And the mixed multitude that was among them lusted; and the children of Israel also wept again and said, Who will give us flesh to eat?
The trouble in this chapter does not begin with Israel. It starts with the rabble — the mixed multitude who left Egypt with them — and their craving spreads until a rescued nation weeps for Egypt's food.
These were people who left Egypt without ever leaving it in heart.
The mixed multitude were people who had joined themselves to Israel without being Israelites. So they are like people who claim to be Christians but are not born again, and who therefore find no pleasure in Christ, the One the manna pictures. They crave the things of the world. It was not that they had no food; the manna did not satisfy them.
Their complaint was aimed at the manna, the food God sent them every day. One writer traces the craving back to who these people were.
The murmuring breaks out again, and this time it takes a definite shape. It is against the manna, the daily witness of Jehovah's daily care. This craving begins with that mixed multitude. They had come out of Egypt with Israel, but they had not known that slavery in the same way, and so they had not known the reality of redemption either. So from the mixed multitude too — inside the company but not part of it — the Church has learned this unholy cry after the things of the world.
One writer sees a pattern repeated wherever God calls a people out.
Corrupting God's work by bringing in a mixture is a very common and very successful device of Satan. As soon as God called a people out of Egypt to Himself, the "mixed multitude" appears. We see the same thing in principle in Matthew 13. When the good seed of the Word is sown, the enemy at once sows weeds among it... A healthy word of warning for us is — beware of the "mixed multitude"!
The word "also" in the verse marks the infection. Israel does not invent this appetite; they catch it.
We are all quick to complain about the way God deals with us. But craving Egypt's food is the sure result of mixing with the world. The children of Israel followed the example of the mixed multitude (Numbers 11:4). No Christian mixes with the world without going down to its level and sharing its cravings.
They were not short of food. They wanted different food — and the asking itself was an insult.
Here we see the result of that mixed multitude which had come out of Egypt with them. Proof came quickly that every departure from the mind of God produces a sad harvest in the days that follow. The strangers mixed in among them fell to craving, and the people of Israel wept again too. This was worse than the complaining just before. It showed contempt for grace that was plain to see. There was complete blindness to the goodness of God.
They had no inheritance waiting in Canaan, so they wanted comfort now. A heart already turned back rewrites its own memories.
The mixed multitude had no inheritance in Canaan, and they fell to craving. Israel was looking for ease and comfort now, good things here, not longing for Canaan. In heart they had turned back to Egypt. The flesh was at work in them, and they could list all the good things the flesh had enjoyed in Egypt. When Satan draws us back to the world like this, we never remember the deliverance, only what we lost by it. Then Pharaoh looks very generous. Instead of crying out under hard slavery, we remember the fish we ate in Egypt for free. This was a lie, for they ate it as slaves.
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One writer hears the same craving in ordinary life today.
How often does the Bible lie unopened for hours while we devour the light, worthless reading of the world? What do the well-thumbed newspaper and the dust-covered Bible say about us? Do these things not tell a story? Is this not despising the manna and longing for — no, swallowing — the leeks and onions?
God gave them what they asked for, and the gift became their grave.
The end of the chapter shows Jehovah's generous provision in sending the meat they had wanted. But the anger of the Lord burned against them, and while they were eating a great plague broke out. There was no repentance. They fell on what God had provided only to satisfy their craving, and they did not see the Giver behind the gift. Kibroth-hattaavah means "graves of lust."
- Mixture — The craving starts with outsiders who joined Israel. They never knew Egypt's slavery, so they never knew what rescue means.
- Method — Bringing in a mixture is a common and successful device of Satan. Where God sows good seed, the enemy sows weeds.
- Mingling — Israel wept "also". Nobody mixes with the world without sinking to its level and sharing its appetites.
- Memory — A heart turned back edits the past. They remembered the free fish and forgot the slavery they ate it in.
- Graves — God answered the craving, and the answer killed them. The camp took the name "graves of lust."
We remember the fish that we ate in Egypt for nothing; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic;
In the wilderness the rescued nation looks back at Egypt and misses the food. What makes a people remember the country that enslaved them by what was on the plate?
The striking thing about their list is what is missing from it.
Here the poor human heart lets itself thoroughly out. Its tastes and its tendencies are made manifest. The people sigh after the land of Egypt, and cast back longing looks at its fruits and its cooking pots. They say nothing about the whip of the slave driver, or the toil of the brick kilns. There is total silence about these things. Nothing is remembered now except the resources by which Egypt had fed the desires of nature.
There is a power behind that forgetting.
When Satan is drawing us back to the world like this, we never remember the deliverance. We remember only what we lost by it. Then Pharaoh seems most generous.
One word in their speech does the most damage: the fish came free of charge. It didn't.
We remember the fish we ate in Egypt freely. This was a deception, because they ate it in bondage. We can remember the things of the flesh, but not the things of the Spirit.
They were never guests at that table.
Ah, "those good old days" that never really existed — what a glow settles over them once we are safely out of them. How impressed we would be by these people's former respectable connections! But we happen to know the truth. All they had to do with the leeks, the onions and the garlic was to grow them for their slave masters. All they had to do with the cooking pots was to clean them.
The complaint did not begin with Israel itself.
The mixed multitude had attached themselves to Israel, though they were not Israelites. They are like people who only profess Christianity and are not born again. So they find no pleasure in Christ, of whom the manna speaks. They lust after the things of the world. It was not that they lacked food; the manna did not satisfy them. The children of Israel then took up the same complaint, because believers are always too ready to copy the selfishness of unbelievers. If we do not enjoy feeding on Christ, we will crave the things of the flesh — things once enjoyed in a world that leaves God out.
Look at what they name, and at where all of it grows.
In Numbers 11 they lusted after six things. Forgetting the hard slavery, they said: "We remember the fish we ate in Egypt that cost nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic." They all belonged to Egypt, and they were all low down. Egypt's prosperity depended on the Nile, but they did not know its source. The land God brought them into drank water from the rain of heaven. Seven things grew in that land. All of them could be gathered without stooping: wheat and barley, vines and fig trees, pomegranates, olive trees and honey.
Egypt's food you gather bending down. The land's food you gather standing up.
Behind the menu is a rejection. The manna pictures Christ, and Christ in a particular character.
In the deliverance from Egypt we feed on Christ as the lamb roasted with fire, our Substitute and Saviour. In Canaan we get Him as the old grain of the land, our glorified and exalted Lord. It is worth noticing that we never find the Israelites of old loathing either of these two foods. It is the manna — Christ in His humiliation and rejection — that they called "light food." This "bread from heaven" is the test for each of our hearts today. Have we been so won by His love that we count a path of rejection with Him better than all the "leeks and cucumbers" of Egypt?
The craving has not gone out of date; it has only changed vocabulary.
We prove, sadly, that Christ is not enough for the heart by the plain fact that we take ourselves off to other things. How often, for example, does the Bible lie neglected for hours while people greedily devour the light and worthless literature of the world. What do the well-thumbed newspaper and the almost dust-covered Bible mean? Do these things not tell a story? Is this not despising the manna, and sighing after — no, devouring — the leeks and onions?
- Remembered. The list names six foods and not one slave driver. Craving lives by editing the past down to its pleasant parts.
- Free. They called the fish free. In fact they ate it as slaves who grew those vegetables for their masters and scrubbed the pots.
- Caught. The craving started with the mixed multitude, outsiders who found no pleasure in the manna. Israel copied them.
- Low. Egypt's six foods all grow low down, so you stoop for them. You gather the land's seven standing up, where rain from heaven does the watering.
- Refused. The manna pictures Christ in humiliation — and that is the one food Israel ever called light. The dust-covered Bible beside the well-read newspaper is the same refusal today.
and now our soul is dried up there is nothing at all but the manna before our eyes.
Israel is in the wilderness, fed every morning by bread from heaven, and their complaint is that heaven's bread is all they can see. So what has happened in a heart that calls God's provision starvation? (The writers quoted below use an older translation, which reads "our soul is dried away.")
You feel the complaint only when you know what they were refusing. One writer explains what the manna was and why God gave it.
They murmured, and in His tenderness and mercy God gave them the manna… He did this day by day for forty years, until they passed over the Jordan. The manna was Israel's food, food suited to the wilderness, and it was of this that they tired… Now the manna is a picture of Christ — of a humbled Christ. It pictures all that Christ was in His tenderness, grace, and sympathy as He passed through this scene. So it pictures all that He now is, suited to us in our wilderness circumstances as strangers and pilgrims. Christ in this character is our only food, the only food that can sustain and strengthen us.
The manna never changed. Their words about it changed, in three stages.
On their wilderness journey the manna God gave His people on earth never changed in itself. But sad to say, their appreciation of it declined! When they first saw the manna, "the taste of it was like cake with honey" (Exodus 16). In Numbers 11 they said, "there is nothing at all beside this manna." The manna by itself was no longer enough for them. They wanted something "beside" it, something extra. Their appreciation sinks to its lowest point in Numbers 21 — "our soul loathes this light bread."
Two writers identify the speaker in verse 6, and neither treats it as a food shortage.
In this we learn something of what the "flesh" is. It never can be satisfied with Christ, our only portion here. "Our soul is dried away" is the language of flesh.
Another writer puts Israel's verdict on the manna into words, then names who still repeats it.
So Christ, God's only provision for His people, dries up the soul that feeds on Him alone! And true Christians learn to repeat this too, in softer and more polite language.
Their list of Egyptian food leaves something out, and the omission is the point.
The people sigh after the land of Egypt and cast wistful looks back at its fruits and its cooking pots. They say nothing about the whip of the slave driver and the hard labour at the brick kilns. There is total silence about these things… The heart loses its freshness in the divine life. Heavenly things begin to lose their flavour. First love declines. Christ stops being a satisfying and altogether precious portion for the soul. The word of God and prayer lose their charm and become heavy, dull, and mechanical. Then the eye wanders back toward the world, the heart follows the eye, and the feet follow the heart.
A daily gift is daily love. So being tired of the sight of it judges the Giver, not just the gift.
God remembers Israel every morning for forty years. The unbeliever may like to receive the gifts of God; the believer loves the One who gives them. If God had only given the manna once a month, He would have shown His love only once, and not every day. God shows every moment how He loves us… If our eyes are not content with seeing the manna every morning, we despise the love of God. Are we happy to be wholly dependent on God?
One writer hears the same complaint in the excuses Christians make about their time.
Have we not heard even those who claim the highest Christian standing say things like this: "How are we to fill up the day? We cannot be always thinking about Christ and heavenly things. We must have some little recreation." Is this not close to Israel's language in Numbers 11?… What do the well-thumbed newspaper and the almost dust-covered Bible mean?
So what keeps Egypt from pulling a believer back? One writer answers.
Whatever is not Christ, and of Christ, is Egypt, and of Egypt. We need therefore to be so drawn to Christ, so gripped and absorbed by Him, that He satisfies every want we have. That is the effective antidote to every charm and attraction Egypt can offer.
- The gift — God answered murmuring with mercy. The manna pictures Christ in His humility and sympathy, the one food fit for the road.
- The drift — appetite fell by stages: honey-sweet, then "nothing but this," then open loathing. The food never changed, only the taste for it.
- The voice — "our soul is dried away" is the flesh talking. The flesh can never rest content in Christ, and believers still say the same thing in politer words.
- The forgetting — they recall Egypt's food, not Egypt's whips. When Christ stops satisfying, the eye wanders back, the heart follows the eye, and the feet follow the heart.
- The test — a daily gift proves daily love. Boredom with the manna despises the Giver. The cure is to be so filled with Christ that nothing in Egypt attracts.