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Manna (2)

Hastings' Dictionary of the New Testament

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(μάννα)

1. Among the sacra contained in the Tabernacle the writer of Heb. mentions (Hebrews 9:4) the pot of manna, which Aaron was directed to lay up before the Lord as a perpetual memorial of the miraculous food whereby the Israelites were sustained in the wilderness (Exodus 16:33). The Heb. text does not describe the pot as golden, but the NT writer follows the Septuagint , which reads λάβε στάμνον χρυσοῦν ἕνα. In Solomon’s Temple the two tables of stone were the sole contents of the ark of the covenant (1 Kings 8:9), but the Rabbis assumed that the jar of manna was also deposited there, evidently basing their belief on the words ‘before the Lord.’

2. The Message to the Church of Pergamos (Revelation 2:12-17) contains the promise that he who overcomes-refusing at all costs to eat things sacrificed to idols-shall be fittingly rewarded by receiving the hidden manna to eat. There is here probably an allusion to the Jewish tradition that, before the Fall of Jerusalem, the ark and its sacred contents were removed by Jeremiah and hidden in a cave of Mount Sinai (2 Maccabees 2:1), from which they were to be restored to their place at the coming of the Messiah, when all the old miracles would be repeated. ‘And at that time,’ says Apoc. Bar. (xxix. 8), ‘the stores of manna shall descend again from above; and they shall eat of it in those years.’ After manna had come to be named ‘corn of heaven’ (Psalms 78:24), ‘bread of the mighty’ (Psalms 78:25), ‘heavenly bread’ (Psalms 105:40), panis angelorum (4 Ezr. 1:29), άγγέλων τροφή (Wisdom of Solomon 16:20), ἀμβροσία τροφή (Wisdom of Solomon 19:21), it was naturally regarded not merely as material nourishment but as ‘spiritual food’ (βρῶμα πνευματικόν [1 Corinthians 10:3]). Like the bread of Christ’s own miracles, it had sacramental value, feeding the soul as well as the body (cf. John 6:31-33).

James Strahan.