Would that All the Lord's People were Prophets

4 WOULD THAT ALL THE LORD’S PEOPLE WERE PROPHETS

Text: Numbers 11

Our Interest in Reading this Text

This is a very complicated text but I have chosen it nevertheless because it throws light on a couple of practical problems which people encounter in the process of getting organised. It has rightly been pointed out in many of our discussion that we should not be vague when we talk of liberation struggle. Therefore I would request you that each of us fills on his or her own situation when we talk of liberation and try to translate this text into our own situation. I, for one, can only try to do this with respect to the situation where I come from.

When Indian Christian leftists talk of “people’s organization”, they have the following facts in mind: they start from the insight that 80 percent of the people live in the countryside and that more than half of the whole population whether rural or urban lives below the poverty line, i.e. does not have the minimal intake in calories, not to talk of other amenities like housing, clothing, education, health care, etc. They further start from the insight that this poverty is not so much a problem of quantitative production since the figures of growth of GNP are quite encouraging.

Poverty in countries like India is much more a question of what is produced and for whom and how it is distributed. Therefore, the bias in people’s organisation is towards the people who are below the poverty line: landless labourers, tenants, poor peasants, slum people and urban labour. The difficulty is not only to link up the interests of these different groups but above all to develop a perspective which goes beyond the immediate daily needs, a perspective where the interests of the people is not only absorbed by the daily question of survival and of fulfillment of basic consumer needs. The question is not only to fill one’s belly but to be able to make decisions, to have a say, to develop a perspective of liberation in which all people are able to participate.

There is an inherent dialectic between people’s physical needs and their spiritual needs. Let me illustrate this. I once saw an

inscription in one ashram saying: “Don’t live in order to eat but eat in order to live.” This means that life is more than just to keep going physically. Yet, the situation of many people is such that they simply have to live just in order to eat. To get just one square meal requires all their energies.

On the other hand, even to develop something like class solidarity requires a farsightedness which goes beyond one’s personal immediate interest. Again, let me illustrate this. I remember having met a priest in the Philippines in 1974 who was telling how he prepared for the Holy Year and how he used it to conscientize people. One of the things he did was to let them carry around slogans in processions. One of these was “Down with selfishness”, which, he said, is a Christian slogan as well as a “Maoist” one. This gives an idea about the relationship between physical needs and human values, spiritual needs. M.M. Thomas at the 5th Assembly in Nairobi coined the term “spirituality for combat”, indicating the need to utilise spiritual resources in order to be able to fight. Let me go now into the text.

The Urge to Satisfy Consumer Needs and the Need for Collective Leadership

The species of the narrative is that it serves to explain to later generations the name of a place (Kibroth-hattaavah, meaning literally the graves of craving). Further it explains certain principles of organisation like the selection of elders among the people of Israel during the exodus.

The explanation of the place name refers to certain consumer needs among the people. The question of leadership comes up and is solved in the context of trying to handle the people’s demands for consumption. To put it more concretely, the situation is that the people of Israel have been wandering through the Sinai Peninsula for a number of years. The text says it is 2 years after having left Egypt and it is said that there is a “mixed crowd” probably some ethnically mixed groups (cf Ex. 12:38) which is economically and socially not fully integrated with the people. We could say that they are sort of “lumpen proletariate”. These people are demanding meat. And also the Israelites themselves became “greedy for better things” and dreamily recalled the abundance and variety of food available in Egypt (v.6). The strain of desert life has exhausted them physically

and mentally. Verse 6 says that their throats are parched. But the Hebrew term has also the meaning that their soul, their life energy, was dried up. Suddenly it looks more attractive to turn back and be well fed slaves.

The temptation to abandon the struggle for liberation and to become well-fed slaves is, of course, lurking in many modern situations. The expectation to fulfill the consumer need is thrown back on the leader, in this case, Moses. And Moses does not know how to handle the situation. He is dead scared! He starts arguing with God.

Moses’ Responsibility and the People’s Responsibility

Moses starts arguing with God and trying to get rid of his own responsibility (v. 11-15). In fact, he behaves towards God in the same way as the people behave against Moses. He asks: Why have you led us into this mess? In fact, he does something which will delight the feminists among us:, He practically addresses God as mother. He puts the qualities of leadership into the categories of motherhood and says: “Am I to mother these people, am I to suckle and nurture them? Do I have to carry them like a nurse to the promised land?”

And he asked God either to kilt him or do something which answers to the expectations of the people to be mothered, to be nurtured. I believe that this psychological expectation to be mothered, to be nurtured is something which is very characteristic with respect to leadership as with respect to expectations towards God. It is therefore interesting to see that God does not respond to this expectation. On the contrary, he throws the responsibility back on the people. The expectation to be mothered, to be nurtured, and to be able to get nice food is answered first of all not by satisfying the consumer need but by changing the leadership pattern.

The first thing that God says is: “I will take some of the spirit which is upon you and give it to the elders of Israel and they shall share the burden to care for these people and you will not have to bear it alone” (v.18). Further, God announces that the people’s greed for meat will be satisfied. But the way the announcement is made already spells disaster. They will eat it until it comes out of their nostrils and makes them sick. The reason for punishment is

not that the people had a craving for meat but the reason is that they had betrayed the quest for liberation and had longed to return to slavery. The betrayal of the common cause in favour of the satisfaction of personal needs is punishment. At the same time, the people receive the spirit of God so that they may carry the burden of the common task together.

70 people are gathered, probably the heads of families. We can assume that “officers” and “elders” are titles which had been given to these people’s representatives in later times. The number 70 probably stands simply as a general expression for a large number. These people gathered in the tent of the meeting, a place outside the camp where people could go and encounter God. In a different context (Ex.33-.7-ll), we hear that God would speak there to Moses face to face, as a man speaks to his friend. And this direct contact between Moses and God is now going to be shared among the people’s representatives. Some of the spirit which is upon Moses will be taken from him and be given to the others (11:17). The charismatic leadership will be democratised. And so it happens (v.24f). When the spirit fell on them, they started to prophecy and they did not stop.

The Distribution of the Spirit

The spirit which is given to the people is a prophetic spirit. When the spirit falls on the people, they start to prophecy. This is a charismatic event which changes people completely. It gives them religious authority but it has a connotation of political responsibility. The same verb “to prophecy” is for example used when Saul is anointed King by Samuel (I Sam.l0:5ff). There it is said of him that he turned into a new man and God gave him a new heart. So the spirit of religious and political leadership which was on the one man Moses is taken from the one leader and given to the many.

But the story does not even end here. Besides the seventy elders who came to the tent of the meeting (the tent of the Presence), we hear of two men, Eldad and Medad, who were also among the selected leaders but for unknown reasons had not come to the tent but remained within the camp (v.26ff). So the spirit came also upon them and they start prophesying in the camp. This means they suddenly exert a political and religious leadership which looks completely unauthorised and which seems to put into question the

orderly distribution of the spirit which goes on in the tent of the meeting. So, the people run to Moses, and Moses’ advisers in their embarrassment, try to convince Moses that he should stop these two. men Eldad and Medad in their prophetic activity and thus restore order. But Moses has no vested interest in his own charisma. He rebukes his followers asking: “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the Lord’s people were prophets and that the Lord would put his spirit upon them all” (v.29). And he goes back and joins the camp together with the elders.

The Defeat of the People’s Greed

The last verses of the chapter bring the story of the people’s greed for meat to an end and link it up with an explanation of the local name.

As it regularly happens on the Sinai Peninsula on the Mediterranean coast, flocks of quails appear from the sea and settle on the land, weary from flying and easy to catch. The people gather quails 2 days and one night and spread them out around the camp. But while the meat is still between their teeth, they are stricken by a plague. Many die. The text does not give details. But the explanation of the name of the place given in the end of the chapter is: the graves of craving. So the suggestion is that the people died because of their greed for meat.

This does not mean that God punishes for sensuous desires. The promised land itself is a land of plenty, of milk and honey and gigantic fruits. But the people in their own tradition express a sense of self criticism, the prophetic sense of repentance for having forgotten the slavery in Egypt and abandoned the promise and the struggle for liberation.

The Spirit for All

The topic of the distribution of the spirit among the people is not very frequent. But it occurs for example in Joel 3:28f and these verses later are quoted in the chapter 2 of Acts in the description of the event of Pentecost. So they are indeed very crucial. These verses read: “And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit on all flesh; your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your old men shall dream dreams and your young men shall see visions. Even upon the menservants and maidservants in those days,

I will pour out my spirit.”

Here the full radical dimension of the pouring out of the spirit is expressed: The Spirit comes over all flesh. It comes over sons and daughters. There is no discrimination of sexes. It comes over old and young. There is no barrier of age. Neither is the authority with the old ones at the cost of the young nor do the young usurp’ power and suppress the wisdom of the old. Even the barriers of class are broken. The servants will be full of spirit like all the others. Consequently, the narrative of Pentecost tells that many people were scared by these events. In the end it says (v.43): “And fear came upon every soul; and many wonders and signs were done through the apostles (v.44) and all who believed were together and had all things in common; and they sold their possessions and goods and distributed them to all, any had need (v.46). And day by day attending the temple together and breaking bread in their homes, they partook of food with glad and generous hearts, praising God and having favour with all the people. And the Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved.”

Of course, there is a tremendous distance of time between the exodus through the desert and the event of pentecost and our days. Yet, the sharing of the spirit of prophecy which makes people new, gives them a new heart, enables them to take their own responsibilities to fight injustice and to attain liberation is something for which we long each day.