Quail From the Lord

⁴ The rabble with them began to crave other food,^(A) and again the Israelites started wailing^(B) and said, “If only we had meat to eat! ⁵ We remember the fish we ate in Egypt at no cost—also the cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions and garlic.^{(C) 6} But now we have lost our appetite; we never see anything but this manna!^(D)”

¹⁸ “Tell the people: ‘Consecrate yourselves^(A) in preparation for tomorrow, when you will eat meat. The Lord heard you when you wailed,^(B) “If only we had meat to eat! We were better off in Egypt!”^(C) Now the Lord will give you meat,^(D) and you will eat it. ¹⁹ You will not eat it for just one day, or two days, or five, ten or twenty days, ²⁰ but for a whole month—until it comes out of your nostrils and you loathe it^(E)—because you have rejected the Lord,^(F) who is among you, and have wailed before him, saying, “Why did we ever leave Egypt?”’”^(G)

³¹ Now a wind went out from the Lord and drove quail^(A) in from the sea. It scattered them up to two cubits^[a] deep all around the camp, as far as a day’s walk in any direction. ³² All that day and night and all the next day the people went out and gathered quail. No one gathered less than ten homers.^[b] Then they spread them out all around the camp. ³³ But while the meat was still between their teeth^(B) and before it could be consumed, the anger^(C) of the Lord burned against the people, and he struck them with a severe plague.^{(D) 34} Therefore the place was named Kibroth Hattaavah,^[c](E) because there they buried the people who had craved other food.

³⁵ From Kibroth Hattaavah the people traveled to Hazeroth^(F) and stayed there.