Miriam
The sister of Aaron and Moses, called a prophetess. She led the women’s song after the crossing of the sea, was struck with leprosy for speaking against Moses, and died at Kadesh.
Miriam is listed with Aaron and Moses as a child of Amram and Jochebed (Numbers 26:59). The sister who watches over the infant Moses among the reeds is not named (Exodus 2:4). After the crossing of the sea “Miriam the prophetess, the sister of Aaron” took a tambourine and led the women in song and dance (Exodus 15:20–21).
In the wilderness she and Aaron spoke against Moses and claimed that God had spoken through them too. She was struck with leprosy, Moses prayed for her, and she was kept outside the camp for seven days while the people waited (Numbers 12:1–15). She died and was buried at Kadesh (Numbers 20:1). The prophet Micah names her beside her brothers as one of the three whom God sent to lead Israel out of Egypt (Micah 6:4).
In the timeline
- c. 1446 or c. 1260 BC, traditional dateThe Exodus from Egypt
Exodus tells how, after a series of plagues and the first Passover, Israel leaves Egypt under Moses and crosses the sea, in which Pharaoh’s pursuing army is drowned. The rest of the Bible looks back to this event constantly.
- c. 1445–1406 or c. 1259–1220 BC, traditional dateForty Years in the Wilderness
At Kadesh-barnea the Israelites refuse to enter Canaan after their scouts report on it, and are sentenced to wander until that generation has died. Forty years after leaving Egypt their children camp opposite Jericho.