What is a nomad?

By the two wives he had a remarkable family. The second characteristic came out in his children, and the lust of the flesh eventuated in the lust of the eyes. One son became a pioneer in trade and commerce, for those who dwelt in tents and had cattle were the nomadic folk who did not settle down as tillers of the soil, but wandered with their beasts and became a people of trade and of transport.

By the two wives he had a remarkable family. The second characteristic came out in his children, and the lust of the flesh eventuated in the lust of the eyes. One son became a pioneer in trade and commerce, for those who dwelt in tents and had cattle were the nomadic folk who did not settle down as tillers of the soil, but wandered with their beasts and became a people of trade and of transport.

Descendants of Rechab, the father of Jonadab. The account of these people is given by themselves: they abstained from wine, and they did not build houses, nor sow seed. Being nomads they did not plant vineyards, nor had any; but all their days they dwelt in tents. Though called Rechabites, they trace their mode of life to what their ancestor Jonadab had commanded. When compelled to dwell in Jerusalem for fear of the Chaldeans and Syrians, Jeremiah called them together and offered them wine; but they refused to drink any, and gave the above explanation.

God instructed Jeremiah to hold up the obedience of the Rechabites as an example to the men of Judah. These men faithfully obeyed their father, whereas Judah had not obeyed their God. It was said of them that because of their faithfulness to their father's commands Jonadab should not want a man to stand before God for ever. The Rabbis interpret this to signify that they should minister in the sanctuary, and say they became united to the Levites; but we find nothing of this in scripture. Jer. 35:1-19. Travellers in the East have met with people who trace their origin to Rechab, and who appeal to the scripture as a proof of God having preserved them. There are still about 60,000 of them, dwelling in tents in the oases of the desert.

qubbah, occurring only in Num. 25:8. With the patriarchs their 'tent' was their dwelling place as far as they had any, easily moved from place to place as the cattle needed fresh pasture. On Israel entering the land the tents gave way to houses in the cities: as the Christian's 'tabernacle' will give place to the 'house' above. 2 Cor. 5:1.

In Jeremiah 35, the obedience of the Rechabites is set before the men of Judah to make them feel that some men, at least, showed more reverence for an earthly father than Israel showed for God Himself. The Rechabites were a certain class of Arabs — Bedouins of the desert, as we say — who were true to the requisition of their father. He had bound them neither to build houses nor to drink wine, and these men had carried out the will of their father for a long time.

Now when the Rechabites sought refuge in Jerusalem because of Nebuchadnezzar, their fidelity to their father's request is used as a solemn condemnation of the disobedience of the children of Judah. The inhabitants of Jerusalem were bidden to accept instruction from the sight of these Rechabites who even in the time of the impending siege would not depart from the regulations of their father. They might have pleaded the circumstances as an excuse for disobeying at that time, but they remained faithful to their fathers. "And Jeremiah said to the house of the Rechabites, Thus says Jehovah of hosts, the God of Israel; because ye have obeyed the commandment of Jonadab your father, and kept all his precepts, and done according to all that he has commanded you: therefore thus says Jehovah of hosts, the God of Israel: Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to stand before Me for ever" (verses 18, 19). And I have no doubt that the Lord is preserving a portion of this very race to this day.

At present Trans-Jordan is governed by a native Emir, assisted by a British Resident. It is practically an Arab country, covering about 90,000 square kilometres, backward, poor, the home of mostly nomadic Bedouins to the number of about 320,000.

From Rameses, first passing through the land of Goshen, they went to Succoth; then the whole host swept along the green valley between the hills, and beside the Sweet Water Canal towards the lakes of Pithom and "Pharaoh's farm," where the nomads, the wandering tribes, were permitted to pitch their tents "in order to feed themselves and to feed their cattle in the great estate of Pharaoh."

The Bedouin Arabs are doubtless the descendants of Ishmael. They are wild men in the sense of their love of freedom, dwelling in tents, and riding over the desert, spear in hand. They truly are 'against every man,' robbing every one when they can do so with safety to themselves. The Bedouins will not admit their descent from Ishmael; they refer his descendants to the Most (or mixed) Arabians, because Ishmael's mother was an Egyptian. The Bedouins claim to have descended from Joktan, son of Eber. Gen. 10:25.

Some unknown people who furnished troops to Shishak when he invaded Judah. 2 Chr. 12:3. Gesenius suggests the meaning to be 'dwellers in tents.' If so, some tribe of Arabs may be alluded to.

Midian, a son of Abraham by Keturah, is, as we have seen, in Gen. 25, in common with his other children, the witness and pledge of how the nations of the earth will find blessing at last in him. It is a picture of blessing, where Ishmael, as another son, comes in also as representing Israel themselves in the same millennial day. The history, however, both of Ishmael and Midian (as man's history everywhere) speaks something very different from God's grace. These two also are connected — in some sense, identified — in Scripture (Gen. 37:28; Judges 8:24), as we shall presently see. Midian in this way stands for the world, as its history has characterized it, and the name corresponds to this, meaning "strife." "The corruption that is in the world" is "through lust" (2 Peter 1:4); and "whence come wars and fightings among you? come they not hence, even of your lusts which war in your members?" (James 4:1.) And especially do the lusts in the members war against Christ, and thus against the Church of Christ. These Midianites — "Midian" is supposed by some to have real connection with the modern word "Bedouin" — were Arab raiders, wandering pillagers, locust-like devouring what they had no will to produce, as the story here shows; and this is what the world is when admitted into the professing church: it has no community of interest in it, but the reverse; the effect is mere desolation. The Israelites were forced by the Midianites into dens and caves and fastnesses; and so, literally, have the true followers of the Lord in the times of the world-church, when rule was ravage merely, and when the "produce of the land" — the heavenly fruits of life, and the seed of the word from which they spring — were the special objects of the spoilers' pursuit.