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If the Lord did speak by Miriam and Aaron, what then? The Lord Himself acknowledges that He speaks in different ways to different men. To some — perhaps to most — He comes in vision and in dream; things are heard as if they were spoken beyond the great mountain; they are echoes, wanting in shape and directness, yet capable of interpretations that touch the very centres and springs of life, that make men wonder, that draw men up from flippancy, and write upon vacant faces tokens of reverence and proofs that the inner vision is at the moment entranced by some immeasurable revelation. To other men God speaks "apparently" — that is, in broad and visible figure. He is quite near; it is as if friend were accosting friend, as if two interlocutors were mutually visible and speaking within hand-range of one another. There is nothing superstitious about this; it is the fact of to-day. Take a book of science — what do you find in that rational and philosophical bible? You find certain names put uppermost. Why should not every boy that has caught his first fly, or cut in two his first worm, say, "Hath not the Lord spoken unto me as well as unto Darwin, or Cuvier, or Buffon? — who are they?" But it does so happen that outside the Bible we have the Moses of science — the chief man of letters, the prince of song. Take the history of music, and we find names set by themselves like insulated stars-great planetary names. What would be thought of a person who has just learned the notes of music, saying, "Hath not the Lord spoken unto me as well as unto Beethoven?" He has; but He has not told you so much. There is a difference in kind; there is a difference in quality. We find this same law operating in all directions. There are books that say, "Are not we inspired as well as the Bible?" The answer is, "Certainly you are." The Lord had spoken to Miriam and to Aaron as certainly as He had spoken to Moses, but with a difference; and it is never for Moses to argue with Miriam. Moses takes no part in this petty controversy. He would have disproved his superior inspiration if he had stooped to this fray of words. So some books seem to say, "Are not we also inspired?" The frank and true answer is, "Yes." Is not many a sentence in the greatest of dramatists an inspired sentence? The frank, Christian, just answer is, "Yes." Is not many a discovery in the natural world quite an instance of inspiration? Why hesitate to say, "Yes; but always with a difference"? The Bible takes no part in the controversy about its own inspiration. The Bible lives — comes into the house when it is wanted, goes upstairs to the sick-chamber, follows the lonely sufferer into solitude, and communes with him about the mystery of disappointment, discipline, pain of heart; goes to the grave-side, and speaks about the old soldier just laid to rest, the little child just exhaled like a dewdrop by the morning sun. It lives because no hand can slay it; it stands back, or comes forward, according to the necessity of the case, because of a dignity that can wait, because of an energy that is ready to advance. Some books claim to be as inspired as the Bible. Then they become leprous, and all history has shown that they are put out of the camp. Many books have arisen to put down the Bible; they have had their day: they have ceased to be. We must judge by facts and realities. When a man who has no claim to the dignity asserts that he is upon an equality with the great musician, the great musician takes no part in the fray; when the competitor has played his little trick, one touch of the fingers regulated by the hand Divine will settle the controversy. By this token we stand or fall with our Christianity, with our great gospel.

(J. Parker, D. D.)

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KJV: And Miriam and Aaron spake against Moses because of the Ethiopian woman whom he had married: for he had married an Ethiopian woman.

WEB: Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses because of the Cushite woman whom he had married; for he had married a Cushite woman.