Moses' staff

I was looking for a good description of the Bible references etc. related to Moses' staff. I was surprised it was not in Bible Facts, as Moses' basket is (which is cited much less frequently in scripture), and if I type in staff I get a lot of people's staffs, but not Moses'.

Bible dictionaries I have don't seem to have an entry on it either.

Does anyone have a suggestion where there might be a good description of Moses' staff?

Thanks!

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Bruce Dunning

I just did the following search "staff WITHIN 5 WORDS Moses" in my Dictionary collection and received quite a few good returns. I would suggest you try the same.

Here is one result for the Dictionary of Biblical Imagery. There are also two images in this article but somehow didn't seem to copy -

ROD, STAFF
Images of the rod and the staff are used somewhat interchangeably in English translations of the Bible. Six main categories may be noted: travelers’ staffs, the striped tree branches employed by Jacob with his flocks, instruments of discipline or punishment, tools used by shepherds, symbols of authority and the miraculous rods of Moses and Aaron.
Staff is the customary biblical term for the walker’s stick that was apparently universal in the ancient world. It is thus an icon of the traveler, symbolic of a transitory lifestyle and the vulnerability of living on the road (inasmuch as the staff was used as both a weapon and a support for the weary). When Jacob wants to identify his earlier status as a wanderer, he chooses the image of the staff: “with only my staff I crossed this Jordan” (Gen 32:10 RSV). At the first Passover the people’s readiness to be on the move is expressed in their eating the Passover meal with “loins girded, your sandals on your feet, and your staff in your hand; and you shall eat it in haste” (Ex 12:11 RSV). When Jesus wishes to picture the revolutionary nature of discipleship, he sends his disciples out devoid of customary preparations for travel—“no bag for your journey, nor two tunics, nor sandals, nor a staff” (Mt 10:10 RSV; cf. Lk 9:3)—confirming how conventional the staff is as a biblical image for traveling.

IMAGES HERE IN ORIGINAL ARTICLE

Two types of rod.

Elderly people especially need the aid of a staff in walking, and while we rightly associate such a staff with frailty, an interesting reversal occurs in the marvelous street scene of Zechariah 8:4, where the picture of old men and women sitting in the streets of Jerusalem, “each with staff in hand” (RSV), is positive in association, indicating the blessing of long life in a peaceable kingdom (see OLD, OLD AGE). The staff as an icon for pilgrimage, largely a postbiblical development, possibly has a lone biblical reference—the picture of the dying Jacob “bowing in worship over the top of his staff” as he blessed his sons (Heb 11:21 RSV), perhaps epitomizing his life as a stranger and sojourner in quest for “a better country, that is, a heavenly one” (Heb 11:16 RSV).
The fashioning of tree branches into striped p 734 “rods” was the province of Jacob’s ridiculous attempts at an animal husbandry (Gen 30:37–4). Thinking that surrounding sheep and goats during the act of mating would influence them to produce speckled and spotted offspring, Jacob placed streaked tree branches before the mating animals. (Gen 31:10–12 records Jacob’s moment of discovery that his intrigue was not the cause of his prosperity with his flocks and herds.)
Rods were also used to punish wayward children, slaves, fools or misbehaving adults. The RSV uses the image for discipline administered by human authorities approximately a dozen times (with nine of the references coming in the book of Proverbs) and for the oppression of a foreign nation four times (Is 9:4; 10:24; 14:29; Mic 5:1). Paul asks the Corinthians whether he should come to them “with a rod [in a mood of anger and reproof], or with love in a spirit of gentleness” (1 Cor 4:21 RSV). God’s punishment, anger or rule is pictured by the rod approximately a dozen times, with the books of Isaiah and Revelation containing a preponderance of the references. Here the rod becomes an image of ultimate terror, as in references to God’s breaking the rebellious kings of the earth “with a rod of iron” (Ps 2:9; cf. Rev 2:27; 19:15), as well as God’s speaking of “the rod of my anger, the staff of my fury” (Is 10:5 RSV).
But the rod and staff can also be images of comfort, protection and security. This is preeminently true of the shepherd’s rod and staff. One of these was the familiar crook, used for disciplining a wandering sheep, encircling a sheep’s neck or belly to rescue it from a gully and laying across the backs of sheep for purposes of counting (the so-called rodding of the sheep) as they entered the sheepfold (Lev 27:32; Ezek 20:37). The other half of the “rod and staff” pair was a clublike weapon used for warding off predators. The picture has been rendered forever famous by the detail in Psalm 23 that in the valley of deepest darkness, the place of treacherous gullies and lurking predators, the sheep will “fear no evil; … thy rod and thy staff, they comfort me” (Ps 23:4 RSV).
In the hands of a leader a rod or staff, like a king’s scepter, can also be symbolic of authority. During Israel’s wilderness wanderings God told Moses at one point to “take the rod, and assemble the congregation” (Num 20:8 RSV), and Moses subsequently used the rod to strike the rock to produce water (Num 20:11; cf. Ex 17:5–6). In the book of Revelation, Christ is the One “who is to rule all the nations with a rod of iron” (Rev 12:5)

Paul-C

Hi Don, I found this in the Dictionary of Bible Themes. Not sure if it's of any help?

[quote]

4512

staff

The staff was a basic item of personal property

It was carried at most times 1Sa 14:27 See also Ge 47:31; Jdg 6:21; Heb 9:4

It was carried by travellers Ge 32:10 See also Ex 12:11; Mt 10:5-10 pp Mk 6:7-13 pp Lk 9:1-6

It was carried by shepherds Mic 7:14 See also Ps 23:4; Zec 11:7,10-14

The staff was sometimes a symbol of authority

Ge 49:10 See also Ge 38:18,25; Nu 21:17-18; Jdg 5:14; 2Ki 18:21 pp Isa 36:6; Mt 27:28-30 pp Mk 15:19

God’s miraculous power was manifest through Moses’ and Aaron’s staffs

Ex 4:2-5,15-17; 7:8-12,14-20 the plague of blood; Ex 8:5-6 the plague of frogs; Ex 8:16-17 the plague of gnats; Ex 9:22-24 the plague of hail; Ex 10:12-14 the plague of locusts; Ex 14:15-16 the parting of the Red Sea; Ex 17:5-13

The budding of Aaron’s staff: Nu 17:1-10; Heb 9:4

Nu 20:7-13

See also

5071 Aaron

5101 Moses

5513 sceptre

7784 shepherd

Brian Losabia

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/537679#Comment_537679

This is from the (super awesome) Jewish Encyclopedia. Interestingly, some of the rabbinical writings "entirely identify the Rod of Aaron with that of Moses".

[quote]
AARON’S ROD

—Biblical Data
A rod which, in the hands of Aaron, the high priest, was endowed with miraculous power during the several plagues that preceded the Exodus. In this function the rod of Moses was equally potent. Upon two occasions, however, the singular virtue of spontaneous power, when not in the grasp of its possessor, was exhibited by Aaron’s Rod. At one time it swallowed the rods of the Egyptian magicians, and at another it blossomed and bore fruit in the Tabernacle, as an evidence of the exclusive right to the priesthood of the tribe of Levi (see AARON). In commemoration of this decision it was commanded that the rod be put again “before the testimony” (Num. 17:10). A later tradition asserts (Heb. 9:4) that the rod was kept in the Ark of the Covenant. The main fact, however, is thus confirmed, that a rod was preserved in the Tabernacle as a relic of the institution of the Aaronic priesthood.
J. F. McC.

—In Rabbinical Literature
The Bible ascribes similar miraculous powers to the Rod of Aaron and to the staff of Moses (compare, for example, Ex. 4:2 et seq. and 7:9). The Haggadah goes a step further, and entirely identifies the Rod of Aaron with that of Moses. Thus the Midrash Yelamdenu (Yalḳ. on Ps. 110 § 869) states that

“the staff with which Jacob crossed the Jordan is identical with that which Judah gave to his daughter-in-law, Tamar (Gen. 32:10, 38:18). It is likewise the holy rod with which Moses worked (Ex. 4:20, 21), with which Aaron performed wonders before Pharaoh (Ex. 7:10), and with which, finally, David slew the giant Goliath (1 Sam. 17:40). David left it to his descendants, and the Davidic kings used it as a scepter until the destruction of the Temple, when it miraculously disappeared (נגנז). When the Messiah comes it will be given to him for a scepter in token of his authority over the heathen.”

That so wonderful a rod should bear external signs of its importance is easily to be understood. It was made of sapphire, weighed forty seahs (a seah=10.70 pounds), and bore the inscription דצ״ך עד״ש באח״ב, which is composed of the initials of the Hebrew names of the Ten Plagues (Tan., Waëra 8, ed. Buber).

Haggadic Modification

Christian Modifications
Legend has still more to say concerning this rod. God created it in the twilight of the sixth day of Creation (Ab. v. 9, and Mek., Beshallaḥ, ed. Weiss, iv. 60), and delivered it to Adam when the latter was driven from paradise. After it had passed through the hands of Shem, Enoch, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob successively, it came into the possession of Joseph. On Joseph’s death the Egyptian nobles stole some of his belongings, and, among them, Jethro appropriated the staff. Jethro planted the staff in his garden, when its marvelous virtue was revealed by the fact that nobody could withdraw it from the ground; even to touch it was fraught with danger to life. This was because the Ineffable Name of God was engraved upon it. When Moses entered Jethro’s household he read the Name, and by means of it was able to draw up the rod, for which service Zipporah, Jethro’s daughter, was given to him in marriage. Her father had sworn that she should become the wife of the man who should be able to master the miraculous rod and of no other (Pirḳe R. El. 40; Sefer ha-Yashar; Yalḳ. Ex. 168, end). It must, however, be remarked that the Mishnah (Ab. v. 9) as yet knew nothing of the miraculous creation of Aaron’s Rod, which is first mentioned by the Mekilta (l.c.) and Sifre on Deut. (Ber. 33:21; ed. Friedmann, p. 355). This supposed fact of the supernatural origin of the rod explains the statement in the New Testament (Heb. 9:4) and Tosef., Yoma, iii. 7 (it is to be interpreted thus according to B. B. 14a), that Aaron’s Rod, together with its blossoms and fruit, was preserved in the Ark. King Josiah, who foresaw the impending national catastrophe, concealed the Ark and its contents (Tosef., Soṭah, 13a); and their whereabouts will remain unknown until, in the Messianic age, the prophet Elijah shall reveal them (Mek. l.c.). A later Midrash (Num. R. xviii. end) confuses the legends of the rod that blossomed with those of the rod that worked miracles, thus giving us contradictory statements. There exists a legend that Moses split a tree trunk into twelve portions, and gave one portion to each tribe. When the Rod of Aaron produced blossoms, the Israelites could not but acknowledge the significance of the token. The account of the blossoming of Aaron’s Rod contained in Clement’s first letter to the Corinthians (ep. 43) is quite in haggadic-midrashic style, and must probably be ascribed to Jewish or, more strictly speaking, Jewish-Hellenistic sources. According to that account, Moses placed upon each of the twelve staffs the corresponding seal of the head of a tribe. The doors of the sanctuary were similarly sealed, to prevent any one from having access to the rods at night. This legend of the rod as given by the Syrian Solomon in his “Book of the Bee” (“Anecdota Oxoniensia, Semitic Series,” vol. i. part ii.) has Christian characteristics. According to it the staff is a fragment of the Tree of Knowledge, and was successively in the possession of Shem, of the three Patriarchs, and of Judah, just as in the Jewish legend. From Judah it descended to Pharez, ancestor of David and of the Messiah. After Pharez’s death an angel carried it to the mountains of Moab and buried it there, where the pious Jethro found it. When Moses, at Jethro’s request, went in search of it, the rod was brought to him by an angel. With this staff Aaron and Moses performed all the miracles related in Scripture, noteworthy among which was the swallowing up of the wonder-working rods of the Egyptian Posdi. Joshua received it from Moses and made use of it in his wars (Josh. 8:18); and Joshua, in turn, delivered it to Phinehas, who buried it in Jerusalem. There it remained hidden until the birth of Jesus, when the place of its concealment was revealed to Joseph, who took it with him on the journey to Egypt. Judas Iscariot stole it from James, brother of Jesus, who had received it from Joseph. At Jesus’ crucifixion the Jews had no wood for the transverse beam of the cross, so Judas produced the staff for that purpose (“Book of the Bee,” Syr. ed., pp. 50–53; Eng. ed., pp. 50–52). This typological explanation of Moses’ rod as the cross is not a novel one. Origen on Exodus (chap. 7) says: “This rod of Moses, with which he subdued the Egyptians, is the symbol of the cross of Jesus, who conquered the world.” Christian legend has preserved the Jewish accounts of the rod of the Messiah and made concrete fact of the idea. Other Western legends concerning the connection of the cross and the rod may be found in Seymour, “The Cross,” 1898, p. 83.

Aaron’s Rod. (From the Sarajevo Haggadah.)

The rod is likewise glorified in Mohammedan legend, which, as is usually the case with the Biblical accounts of the Mohammedans, is plainly derived from Jewish sources. The following passage will serve as an illustration:

“Moses flung his staff upon the ground, and instantly it was changed into a serpent as huge as the largest camel. It glared at Pharaoh with fire-darting eyes, and lifted his throne to the celling. Opening its Jaws, it cried aloud, ‘If It pleased Allah, I could not only swallow up the throne with thee and all that are here present, but even thy palace and all that it contains, without any one perceiving the slightest change in me’ ” (G. Weil, “Biblische Legenden der Muselmänner,” p. 140, Frankfort-on-the-Main, 1845).
L. G.

Singer, I. (Ed.). (1901–1906). In The Jewish Encyclopedia: A Descriptive Record of the History, Religion, Literature, and Customs of the Jewish People from the Earliest Times to the Present Day, 12 Volumes. New York; London: Funk & Wagnalls.

Don Awalt

https://community.logos.com/discussion/comment/537682#Comment_537682

Thank you everyone for the text and also for the search tips!