Moses' brother Aaron and sister Mariam are critical of his marriage to an Ethopian woman, which angers Yahweh. God punishes Mariam for seven days with leprosy and she is expelled from the camp. There is no punishment for Aaron.
Upon Marriam's return, the tribe moves to the wilderness of Paran. Supposedly, the cloud must have lifted for them to know to do so.
Moses is described in the King James version as "the most meek of all the men on the face of the earth." As we move through Numbers, we'll discover that this is an interesting observation.
Why wasn't Aaron punished for criticizing Moses? After all, he's the one who seems to break Yahweh's laws the most, starting with the golden calf worship when Moses was off getting the ten commandments. Or does this, once again, illustrate God's disfavor of women?
As Skeptics Annotated points out, previous verses in Exodus and Deuteronomy forbade intermarriage with non-Israelite women, which might be why Aaron and Miriam were critical of the marriage. The law apparently applied to everyone but Moses; however, Moses was married before embarking on his journey to free the Israelite slaves from the Egyptians so perhaps his marriage was grandfathered in.
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