--we can go no further than bare
conjectures in such cases; only the notions of Jews were generally
so different from those of Gentiles, that we may sometimes make no
improbable conjectures to which sort such additions belong. See also
somewhat like these additions in Josephus's account of Elisha's making
sweet the bitter and barren spring near Jericho, War, B. IV. ch. 8.
sect. 3.

[3] It seems to me, from what Moses, Exodus 16:18, St. Paul, 2
Corinthians 8:15, and Josephus here say, compared together, that the
quantity of manna that fell daily, and did not putrefy, was just so
much as came to an omer apiece, through the whole host of Israel, and no
more.

[4] This supposal, that the sweet honey-dew or manna, so celebrated in
ancient and modern authors, as falling usually in Arabia, was of the
very same sort with this manna sent to the Israelites, savors more of
Gentilism than of Judaism or Christianity. It is not improbable that
some ancient Gentile author, read by Josephus, so thought; nor would he
here contradict him; though just before, and Antiq. B. IV. ch. 3. sect.
2, he seems directly to allow that it had not been seen before.
However, this food from heaven is here described to be like snow; and in
Artapanus, a heathen writer, it is compared to meal, color like to snow,
rained down by God," Essay on the Old Test. Append. p. 239. But as to
the derivation of the word manna, whether from man, which Josephus says
then signified What is it or from mannah, to divide, i.e., a dividend or
portion allotted to every one, it is uncertain: I incline to the latter
derivation. This manna is called angels' food, Psalm 78:26, and by our
Sacior, John 6:31, etc., as well as by Josephus here and elsewhere,
Antiq. B. III. ch. 5. sect. 3, said to be sent the Jews from heaven.

[5] This rock is there at this day, as the travelers agree; and must be
the same that was there in the days of Moses, as being too large to be
brought thither by our modern carriages.

[6] Note here, that the small book of the principal laws of Moses
is ever said to be laid up in the holy house itself; but the larger
Pentateuch, as here, some where within the limits of the temple and its
courts only. See Antiq. B. V. ch. 1. sect. 17.

[7] This eminent circumstance, that while Moses's hands were lift up
towards heaven, the Israelites prevailed, and while they were let down
towards the earth, the Amalekites prevailed, seems to me the earliest
intimation we