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The Bitter Well of Marah
By Peace | August 12, 2008
So Moses led the Israelites from the Red Sea into the wilderness of Shur. They went for three days in the wilderness and found no water.
When at last they came to Marah, they could not drink the water there, for it was bitter. For this reason, it was given the name of Marah, meaning ‘bitterness’.
The people murmured against Moses, saying,”What shall we drink?”
Moses cried to the Lord, and the Lord showed him a tree which, when he cast it into the water, made the water sweet. And there the Lord laid down a law for them, saying,”If you will listen carefully to the voice of the Lord your God, and will do what is right in his sight, and will give ear to his commandments, and keep all his laws, I will not bring upon you any of those diseases which I brought upon the Egyptians, for I am the Lord who heals you.”
Then they came to Elim, where there were twelve wells of water and seventy palm trees, and they camped beside the waters.
Onward from Elim they journeyed, and all the children of Israel came to the wilderness of Sin, which is between Elim and Sinai, on the fifteenth day of the second month after their departure from Egypt. And the children of Israel murmured against Moses and Aaron in the wilderness, saying,”It would have been better for us to die by the hand of the Lord in the land of Egypt, when we sat down to bowls of meat and ate our fill of bread. For you have brought us out into this wilderness to kill all of us with hunger.”
