Wordswarms From Years Past
Adjacent WordsMANKIND
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Manna definitions
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MAN'NA, n.
1. A substance miraculously furnished as food for the Israelites in their journey through the wilderness of Arabia. Exodus 16.
Josephus, Ant.B.3.1. considers the Hebrew word man, to signify what. In conformity with this idea, the seventy translate the passage, Exo
16:15. what is this? which rendering seems to accord with the following words, for they knew not what it was. And in the Encyclopedia, the translators are charged with making Moses fall into a plain contradiction. Art. Manna. But Christ and his apostles confirm the common version: "Not as your fathers ate manna, and are dead." John
6:58. Heb
9:4. And we have other evidence, that the present version is correct; for in the same chapter, Moses directed Aaron to "take a pot and put a homer full of manna therein." Now it would be strange language to say, put an homer full of what, or what is it. So also verse 35. "The children of Israel ate manna forty years, etc." In both verses, the Hebrew word is the same as in verse 15.
2. In the materia medica, the juice of a certain tree of the ash-kind, the Fraxinus ornus, or flowering ash a native of Sicily, Calabria,and other parts of the south of Europe. It is either naturally concreted, or exsiccated and purified by art. The best manna is in oblong pieces or flakes of a whitish or pale yellow color, light, friable, and somewhat transparent. It is a mild laxative.
n
1: hardened sugary exudation of various trees
2: (Old Testament) food that God gave the Israelites during the Exodus [syn: miraculous food, manna, manna from heaven]
noun Etymology: Middle English, from Old English, from Late Latin, from Greek, from Hebrew m?n Date: before 12th century 1. a. food miraculously supplied to the Israelites in their journey through the wilderness b. divinely supplied spiritual nourishment c. a usually sudden and unexpected source of gratification, pleasure, or gain 2. a. the sweetish dried exudate of a Eurasian ash (especially Fraxinus ornus) that contains mannitol and has been used as a laxative and demulcent b. a similar product excreted by a scale insect (Trabutina mannipara) feeding on the tamarisk
n. 1 the substance miraculously supplied as food to the Israelites in the wilderness (Exod. 16). 2 an unexpected benefit (esp. manna from heaven). 3 spiritual nourishment, esp. the Eucharist. 4 the sweet dried juice from the manna-ash and other plants, used as a mild laxative. Phrases and idioms: manna-ash an ash tree native to S. Europe, Fraxinus ornus. Etymology: OE f. LL f. Gk f. Aram. manna f. Heb. man, explained as = man hu? what is it?, but prob. = Arab. mann exudation of common tamarisk (Tamarix gallica)
Manna Man"na, n. [L., fr. Gr. ?, Heb. m[=a]n; cf. Ar. mann, properly, gift (of heaven).] 1. (Script.) The food supplied to the Israelites in their journey through the wilderness of Arabia; hence, divinely supplied food. --Ex. xvi. 15. 2. (Bot.) A name given to lichens of the genus Lecanora, sometimes blown into heaps in the deserts of Arabia and Africa, and gathered and used as food. 3. (Bot. & Med.) A sweetish exudation in the form of pale yellow friable flakes, coming from several trees and shrubs and used in medicine as a gentle laxative, as the secretion of Fraxinus Ornus, and F. rotundifolia, the manna ashes of Southern Europe. Note: Persian manna is the secretion of the camel's thorn (see Camel's thorn, under Camel); Tamarisk manna, that of the Tamarisk mannifera, a shrub of Western Asia; Australian, manna, that of certain species of eucalyptus; Brian[,c]on manna, that of the European larch. Manna grass (Bot.), a name of several tall slender grasses of the genus Glyceria. they have long loose panicles, and grow in moist places. Nerved manna grass is Glyceria nervata, and Floating manna grass is G. flu. Manna insect (Zo["o]l), a scale insect (Gossyparia mannipara), which causes the exudation of manna from the Tamarisk tree in Arabia.
If you say that something unexpected is manna from heaven, you mean that it is good and happened just at the time that it was needed. Ex-forces personnel could be the manna from heaven employers are seeking... PHRASE: oft v-link PHR
Heb. man-hu, "What is that?" the name given by the Israelites to the food miraculously supplied to them during their wanderings in the wilderness (Ex. 16:15-35). The name is commonly taken as derived from _man_, an expression of surprise, "What is it?" but more probably it is derived from _manan_, meaning "to allot," and hence denoting an "allotment" or a "gift." This "gift" from God is described as "a small round thing," like the "hoar-frost on the ground," and "like coriander seed," "of the colour of bdellium," and in taste "like wafers made with honey." It was capable of being baked and boiled, ground in mills, or beaten in a mortar (Ex. 16:23; Num. 11:7). If any was kept over till the following morning, it became corrupt with worms; but as on the Sabbath none fell, on the preceding day a double portion was given, and that could be kept over to supply the wants of the Sabbath without becoming corrupt. Directions concerning the gathering of it are fully given (Ex. 16:16-18, 33; Deut. 8:3, 16). It fell for the first time after the eighth encampment in the desert of Sin, and was daily furnished, except on the Sabbath, for all the years of the wanderings, till they encamped at Gilgal, after crossing the Jordan, when it suddenly ceased, and where they "did eat of the old corn of the land; neither had the children of Israel manna any more" (Josh. 5:12). They now no longer needed the "bread of the wilderness."
This manna was evidently altogether a miraculous gift, wholly different from any natural product with which we are acquainted, and which bears this name. The manna of European commerce comes chiefly from Calabria and Sicily. It drops from the twigs of a species of ash during the months of June and July. At night it is fluid and resembles dew, but in the morning it begins to harden. The manna of the Sinaitic peninsula is an exudation from the "manna-tamarisk" tree (Tamarix mannifera), the el-tarfah of the Arabs. This tree is found at the present day in certain well-watered valleys in the peninsula of Sinai. The manna with which the people of Israel were fed for forty years differs in many particulars from all these natural products.
Our Lord refers to the manna when he calls himself the "true bread from heaven" (John 6:31-35; 48-51). He is also the "hidden manna" (Rev. 2:17; comp. John 6:49,51).
man'-a (man; manna): The Hebrew man is probably derived, as Ebers suggests, from the Egyptian mennu, "food." In Ex 16:15, we have a suggested source of the name, "They said one to another, What is it?" i.e. manhu, which also means, "It is manna" (see margin).
1. Old Testament References:
This substance is described as occurring in flakes or small round grains, literally, "hoax frost"; it fell with the dew (Nu 11:9) and appeared when the dew left the ground (Ex 16:14); "It was like coriander seed, white; and the taste of it was like wafers made with honey" (Ex 16:31). In Nu 11:8, its taste is described "as the taste of fresh oil," margin "cakes baked with oil." "And the children of Israel did eat the manna forty years, until they came .... unto the borders of the land of Canaan" (Ex 16:35). It ceased the day after they ate the produce of the land, unleavened cakes and parched grain, in the plains of Jericho (Jos 5:10-12). Although an important article of diet, it was by no means the sole one as seems implied in Nu 21:15; there are plenty of references (e.g. Ex 17:3; 24:5; 34:3; Le 8:2,26,31; 9:4; 10:12; 24:5; Nu 7:13,19 f, etc.) which show that they had other food besides. The food was gathered every morning, "every man according to his eating: and when the sun waxed hot, it melted" (Ex 16:21); a portion of the previous day's gathering bred worms and stank if kept (Ex 16:20); on the 6th day a double amount was gathered, the Sabbath portion being miraculously preserved (Ex 16:22-27). A pot--a golden one (Heb 9:4)--with an omer of manna was "laid up before Yahweh" in the tabernacle (Ex 16:33). Manna is referred to in Ne 9:20. It is described poetically as "food from heaven" and "bread of the mighty" (Ps 78:24 f); as "bread of heaven" (Ps 105:40); and as "angels' bread" (2 Esdras 1:19; The Wisdom of Solomon 16:20).
2. New Testament References:
In Joh 6:31-63, our Lord frequently refers to "the manna" or "bread from heaven" as typical of Himself. Paul (1Co 10:3) refers to it as "spiritual food," and in Re 2:17 we read, "To him that overcometh, to him will I give of the hidden manna."
Manna, as might be expected, figures largely in rabbinical literature. It was, it is said, adapted to the taste of each individual who could by wishing taste in the manna anything he desired (compare The Wisdom of Solomon 16:21). Manna is reserved as the future food of the righteous (compare Re 2:17), for which purpose it is ground in a mill situated in the third heaven (Chag 12b; Tan. Beshallach 22).
3. Natural Explanations:
No substance is known which in any degree satisfies all the requirements of the Scriptural references, but several travelers in the wilderness have reported phenomena which suggest some of the features of the miraculous manna.
(1) In the Peninsula of Sinai, on the route of the children of Israel, a species of tamarisk, named in consequence by Ebers Tammaris mannifera, is found to exude a sweet, honey-like substance where its bark is pierced by an insect, Gossyparia mannifera. It collects upon the twigs and falls to the ground. The Arabs who gather it to sell to pilgrims call it mann-es-sama, "heavenly manna"; it is white at first but turns yellow; in the early morning it is of the consistency of wax but when the sun is hot it disappears. This substance occurs only after mid-summer and for a month or two at most.
(2) A second proposal is to identify manna with a lichen--Lecanora esculenta and allied species--which grows in the Arabian and other deserts upon the limestone. The older masses become detached and are rolled about by the wind. When swept together by sudden rain storms in the rainy season they may collect in large heaps. This lichen has been used by the Arabs in time of need for making bread. It is a quite reasonable form of nourishment in the desert, especially when eaten with the sugary manna from the trees.
E. W. G. Masterman
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