The Brass Serpent

Illustration of The Brass Serpent
Bitten Israelites healed by a single look at a brass serpent on a pole - the miracle Jesus chose to explain his own cross.

When Israel spoke against God and against Moses on the wilderness road, the LORD sent fiery serpents among the people, and many died. The people confessed their sin and begged Moses to pray, and God's remedy was as strange as it was simple: 'Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live.' Moses made a serpent of brass, and whoever looked at it lived - healing by nothing but a look of faith at the very image of the curse. Centuries later Hezekiah destroyed the relic because Israel had begun burning incense to it; and Jesus himself made it the Bible's clearest picture of the cross: 'As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up: that whosoever believeth in him should not perish.'

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Details

Category
Healing
Testament
Old Testament
Performed by
God through Moses

Key Chapters

Numbers 21 The Bronze Serpent 6 min read John 3 Jesus and Nicodemus 5 min read

Key Passages

Look and Live

Numbers 21:6-9

A6nd the LORD sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people; and much people of Israel died.

7 Therefore the people came to Moses, and said, We have sinned, for we have spoken against the LORD, and against thee; pray unto the LORD, that he take away the serpents from us. And Moses prayed for the people. 8 And the LORD said unto Moses, Make thee a fiery serpent, and set it upon a pole: and it shall come to pass, that every one that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live. 9 And Moses made a serpent of brass, and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass, that if a serpent had bitten any man, when he beheld the serpent of brass, he lived.

Jesus Interprets the Serpent

John 3:14-15

A14nd as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up:

15 That whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have eternal life.

Explore Related

Characters

Moses Moses was a prophet chosen by God to lead the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt during the Exodus. Throughโ€ฆ Hezekiah Hezekiah served as a righteous king of Judah in the late eighth century BC, following the Assyrian conquestโ€ฆ Jesus Jesus is portrayed in the Bible as the Son of God and the long-awaited Messiah whose coming fulfilled Oldโ€ฆ Nicodemus Nicodemus was a Pharisee and member of the Sanhedrin, the Jewish ruling council, who sought out Jesus atโ€ฆ

Themes

Faith Without faith it is impossible to please God. From Abraham leaving everything for an unknown land to aโ€ฆ Mercy Mercy in the Bible is not weakness - it is the deliberate choice of the all-powerful to spare the guilty.โ€ฆ Hope Hope in the Bible is not wishful thinking - it is confident expectation anchored in the character of God.โ€ฆ

Did You Know?

1

The brass serpent survived over 700 years until King Hezekiah smashed it - the people had named it Nehushtan and were burning incense to the relic of their own healing.

2

Jesus cited this miracle to Nicodemus in the conversation that produced John 3:16 - 'as Moses lifted up the serpent' is the verse immediately before the Bible's most famous sentence.

3

The healing required looking at an image of the very thing killing them - the cure shaped like the curse, exactly how Paul later describes Christ 'made sin for us.'