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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Manna Springing from the Earth

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At one of my aunt’s, there was an illustrated children’s edition of the Bible. I was six or seven years old, and on Saturday afternoons she would often take care of me. It was a fortunate deal everybody gained from. My parents were free to do the shopping and get some fresh air. My aunt enjoyed stuffing me with biscuits and milk, but not as much as I enjoyed the adventures of the Bible lands: Yahweh furiously unleashing plagues on the Pharaoh, the miraculous escape from Egypt, with the Red Sea saving the tribes, in extremis, from Ramses’ troops; the great king on his knees, watching the bodies of his drowned soldiers, wondering why God might favor a bunch of goat keepers; Moses wandering through the desert carrying his ark, bound for the Promised Land. And manna would drop from the sky in the early morning and seemed to me more miraculous, being so sustained and regular, than the opening of the sea.