What is the Wilderness of Sin?

The district lying between the Red Sea and Sinai, in some part of which the Israelites encamped. Ex. 16:1; Ex. 17:1; Num. 33:11-12.

A district far south of Judah, lying between the Dead Sea and the Gulf of Akaba, in which Kadesh was situated, and in which a great part of the wanderings of the Israelites occurred. Num. 13:21; Num. 20:1; Num. 27:14; Num. 33:36; Num. 34:3-4; Deut. 32:51; Joshua 15:1, 3. It must not be confounded with the Wilderness of Sin (which lies along the south-east coast of the Red Sea).

"And they took their journey from Elim, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came unto the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departing out of the land of Egypt. And the whole congregation of the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness: and the children of Israel said unto them, Would to God we had died by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat by the flesh pots, and when we did eat bread to the full! for ye have brought us forth into this wilderness, to kill this whole assembly with hunger." (vv. 1-3.)

The wilderness of Sin lay "between Elim and Sinai." It occupied therefore, as indeed has already been indicated, a very special place in the history of the children of Israel. Elim would ever remind them of one of their most blessed experiences, and the journey likewise to Sinai would recall to their minds a period distinguished by long-suffering and grace in God's dealings with them; whereas Sinai would be ever engraven on their memories in connection with the majesty and holiness of the law. Up till Sinai, it was what God was for them in His mercy and love; but from that time the ground, by their own action, was changed into what they were for God. This is the difference between grace and law; and hence the peculiar interest attaching to the journey between Elim and Sinai. But whether under grace or law, the flesh remained the same, and took every opportunity of revealing its corrupt and incurable character. Again the whole congregation murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness. (v. 2.) They had done so at Pi-hahiroth, when they saw the army of Pharaoh approaching; they repeated their sin at Marah, because the waters were bitter; and now they complain again because of their pilgrim fare. "They soon forgat His works; they waited not for His counsel; but lusted exceedingly in the wilderness, and tempted God in the desert." (Psalm 106:13-14.) The recollection of Egypt and Egypt's food possessed their hearts, and forgetful of the bitter bondage with which this had been connected, they looked back with longing eyes. How often this is the case with newly-emancipated souls. There must always be hunger in the wilderness; for the flesh can find no gratification for its own desires, or satisfaction in its toils and hardships. It is the place where the flesh must be tested. The Lord "humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest not, neither did thy fathers know, that He might make thee know that man doth not live by bread only, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of the Lord doth man live." (Deut. 8:3.) This is the conflict. The flesh craves that which will meet its desires, but if we are delivered from Egypt this cannot be allowed: the flesh must be refused, looked upon as already judged in the death of Christ; and therefore we are debtors not to the flesh, to live after the flesh, for if we live after the flesh we shall die: but if we through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body we shall live. (Rom. 8:12-13.) But the Lord, as we have seen in Deuteronomy, has His object in suffering us to hunger; it is to wean us from the flesh pots of Egypt, and to attract us to Himself — to teach us that true satisfaction and sustenance can only be found in Himself and His word. The contrast is therefore between the flesh pots of Egypt, and Christ; and very blessed is it when the soul learns that Christ is enough for all its needs. In their unbelief the children of Israel charged Moses with the design of killing them with hunger. But their hunger was intended to create in them another appetite, by which alone their true life could be sustained. The Lord, however, gave them their request, even though He sent leanness into their soul. For, as will be seen, He gave them the quails as well as the manna.

"And they took their journey from Elim, and all the congregation of the children of Israel came to the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departure out of the land of Egypt." (Chap. 16:1) Here we find Israel in a very marked and interesting position. It is still the wilderness, no doubt, but it is a most important and significant stage thereof, namely, "between Elim and Sinai." The former was the place where they had so recently experienced the refreshing springs of divine ministry; the latter was the place where they entirely got off the ground of free and sovereign grace, and placed themselves under a covenant of works. These facts render "the wilderness of Sin" a singularly interesting portion of Israel's journey. Its features and influences are as strongly marked as those of any point in their whole career. They are here seen as the subjects of the same grace which had brought them up out of the land of Egypt, and, therefore, all their murmurings are instantly met by divine supplies. When God acts in the display of His grace, there is no hindrance. The streams of blessing which emanate from Him, flow onward without interruption. It is only when man puts himself under law that he forfeits everything; for then God must allow him to prove how much he can claim on the ground of his own works.

The opening words of this chapter are simple yet cannot fail to arrest the attention of the careful reader. "And they journeyed from Elim, and the whole assembly of the children of Israel came into the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai." Elim would remind them of the place where they had rested and been refreshed according to the tender compassions of their God whose "compassions fail not," while Sinai would cause them to remember those awe-inspiring evidences of the holiness and majesty of that law, obedience to which they had fatally pledged themselves as the basis of their relationships with God. Up to that stage of their journey every circumstance served only to display what God was for them in all His matchless, long-suffering and unwearied love. From Sinai, by assuming this place of responsibility, the whole character of their relations with God was completely changed, and placed on an entirely different footing. It was no longer a question of what God was for them, but of what they should be for God. This brings out the great distinction between grace and law, and thus invests the journey between Elim and Sinai with a peculiar interest for those who desire to be instructed as to these two weighty and contrastive truths with which the Spirit has dealt so exhaustively in the word of God.

With the place of this encampment settled beyond controversy, we pursue on the map the direction of the lower road to Horeb. We have followed it across the Wady Useit and seen it enter the Wady Taiyibeh. The road now works round by the shore, at times leaving but little space between the cliffs and the water, and then crosses the "barren flinty plain of" El Markha. This may be regarded as the Wilderness of Sin, which was Israel's next encampment.

Just one month following the Passover in Egypt, Israel, leaving the refreshment of Elim's oasis, came into “the wilderness of sin” (v. 1). Sin means “thorn,” and a thorn is an aborted attempt to bear fruit, which issues rather in that which is harmful and painful. In our Christian history too we find that the world through which we pass is a wilderness full of thorns, or in other words, “the sin which so easily ensnares us” (Heb. 12:1).

Israel's reaction to this barrenness and lack of food was to give way to their sinful nature and complain against Moses and Aaron (v. 2). How sadly we resemble Israel! Certainly this selfish murmuring would not produce food or any other good result. But the trials of the wilderness bring out such foolish workings of sin in our own hearts. They say they wish they had died in the land of Egypt while they sat by the fleshpots and had plenty to eat. But they forgot the rigorous bondage under which they had suffered with bitter complaints! They accuse Moses and Aaron of bringing them out of Egypt, though only recently they had sung in triumph to the Lord, thanking Him for His great deliverance. How is it possible that their eyes had become so dim, and in so short a time? Just recently too God had told Moses to throw a tree into the bitter waters of Marah and they became sweet. Why did they not simply appeal in faith to God on this fresh occasion of need? Complaining is not trusting God.

(1) It is in the wilderness of Sin where the manna falls for the first time, and the numerical stamp seems to emphasize its meaning. "Sin" is connected with seneh, a "thorn-bush," the word used for that in which God revealed Himself to Moses. We are familiar already with the thorn as the sign of the ground cursed for man's sake, and we must not surely forget it here. Yet here both the numerical place and the lesson of the whole chapter seem to insist upon another character of a "wilderness of thorn." Of Palestine in its present state Tristram says, "The combined heat and dryness of the climate seem to develop a tendency to form thorns, even in groups like the astragalus, where we should least expect them. All plants become more spiny in rocky and parched situations, the expansive effort which under moister conditions would develop a bough with leaf or blossom being arrested, and forming merely a barren thorn or spine. "No picture could be more striking than this: the sun smiting, the genial heavenly influence become a scorching heat, water — the type of the Spirit — withheld, the barren soil with its vegetation running into weapons of offense: such is the world as the place of need into which the Son of God came as Son of man.

After they removed from Elim, they encamped by the Red Sea (Numbers 33:10). They came into the wilderness of sin. The Hebrew word means "thorn," the bush in which Jehovah had appeared to Moses in the Hebrew is "Sineh," a thornbush. The second murmuring takes place. This gives a deep glimpse into the desperately wicked condition of the human heart. God had brought them out of the house of bondage; they wished themselves back. God had sheltered them beneath the blood; they wished the judgment might have carried them away. They were ready to leave the ground of redemption, guided by Jehovah, and turn back to Pharaoh to become slaves once more. What infinite patience and grace the Lord manifested toward them. All this is repeated in the lives of many believers. It need not to be so and it will not, if Christ and the redemption we have in Him as well as our glorious inheritance which is before us, is a reality in our lives.

Heaven offers now to minister to the daily need of such a people. The glory of the Lord was seen again out of the cloud (verse 7, 10). The bread from Heaven was given. It is described as small in size, round, white like coriander seed, like wafers made with honey and hard. Rationalists have tried to explain the giving of this bread in a natural way. In a certain part of the desert is found a tree from which exudes at certain times an eatable gum and falls to the ground in the form of small cakes; this, it is claimed, explains the manna. But they do not explain how it is that the Israelites received the manna in every part of the desert, that they received it in such immense quantities that the hundred thousands were fed by it and it lasted for forty years. It ceased as miraculously as it was given (Josh. 5:12). The word "manna" is from the Hebrew "Man-hu," the question, "What is that?" It is designated as the bread from heaven (Psalm 78:24; 105:40). Our Lord speaks of it as the bread from heaven in John 6, a chapter which is of importance in connection with the typical meaning of the manna. But quails were given first and in the morning dew, and after it arose, the manna. The quails and the manna are both the types of Christ, the food for God's people. The dew after which the manna is seen, speaks of the Holy Spirit, who ministers Christ. Each gathered the bread which had come down according to his eating. Each got what he wanted, and not more. So Christ meets the need we have of Him if only our need of Him were greater and felt more.

On the fifteenth day of the second month, Israel reached the Wilderness of Sin (Ex. 16:1) (or the Thorn-bush), and began a fresh round of time after their departure from Rameses. At this place and time their first great uprising against their leader and their God occurred "the whole congregation… murmured." (ver. 2.) Their stores of food brought out of Egypt had come to an end, and they complained bitterly, "We sat by the flesh-pots and… did eat bread to the full;" and as they looked upon the barren place around them, they declared "Ye have brought us forth into this wilderness to kill this whole assembly with hunger." (ver. 3.)