Hebrew Word Study – Bread of Heaven – Lechem Shamayim

Psalm 78:24-25: “And had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them of the corn of heaven.  Man did eat angels’ food: he sent them meat to the full.”

If you read the context of this passage, you will find it relates to the story of the children of Israel when they got tired of eating manna, and they called out to God for more meat in their diet.  God said: “You want meat, I’ll give you meat but don’t come bellyaching to me.” What the children of Israel did not know that we know today is that dead birds become filled with nasty germs if left in the sun too long, and if you eat it, you will get sick and maybe even die.

Well, after all, it came from God it had to be okay, right? God wants you to prosper, eat, and enjoy.  Many did eat, and many died. But they ate in their lust, and while the meat was still in their mouths, they fell victim to the hidden world of microbes (verses 30-31).

Stop and consider this, the people of God knew that He does answer prayer, even if prayed in your own lust. The only problem is that if you pray in your lust, you might have to suffer some consequences.  You can pray for a specific job, and God will answer that prayer, but if you prayed in your own lust, you may find that job will eat away at you with the microbes of stress, time, and peace of mind. The old saying: “Be careful what you pray for, is more true than we realize as clearly shown in this passage.”

Yet, these people had some discernment.  They knew what the manna was all about, that is it was more, much more than physical nourishment. The word manna is ma’n in Hebrew.  Ma’n is often used as an interrogative for who, what, where, when, or whosoever.   In Exodus 16:15, it was called ma’nhu which means whatness or what is this.  The word manna itself means to be numbered or portioned out.  Whatever it was, it was to be carefully portioned out.  If you didn’t, you ended up with spoiled manna the next morning.

Now we must carefully note that it is the people who called it ma’n. God called it in Exodus 16 lechem shamayim, which means bread of heaven.  This is a rare time in Scripture that the word shamayim does not have the definite article Hei or the.  This was not manufactured in the sky.  The syntax of Psalms 78:25 would suggest it was not the food that angels ate but food that the angels personally carried from heaven and laid out for the people every morning. God not only provided food for his children, but he also had angels serving as waiters.

He also gave them corn of heaven. This is the same as manna, but God uses a different word.   The word corn is degan, which is a metonymy, that is a figure of speech where one word replaces another closely related word for bread, so why did God use degan instead of manna?   The word degan not only means corn or bread but also means to be ready, available, and complete.  Pause here a second.  Degan means to be complete, total. The Talmud teaches that this was the perfect food.  In other words, there was no waste created by this food.  It was ready and available. If eaten in the prescribed time, it would be that perfect food.  If you will forgive my political incorrectness, they never had to go to the potty.  This was important; with a million people packed together, you have a literal sanitary nightmare.  Remember too, these people knew nothing of microbes.  So God gave them a perfect food that they could completely digest and provide the entire nourishment they needed without, to put it delicately, any elimination.  The Bible teaches as they wandered through the desert, the elderly were able to keep up with the young.  We do not read of any sickness or plague.  Can you imagine if we could get our hands on that manna today?  It could be truly marketed as a miracle food.  Eat it, and you will never lose your vitality, and you will never be sick.

So here we have a people blessed with the most perfect food found in the history of man, and what do the people do?  They start to bellyache because they want some variety.  They got tired of the same old same old.   They forgot what a great blessing they had. So they prayed for meat.  The best was not enough, so God sent meat, and those who were dissatisfied with perfection gobbled the meat up that was not degan, complete, or total. It went bad really quickly in that desert heat, and many got sick and died.  Those who did not suffer were not the ones who felt God owed them a living, and if you love me, you will let me prosper.  They were not the ones who came to God with a handful of gimmie and a mouthful of much obliged.

Sometimes rather than bellyache to God over the blessings we have not being enough, we need to consider that perhaps we are better off with what God gives us than what we think we want.

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