Meribah

Meribah — "striving" — is the place-name attached to two separate water-from-the-rock incidents in the wilderness wandering. The first is at Rephidim early in the journey, where Moses is told to strike the rock and water comes out; the second is at Kadesh in the desert of Zin near the end of the wandering, where the same provision turns into the occasion of the rebellion that bars Moses and Aaron from the promised land.

The Rock at Rephidim

The first Meribah belongs to Rephidim, the camp Israel reached after the wilderness of Sin. The people had no water and quarrelled with Moses: "And all the congregation of the sons of Israel journeyed from the wilderness of Sin, by their journeys, according to the mouth of Yahweh, and encamped in Rephidim: and there was no water for the people to drink. Therefore the people strove with Moses, and said, Give us water that we may drink. And Moses said to them, Why do you⁺ strive with me? Why do you⁺ try Yahweh? And the people thirsted there for water; and the people murmured against Moses, and said, Why have you brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our sons and our cattle with thirst? And Moses cried to Yahweh, saying, What shall I do to this people? They are almost ready to stone me" (Exo 17:1-4).

Yahweh's instruction is precise: the rod that had struck the Nile is to strike a rock at Horeb. "And Yahweh said to Moses, Pass on before the people, and take with you of the elders of Israel; and your rod, with which you struck the river, take in your hand, and go. Look, [my Speech] will stand before you there on the rock in Horeb; and you will strike the rock, and there will come water out of it, that the people may drink. And Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel" (Exo 17:5-6). The naming follows: "And he called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because of the striving of the sons of Israel, and because they tried Yahweh, saying, Is Yahweh among us, or not?" (Exo 17:7). The double name "Massah and Meribah" — testing and striving — fixes the episode to two faults at once: they tested Yahweh, and they strove with him.

The Waters of Meribah at Kadesh

The second Meribah is in the desert of Zin, at Kadesh, late in the forty years. The verdict on the place is given before the report of the events: "These are the waters of Meribah; because the sons of Israel strove with Yahweh, and he was sanctified in them" (Num 20:13). And the consequence falls on Aaron at Mount Hor when the journey-list halts: "Aaron will be gathered to his people; for he will not enter into the land which I have given to the sons of Israel, because you⁺ rebelled against my mouth at the waters of Meribah" (Num 20:24). The plural "you⁺" addresses Moses with Aaron: their joint rebellion at this second Meribah costs them both entry into the land. The same name that belonged to Israel's striving in Exodus 17 has now been re-attached to the leaders' striving against Yahweh's word.