The Emancipation of Massachusetts. Adams Brooks

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СКАЧАТЬ a nation of lepers. And in the camp the regulations touching them were strict and numerous. But the Jews were always a dirty race.

      In chapter XIII of Leviticus, elaborate directions are given as to how the patient shall be brought before Aaron himself, or at least some other of the priests, who was to examine the sore and, if it proved to be a probable case of leprosy, the patient was to be excluded from the camp for a week. At the end of that time the disease, if malignant, was supposed to show signs of spreading, in which case there was no cure and the patient was condemned to civil death. On the contrary, if no virulent symptoms developed during the week, the patient was pronounced clean and returned to ordinary life.

      The miracle in the case of Miriam was this: When the cloud departed from off the tabernacle, Miriam was found to be “leprous, white as snow,” just as Moses’ hand was found to be white with leprosy after his conversation with the Lord at the burning bush. Upon this Aaron, who had been as guilty as Miriam, and was proportionately nervous, made a prayer to Moses: “Alas, my lord, I beseech thee, lay not the sin upon us, wherein we have done foolishly.... Let her not be as one dead.

      “And Moses cried unto the Lord, saying, Heal her now, O God, I beseech thee.”

      But the Lord replied: “If her father had but spit in her face, should she not be ashamed seven days? Let her be shut out from the camp seven days, and after that let her be received in again.”

      This was the Mosaic system of discipline. And it was serious for all parties concerned. Evidently it was very serious for Miriam, who had to leave her tent and be exiled to some spot in the desert, where she had to shift for herself. We all know the almost intolerable situation of those unfortunates who, in the East, are excluded from social intercourse, and sit without the gate, and are permitted to approach no one. But it was also a serious infliction for the congregation, since Miriam was a personage of consequence, and had to be waited for. That is to say, a million or two of people had to delay their pilgrimage until Moses had determined how much punishment Miriam deserved for her insubordination, and this was a question which lay altogether within the discretion of Moses. In that age there were at least seven varieties of eruptions which could hardly, if at all, be distinguished, in their early stages, from leprosy, and it was left to Moses to say whether or not Miriam had been attacked by true leprosy or not. There was no one, apparently, to question his judgment, for, since Jethro had left the camp, there was no one to controvert the Mosaic opinion on matters such as these. Doubtless Moses was content to give Aaron and Miriam a fright; but also Moses intended to make them understand that they lay absolutely at his mercy.

      After this outbreak of discontent had been thus summarily suppressed and Miriam had been again received as “clean,” the caravan resumed its march and entered into the wilderness of Paran, which adjoined Palestine, and from whence an invasion of Canaan, if one were to be attempted, would be organized. Accordingly Moses appointed a reconnaissance, who in the language of the Bible are called “spies,” to examine the country, report its condition, and decide whether an attack were feasible.

      On this occasion Moses seems to have remembered the lesson he learned at Sinai. He did not undertake to leave the camp himself for a long interval. He sent the men whom he supposed he could best trust, among whom were Joshua and Caleb. These men, who corresponded to what, in a modern army, would be called the general-staff, were not sent to manufacture a report which they might have reason to suppose would be pleasing to Moses, but to state precisely what they saw and heard together with their conclusions thereon, that they might aid their commander in an arduous campaign; and this duty they seem, honestly enough, to have performed. But this was very far from satisfying Moses, who wanted to make a strenuous offensive, and yet sought some one else to take the responsibility therefor.

      The spies were absent six weeks and when they returned were divided in opinion. They all agreed that Canaan was a good land, and, in verity, flowing with milk and honey. But the people, most of them thought, were too strong to be successfully attacked. “The cities were walled and very great,” and moreover “we saw the children of Anak there.”

      “The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south; and the Hittites, and the Jebusites, and the Amorites, dwell in the mountains; and the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and by the coast of Jordan.

      “And Caleb stilled the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once, … for we are well able to overcome it.

      “But the men that went up with him said, We be not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we.

      “And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had searched, … saying, … all the people that we saw in it are men of great stature.

      “And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, … and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so were we in their sight.”

      Had Moses been gifted with military talent, or with any of the higher instincts of the soldier, he would have arranged to have received this report in private and would then have acted as he thought best. Above all he would have avoided anything like a council of war by the whole congregation, for a vast popular meeting of that kind was certain to become unmanageable the moment a division appeared in their command, upon a difficult question of policy.

      Moses did just the opposite. He convened the people to hear the report of the “spies.” And immediately the majority became dangerously depressed, not to say mutinous.

      “And all the congregation lifted up their voice, and cried; and the people wept that night.

      “And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron: and the whole congregation said unto them, Would God that we had died in the land of Egypt! Or would God we had died in this wilderness!…

      “And they said one to another, Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt.

      “Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel.”

      But Joshua, who was a soldier, when Moses thus somewhat ignominiously collapsed, retained his presence of mind and his energy. He and Caleb “rent their clothes,” and reiterated their advice.

      “And they spake unto all the company of the children of Israel, saying, The land which we passed through to search it, is an exceeding good land.

      “If the Lord delight in us, then he will bring us into this land, and give it us; a land which floweth with milk and honey.

      “Only rebel not ye against the Lord, neither fear ye the people of the land; for they are bread for us: their defence is departed from them… fear them not.

      “But all the congregation bade stone them with stones.”

      By this time Moses seems to have recovered some composure. Enough, at least, to repeat certain violent threats of the “Lord.”

      Nothing is so impressive in all this history as the difference between Moses when called upon to take responsibility as a military commander, and Moses when, not to mince matters, he acted as a quack. On the one hand, he was all vacillation, timidity, and irritability. On the other, all temerity and effrontery.

      In this particular emergency, which touched his very life, Moses vented his disappointment and vexation in a number of interviews which he pretended to have had with the “Lord,” and which he retailed to the congregation, just at the moment when they needed, as Joshua perceived, to be steadied and encouraged.

      “How long,” vociferated the Lord, when Moses had got back his power of speech, “will this people provoke me? and how long will it be ere they believe me, for all the signs which I have shewed among them?

      “I СКАЧАТЬ