SEV Biblia, Chapter 11:31
¶ Y salió un viento del SEÑOR, y trajo codornices del mar, y las dejó sobre el campamento, un día de camino a un lado, y un día de camino al otro, en derredor del campamento, y casi dos codos sobre la faz de la tierra.
Clarke's Bible Commentary - Numbers 11:31
Verse 31. A wind from the Lord] An extraordinary one, not the effect of a natural cause. And brought quails, a bird which in great companies visits Egypt about the time of the year, March or April, at which the circumstance marked here took place. Mr. Hasselquist, the friend and pupil of the famous Linnaeus, saw many of them about this time of the year, when he was in Egypt. See his Travels, p. 209. Two cubits high upon the face of the earth.] We may consider the quails as flying within two cubits of the ground; so that the Israelites could easily take as many of them as they wished, while flying within the reach of their hands or their clubs. The common notion is, that the quails were brought round about the camp, and fell there in such multitudes as to lie two feet thick upon the ground; but the Hebrew will not bear this version. The Vulgate has expressed the sense, Volabantque in aere duobus cubitis altitudine super terram. "And they flew in the air, two cubits high above the ground."
John Gill's Bible Commentary
Ver. 31. And there went forth a wind from the Lord , etc.] Both an east wind and a south wind, according to ( Psalm 78:26); either first one wind, and then another; one to bring the quails, or whatever are meant, to a certain point, and then the other to bring them to the camp of Israel; or a southeast wind, as the Jewish writers interpret it: however, it was not a common wind, but what was immediately raised by the Lord for the following purpose: and brought quails from the sea ; the Red sea, from the coasts of it, not out of it. Josephus says, there were great numbers of this sort of fowl about the gulf of Arabia; and Diodorus Siculus says, near Rhinocalura, a place not far from those parts, quails in flocks were brought from the sea, which the people caught and lived upon. After Job Ludolphus, who has wrote a learned dissertation on locusts, many are of opinion with him, that locusts are intended here, and think that what is hereafter related best agrees with them; it is pretty difficult to determine which is most correct; there are learned advocates, and much to be said, for both f136 : and let [them] fall by the camp : the camp of Israel, and round about it on all sides, as follows; which agrees well enough with locusts, which are usually brought by a wind, as the locusts of Egypt were by an east wind, which fall, rest, and settle on the earth, and sometimes in heaps, one upon another; and these, whatever they were, fell as thick as rain, and were as dust, and as the sand of the sea. The Jewish writers, who understand them of quails, interpret this not of their falling to the ground, but of their flying low, two cubits from the earth, about the breast of a man, so that they had no trouble in taking them; so the Targum of Jonathan, Jarchi, Ben Gersom, and Abendana; but this seems to be without any foundation: as it were a day’s journey on this side, and as it were a day’s journey on the other side, round about the camp ; on the north side, and on the south side, as the Targum of Jonathan explains it; but it doubtless means on all sides, since they fell round about the camp; and from thence they lay thick upon the ground, a day’s journey every way; which some compute at sixteen, others at twenty miles on which space there must be a prodigious number of quails or locusts; and it is certain the latter do come in great numbers, so as to darken the air, and to cover a country, as they did Egypt; and the quails also, in some countries, have been taken in great numbers; in Italy, on the coast of Antium, within a month, in the space of five miles, 100,000 quails were taken every day f137 : and as it were two cubits [high] upon the face of the earth ; as they fell they lay one upon another, the height of two cubits; which it is thought better agrees with locusts than with quails, since the quails, by lying one upon another such a depth, must be suffocated; whereas the locusts, through the length of their feet, and the thinness of their wings, would not.
Matthew Henry Commentary
Verses 31-35 - God performed his promise to the people, in giving them flesh. How muc more diligent men are in collecting the meat that perishes, than i labouring for meat which endures to everlasting life! We ar quick-sighted in the affairs of time; but stupidity blinds us as to the concerns of eternity. To pursue worldly advantages, we need n arguments; but when we are to secure the true riches, then we are all forgetfulness. Those who are under the power of a carnal mind, wil have their lusts fulfilled, though it be to the certain damage and rui of their precious souls. They paid dearly for their feasts. God ofte grants the desires of sinners in wrath, while he denies the desires of his own people in love. What we unduly desire, if we obtain it, we have reason to fear, will be some way or other a grief and cross to us. An what multitudes there are in all places, who shorten their lives by excess of one kind or other! Let us seek for those pleasures whic satisfy, but never surfeit; and which will endure for evermore __________________________________________________________________
Original Hebrew
ורוח 7307 נסע 5265 מאת 853 יהוה 3068 ויגז 1468 שׂלוים 7958 מן 4480 הים 3220 ויטשׁ 5203 על 5921 המחנה 4264 כדרך 1870 יום 3117 כה 3541 וכדרך 1870 יום 3117 כה 3541 סביבות 5439 המחנה 4264 וכאמתים 520 על 5921 פני 6440 הארץ׃ 776
