Water Comes from the Rock—but Moses and Aaron Fail at Meribah

With Miriam dead and the people again without water, YHWH tells Moses to speak to the rock. Moses angrily addresses the congregation and strikes the rock twice. Water still comes, but YHWH says Moses and Aaron failed to believe and sanctify him before Israel, so they will not lead the congregation into the land.

Explicit Christological interpretation: 1 Corinthians 10:4 says the wilderness people drank from a spiritual Rock and “that Rock was Christ.” Later Jewish tradition also told of a continuing rock or Miriam’s well, but that tradition must be kept separate from Paul’s inspired Christological claim; Numbers itself never says a physical boulder followed the camp.