Let’s look at the passages in question.Many commentators over the years have tried to explain these differences with various ideas. Both Balak and Balaam are recurring characters in the Jewish story throughout the ages and present in our current world. Numbers 13–14 describes the punishment of the generation of the wilderness. Sinai. They were not happy. In the end, God turns Balaam’s curses into blessings. Then the cloud went away from the tabernacle. They were sorry they had left Egypt. Sinai in … A mighty and unforeseen wind uproots them after centuries of living there and they move on to new shores. They did not have faith in God. God’s Provisions and Israel’s Failure. It is full of character sketches and descriptions of people who by their actions changed the course of Jewish history, not only in the desert of Sinai but for all times as well. The spies came back. He is hired by Israel’s enemies to curse G… When Pharaoh … Why did Israel have to eat strange food called manna during … There is no mention that the “evening meal of meat” (quail) mentioned in Exodus 16:12 ever stopped. If only the Jewish people hadnt skipped that class while enslaved in Egypt, perhaps it wouldnt have taken them 40 years to arrive at the Promised Land. God said they must live in the wilderness for forty years. Then the cloud went away from the tabernacle. Balak is the hateful enemy, the bully and seeming aggressor. They did not like the wilderness. The exile mentality of the Jewish people, formed already in Egyptian bondage over three millennia ago, remains part of Jewish DNA even today. When Moses was 120 years old, God told him to go to a mountain. Without God’s interference, so to speak, Balaam’s true wishes could have been fulfilled. The end result of the rebellion was that the Earth miraculously opened and swallowed up Korah and his followers, dragging them down into bottomless pit of no return (as, historically, has been the fate of man-made “Judaisms” over the centuries). It tasted bad. EXODUS 16:2-3- 2. After Moses sends twelve spies to scout out the land and bring back pertinent information, they return with tales of the great power of the natives there, and the Israelites are scared and refuse to enter the land. The scene: Israel has a working tabernacle, the tribes are organized and prepared to leave Mt. They thought they could not capture the land of Canaan. The time at Sinai was not idle. Moses asked God to forgive them. The people were big and strong. Therefore, it was not merely Moses and his leadership that were the core issues in this dispute, but the very definition of Judaism: Is it revealed and Godly or man-made and invented? He cursed them with forty years of wilderness wandering until the unbelieving generation died off, never stepping foot in the Promised Land. But even though God’s timeline may not align with ours, he doesn’t keep us in the desert forever. The tree made the water taste good. Apparently there is no human force possessed by the Jewish people that can safely counteract Balaam’s venom. A mood of wild depression overwhelmed Israel and God informed them that they would not enter the Promised Land. It is a book designed to address humanity’s achievements and foibles, grandeur and pettiness, and great capacity to do good and be evil. Like one domino falling after another, rebellion broke out in the camp directly following the failure of the spies. This is a struggle that many people face at least one time or another in life: a reluctance to try something new, to veer off into uncharted territory, to stray from our comfort zones, all at the risk of traveling a path tha… The actual trip should have taken 11 days. Instead they returned with a report about the land and its inhabitants whose negative parts overwhelmed the positive statements they uttered (Numbers 13:27-29). He has already warned the people of his dark visions about their future and has advised them of the terrible costs that will be exacted from them in their long exile. During this time, God Almighty did draw close to them . The laws of geometry teach us that the shortest distance between two points is a straight line. God Doesn’t Keep Us in the Desert Forever Forty years sounds like a long time. In their long exile there is almost no place in the world they have not visited, settled and eventually moved from. God (Yahweh)—the creator of heaven and earth, who chose Israel as his special nation and dwells in their midst.Moses—the prophet and human leader of the nation of Israel. He’s the chief spokesperson for God to his people, and vice versa.Aaron—Moses’ brother, and the high priest of Israel.Eleazar—Aaron’s son, who takes his place when Aaron dies.Balaam—A diviner for hire from far away. And this mood was heightened by the sudden unprovoked attack of Amalek (Exodus 17:8). Balak is brutal, direct and minces no words. On that basic core issue of Judaism, Moses saw no room for compromise or tolerance. But now Jews have moved on again to other shores. The priests carried the ark of the covenant in front of them. The Book of Numbers concludes detailing all the places the Jews stayed from the time they left Egypt to the end of their 40 years in the desert. Corresponding to the 40 days that the spies toured the land, God decreed that the Israelites would wander in the wilderness for 40 years as a result of their unwillingness to take the land. Another major incident in the desert was the attempt of a Moabite king Balak to hire a non-Jewish prophet, Balaam, to curse the Jewish people (Numbers 22-24). The existence of the Jewish people itself is somehow seen as a lethal threat to him and Moab. Their lack of belief in God’s word and promises brought forth the wrath of God. The Israelites traveled on. Jesus said he would lead the Israelites to the promised land. Moses hit a rock two times with his rod. 1. Numbers 11-21 contains seven narratives about Israel’s rebellion as they journey through the wilderness. (In Exodus 16:3 the Israelites complained that they did not have enough to eat.) Were Israelites tired of the “evening meal of quail” or did God stop sending it? He undoubtedly had unquestioned trust in their piety and wisdom, and expected them to return with an enthusiastic assessment of the Land of Israel. But because we are plagued by minds that are broken due to living in a sin-cursed world, we can never perfectly understand everything. Deut 1:3 In the fortieth year, on the first day of the eleventh month, Moses spoke to the people of Israel according to all that the LORD had given him in commandment to them, With his defeat and elimination, the situation can return to a manageable normalcy. After the ancient Israelites left Egypt and came out of slavery, God commanded Moses to have them set up their Wilderness Camp in a specific way. Nevertheless, at the end his thoughts turn toward the future, to the greatness of the eternal people, its resilience and stubbornness and its tenacity. And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness: 3. He taught them the commandments of God. The wilderness through which Israel traveled on their way to the Promised Land was a hard place. The way to our promised land is not always easy, in fact, it rarely is. Read 5 Lessons We Can Learn from the Israelites' Wandering Years - Your Daily Bible Verse - July 1 from today's daily devotional. The paradigm of Jewish history in exile is that Jews arrive at a new destination, settle, help develop that country, begin to feel at home and attempt to assimilate into the majority culture and society. But he would not let them go into the promised land. The Israelites were afraid. The Israelites in the Wilderness. It was not Moses’ status that was at stake here. The Scouts Story and the Wilderness Wandering. 38 years and 17 campsites later, they returned to Kadesh. I find it true and a new revelation of Biblical truth. Thus, the recording of all of the travels and way stations that the Jews experienced in their years in the Sinai desert is a small prophecy as to the future historical experiences of Jews over millennia of wandering. Moses lived in the wilderness for neither several days nor a couple of years, but for as long as 40 years. So we must let Scripture shed light on itself. The Wilderness of Sinai was the last stop of the Exodus where Israel camped for 11 months and 5 days: a. Israel arrived at the final camp in front of Mt. The spiritual aspect expressed by Balaam vs. the phsical aspect expressed by Balak is a new thought for me. It was the land God had promised the Israelites. The people got tired of eating manna. Their children would grow up and go into the promised land. Then God took Moses. Jesus was angry at the Israelites. He told Moses he would not help them anymore. And the children of Israel Israel was not wandering for 40 years in the desert. They had never been slaves; had never known the taskmaster’s whip. The Book of Deuteronomy, which consists of the final lectures of Moses during his last month on Earth, is the most human of all of the five books of the Torah. Israel was sentenced to 40 years in the Wilderness Journey at Kadesh/Rithmah. The time of Wandering in the Wilderness lasted 40 years. The true reason for that is because Korah wished to convert Judaism to a man-made “democratic” faith, not its original and true source as a faith revealed to humans from on high, a faith and life system ordained in Heaven and revealed to humans. Balaam, on the other hand, is suave, cunning, full of sweet words and blessings, but no less inimical to the existence of the Jewish people. In Exodus 15:25, God gave the Israelites clean water to drink. But behind that veneer of sincerity and good intentions lays the real villain of the story – the greedy, frustrated, amoral Jew-hater. Korah — a leader of the tribe of Levi, one of the bearers of the Holy Ark, the wealthiest man in Israel, and a close relative of Moses and Aaron — aroused others to mutiny and appoint him leader. It was the promised land. He is a prophet, soothsayer and “holy” man, possessed of great charisma and intelligence. Food, water and shelter were all lacking. The Israelites were to wander in the wilderness for 40 years before they would be allowed to enter the Promised Land!!! They were human. Every way station and desert oasis is recorded to serve as a reminder that the future of the Jewish people lies only in the Land of Israel. With the most positive of intentions, Moses commissioned twelve leaders to spy out the land God had promised (Numbers 13:1-16). Amalek was defeated by Joshua and Moses, but the mere fact that such an attack occurred so soon after the events of the exodus had a disheartening effect upon the people. 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