The Pulpit Commentary — Exodus — Volume 2 — Section 63

God c:m, and will, break through the greatest outward hindrances and impediments (cf. Is. xuv. 6). IV. TEMPTING Goo. "They tempted the Lord, saying, Is the Lord amoncr us o:- not?" (ver. 7). The peculiarity of this sin of Rephidim deserves to be carefully noted. Rephidim, it is true, is not the only instance of it; but it is the outstanding and typical one, and, as such, is frequently alluded to in Scripture (cf. Deut. vi. 16; Ps. xcv. 8, 8; Heb. iii. 8, 9). The allusion in Ps. lxxviii. 18, 19-" They tempted God in their heart by asking meat for their lust. Yea, they spake against God ; they said, Can Gu<l furnish a table in the wilderness?" is to the incident in .Num. xi. Comparing the different scripture references to this sin of "tempting," it will be found that both in the Old ancl New Testaments, it is invariably connected with the idea of proposinq tests to God, of putting him in some way u, the proof, of prescribing to him conditions of action, compliance or non-compliance with which is to settle the question of his con- tinued right to our trust and obedience. It is the spirit which cl.allenges God, and is even peremptory in its demand that he shall do as it requires, if, forsooth, he is not to fall in its esteem. It is, as in the gospels (Matt. xvi. 1, etc.), the sign-suking spirit, which, not satisfied with the ordinary evidences, demands exceptional ones, and lays down conditions on which belief in the revealed word is to be made to depend. Cf. Renan's demand for "a commission, composed of physiologists, physicists, chemists, and persons accustomed to historical criticism," to sit in jud,,ament on the miracles (" Life of Jesus," Introduction). It is, in short, the spirit which requires from God proofs of his faithfulness and love other than those which he has been pleased to give us, and which even presumes to dictate to him what these proofs shall be. It is, therefore, a spirit which carries distrust on the face of it, and is, besides, daringly presumptuous and irreverent. This furnishes the key to Christ's second temptation in the wi ldemess. Jt was a temptation to put his father's care and faithfulness to the test by casting himself down from the pinnacle of .the temple (Matt. iv. 5----8). .And he repelled it h,· quoting the passage in Deuteronomy which alludes to this sin of Massah, " Ye sh.'\ll not tempt the Lord your God" (Deut. vi. 16). It is forgotten by those who are guilty of this sin, that God brings us into situations of trial, not that we may test him, but that he may test us. Professor Tyndall's proposal of a prayer-test may be cited as a not irrelevant illustration of the type of transgression referred to.---J. 0. Ver. 6.-" That rock was Christ." In the statement of Paul-" They drank of that spiritual Rock that followed them, and that Rock was Christ" (1 Cor. x. 4}-we have a clear assertion of the .typical character of this transaction at Rephidim. We may either suppose the term "Rock" in the first clause to be used by metonymy for the water which flowed from the rock, or we may understand the allusion to be to him of whom the rock was but a symbol, and who did accompany the Israelites in thei.. wanderings,·abundantly supplying their wants. The latter view, which conserves eh" grain of truth in the Rabbinical traditions above referred to, to which the apostle seems to make allusion, is most in keeping with the further statement, "that Rock was Christ." An interesting comparison is with the words of Christ himself, when, on "the ,ast day, that great day of the feast," he "stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto me and drink" (John vii. 37). The libation of water from the pool of Siloam, which was a ceremony connected with the feast of tabernacles, and which most commentators take to be the subject of Christ's allusion in these memorable words, was commemorative of this miraculous supply of water in the desert. Dr. Godet goes further, and takes this passage in Exodus to be itself the" scripture" (John vii. 38), and the bringing of the water from the rock the event, which Jesus had in view when he gave his invitation. "Why," he :1ays, "should not Jesus, instead of &topping at the ernblec, go bacii: to the Divine fact which this rite commemorated. . . . lie had in eh. ii. (of John's Gospel) represented himself as the true temple, in eh. iii. as the true brazen serpent, in eh. vi. as the bread of heaven; in eh. vii. he is the tme rock: in eh. viii. he will he the true li,.ht-giving cloud, and so on till eh. xix., wlien he will at length realise the type of the Paschal Lamb" (Godet on John vii. 3i). The points to be noted here are these :- I. HUMAN NATURE IS IN A CONDITION 01" THIRST. Its state is figured by that of the lsraolites in the desert. It thlrsts for a satisfaction which the world cannot gh-e it. EXODUS-II. 66 THE BOOK OF EXODUS. [cH. XVII, 1-i.