Brazen snake
The brazen serpent ( Heb. נחשתן Neḥuschtan ) was an image of a serpent made of processed copper ore . According to biblical legend, it was set up by Moses at the instruction of God for healing after the bite of fiery snakes. Depending on the translation, there is also talk of a copper or bronze snake .
Biblical narration
According to a tale in the Tanakh or the Old Testament , God sent snakes among the Israelites as punishment for impatience, ingratitude and nagging after leaving Egypt while wandering through the desert. Anyone who was bitten by a fiery serpent and looked up at the brazen serpent erected on a stick was healed and was allowed to go on living.
“ 6 The LORD sent fiery serpents among the people; they bit the people, so that many of Israel died. 7 So they came to Moses and said, We have sinned in speaking against the Lord and against you. Ask the Lord to take the serpents away from us. And Moses prayed for the people. 8 The Lord said to Moses, Make yourself a brazen serpent, and put it on a pole. Anyone who is bitten and looks at them should live. 9 So Moses made a bronze serpent and raised it up high. And if someone bit a snake, he looked at the brazen snake and stayed alive. "
In the 2nd Book of Kings it is described how King Hezekiah destroyed the figure because it was abused for idolatry ( 2 Kings 18.4 EU ).
The healing of those who looked at the snake is counted among the salvific deeds of God (cf. Dtn 8,15 EU ). The wisdom literature says that God gave his people a “saving sign” ( Weish 16.5–11 EU ).
Reference in the New Testament
The story of the serpent is taken up in the New Testament when Jesus speaks to Nicodemus , using the story as an analogy :
"And just as Moses exalted the serpent in the desert, so the Son of Man must be exalted so that everyone who believes (in him) may have eternal life in him."
The healing that the Israelites found by looking at the snake is pictorial for the salvation that Jesus achieved through his death on the cross, that is, also "exalted" hanging on a wood. The believer is healed when he looks at the crucified Christ like the Israelites at the serpent. For this reason, art is often used to depict a cross with a snake.
background
Snake gods , snake cults, snake dances and snake idols are known from different cultures, especially in the African region, but also occur among the Germanic tribes in the form of the Midgard snake . She also represents a central mythical figure in the story about the first human couple Adam and Eve in Genesis . At the beginning of the 20th century, the snake idol was associated with Moses' Midianite father-in-law Jitro , whom the Bible mentions repeatedly. In 1969 the Israeli researcher Beno Rothenberg discovered a 12 cm long, partially gilded copper snake in the holy of holies of the Midianite tent sanctuary of Timna . This find gives the biblical account of the bronze serpent its historical background.
According to the Christian view, the poisonous snakebite and its consequences symbolize the destructive and sickening sin from which humanity was later freed by Christ, who carried these sins on his body on the cross ( 1 Pet 2,24 EU ). Healing and deliverance from sin should take place through faith in Christ ( John 3:14, 15 EU ).
See also
literature
- Glyn Daniel : Encyclopedia of Archeology. Nikol, Hamburg 1996, ISBN 3-930656-37-X .
- Ursula Diehl, Ruth Matthaes: Brazen snake. In: Real Lexicon on German Art History . Volume 4, 1956, Col. 817-837.
- Hugo Gressmann : The magic wand of Moses and the brazen serpent. In: Journal of the Association for Folklore. Vol. 23, No. 1, 1913, pp. 18-35 .
Web links
- Klaus Koenen: Nehuschtan. In: Michaela Bauks, Klaus Koenen, Stefan Alkier (Eds.): The Scientific Biblical Lexicon on the Internet (WiBiLex), Stuttgart 2006 ff.