Numbers 11:4

"And the mixed multitude that was among them lusted exceedingly: and the children of Israel also wept again, and said, Who shall give us flesh to eat? We remember the fish which we did eat in Egypt for naught; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic: but now our soul is dried away; there is nothing at all save this manna to look upon. And the manna was like coriander seed, and the appearance thereof as the appearance of bdellium. The people went about, and gathered it, and ground it in mills, or beat it in mortars, and boiled it in pots, and made cakes of it: and the taste of it was as the taste of fresh oil. And when the dew fell upon the camp in the night, the manna fell upon it."

"And the mixed multitude that was among them ..." (Numbers 11:4). Plaut gave the meaning of this as "the riffraff."[6] Owens called them, the rabble, adding that "the word occurs nowhere else in the O.T."[7] They were part of the great mob of people that followed Israel out of Egypt (Exodus 12:38). In the account here, it is very evident that this vast throng of stragglers and hangers-on were a major source of trouble.

McGee's comment on this mixed multitude is of interest:

"The real troublemakers in any church are the mixed multitude. They are fellow-travelers with the world and with the church. They like a church banquet, but they don't want the Bible school. They do not want to go forward with the ark of God; they want to stay in the back, for they might want to turn and go back some time."[8]

"Who shall give us flesh to eat ...?" (Numbers 11:4). There could be more to this request than meets the eye. We are indebted to Plaut for the comment that, "The words used here are a euphemism for the sexual license they enjoyed in Egypt, but forbidden in the Law."[9] Some commentators find fault here, because, they say, "This lack of flesh is inconsistent with the possession by Israel of great flocks and herds of cattle (Exodus 12:32,38, etc.)."[10] Many recent commentators still follow this old, discredited view. First, the cattle they owned would have been very shortly deleted and consumed if used for food; and besides that, the possession of herds in Israel was by no means universal. The instructions for the offering by a poor man of two turtle doves on occasion proves this. An incredible number of animals were used in the sacrifices, and there was no way that the people could afford to reduce the supply of animals. Furthermore, the employment of many of the cattle in the dairy business would also have forbidden their use as beef cattle.

"Israel also wept again ..." (Numbers 11:4). "This points to the former complaint of the people respecting the absence of flesh in the desert of Sin (Exodus 16:2ff)."[11] This truth frustrates all allegations about the two occasions being merely various accounts of one event. As a matter of fact, it is not mentioned that "they wept" in the first account, but the mention here of their weeping "again" proves that they did. This type of narrative is common in the sacred writings. (See Jonah 1:4). Furthermore, the riffraff, remembering the quails they got the first time, were, in this case, the leaders of a demand for more. It appears a little later that they even organized this demonstration.

The description of the manna given here is not exactly like that in Exodus, but so what? Ask any two or three people today to describe the taste of an olive and see what happens. To one the manna tasted like honey, to others like fresh oil; to some it appeared "white," and to others the color of bdellium. Since nobody on earth today knows anything at all about bdellium,[12] it is mere cavil to allege "a contradiction." Furthermore, even the phrase rendered here "as the taste of fresh oil" actually means, "its taste was like that of a dainty prepared with oil."[13] Thus, it is clear that no problems whatever exist with regard to these passages on the manna.