose ideas were more tribal than territorial, especially at this time, ere they possessed a country of their own, denominated any people whose origin they knew, rather from their descent than from the country in which they lived.
But admitting the existence of any sense in which Jethro’s daughter could be called an Ethiopian, it is obvious that her arrival might be very unwelcome to Miriam, who would find herself unpleasantly superseded in the position which as the sister of both Moses and Aaron, she had hitherto held as a mother in Israel, and chief lady in the camp. The wife of Moses would at least share, if not engross, the deference and attention which had hitherto belonged to his sister alone. The high consideration with which Jethro had been treated on his visit to the camp; the improvements in the dispensation of justice which had been made by his wise suggestions; and the influential position now taken by his son Hobab, who was to remain with them, may have been distasteful to Aaron is his present temper, as dividing the power and authority which he wished to retain in the Levitical priesthood, and which his recollection of the concentration of power in the hands of the Egyptian priesthood might lead him to regard as properly belonging to his office. Thus we see, that Aaron and Miriam might, under somewhat different influences, make common cause in their discontent at the connection in marriage which Moses had formed. But there was One who guarded the honor of Moses too well for him to be afflicted at the hard speeches even of a sister and a brother. It is emphatically remarked that “the Lord heard it,” They were all three—the two brothers and the sister—suddenly summoned before the door of the tabernacle. To that door the pillar of cloud visibly moved, and the voice of the Lord spoke to them from it, in words well suited to fill their hearts with shame. They claimed to equal powers—they were prophets no less than he—and by them also had the Lord spoken. But what said the Lord himself? To others, however highly favored, he had disclosed his will only in visions and dreams: “But my servant Moses is not so, who is faithful in all mine house: With him will I speak mouth to mouth, even apparently, and not in dark speeches; and the similitude of the Lord shall he behold. Wherefore, then, were ye not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?” The sign of his glorious presence was then withdrawn; and the proof of his anger was seen in the fact that Miriam had become a leper. This was a peculiar and striking judgment. There had been special regulations regarding the treatment of those infected with the leprous taint—under which it became the duty of the priest himself to judge of its existence, and pronounce the doom of exclusion from the camp. It is therefore not without a point, not usually noticed, remarked that “Aaron looked upon Miriam, and behold she was leprous!” This fact made him the very person to pronounce the sentence upon the sharer of his sin. Indeed, he may not at the moment have known but that Miriam saw the same signs of the disease in him that he saw in her—and that he also had been smitten with leprosy. Hence his intercession was for both, and he very humbly confessed that they had both been in this matter sinful and foolish. The woman, whose tongue had before been so free upon her brother’s conduct and character, was now mute with horror. She who had been so high—whose views were so aspiring—was now to be cast forth, as an unclean thing, from the camp, and live separate, she knew not for how long—for the disease seldom passed away soon, and was often never eradicated. Yet pity was shown her—and though she might not be spared this humiliation, the period of her exclusion was limited to the seven days which those once afflicted with leprosy were required to pass before they could be re-admitted. It would now be Aaron’s duty to visit her without the camp. If the symptoms of the complaint had not disappeared, there would be no help for her. She must be reduced to the condition of confirmed lepers. These not only dwelt without the camp, but even there had the responsibility of taking care that clean persons should not come near enough to them in their walks, to be rendered ceremoniously unclean by contact with them. The eye of the stranger should be able to distinguish them by the badge they were constrained to wear upon their faces—by their uncovered heads, and by their sordid raiment. And that the ear also might supply the information which the eye might not readily take, they were bound to cry out “Unclean! unclean:” whenever they saw a stranger approach.
But if she were then free from this loathsome affliction, and declared to be so on the authority of the priest, certain ceremonial acts of lustration and sacrifice would enable her to return to the camp, and join once more in the intercourses of common life. When this took place to Miriam—after the people had remained at the place a whole week on her account—she came back to the tents, humbled no doubt in her own eyes, but strengthened in her soul by the correction she had received. The best proof of the efficacy of that correction is, that we hear no more of her until her death.