Commentary on Harmony of the Law Volume 1 Complete John Calvin
JOHN CALVIN
33. And Moses said unto Aaron, Take a pot, and put an omer full of manna therein, and lay it up before the Lord, to be kept for your generations.
33. Et ait Moses ad Aharon, Tolle urnam unam, et pone in ea homer integrum man, et repone illud coram Jehova in custodiam in aetates vestras.
34. As the Lord commanded Moses, so Aaron laid it up before the Testimony, to be kept.
34. Sicut praeceperat Jehova Mosi, reposuit illud Aharon coram testimenio in custodiam.
35. And the children of Israel did eat manna forty years, until they came to a land inhabited: they did eat manna until they came unto the borders of the land of Canaan.
35. Et comederunt filii Israel man quadraginta annis, donec venissent in terram habitandam: man ipsum comederunt, donec venissent ad terminum terrae Chanaan.
36. Now an omer is the tenth part of an ephah.
36. Porro homer est decima pars epha.
31. And the house of Israel called. It is not without reason that Moses repeats what he had said before, that the name of Manna was given to the new kind of food which God had supplied, in order that they might be brought under condemnation for their stubborn impiety, who shall dare to raise a question on so manifest a point, since the conspicuous nature of the thing had extorted this name from people otherwise malicious and ungrateful. Its form is mentioned to prove the certainty of the miracle, viz., that its grains were round and like coriander-seed, because nothing like it had been seen before. Its taste reproves the people's ingratitude in rejecting a food which was not only appropriate and wholesome, but also very sweet in savor.
32. And Moses said. Moses does not proceed with the history in order, but by interposing these circumstances by anticipation, he the more confirms the fact that this food was then created for the people by God's special bounty, because He desired an omer of it to be preserved as a memorial, which, undergoing no putrefaction, handed down to posterity the gloriousness of the miracle. And first, he propounds generally God's command, and then, in the next verse, describes the manner in which it was done, viz., that Aaron put it in a bottle or pot, and laid it up by the Ark of the Covenant. Whence, too, it appears how high importance God would have attached to this His bounty, since he wished its memorial to