Manna
Manna, sometimes or archaically spelled mana, is described in the Bible and the Quran as an edible substance that God bestowed upon the Israelites while they were wandering the desert during the 40-year period that followed the Exodus and preceded the conquest of Canaan.
Description
Biblical narrative
In the Hebrew Bible, manna is described twice: once in Exodus 16:1–36 with the full narrative surrounding it, and once again in Numbers 11:1–9 as a part of a separate narrative. In the description in the Book of Exodus, manna is described as being "a fine, flake-like thing" like the frost on the ground. It is described in the Book of Numbers as arriving with the dew during the night. Exodus adds that it had to be collected before it was melted by the heat of the Sun, and that it was like a coriander seed in size, but white in colour.Numbers describes it as having the appearance of bdellium, adding that the Israelites ground it and pounded it into cakes, which were then baked, resulting in something that tasted like cakes baked with oil. Exodus states that raw manna tasted like wafers that had been made with honey. The Israelites were instructed to eat only the manna they had gathered for each day. Stored manna "bred worms and stank", the exception being that stored the day before the Sabbath, when twice the amount of manna was gathered. This manna did not spoil overnight. Exodus 16:23–24 states:
This is what the commanded: "Tomorrow is to be a day of rest, a holy Sabbath to the. So bake what you want to bake and boil what you want to boil. Save whatever is left and keep it until morning". So they saved it until morning, as Moses commanded, and it did not stink or get maggots in it.
Quranic narrative
The word mana appears three times in the Quran, at 2:57, 7:160, and 20:80. It is narrated in Sahih Muslim that Muhammad said: "Truffles are part of the 'manna' which God sent to the people of Israel through Moses, and its juice is a medicine for the eye."Author Steven Hager has suggested manna is nothing more than hempseed flour ground in a mortar and pestle and baked into matzo. This is based on the identification of it looking like coriander seeds, which hemp seeds greatly resemble. Hager suggests the tiny seeds were best plucked in early morning by children because their little fingers could easily pluck the small seeds. The fact hemp survives drought better than almost any other plant, and grows the fastest, longest tap root, made it an ideal source of food during droughts, which is why the Russian peasants lived on it in times of famine. Hempseed is also a complete form for food with an unrivaled essential nutrient profile.
Identification
In the biblical account, the name Manna is said to derive from the question "man hu?", seemingly meaning "What is it?", which is perhaps derived from Aramaic, not Hebrew. Man is possibly cognate with the Arabic term man, meaning aphids, with man hu thus meaning "this is aphids", which fits one widespread modern identification of manna as the crystallized honeydew of certain scale insects. In the environment of a desert, such honeydew rapidly dries due to evaporation of its water content, becoming a sticky solid, and later turning whitish, yellowish, or brownish.In particular, there is a scale insect that feeds on tamarisk, the Tamarisk manna scale, the secretions of which are often considered to be the prime candidate for biblical manna. At the turn of the twentieth century, Arabs of the Sinai Peninsula were selling this substance as man es-simma من السما, roughly meaning "heavenly manna". Tamarisk trees were once comparatively extensive throughout the southern Sinai, and the honeydew produced by the Tamarisk manna scale is similar to wax, melts in the sun, is sweet and aromatic, and has a dirty-yellow color, fitting somewhat with the biblical descriptions of manna. However, being mostly composed of sugar, it would be unlikely to provide sufficient nutrition for a population to survive over long periods of time, and it would be very difficult for it to have been compacted into cakes.
Another type of honeydew is turkey oak manna, also called Persian gezengevi-gezo, men, Turkish kudret helvasi, man-es-simma, also Diarbekir manna, or Kurdish manna. It is formed by aphids and appears white. It was common in western Iran, northern Iraq and eastern Turkey. When dried it forms into crystalline lumps which are hard and look like stone. They are pounded before inclusion in breads.
Some scholars have proposed that manna is cognate with the Egyptian term mennu, which designated a substance that figured in offerings; a white aromatic plant that smelled of antiu.
Other researchers have believed manna to be a form of lichen a plant-like colony that often has a low mass per unit volume density and a large "sail area". In particular, Lecanora esculenta has been postulated. Known natural aerial falls of various lichens have been described as occurring in accounts separate from that in the Bible. "In some parts of Asia Lecanora esculenta covers the soil to such a degree that, according to Parrot, it forms beds 15 to 20 centimetres thick."
In 1921, the American consul in Jerusalem reported to the American government that he had identified manna as a "form of dew" that "hardens and assumes the form of a grain" when it falls on the leaves of oak trees.
Differences
Some form critics posit conflicting descriptions of manna as derived from different lore, with the description in Numbers being from the Jahwist tradition, and the description in Exodus being from the later Priestly tradition. The Babylonian Talmud states that the differences in description were due to the taste varying depending on who ate it, with it tasting like honey for small children, like bread for youths, and like oil for the elderly. Similarly, classical rabbinical literature rectifies the question of whether manna came before or after dew, by holding that the manna was sandwiched between two layers of dew, one falling before the manna, and the other after.Origin
Manna is from Heaven, according to the Hebrew Bible and to Jesus in the New Testament, but the various identifications of manna are naturalistic. In the Mishnah, manna is treated as a natural but unique substance, "created during the twilight of the sixth day of Creation", and ensured to be clean, before it arrives, by the sweeping of the ground by a northern wind and subsequent rains. According to classical rabbinical literature, manna was ground in a heavenly mill for the use of the righteous, but some of it was allocated to the wicked and left for them to grind themselves.Use and function
Until they reached Canaan, the Israelites are implied by some passages in the Bible to have eaten only manna during their desert sojourn, despite the availability of milk and meat from the livestock with which they traveled, and the references to provisions of fine flour, oil, and meat, in parts of the journey's narrative.As a natural food substance, manna would produce waste products; but in classical rabbinical literature, as a supernatural substance, it was held that manna produced no waste, resulting in no defecation among the Israelites until several decades later, when the manna had ceased to fall. Modern medical science suggests the lack of defecation over such a long period of time would cause severe bowel problems, especially when other food later began to be consumed again. Classical rabbinical writers say that the Israelites complained about the lack of defecation, and were concerned about potential bowel problems.
Many Christian vegetarians say that God had originally intended that man would not eat meat, because plants cannot move and killing them would not be sinful: manna, a non-meat substance, is used to support this theory. Further, when the people complained and wished for quail, God gave it to them, but they apparently still complained and some greedily gathered the quail. "While the meat was still between their teeth, before it was chewed, the anger of the Lord was kindled against the people."
Food was not manna's only use; one classical rabbinical source states that the fragrant odor of manna was used in a Jewish perfume.
Gathering
Exodus says each day one omer of manna was gathered per family member, and may imply this was regardless of how much effort was put into gathering it. A midrash attributed to Rabbi Tanhuma remarks that although some were diligent enough to go into the fields to gather manna, others just lay down lazily and caught it with their outstretched hands. The Talmud states that this factor was used to solve disputes about the ownership of slaves, since the number of omers of manna each household could gather would indicate how many people were legitimately part of the household. The omers of manna for stolen slaves could be gathered only by legitimate owners, and therefore legitimate owners would have spare omers of manna.According to the Talmud, manna was found near the homes of those with strong belief in God, and far from the homes of those with doubts; indeed, one classical midrash says that manna was intangible to Gentiles, as it would inevitably slip from their hands. The Midrash Tanhuma holds that manna melted, formed liquid streams, was drunk by animals, flavored the animal flesh, and was thus indirectly eaten by Gentiles, this being the only way that Gentiles could taste manna.
Despite these hints of uneven distribution, classical rabbinical literature expresses the view that manna fell in very large quantities each day. It holds that manna was layered out over 2,000 cubits square, between 50 and 60 cubits in height, enough to nourish the Israelites for 2,000 years and to be seen from the palaces of every king in the East and West.