“Numbers 12:3: “And the man Moses was very humble above all the men which were upon the face of the earth.”
When I was a student at Moody Bible Institute, my roommate and I had a friend, named Kanechi, who attended the Illinois Institute of Technology. He would often come to Moody to visit us. He was from Tokyo, Japan. He was just a short 5’0” skinny little man. He bore all the demeanor of the oriental culture, very mild, meek and humble. He was also an expert in the martial arts, Olympic class. He told how, one evening, he was waiting for a subway train when four big, honking guys walk up to him, kick the book he was reading out of his hands and said; “Ok little man, give us your wallet.” Kanechi jumped up and said: “I no give wallet, I fight!” We said: “Kanechi, there were four of them, could you handle it?” Kanechi replied: “Ah, vary easy, I break ones arm, throw another on track, all others run way.”
I suppose when we think of humility, someone like Kanechi would come to mind. Kanechi was someone with a lot of power and might, but he did not go around showing it off, except when necessary. Is that what Numbers means when it tells us that Moses was humble? He was someone who had the power and might of God Himself, but never went around showing it off.
No doubt it was that, but if you look further you will find it was much more. It is very important to understand that “much more” because we learn that it was humility that allowed God to work through Moses.
First note that the Bible does not say Moses but The man Moses. The word man here is ‘ish which is both a spiritual man and physical man. He was humble both spiritually and physically. It is highly possible he did not look like Charleston Hesston. But let’s look further and examine this word humble. It is used two times consecutively in this passage: ‘anav ‘anuv. The first time it is an adjective and the second it is a noun. Moses was a humbled humble. It also has the word mo’d which intensifies it . He was the very humbled humble.
We need to remember that God spoke this to Aaron and Miriam who were trying to steal the spotlight from Moses. God is trying to get a point across. This particular formation of these words is unusual and suggest something more than we see on the surface. The root word for humble is anah which means to be humble, submissive, but it can also be used to express a response or give an answer. It would appear the double use of the anah was a slight play on words. You see Aaron and Miriam were saying in verse 2: “Has the Lord spoken only to Moses? Has he not spoken to us also?” They had a point. God did indeed speak to Aaron and Miriam, so what made Moses so special? God said in verse 6-8 that when He makes Himself known to his prophets He does it through dreams and visions but with Moses he speaks mouth to mouth. Visions and dreams are pretty one sided. Mouth to mouth is a conversation.
Let’s go a little deeper with the word anah. It is spelled Ayin, Nun Hei. The Ayin represents spiritual insight and discernment. The Nun represents faith and the Hei represents the presence and power of God. This pictures a heart joined with the heart of God and then being surrounded by His presence. Humility is having the spiritual discernment that comes from joining your heart with God so you can use your faith to release the power of God. How did Moses get this discernment. He answered God, conversed with God, he just did not speak to him or listen. But it goes deeper than that and this is what the difference between him, Aaron and Miriam was. Verse 8 tells us God spoke to Moses mouth to mouth or pe ‘al” pei. The word spoke is davar. The word is spelled Daleth Beth and Resh which represents a doorway to the heart of God. This mouth to mouth was literally mouth to mouth, heart to heart or what we would call a kiss. Moses allowed God to kiss him into submission. I know that sounds a little creepy, but I can’t come up with a better illustration. Aaron and Miriam only allowed God to speak to them but they did not melt in His arms.
You’ve seen the movies where the hero and the heroine are having it out, the woman is angry, shouting, and argumentative and the hero takes her in his arms and gives her a big kiss and she is ready to follow him to whatever adventure awaits. In a way that is God’s relationship with Moses which was one of intimacy and love where that of Aaron’s and Miriam’s was basically a business relationship.
In its Semitic root the word humility or anah is indeed one which expresses submission. In this case a submission to God. But it is a submission that comes not from threats but from a kiss, a submission to God’s heart. You could say it is melting in His embrace. Remember when you were in love and your beloved said: “I love you.” You just fell into nothingness. It is something like that. The ancient Jewish sages in fact talk of the kiss of God where one enters into such deep intimacy with God, that they lose all sense of their surroundings and awareness of what is going on around them. They call this a state of Devekut. (insert commercial here) I have a whole chapter on Devekut in my new book Hebrew Word Study Revealing the Heart of God which will be released next month, so I will not talk about it here, you will have to purchase my book (end commercial here).
Maybe it sounds creepy to us in our Western Culture but I believe all this humility talk about Moses isn’t that he was “Aw shucks it ain’t nutin’”. I believe it was a deep intimacy with God, a kiss of God, an embrace. It was a love relationship and not a business relationship.
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