1However, bread, which is essential, they asked for appropriately. Therefore, it was given to them appropriately, in the morning, when there was time to prepare it. The Gemara comments: From here, the Torah teaches etiquette, that it is proper to eat meat only at night, as Moses said to the children of Israel: “This shall be, when the Lord will give you in the evening meat to eat” (Exodus 16:8). The Gemara asks: But didn’t Abaye say that someone who has a meal should eat it only in the day? The Gemara answers: We mean to say: Like day. It is not necessary to eat the food in the daytime, as long as one can see what he eats. Rabbi Aḥa bar Ya’akov said: At the beginning, the Jewish people were like chickens pecking at the garbage; any time there was food they grabbed it and ate it, until Moses came and set specific times to eat, as the verse implies. He set mealtimes for them in the morning and in the evening.
2It was stated with regard to the quail: “While the meat was yet between their teeth, before it was chewed, the anger of the Lord was kindled against the people” (Numbers 11:33), which means that they died immediately. However, it also states: “You shall not eat it for only one day…but for an entire month until it comes out of your nostrils and becomes loathsome to you” (Numbers 11:19–20). How can these texts be reconciled? The average people died immediately, but the wicked continued to suffer in pain for a month and then died.
3The verse states: “And they spread them [ vayishteḥu ] out for themselves round about the camp” (Numbers 11:32). Reish Lakish said: Do not read it as vayishteḥu . Rather, read it as vayishḥatu . This teaches that the enemies of the Jewish people, a euphemism for the Jewish people themselves, were liable to receive the punishment of slaughter due to their demand. The verse states: “Spread out [ shato’aḥ ]” (Numbers 11:32). A tanna taught in the name of Rabbi Yehoshua ben Korḥa: Do not read it as shato’aḥ but as shaḥot . This teaches that other food fell for the Jewish people along with the manna. The food was something that requires ritual slaughtering [ sheḥita ], referring to birds. Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi said: And do you learn this from here? Do we need to alter the word for this purpose? Isn’t it already stated explicitly: “And he rained meat upon them like dust, and winged birds like the sand of the seas” (Psalms 78:27)?
4And it was taught in a related baraita : Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi says: The verse states: “Then you shall slaughter of your herd and of your flock which the Lord has given you, as I have commanded you” (Deuteronomy 12:21). This teaches that Moses was commanded in the laws of ritual slaughter to cut the gullet and the windpipe in the neck. And with a bird one must cut through the majority of one pipe, and with an animal one must cut through the majority of both pipes. Moses was commanded these laws along with the other details of slaughtering. According to Rabbi Yehuda HaNasi, the word shatoaḥ does not teach us about ritual slaughter. Rather, what is the meaning when the verse states: Shatoaḥ ? It teaches that the manna fell in layers [ mashtiḥin ] in a straight row.
5With regard to the manna, it is written “bread” (Exodus 16:4), and it is written “oil” (Numbers 11:8), and it is written “honey” (Exodus 16:31). How can we reconcile these verses? Rabbi Yosei, son of Rabbi Ḥanina, said: For the youth it was like bread, for the elderly it was like oil, and for the children it was like honey. Each received what was appropriate.
6The Gemara comments further: The word quail is written shlav , with the letter shin , but we read it as slav , with the letter samekh . What does this teach us? Rabbi Ḥanina said: The righteous eat it in peace [ shalva ], based on the written form of the word; whereas the wicked eat it, and it seems to them like thorns [ silvin ], based on the way the word is read.
7Furthermore, with regard to the quail: Rav Ḥanan bar Rava said: There are four types of quail and these are they: Sikhli , and kivli , and pasyoni , and slav . The best tasting of all is the sikhli . The worst of all is the slav . The Gemara relates how tasty even the quail was that the Jews ate in the desert: It was as small as a sparrow, and they would place it in the oven to roast, and it expanded until it filled the entire oven. They would place it upon thirteen loaves of bread, and even the last loaf on the bottom could be eaten only when mixed with other food, due to all the fat it had absorbed from the quail.
8It is told that Rav Yehuda found quail among his barrels of wine, and Rav Ḥisda found quail among logs of wood in his storeroom. Every day Rava’s sharecropper brought him a quail that he found in his fields. One day, he did not bring him one because he failed to find any. Rava said to himself: What is this, why is today different? He went up to the roof to think about it. He heard a child say the verse: “When I heard, my innards trembled, my lips quivered at the voice, rottenness enters into my bones, and I tremble where I stand; that I should wait for the day of trouble when he comes up against the people that he invades” (Habakkuk 3:16). Rava said: Learn from this that Rav Ḥisda has died. I am therefore not worthy to receive the quail anymore, since it is on account of the teacher that the student eats. When Rav Ḥisda was alive, Rava received the quail due to Rav Ḥisda’s merit; now that he had died, Rava was not worthy to receive the quail.
9§ Furthermore, with regard to the manna it is written: “And when the layer of dew lifted, behold, upon the face of the wilderness there lay a fine flaky substance, as fine as frost on the ground” (Exodus 16:14), indicating that the dew covered the manna. And it is written: “ And when the dew fell upon the camp in the night, the manna fell upon it” (Numbers 11:9), meaning that the manna fell on top of the dew. How can these verses be reconciled? Rabbi Yosei, son of Rabbi Ḥanina, said: There was dew above and dew below, with the manna in between, and the manna appeared as if it were placed in a box [ kufsa ] of dew.
10The verse describes the manna as “a fine flaky [ meḥuspas ] substance” (Exodus 16:14). Reish Lakish said: Meḥuspas means it was a substance that dissolved [ maḥ ] on the palm [ pas ] of the hand. Since it was so fine, it dissolved upon contact. Rabbi Yoḥanan said: It was a substance that was absorbed in all 248 limbs, the numerical equivalent of the word meḥuspas . The Gemara expresses surprise at this: If one calculates the value of the letters in the word meḥuspas , it is more, totaling 254. Rabbi Naḥman bar Yitzḥak said: Meḥuspas is written in the Torah without the letter vav . Therefore, the total is exactly 248.
11The Sages taught: The Torah states: “And He caused manna to rain upon them for food, and He gave them of the grain of heaven. Man did eat the bread of the mighty [ abirim ]” (Psalms 78:24–25). “Bread of the mighty” is bread that the ministering angels eat; this is the statement of Rabbi Akiva. When these words were said before Rabbi Yishmael, he said to them to go and tell Akiva: Akiva you have erred. Do the ministering angels eat bread? It is already stated about Moses, when he ascended on high: “Bread I did not eat and water I did not drink” (Deuteronomy 9:9). If even a man who ascends on high does not need to eat, certainly the ministering angels do not need to eat. Rather, how do I establish the meaning of the word abirim ? It can be explained as bread that was absorbed into all 248 limbs [ eivarim ], so that there was no waste.
12The Gemara asks: But if so, how do I establish the verses: “And you shall have a spade among your weapons, and it shall be that when you relieve yourself outside, you shall dig with it, and shall turn back and cover your excrement” (Deuteronomy 23:14) and “You shall have a place also outside the camp where you can relieve yourself ” (Deuteronomy 23:13). From here we learn that there was waste in their bowels, as they had to leave the camp to relieve themselves. The Gemara explains: This waste was not a byproduct of the manna; it was from food items that the gentile merchants sold them.
13Rabbi Elazar ben Perata disagrees and says: The manna caused even items that the gentile merchants sold them to be completely digested, so that even other food that they ate produced no waste. But then how do I establish the verse: “And you shall have a spade among your weapons”? After they sinned, the manna was not as effective. The Holy One, Blessed be He, said: I initially said that they would be like ministering angels who do not produce waste; now I will trouble them to walk three parasangs to leave the camp in order to relieve themselves.
14How do we know that the Israelite camp was three parasangs? As it is written: “And they camped by the Jordan from Beth-Jeshimoth to Abel-shittim” (Numbers 33:49), and Rabba bar bar Ḥana said: I saw that site and it was three parasangs in length. And a baraita taught: When the Jews relieved themselves in the desert, they did not relieve themselves ahead of themselves, i.e., in the direction of their travel, nor to the side of the camp, but behind the camp, in a place that they had already traveled. Consequently, those near the front of the camp had to walk a distance of three parasangs from their homes to leave the camp.
15Furthermore, with regard to the manna, the verse states Israel’s complaint: “But now our soul is dry, there is nothing at all; we have nothing beside this manna to look to” (Numbers 11:6). They said: This manna will eventually swell in our stomachs and kill us; is there anyone born of a woman who ingests food but does not expel waste? This supports the Gemara’s claim that the manna did not create waste.
16When these words were said before Rabbi Yishmael, he said to them: Do not read it as abirim . Rather, read it as eivarim , limbs. The manna was something that was absorbed by 248 limbs. But, how do I establish “And you shall have a spade among your weapons”? From the food items that came to them from overseas lands. Rabbi Yishmael disagrees with Rabbi Elazar ben Perata with regard to the effect the manna had on the digestion of other foods.
17Alternatively, “Man [ ish ] did eat the bread of the mighty” (Psalms 78:25);