Water From the Rock

17 All the congregation of the children of Israel journeyed from the Wilderness of Sin, from place to place, according to the commandment of the Lord, and pitched in Rephidim, but there was no water for the people to drink. ² Therefore the people contended with Moses and said, “Give us water so that we may drink.”

And Moses said to them, “Why do you contend with me? Why do you test the Lord?”

³ But the people thirsted there for water, and the people murmured against Moses, and said, “Why is it that you have brought us up out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and our livestock with thirst?”

⁴ Then Moses cried out to the Lord, saying, “What shall I do to this people? They are almost ready to stone me.”

⁵ The Lord said to Moses, “Pass over before the people, and take with you some of the elders of Israel. And take in your hand your rod with which you struck the Nile, and go. ⁶ Indeed, I will stand before you there on the rock in Horeb, and you shall strike the rock, and there water shall come out of it, so that the people may drink.” Then Moses did so in the sight of the elders of Israel. ⁷ He called the name of the place Massah, and Meribah, because of the contending of the children of Israel, and because they tested the Lord, saying, “Is the Lord among us, or not?”