Commentaries:
Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown
people stood up—rose up in eager haste—some at one time, others at another; some, perhaps through avidity, both day and night.
ten homers—ten asses' loads; or, "homers" may be used indefinitely (as in Exodus 8:14; Judges 15:16); and "ten" for many: so that the phrase "ten homers" is equivalent to "great heaps." The collectors were probably one or two from each family; and, being distrustful of God's goodness, they gathered not for immediate consumption only, but for future use. In eastern and southern seas, innumerable quails are often seen, which, when weary, fall down, covering every spot on the deck and rigging of vessels; and in Egypt they come in such myriads that the people knock them down with sticks.
spread them all abroad for themselves round about the camp—salted and dried them for future use, by the simple process to which they had been accustomed in Egypt.
There went forth a wind from the Lord, and brought quails from the sea, etc.—These migratory birds (see on Exodus 16:13) were on their journey from Egypt, when "the wind from the Lord," an east wind (Psalms 78:26) forcing them to change their course, wafted them over the Red Sea to the camp of Israel.
let them fall a day's journey—If the journey of an individual is meant, this space might be thirty miles; if the inspired historian referred to the whole host, ten miles would be as far as they could march in one day in the sandy desert under a vertical sun. Assuming it to be twenty miles this immense cloud of quails (Psalms 78:27) covered a space of forty miles in diameter. Others reduce it to sixteen. But it is doubtful whether the measurement be from the center or the extremities of the camp. It is evident, however, that the language describes the countless number of these quails.
as it were two cubits high—Some have supposed that they fell on the ground above each other to that height—a supposition which would leave a vast quantity useless as food to the Israelites, who were forbidden to eat any animal that died of itself or from which the blood was not poured out. Others think that, being exhausted with a long flight, they could not fly more than three feet above the earth, and so were easily felled or caught. A more recent explanation applies the phrase, "two cubits high," not to the accumulation of the mass, but to the size of the individual birds. Flocks of large red-legged cranes, three feet high, measuring seven feet from tip to tip, have been frequently seen on the western shores of the Gulf of Akaba, or eastern arm of the Red Sea [STANLEY; SHUBERT].
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