A reading from the book of Numbers.

The children of Israel lamented,

would that we had bread for food.

We remember the fish we used to eat without cost in Egypt,

and the cucumbers, and the melons, and the

leeks, the onions, and the garlic? Now, but now we are famished. We have nothing before us but this

manna. Now, manna was like a corner seed and had the color of resin. When they had gone about and gathered it up,

the people would grind it between millstones or pound it in a mortar,

then cook it in a pot and make it into loaves,

which tasted like cakes made with oil.

At night, when the dew fell upon the camp, the manna also fell.

When Moses heard the people, family after family, crying at the entrance of their tents,

so that the Lord became very angry, and he was grieved.

Why do you treat your servants so badly, Moses asked the Lord?

Why are you so displeased with me that you burdened me with all this people?

Was it I who conceived all this people, or was that I who gave them birth, that you tell me to carry them at my bosom like a foster father carrying an infant to the land you have promised

under oath to their fathers? Where can I get meat to give to all these people? For they are crying out to me,

give us meat for our food. I cannot carry all these people by myself. They are too heavy for me.

If this is the way you want to deal with me, then please

do me the favor of killing me at once so that I need no longer face this distress. The word of the

Lord. Sing with joy to God our help. Sing to with God sing with joy sorry my people heard not my voice

and Israel obeyed me not so I gave them to the hardness of their hearts they walked according to their own

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