MANNA (מָ֥ן; μάννα, G3445). The Heb. word “man” implies a sweet gum or resin. It was, of course, the food given miraculously by God morning after morning to the children of Israel. This manna was supplied all the years of their wanderings. It says in Numbers 11:6—“nothing at all, but this manna.” It is described in Numbers 11:7 as looking “like coriander seed,” and in Deuteronomy 8:3, Moses says: “...fed you with manna, which you did not know, nor did your fathers know.” He did this “that he might make you know that man does not live by bread alone, but that man lives by everything that proceeds out of the mouth of the Lord.” The Lord Jesus quoted this text to Satan at the time of His temptation in the wilderness (Luke 4:4).

The miraculous falling down of the manna ceased “on the morrow, when they ate of the produce of the land” (Josh 5:12). The psalmist (Ps 78:24) makes it clear that the manna came down like rain, i.e. “rained down upon them manna to eat.” In the NT, manna is mentioned three times: in John 6:31, 49, “our fathers ate the manna,” and in Hebrews 9:4, reference is made to the putting of the manna into a golden urn. This refers to Exodus 16:33, where Aaron put an omer of manna in a jar which was laid up “before the Lord” in the Tabernacle. Future generations could see the special type of “bread” with which God fed them during the wilderness wanderings.

This white coriander seed-like manna was described as tasting like wafers made with honey (Exod 16:31). The last reference to manna appears in Revelation 2:17, where the giving of manna is spiritualized, i.e. “to him who conquers I will give some of the hidden manna.”

Those who find it difficult to believe in the miraculous provision of manna by God refer to the Apoc, where in the book of Baruch 1:10 (KJV) it says: “Prepare a cereal offering and offer them upon the altar of the Lord our God.” As this instruction was given long after the daily supply of manna had ceased, it therefore refers to some substance that could be bought. This is presumed to be a gum-resin, which exuded from trees such as Alhagi maurorum, called the Prickly Alhagi—sometimes the Sinai manna. Two other trees which are found in Pal. and could produce similar globules of gum are Fraxinus ornus, a flowering ash, and Tamarisk gallica, variety manifera. Syn. Tamarisk nilotica, variety manifera.